Chapter 72: The Greatest Duel Committee Member
"He won! He actually won!"
The upset punch heard round the venue. The moment Eve's fist connected, the crowd at Academy City's central stage erupted.
Most of the cheering was coming from Synchro Academy students, naturally.
First-year joint duels were usually treated as the appetizer—the warm-up act before the upper years brought out the real spectacle. But as the very first joint duel of the new semester, there was still something that mattered about winning it. An opening statement. A declaration of intent.
And the team that had been the underdog for years was the one walking away with the win.
It didn't matter that Amano's victory had nothing to do with Synchro Summoning. Nobody cared about the fine print.
For the first time, the cheers for Amano Rei weren't just coming from Class 1-E.
"That was incredible, Amano-kun!"
"He beat Kaiba Chiha from Xyz Academy at the entrance exam—"
"And now he just took the first joint duel of the semester, beating both Xyz and Fusion!"
"Duel Committee Rep, you're a LEGEND!!"
The loudest voices still belonged to Class 1-E, obviously. But for the first time, they weren't alone.
The class lifted Amano off his feet like a returning hero, carrying him down from the stage in a wave of noise and genuine celebration. This was the kind of Duel Committee Rep people wrote about. The kind who slipped you answers during exams, covered for you when you wanted to skip the morning lap drills, and then went out and won glory for the whole class on top of it.
The Class 1-E sentiment was unanimous.
Undying loyalty. Full commitment. No questions asked.
Even Nanki'in Sakuya—who had exactly one expression on her face at any given time and it was not "enthusiastic"—had joined the crowd tossing him into the air.
[Nanki'in Sakuya] [Affection +2] [Affection: 69]
In the dean's office, Kondo Tsuyoshi watched the broadcast feed and gave a slow, satisfied nod.
"I knew I wasn't wrong about you, Amano."
The final tally of ranking points from the joint duel battle royale would have to wait until everyone got back to the academy—there were still four more year groups to duel, and both individual performance and the academy's overall standings factored into the final score.
Whether Amano's first match had set a tone or just rattled a few cages became obvious pretty quickly. In the second-year joint duel, Xyz Academy came out visibly cautious, unwilling to commit to the same easy two-on-one dynamic they'd relied on before. The coordination they usually took for granted wasn't there.
Yanagiji from Synchro Academy's second year spotted the opening.
Word was he'd come into some money recently and quietly upgraded his deck by a full tier—enough to earn his spot as the second-year representative. He didn't win the whole thing, but he made the most of the disrupted field, slicing his way through with Six Samurai — Shinai and Sometaro before going down, and took the Xyz Academy duelist out with him on the way. Second place.
After two rounds: Synchro and Fusion had each won once. Xyz had finished last twice in a row.
The Xyz students in the crowd were now openly wondering whether the other two academies had made some kind of pact.
"A bunch of scrubs! Only weaklings need to gang up!"
Amano felt the familiar prickling sensation at the back of his skull—the one that usually came with an affection score going in the wrong direction.
Kaiba Chiha. Third-year representative. Xyz Academy.
The crowd's reaction said everything. No one had expected her to show up this early. Each student only got one shot per semester to represent their academy in the joint duels, and someone of Chiha's caliber—a top-ten ranked duelist—would normally be held back for a more decisive moment. A trump card. A finishing move.
Then again, she'd taken a significant hit. The irregularities during Amano's entrance exam had tanked Kaiba Corporation's stock and shaved a chunk off her ranking in the process, dropping her out of the top fifty. She presumably wanted those points back—and she wanted to make a statement while doing it.
The Chiha who stepped onto that stage was nothing like the one who had cornered Amano on entrance exam day.
That Chiha hadn't unlocked Xyz Summoning yet. This one had.
Three Level 8 monsters. One Overlay. A single, clean Xyz Summon.
"Number 62: Galaxy-Eyes Prime Photon Dragon!"
The version she fielded wasn't some watered-down recreation, either. This was the anime original—full effect, unmodified. The Galaxy-Eyes that showed up on her field proceeded to tear through both the Fusion and Synchro representatives with a cascade of attack multiplications that pushed the overkill numbers past 6000 on both ends.
Amano ran the mental math.
Average monthly income in the mid-level district was about ten times the bottom. Roughly ten thousand Eva Points a month. Enough to live on, but not enough to be comfortable—the equivalent of scraping by at three hundred a month in the lower district and suddenly making three thousand. For a student with no income of their own, eating a 6000-point loss in a single duel was the kind of thing you'd feel for a while.
Galaxy-Eyes decks were money printers inside Eva's economy. Amano had suspected it from the moment he saw Chiha's setup. She just happened to be so wealthy that she never needed to exploit the advantage properly.
After three rounds: one win each for all three academies.
In the runner-up count, Synchro had one second place, Fusion had two, and Xyz had zero.
The gap was closing. Fusion was pulling ahead in the overall tally.
Especially with the fourth-year duel coming up—word in the stands was that Fusion Academy's representative was ranked eighteenth overall and ran an Ancient Gear deck.
Amano hadn't noticed himself getting caught up in the atmosphere until it was already happening. He told himself this was just about how his ranking points would be calculated at the end. But honestly? A tournament like this—the kind of thing he'd only ever seen in anime—was physically in front of him. Two lives as a card game fanatic and it still hit different in person.
His Eva terminal buzzed.
VSN notification. A message.
Who's messaging me right now?
He pulled it open.
The sender was Rin Seiya.
[If I win, will you grant me one request?]
Amano stared at the message.
Did she send this to the wrong person?
What did she mean, if she won?
He looked up—and the roar that shook the venue walls gave him his answer.
"Rin Seiya is dueling?! She came out in the very first joint duel of the semester?!"
"Best ticket I've ever bought in my life!"
"I got mine from a scalper at three hundred over face value and I don't even regret it!"
If it had been announced in advance that two of Academy City's most talked-about duelists would both be competing today, you could have tripled the ticket price and still sold out.
Rin Seiya. Fourth-year representative. Synchro Academy.
Under the stage lighting, her white hair looked like it was catching starlight. She drew stares without trying—an effortlessly striking presence in a setting built for spectacle.
But what Amano found himself actually watching wasn't her appearance. It was her deck.
"Gathered wishes will become newborn shining stars! Become the path illuminated by light!"
Amano went very still.
He knew those words.
"Synchro Summon! Soar! Stardust Dragon!!"
The stage erupted in star fragments. They drifted down through the arena light and caught in the white hair of the girl standing at the center of it all, glittering like a river of stars had been poured over the stage.
Stardust Dragon.
The protagonist card. The real one.
Amano's mind started running immediately. He had a full Dragon Extra Deck courtesy of the system. That technically meant Stardust Dragon was in there somewhere, didn't it? Two copies of the protagonist's ace monster existing simultaneously because a game system decided to hand one out as a reward—was that why Rin hadn't registered in the affection system? Because the prize was already accounted for?
He hadn't gotten far with that line of thinking when the crowd pulled him back.
"She disappeared!"
Under the full glare of the cyber spotlight, in front of everyone, Rin Seiya simply ceased to be visible.
Amano recognized the state instantly. Clear Mind. The mental condition required for Accel Synchro—a technique from the anime that was supposed to only be accessible during Turbo Duels at high speed. She was achieving it standing still on an open stage, and the visual effect was reproducing perfectly.
"The crystallized dreams gathered here will open the door to a new evolution! Become the path that shines with light!"
She reappeared at center stage—and when she did, it looked like she was standing on the surface of a meteor shower, stars breaking apart beneath her feet with every step.
"Accel Synchro! Come forth—Shooting Star Dragon!!"
***
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