After leaving the shopping district, Yusaku returned to Takeuchi Dojo and was now sitting on the sofa in the dojo master's office.
At this moment, Master Takeuchi was comforting the trainees who had been eliminated.
"Don't be so down. It's just one loss, isn't it? You can win it back next time." Master Takeuchi patted their shoulders. "Besides, it's not like no one from our dojo made it through. In the past, we usually had two or three people advance. This time it's just one fewer than usual."
After consoling the eliminated trainees, he turned to Ushio.
"You did well this time. You knocked out four people all by yourself, and one of them was from Aurora Dojo. You truly live up to your name as our dojo's big brother…"
The Challenge Tournament would begin tomorrow.
On their way back, Ushio had told him the information he'd gathered, and things didn't look good for their dojo.
This time, only Yusaku and Ushio had advanced from Takeuchi Dojo.
Of the remaining eighteen spots, Lion King Dojo had taken five, Aurora Dojo had taken four, and Red Sun Dojo had taken two.
The last seven entries had been taken one each by seven different small dojos.
After finishing his words of encouragement, Master Takeuchi patted Ushio's shoulder and asked him to take the others and leave.
Once everyone had gone, Master Takeuchi looked at Yusaku and smiled. "Not bad at all. You took down three people from Red Sun Dojo all by yourself."
"Only thanks to your guidance, Master," Yusaku replied.
Hearing that, Master Takeuchi couldn't help but laugh. "You're a polite one, I'll give you that. But I know full well your current level is not something I could have taught you up to."
He gave Yusaku a once-over from head to toe.
"You didn't need to take a test to join our dojo, and I've no idea when exactly you enrolled. That day in the square, when everyone was talking about Deck-building, I saw you zoning out, so I just told you to stand up and share your thoughts."
"I never imagined you'd be able to say that kind of theory."
He paused for a moment.
"From that moment on, I knew you were different. I could feel it—you're not like the other trainees in our dojo. But as for exactly what's different about you, I couldn't put it into words."
He shook his head with a smile.
"Lately, the conflict between the Upper City and the Satellite Zone has been getting worse. An old friend of mine thinks you might have been sent down from above, but I don't think so."
Master Takeuchi shook his head again and turned his back.
"You don't have that arrogant, domineering attitude those Duelists from the Upper City always have. The Upper City and the Satellite Zone are bound to go to war sooner or later. When that happens, I hope you'll stand on the Satellite Zone's side."
Hearing this, Yusaku frowned slightly in confusion.
"Master, what do you mean by saying the conflict between the Upper City and the Satellite Zone is getting worse?"
At his question, Master Takeuchi walked to the window, opened it, and looked up at the sky.
"Have you never wondered why there's no sun overhead, yet the sky is always bright?"
"Why is that?" Yusaku asked.
He honestly had no idea. In the first two closed betas, he'd always been in the Upper City. No one knew anything about the Satellite Zone back then.
"Because what's shining down on us is what the Upper City likes to call a 'lighthouse'—a sun that's really just a lamp they switch on and off on a schedule. That's also why you see the 'lights-out' phenomenon at fixed times."
"Lighthouse…?"
Master Takeuchi shook his head.
"Rather than a lighthouse, I prefer to call that thing what it really is—a surveillance device. It's the Upper City's eyes on us."
He glanced downward toward the floor.
"This place we live in is an old underground city. We're on the 27th level. There are still six levels below our feet. There used to be no such distinction as Satellite Zone and Upper City at all—everything was connected. But…"
He paused again and let out a sigh.
"After the first King of Games disappeared, the people living on the surface sealed off all the paths from the underground city leading up. The first underground layer was occupied, and anyone who wants to go up now has to challenge the arena on the next floor above. If you win ten Duels in a row, you can obtain Upper City citizenship. Ten wins in a row…"
"The ones arranged to fight in that arena are either professional Duelists or elite students from the Upper City's top Duel Academies. Ten wins in a row… easier said than done."
Master Takeuchi shook his head once more, then turned back to Yusaku.
"Alright. Enough about that. Come on, I kept you behind because there's something I want to give you. I was originally planning to wait until after the tournament was over, but whether I give it to you now or afterward doesn't really make a difference."
As he spoke, he walked over to the table, opened a cupboard, and took out a storage box. Inside, lying quietly, was a golden fragment.
Looking at the fragment in the box, Master Takeuchi's gaze grew distant and nostalgic. "This is our dojo's greatest treasure. This dojo isn't originally mine—it was left behind by the previous master. He made me promise that if I never met the right person, I shouldn't take this out. This fragment is related to the first King of Games."
At that, Yusaku looked down into the box. The moment he saw the fragment inside, he raised an eyebrow.
Wasn't this a piece of the Millennium Puzzle?
This game has Millennium Items too?
As Yusaku was thinking that, Master Takeuchi's voice reached him again.
"This fragment seems to be a piece of some Millennium Item. The Millennium Items are tied to the legendary Egyptian God Cards. They say that only those who possess the Items can control the power of the Gods."
He opened the card box, took out the fragment, and held it out toward Yusaku.
"The God Cards have been gone for a long time. Now, I'm entrusting this to you. I hope that one day, you'll be able to gather all the pieces. Besides this fragment, our dojo also has a trump-card Spell as our other treasure. You can use it for now."
A dojo treasure?
Hearing that, Yusaku looked at the card in the master's hand and froze for a moment.
So that's why he never saw it in the in-game shop—Super Polymerization was here.
In this game's design, there was only one copy of certain special cards.
For example: the God Cards, the Sacred Beasts, and Super Polymerization.
Never mind the God Cards—even the Sacred Beasts weren't in the system shop.
Now that he'd seen Super Polymerization with his own eyes, Yusaku could be sure that some of these cards did already exist in the world; they just hadn't surfaced yet.
And if you wanted to obtain them, it all came down to luck and collection efforts.
"…Giving me the dojo's treasure kind of feels like too much." Yusaku said that, but his hand was already sliding the fragment and the card straight into his pocket.
The moment his fingers brushed the fragment, the long-silent system voice rang out in his mind.
[Congratulations to the Host for obtaining a Millennium Puzzle fragment. Reward: Crystals x1000, Forbidden Card Shards x10.]
One thousand Crystals! Ten Forbidden Card Shards!!!
Hearing the system prompt, Yusaku couldn't help but be startled.
This morning, he'd spent 3300 Crystals and hadn't drawn a single Forbidden Card Shard. But just for one Millennium Item fragment, the system was handing him ten shards at once.
You needed 20 Forbidden Card Shards to exchange for a Tearlaments card. At this rate, he'd already gotten half a card's worth in one go.
"Too much for you?" Master Takeuchi glanced at him and scolded with a smile. "Then maybe don't be so quick to stash them away next time?"
"You don't think I'm just giving them to you for free, do you?"
He clicked his tongue.
"This is an investment I'm making in you. When the day comes that you've gathered all the Millennium Items and found the God Cards, I hope you'll stand on the Satellite Zone's side—or at least resolve the conflict between the two. And on top of that…"
He took a deep breath, his expression turning serious.
"In the ranking battles, our dojo has always been stuck at the very bottom. This time, I'm counting on you to win us a good placement!"
"No problem."
Yusaku put away his inner shock and nodded.
The whole point of entering the tournament was to take the championship. If he didn't win first place, what was even the point?
ps: This chapter gave a rough outline of the world setting. Also, a little spoiler about the plot plan for this book—I've already finished drafting the overall outline.
The story will follow the game's version updates. After this tournament, we'll enter the official 1.0 open-beta version, and that's when players will start descending into the world.
Version 1.0 will mainly focus on the conflict between the Upper City and the Satellite Zone, as well as everything related to the Egyptian God Cards.
Another little spoiler: Version 2.0's main battlefield will be the Upper City itself, and we'll see the Gods, Sacred Beasts, and Aesir Gods clashing in massive battles.
Version 3.0 will be all about dimensional invasions.
(End of Chapter)
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