025 Handsome Protagonist vs. Malnourished

The next day.

“Have you found new prey?”

The man with a headscarf patterned after a national flag, exuding an air of freedom, and a short, scruffy blond beard was none other than Keith Howard—known as Bandit Keith, the former American Duel Monsters Champion and notorious tournament prize thief.

“Yes, we’ve found three!” Satake, dressed in purple, nodded in response to Keith’s question.

“But there’s a bit of a problem,” Takiguchi, a redhead with small glasses and one of Keith’s subordinates, added.

“Boss! I think we’d better not mess with them. I’ve got a bad feeling we’ll only end up losing if we go against them!” The gaunt, ghostly-looking Gozuka, whose appearance and build suggested malnutrition, wore a troubled expression as he tried to persuade his boss.

As Keith slowly raised an eyebrow in curiosity, Satake, the tallest and burliest of the three, explained:

“One of those three with the Duelist Gloves is a kid called Yugi Mutou—the one rumored to have defeated Seto Kaiba, who owns three Blue-Eyes White Dragons, and is almost guaranteed a spot in the castle for this Duelist Kingdom!”

“Yugi Mutou? Hmph! Never heard of him.” Keith’s face showed complete indifference. Cracking his knuckles with an air of total control, he declared, “Those four spots in the castle are already reserved for us!”

As the former American Duel Monsters Champion, how could he be threatened by some small “kingdom” island and its duelists? Even those assassins they encountered last night were easily dispatched with his deck (and were weaker than the guy Yugi dueled)!

“Uh…”

“Y-yeah!”

“That’s why we teamed up in the first place!”

“And we even ran into you, boss—the most famous duelist around!”

Though awkward inside, the three subordinates still flattered their leader on the surface. Keith certainly deserved their praise and had the strength to back it up; after all, he was the former U.S. Duel Monsters Champion.

“Exactly!” Keith basked in their praise without a hint of embarrassment, then spoke bluntly: “If not for me, you mediocre duelists wouldn’t have survived this long! Listen to my advice from Bandit Keith!”

He wore an expression that clearly said, “You’re all worthless; the only reason you’re still here is thanks to me! Aren’t you going to thank me?”

“You’re absolutely right!”

“With you, the number one bounty hunter in America, boss, those four spots in the kingdom are as good as ours!”

“So what if it’s Yugi Mutou? So what if he beat Seto Kaiba? When we run into him, you could take him out in a flash, boss!”

The three did their utmost to flatter him, and Keith enjoyed every minute of it.

“By the way, what about the other two?”

After relishing their praise, Keith asked about the other two pieces of prey besides this “Yugi.”

“Oh, those two look pretty weak,” Satake recalled, thinking back to their earlier surveillance of Yugi and his companions.

“One has golden hair like you, boss, with four stars on his glove. The other is a bit handsome, with wine-red hair and a fringe covering his left eyebrow—he has one more star on his glove than the blond one.”

“I see…” Rubbing his stubble between his thumb and forefinger, Keith considered his options, then stood up from the rock and issued a new order to his three subordinates:

“In that case, let’s start with those two weaklings. If possible, bring them all in at once!”

“No need to look for them!”

To their surprise, just as Keith had given his order, a strange male voice called out from the brush ahead.

“Who’s there?”

All four of them turned sharply toward the sound, eyes wary.

The bushes rustled, and soon a young man emerged—his wine-red bangs covered his left eyebrow. Facing the four, he smiled and said, “I think I just heard someone talking about me. Was it you?”

For reasons unknown, though the man was smiling, the atmosphere felt as if a grinning devil were whispering quietly in their ears.

Terror seized them.

…

…

Inside a cave, in an almost hidden, man-made graveyard.

Yugi and Gozuka, one of Keith’s subordinates, stood on the Duel Platform—Yugi at the red side, Gozuka at the blue.

“A graveyard field… Eighty percent ‘deathly aura,’ twenty percent ‘neutral ground.’ This is the perfect battlefield for your deck!” Yugi observed the field, crowded with tombstones, and congratulated his opponent, though it was he who had found this dueling stage and brought the four of them here.

“Hmph! You’ll regret provoking us!” Backed by his boss and two teammates, and with his deck strengthened by Keith’s prized cards, Gozuka felt confident. The battlefield was perfectly suited to his monsters. He was determined to make this challenger—and his attempts at intimidation—pay the price!

“Duel!”

Yugi: 2000 LP
Gozuka: 2000 LP

“I’ll go first!” For the first time in the tournament, Yugi had won the right to start.

“I set one monster in defense position. Turn end.” Though he had the first move, Yugi opened with a defensive play, just as he had in previous duels.

“My turn!” Drawing five cards, Gozuka’s eyes lit up when he saw two spell cards among them—cards with a green border.

‘As expected of me! I drew the boss’s reinforcement cards right away!’

He glanced back at Keith, who gave him a confident look. With that encouragement, Gozuka began his “invincible zombie combo!”

“I set one card, then activate the spell card—Card Destruction!”

Seeing the card, Yugi was briefly taken aback—he hadn’t expected to encounter Card Destruction in this kingdom’s high-stakes duels.

“According to Card Destruction’s effect, as long as both players have cards in hand, they must discard them all to the graveyard, then draw the same number of cards from their decks.”

Gozuka had five cards, set one and played Card Destruction, discarding three to draw three. Yugi had set a monster, so he discarded four and drew four.

‘Three monsters sent to the graveyard. If I can just draw the card the boss gave me, I can pull off the invincible zombie combo this turn!’

Gozuka looked at his three new cards.

“!”

Among them was a monster card with a pumpkin illustration. Gozuka was stunned.

Could it be… that I, Gozuka, am chosen by fate? How else could I get the boss’s reinforcement cards in my very first turn?

Recovering himself, Gozuka flashed a triumphant smile and revealed the card he’d set in advance:

“I activate the spell card, Call of the Haunted!”

On the field, three graves erupted. From the broken earth, three grotesque monsters crawled forth, each exuding the unmistakable aura of death.

“Thanks to Call of the Haunted, the three monsters sent to the graveyard by Card Destruction—Armored Zombie, Crawling Dragon, and Killer Clown—have all been revived! They’ve transformed from their original Warrior, Dragon, and Fiend types into true Zombies with undying power! Rise, my zombie army!!”