"That should do it for now..." Akia said as she put her slightly changed deck back in her pocket deck holder. "It still feels somewhat incomplete. This deck cannot guarantee me a win. It just makes my chances a little bit better." Akia sighed and started walking around again, trying to find a possible next opponent.
While she looked around, she found a very noisy crowd of girls. Annoyed by the screams, but still curious, Akia made her way there only to find a familiar face. "It's that Seiji guy from Duelist Kingdom. Wait, why are there four people dueling?" Looking more closely, Akia noticed that Seiji was dueling alongside another guy, who looked almost identical to him. "Twins?"
They were both dueling against none other than Erika and Tori, the two girls who were all over Seiji back in Duelist Kingdom.
"You girls are done!" Seiji's partner said.
"Why are you doing this to us Seiji? We were close back in Duelist Kingdom!" Erika inquired, looking hurt.
"Close? I was only after your star chips. And you went ahead and gambled them all away! It's your fault I didn't make it to the finals. This time, though, I'll make it there with my brother Reiji," Seiji retorted.
"Are we really going to lose...?" Tori questioned.
Akia looked at the field. There was a Faith Bird(1500/1100) in defence mode on Tori's side of the field. There were also a few facedown cards there.
"We're not done yet! I sacrifice Tori's Faith Bird to summon one of my strongest monsters: Gigaplant(2400/1200)!" Erika exclaimed.
"That's a pretty rare card," a voice sounded from next to Akia.
Akia turned her head towards the person who said that. "Ah! Mai-san!"
Mai was standing right next to Akia. She had just gotten there to find out what the ruckus was all about when she spotted Akia.
"She definitely didn't use that card back when I duelled her back in Duelist Kingdom," Akia noted.
"You duelled her before?" Mai asked.
"Yeah, actually I ran into those two girls and one of the guys. Back then they were all over him. I wonder what happened," the red-eyed girl replied.
"Seems like he's blaming them for not getting into the finals."
"What? He was pretty compliant with their plan back then... Besides, he was tricking them."
"Ugh. I really hate that type of guy. And these girls were stupid enough to fall for it..."
Akia directed her attention back to the field. Erika and Tori now had Gigaplant on their side of the field, and Seiji and Reiji had four monsters on their side.
"It looks like those monsters aren't strong enough to stand against Erika's new monster," Akia observed.
"I'll attack your Brron, Mad King of Dark World(1800/400) with Gigaplant!" Erika played her move.
The attack succeeded and Seiji and Reiji's life points went down to 3200.
"This was the first time they receive damage this whole duel?" Akia remarked.
Looking at Tori and Erika's life points, it was a whole other story. They only had 400 life points left.
"Erika-chan! We might have a chance after all!" Tori exclaimed.
Looking at Erika more carefully, Akia saw that she was still not convinced that things would go smoothly from there. She also noticed her appearance for the first time. Back in Duelist Kingdom, she couldn't care less about her. Erika had long red hair that she kept in a ponytail. Her striking green eyes complemented her hair nicely.
"Looking at her more closely, she's actually quite the beauty," Akia casually commented.
"Huh? Don't tell me... you roll that way?" Mai chuckled.
"No, that's not it! It's just that I never really noticed her before. She was just another stepladder back in duelist kingdom for my ultimate goal of saving my grandpa. Come to think of it, Tori is also kind of cute with her short blue hair and brown eyes."
"You're such a weirdo, Akia-chan."
Redirecting their attention to the duel, it was now the boy team's turn. They were both smirking, which meant they had something up their sleeve.
"Hahaha! Well I guess you had a little hope of winning with your Gigaplant. Too bad I'm going to crush that hope into tiny pieces. I play the spell card Dark World Dealings!" Reiji exclaimed. According to the spell card's effect, every player had to draw a card then discard another. "Get a load of this! I discarded Kahkki, Guerilla of Dark World. According to its effect, when it's discarded to the graveyard, I get to destroy one monster on the field. You know what that means," Seiji's twin chuckled.
"No...!" Erika yelled out.
"That's right! Say goodbye to your Gigaplant!" Reiji let out a cocky laugh.
Just as Gigaplant got destroyed, a monster on Seiji and Reiji's side of the field appeared.
"What's that monster?" Tori asked.
"Oh, did you forget about me? I also had to discard one card from my hand. I chose to discard Lucent, Netherlord of Dark World. When it's discarded to the graveyard, I can special summon it to my side of the field," Seiji answered nonchalantly.
"Isn't it great when your partner actually has useful cards?" Reiji said as he looked at Tori.
"...Erika... If it wasn't for me you would've..." The blue-haired girl whimpered.
"Don't say that! You have great cards and great strategy! They're just... out of league..." It was a big hit to Erika's pride to admit this. Akia was feeling for her a bit.
"That's right! And now let's end it. I attack you directly with all my monsters!" Reiji exclaimed.
In flash, the duel was over with Reiji and Seiji standing as the victors.
"Serves you right. Justice is mine! Now give me your puzzle cards and get out of this tournament!" Seiji ridiculed his opponents.
Just as Erika and Tori were taking their puzzle cards out, Akia couldn't stand it anymore and stood in front of them, facing Seiji and Reiji.
"Akia...! What are you doing?!" Mai called out to her friend.
Seiji, realizing who she was took a step back and frowned. "You! You're the one who took my star chips back then!"
"Stop playing the victim, you coward!" Akia called him out.
Erika and Tori couldn't believe their eyes. The girl that they were blaming for all of this just a minute ago was standing up for them.
"What did you say?" Seiji grit his teeth.
Mai got out of the crowd as well and stood next to Akia. "You heard her. I wasn't there for the whole story, but from the gist of it, you played with these girls' hearts and decided to throw them away when they weren't useful to you anymore. That's a definite no no, right everyone?" Mai addressed the crowd who wholeheartedly supported her.
"You did win this duel fair and square, so I won't ask you to not take their puzzle cards. However, I want to challenge you to a duel for their puzzle cards. I'll also add in two of my puzzle cards. How about it?" Akia tried to strike a deal with him.
"Sorry, but I won't fall for your tricks anymore. Reiji and I only tag duel, so if you don't have a partner, then I have no business-" Seiji started saying.
"I'll be her partner," Mai interjected.
"Mai-san!" Akia smiled at her friend.
"That should do it, right? I'll throw in two of my puzzle cards as well," the blonde woman pitched in.
"Interesting... So we will each wage two puzzle cards and if we win this we'll get four each," Seiji pondered.
"Might as well. We can take a couple of women on. Sooner or later all the ladies fall to our feet," Reiji cackled.
Akia almost gagged at the comment. "Let's just get this over with..."
"Akia-san... You don't have to do this..." Erika told her.
"I don't have to, but I want to," the black-haired girl answered with a smile.
"We girls need to stand by each other." Mai added with a thumbs up.
Erika's eyes watered a bit and then she finally smiled and nodded quietly.
"Thank you so much. I would've never thought you'd be willing to do this for us," Tori expressed her gratitude.
"Don't sweat it. It'll be so satisfying when I wipe that smug grin off their faces," Akia chuckled.
Mai and Akia then went to take their positions and activated their duel disks.
"Ready or not..." Akia started.
"Duel!" They all shout as the duel began.