Chapter 173: Is It a Tradition to Have Your Childhood Love Demolished From Above?
Amano had already spotted the inconsistency.
The Nanki'in and Jinguuji marriage alliance tradition was genuinely news to him. But that was not really the problem. It was also information Sakuya had no real obligation to share with him, since under the circumstances, an alliance between two families that had both produced female heirs in the same generation would naturally be considered void.
What actually had a problem was the person who had been quietly steering the entire room's atmosphere since the moment she sat down.
Nanki'in Yukki, the most elegantly subtle instigator in the room.
"Masayo-nee-san, please don't misunderstand."
"Amano-sensei, please don't misunderstand."
Say that to someone, and you guarantee they start misunderstanding immediately. Saying "don't misunderstand" while providing the precise context needed to misunderstand was the signature move of a master at this kind of thing.
If Amano had taken Yukki's words at face value, lost his temper, and made things difficult for Sakuya, he would have done exactly what she wanted.
"No worries, Yukki. I completely did not misunderstand."
Amano smiled pleasantly back at her and opened the Quadratic Functions Problem Set on the table between them.
Two could play the game of apparent innocence. If she was going to act like the pure-hearted bystander, he would do the same right back.
"If nothing else needs to be addressed, shall we get started?"
Sakuya's expression when he said that, noticeably without any anger in it, flickered with a brief flash of something warm. Then, almost immediately after the warmth, a trace of something more complicated.
Only someone who had learned to read Sakuya's particular brand of composed expression would catch it. The class representative had first been relieved that he was not upset, and then had apparently followed that thought all the way to: does this mean he does not actually care about the marriage alliance thing, or that he simply does not care about me?
Women really were something else.
Playing completely indifferent had its own drawbacks as a strategy.
Yukki followed up with a smile: "Oh, Amano-sensei really did not misunderstand at all. How wonderful. Not caring about these things. Onee-sama, your future really will be very relaxed."
Amano could sense that Yukki was not operating from actual malice. This was probably just a habit she had developed over time. Regular family diagnostics indicated her memory had not yet returned, so this particular quality had to be natural to her personality rather than something she was consciously deploying.
Onikiri's daughter, right down to the subtle maneuvering being baked into daily conversation.
He uncapped his pen, circled a problem on the page with casual ease, and answered without looking up from the book.
"I never said I did not care at all. I just trust Sakuya. Now: since the goal is top ten in the class, you need to approach this with some confidence. Let's get through the math review for today, Sakuya."
The redirect was immediate. Sakuya practically snapped forward to lean over the table, giving the explanation her full attention.
The conclusion that came to Amano over the next two hours was a simple one: the kid was actually smart. She just never tried.
That particular observation had come up in his previous life during parent-teacher conferences more times than he could count. Applied to Sakuya, it fit exactly. She was not slow at all. She simply lived in an environment where studying had never been the relevant skill.
Yukki, by contrast, showed little engagement throughout the session, her attention frequently drifting.
Amano was not particularly concerned about that. Yukki being included was incidental: his actual task was getting the class rep into the top ten of her class on the monthly exam. How Yukki performed was a separate matter entirely.
"This is the first time I have genuinely felt like math is not that difficult." Sakuya looked at the formula she had just worked through on her own with quiet astonishment.
"That is enough for today's session." Amano started packing up.
Yukki, who had been quietly disengaged for most of the session, chose this exact moment to speak. "Are you not staying the night, Amano-sensei? It is already quite late."
Ten o'clock was not particularly late by any standard. It was approximately when the evening self-study period ended on a normal school night.
"I should not impose. My little sister is waiting for me."
"Amano-sensei has a little sister? I would love to meet her sometime. As fellow younger sisters, we would probably have quite a lot to talk about."
"Perhaps," Amano replied politely.
Whether Shio would enjoy conversation with Yukki was genuinely uncertain. Depending on whether Shio had a taste for carefully brewed social tea of this particular variety, they might get along exceptionally well.
Sakuya stood quickly. "I will walk you out."
Yukki fell in behind them as they walked toward the inner entrance.
When the door opened, they found Masayo still standing at the entrance to the inner garden. Judging from when Ryuuma had escorted her out, she had been waiting there for approximately two hours.
"Masayo-nee-san, you have not left yet?" Yukki said, sounding surprised.
"No." Masayo dipped her head toward Yukki, then shifted her focus entirely to Sakuya. "Sakuya. Can you give me one more chance?"
Sakuya had clearly not been expecting the directness of it and did not immediately respond.
"I genuinely like you. I have been watching you from afar since we were little. Even if we are both girls, that does not matter to me. I do not want to end the alliance."
Sakuya shook her head slowly. "The engagement matter was settled with the Jinguuji family three years ago, before Grandfather stepped down. Masayo, please stop this."
Three years ago, when Nanki'in Muramasa had still held the family head position, the situation had already been addressed with the Jinguuji family. The Nanki'in family's sole heir was Sakuya, and whether considered from Sakuya's personal wishes or from the practical matter of the family's continuation, cancellation of this generation's alliance had been determined. Both families had reached a quiet mutual understanding, and Sakuya had accepted it.
Across everyone connected to this situation, the only person who had not accepted it was Masayo.
Falling for someone you should not have fallen for: there was no right or wrong in that.
Even with the alliance's cancellation as a settled matter, Masayo kept coming. She brought small gifts. She purchased Duel Disk cosmetics for Sakuya. She taught Sakuya about Synchro dueling. As a friend, there was genuinely nothing to criticize about her devotion.
That had been her plan: even if Sakuya only treated her as a friend, letting feelings develop gradually at least meant there would be a chance.
Then Amano had appeared and dismantled everything with a force that made no sense to her. Not just with Sakuya personally: even Ryuuma, who had never shown warmth toward Masayo, apparently looked at Amano with open admiration. She had heard rumors that Muramasa the elder had given over the Millennium Scale as something close to an engagement token.
How had this person managed all of that?
No matter how Masayo thought it through, she could not work it out.
Childhood loves really did get demolished by people who arrived without warning.
But she was not ready to stop.
Even if it meant holding on with every last thread of persistence she had, asking Sakuya to give her one more chance: she would make this final attempt.
"Please, Sakuya. One more chance. I will prove that I am better than him."
"This is not about who is better than whom, Masayo. I have never had those kinds of feelings toward you. Please let it go."
Sakuya's emotional expression was usually invisible to most people. But the honest truth was that the way Masayo looked at her, with that particular quality of longing, made Sakuya genuinely uncomfortable. She always had the sensation that Masayo was looking for an opportunity to sleep with her. The fact that Masayo had, in point of fact, asked to sleep with Sakuya an uncountable number of times since childhood, and had been declined every single time, had not appeared to diminish Masayo's optimism on this front.
"I am not giving up." Masayo's eyes moved to Amano. "Amano Rei. I will prove that I am better than you. Contract Duel."
"A Contract Duel?"
"If you lose, I take over the tutoring for Sakuya from now on."
You are staking everything on a Contract Duel, and the best you can come up with is tutoring access? That is remarkably limited for someone who came in this committed.
Amano had assumed the minimum bet would be something like permanent distance from Sakuya. The tutoring angle at least made strategic sense: proving superiority to Sakuya without triggering the social consequences that a more aggressive stake would produce.
"And if I win?"
Masayo opened the chest pocket of her school jacket and produced a carefully packaged cloth drawstring bag.
"This contains the baby tooth Sakuya shed during her very first round of milk teeth. It is one of my most treasured possessions. I will stake this."
A beat of silence.
Then Amano's back went very cold.
This person was genuinely unwell.
He had zero interest in the item being described. Less than zero.
Across from him, Sakuya looked as though her understanding of reality had taken a significant structural hit.
"Ryuuma. Take it."
"Yes, young mistress!"
Ryuuma moved with speed that spoke to extensive training, extracted the cloth bag from Masayo's hand, and prepared to dispose of it.
"Per tradition," Ryuuma announced crisply, "the lower teeth of a child's first milk teeth should be thrown upward toward the eaves, to encourage the new tooth to grow straight and strong."
He threw the cloth bag cleanly onto the top of the inner residence rooftop.
Masayo watched her treasure vanish with the expression of someone discovering their losses had been finalized.
"A more conventional stake, if you would, Jinguuji-senpai."
At this point, Amano could not very well refuse the duel outright. And despite his issues with the proposed stakes, he was genuinely curious about her abilities.
Jinguuji Masayo: third year, fifth-ranked at Synchro Academy. But Synchro Academy held five of the top ten ranked slots in the full Academy City competitive ladder. Her position translated directly to ninth overall. In next week's academy challenge tournament, she would be among the most dangerous offensive players fielded by Synchro Academy. By the raw ranking numbers, neither Fusion Academy's nor Xyz Academy's bronze seat defender could stop her.
This time Masayo reached into her card box and pulled out a single card.
"I will stake this Ghost Ogre and Snow Rabbit."
Amano stared at it.
She also had one? And the one currently listed on the Eva Network auction at 460,000 Eva Points: was she the seller?
Yukki immediately registered her objection. "Masayo-nee-san, that is the card I gave you a few days ago! You are staking it as a bet right in front of me, the person who gave it to you. Do you know how that makes me feel?"
"Do not worry, Yukki. I will not lose."
So this Ghost Ogre and Snow Rabbit was originally Yukki's.
She was in the middle of assembling her deck based on her newly-identified field. And she had given away a hand trap this useful as a casual gift?
Amano offered a gentle suggestion: "Yukki. Ghost Ogre and Snow Rabbit is a card you should hold onto for yourself."
Yukki blinked at him.
"But Amano-sensei, I have quite a few Ghost Ogre and Snow Rabbit."
She opened her own card box and produced five copies, setting them on the surface in a neat row.
"I had so many I could not fit them all in my deck, so I put one up for auction."
She was the auction seller.
A hand trap and Tuner in one card, and this girl was wholesaling them. She was going to single-handedly collapse the Eden card market for this archetype.
Amano's curiosity about Yukki's revealed deck field had reached a new intensity.
In Eden, one's deck field was personal and private information. Asking directly would be inappropriate.
"I accept the terms."
If winning this duel was a faster path to the Ghost Ogre and Snow Rabbit than working for the tutoring fee, then it was the more efficient route. He would have to thank Yukki at some point. A card that worked as both a hand trap and a Tuner was something no deck could have too many of.
They relocated to a wide open section of the estate's courtyard. A yakuza family's residence, and even the garden was spacious enough for a full duel projection.
Observers assembled: Ryuuma at the front, visibly the most animated he had been all evening. 'I get to see Amano-aniki duel again!'
Yukki beside him with bright curiosity 'I have been told Amano-sensei duels in a way that is very impressive'
Sakuya was simply pleased that the person who had been heading for the dormitory would now be staying a little longer.
In the shadow at the edge of the courtyard, Masayo stood alone.
"Nobody is cheering for me..."
Still. If she gave up on the duel, she would have no chance at all. The deck she carried was more than just her deck: it was the Mayakashi archetype, bound by history and fate to the Shiranui lineage that had been the Nanki'in family's heritage for generations. That bond was the foundation of her conviction that she and Sakuya were destined.
"Begin, Amano Rei!"
"Please take care of me, Jinguuji-senpai."
[Eva: Duel Approved]
[Duelist: Amano Rei]
[Duelist: Jinguuji Masayo]
[Data network active. Field generated.]
[Duel Type: Contract Duel]
[Proud duelists, let the outcome of this battle be the scale that measures the weight of your souls!]
[Duel!!]
Amano's Duel Disk lit first, reflecting off the dark garden stones.
Before his first draw, he confirmed his skill selection.
From Nanki'in Sakuya's 80-point affection: the skill "Inheritor of the Shiranui Style."
Effect: The full Zombie Synchro Extra Deck is unlocked. At the start of a duel, you may add any number of Shiranui Spiritblade (up to 3) to your Main Deck.
If this duel was meant to make Masayo accept that the road toward Sakuya was closed, then this was exactly the right card to use.
Three copies of Shiranui Spiritblade loaded.
"Show a Synchro Academy senior what you are made of, kohai!. Let me see your Synchro soul!"
"My turn! Draw!"
Amano pulled his card and immediately inserted a Spell Card into the Duel Disk.
"Spell Card: Fusion Deployment!"
[Fusion Deployment: Reveal 1 Fusion Monster in your Extra Deck. Special Summon 1 of its listed Fusion Materials from your hand or Deck.]
"I reveal Blue-Eyes Twin Burst Dragon from my Extra Deck! Its Fusion Materials include Blue-Eyes White Dragon, so I Special Summon one from my Deck!"
Blue-Eyes Twin Burst Dragon's Fusion Materials required two Blue-Eyes White Dragon monsters. Revealing it produced the same result as revealing Blue-Eyes Ultimate Dragon.
Amano caught the ejected card from the Duel Disk in one motion and placed it on the field. The dragon's light cut through the darkness of the garden in a sharp white arc.
"If endless darkness surrounds us, let the darkness be painted white!
"Rise, Blue-Eyes White Dragon!"
Blue-Eyes White Dragon: ATK 3000
The dragon's roar rang out across the stone garden, and for one instant the Nanki'in estate's courtyard was flooded with light bright enough to erase the shadows entirely.
"Blue-Eyes White Dragon." Sakuya watched it with something she had not fully named, the way you look at a thing that shows up at exactly the moments it matters most. The first time she and Amano had ever faced each other, in the slums of District 32, he had hit her with Blue-Eyes White Dragon's attack and closed out the duel. She had walked away frustrated at the loss and nothing else. She had not come anywhere close to imagining that this particular person would eventually become this significant in her life.
"Opening with a 3000-ATK monster. Impressive, for a first-year." Masayo watched the dragon with careful eyes. "But this is absolutely not a Synchro play."
Fusion Deployment's side effect: the turn it was activated, Amano could only Special Summon Fusion Monsters from the Extra Deck.
He had no intention of Fusion Summoning.
Just as he had said before: Fusion Deployment pulling Blue-Eyes White Dragon from the deck with a single card was strong enough on its own without following through on a Fusion.
"I set one monster face-down and one card. Turn end."
"My turn! Draw!"
Facing the brilliance of Blue-Eyes White Dragon's presence, Masayo pulled her card.
"This card is proof of the bond between me and Sakuya, and everything I believe in."
She drove it onto the Duel Disk.
"Normal Summon: Hajun, the Winged Mayakashi!"
Hajun, the Winged Mayakashi
Level 1 / WIND
Zombie / Effect
ATK: 600 / DEF: 400
The apparition controlling the night wind materialized on Masayo's field.
"Hajun's effect activates upon Normal Summon! From the Deck, I Special Summon one Mayakashi monster! I Special Summon Dakki, the Graceful Mayakashi!"
Dakki, the Graceful Mayakashi
Level 2 / FIRE
Zombie / Tuner / Effect
ATK: 1000 / DEF: 0
Named for the legendary nine-tailed fox spirit of ancient myth, Dakki materialized as a Level 2 Tuner. In the very next instant, her image collapsed into two spinning Synchro Star rings and passed through Hajun's body.
"From here, the Night Parade begins! Watch closely, Amano Rei. This is how Synchro dueling is done!
"Twenty plus ten equals thirty!
"Burning ghost-fire war chariot, charge forward and open the path for the hundred demons!
"Synchro Summon! Level 3! Shafu, the Wheeled Mayakashi!"
Shafu, the Wheeled Mayakashi
Level 3 / FIRE
Zombie / Synchro / Effect
ATK: 800 / DEF: 2100
Yukki tilted her head. "Only a Level 3 Synchro? That cannot defeat Amano-sensei's Blue-Eyes White Dragon."
"The Night Parade of a Hundred Demons has only just begun! I activate Dakki, the Graceful Mayakashi's effect from the Graveyard!"
[When a Mayakashi monster is Special Summoned from the Extra Deck, this card in the GY can Special Summon itself.]
The graceful nine-tailed fox, just sent to the Graveyard as Synchro material, returned to Masayo's field without a moment's delay.
"I tune Level 3 Shafu, the Wheeled Mayakashi with Level 2 Tuner Dakki!
"Thirty plus twenty equals fifty!
"Night Parade of a Hundred Demons: blackened venomous poison!
"Synchro Summon! Level 5! Tsuchigumo, the Poisonous Mayakashi!"
Tsuchigumo, the Poisonous Mayakashi
Level 5 / EARTH
Zombie / Synchro / Effect
ATK: 2000 / DEF: 1800
"When a Mayakashi monster is Synchro Summoned, Dakki, the Graceful Mayakashi Special Summons itself from the Graveyard again!"
Dakki's revival had no once-per-turn restriction.
This was the Mayakashi archetype's core Synchro mechanism: an endless chain of ascending Levels, powered by Dakki returning to the field every single time.
Tsuchigumo and Dakki tuned together.
Fifty plus twenty equals seventy.
"Night Parade of a Hundred Demons: gale force that shakes the mountains!
"Synchro Summon! Level 7! Tengu, the Winged Mayakashi!"
Tengu, the Winged Mayakashi
Level 7 / WIND
Zombie / Synchro / Effect
ATK: 2600 / DEF: 1500
Dakki materialized again.
Seventy plus twenty equals ninety.
"Night Parade of a Hundred Demons: fox-fire glowing in the dark!
"Synchro Summon! Level 9! Yoko, the Graceful Mayakashi!"
Yoko, the Graceful Mayakashi
Level 9 / FIRE
Zombie / Synchro / Effect
ATK: 2900 / DEF: 2400
Yukki's voice rose: "2900 ATK! That is already close to Blue-Eyes White Dragon!"
Jinguuji Masayo's chain of Synchro Summons was, Amano had to admit, a genuinely striking sequence. In the night garden setting, with each legendary supernatural figure summoned in turn, each one inheriting the accumulated Level to immediately give way to the next stronger apparition, it had exactly the feeling of a real Night Parade of a Hundred Demons: the full procession of supernatural entities marching through the darkness in unending succession.
"Final tuning! Yoko and Dakki!
"Ninety plus twenty equals one hundred ten!
"Night Parade of a Hundred Demons! The ultimate Level! Come forth, supreme commander of the demon parade!
"Synchro Summon! Level 11! Gashadokuro, the Skeletal Mayakashi!!"
Gashadokuro, the Skeletal Mayakashi
Level 11 / DARK
Zombie / Synchro / Effect
ATK: 3300 / DEF: 2600
"And now the ATK exceeds Blue-Eyes White Dragon!"
The massive black skeleton, absorbing the accumulated Levels of every demon in the Night Parade, descended onto Jinguuji Masayo's field.
In that moment, the blue-haired girl standing with her Duel Disk extended at the center of the field, surrounded by the lingering spirit trails of every apparition in the chain, looked every part the commander the chant had described. Standing at the center of the hundred demons' procession, the one who led them all.
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