"Rumble!"
In the blink of an eye, ice spears covered most of the arena.
The dense barrage kept hammering down, and the field, already softened by melted ice-water, was pounded into a sieve!
Nearly everyone stared fixedly at the field, trying to spot the Magic Guide Spirits that had been blasted by the spears.
But Jeffrey, who was commanding [Liyuan Ice Sprite] through its [Ice Thorn Spear Array], suddenly lost the fervor he'd only just worked up. His face fell.
He could tell something was wrong, and without hesitation he began setting up a Tribute Summon again.
"Roar!"
Almost at the same moment, the Sin Blue-Eyes Baby Dragon burst out of the dense hail of ice spears.
[Ice Thorn Spear Array] covered a vast area, but each individual spear lacked the power to kill a six-star Magic Guide Spirit on the spot.
After shattering several spears, [Sin Blue-Eyes Baby Dragon] lunged ferociously at [Liyuan Ice Sprite], which was still spinning in midair.
Down on the ground.
Persian had used its Ultimate Move, [[Protect]], again just as the spears came down!
[[Protect]] lasted thirty seconds, completely blocked the opponent's attacks, and was unaffected by most Ultimate Moves.
Its cooldown wasn't long, but if it was used repeatedly within one hour, the success rate dropped to one third of the previous attempt each time.
This was Persian's second use of [[Protect]], and it got lucky, catching that one-in-three chance and spreading a thin wall of light overhead.
The wall protected the blue Magic Sphere and shielded Eevee-chan as well.
Hiding beneath Persian's cover, Eevee had curled up into a tight ball of fluff.
The ice spears shattered in midair, and frigid shards rained down across the ground.
…
The blue Magic Sphere's survival clearly surprised most of the crowd.
But even more eyes were drawn to [Sin Blue-Eyes Baby Dragon].
Having broken out of the spear array, it closed in on [Liyuan Ice Sprite]. Its dragon claw, power long since stored up, struck out viciously, and that single blow blasted half of the three-meter-wide ice sphere to pieces.
[Liyuan Ice Sprite] scrambled upward.
Without [Liyuan Tundra] to supply ice elements, [Liyuan Ice Sprite] had its [Heart of Ice Element] for nothing, with nothing left to draw from.
The half of its body that [Sin Blue-Eyes Baby Dragon] had crushed couldn't recover either.
And all of its Ultimate Moves had gone on cooldown.
In this situation, [Liyuan Ice Sprite] could only be offered up as a tribute.
In fact, that was exactly what Angus Jeffrey did.
The Tribute Summon he cast again treated [Liyuan Ice Sprite] as the tribute.
A four-star [Liyuan Ice Sprite] plus the three-star Magic Guide Spirit still hiding on the field, [Sode no Shirokuma], would summon a seven-star Magic Guide Spirit!
But just as Jeffrey's Tribute Summon reached its final moment and [Liyuan Ice Sprite] was about to turn to light, a flash of sword light streaked past, and the last half of [Liyuan Ice Sprite]'s body was blasted to pieces too!
This time there was no saving it. The ice-crystal dust splashing across the sky gradually turned into motes of magic power.
Angus Jeffrey's expression changed sharply.
…
"This is a duel."
Dark set down the Magic Guide Card for [Honedge] and spoke in a flat tone.
In a Magic Guide Duel where the situation shifted by the second, anyone who chose to interrupt a Tribute Summon had to be ready for the second Tribute to be interrupted as well.
As Jeffrey's opponent, Dark was naturally never going to let him complete that second Tribute at his leisure.
And now that this Tribute Summon had been forcibly cut off,
Angus Jeffrey had only a single invisible [Sode no Shirokuma] left on the field.
But that [Sode no Shirokuma] seemed to be just that: a Magic Guide Spirit with little use beyond serving as a tribute.
Otherwise, when [Ice Thorn Spear Array] had been ravaging the whole field a moment ago, it should have come out and kicked them while they were down.
By contrast,
Dark already had four Magic Guide Spirits on the field!
Persian was in charge of protecting the Magic Sphere, and Eevee was in charge of…
While [Sin Blue-Eyes Baby Dragon] and [Honedge] could point straight at the red Magic Sphere!
…
[Battle Phase (4)] [30s]
…
The turn switched in an instant.
Dark ordered [Sin Blue-Eyes Baby Dragon] and [Honedge] to attack the red Magic Sphere.
Jeffrey, meanwhile, drew two new Magic Guide Cards from the top of his deck into his hand as fast as he could!
His earlier hand lacked any Magic Guide Cards for clearing the field, so he could only pin his last hope on these two new cards.
The moment the two new cards reached his hand, his grim expression changed in an instant, and his eyes lit up.
Three seconds.
He watched [Sin Blue-Eyes Baby Dragon] and [Honedge] fly at his Magic Sphere like lightning, and he still stubbornly chose to cast a Normal Summon!
[Sin Blue-Eyes Baby Dragon] had 3000 attack and [Honedge] had 2200, while the red Magic Sphere had 5666 magic power remaining.
He still had room to survive at least one more round of attacks!
And besides…
Just as the edge of [Honedge] was about to touch the red Magic Sphere, the sphere abruptly vanished without any warning.
And in the spot where it had been, a snow-white little bear suddenly appeared!
"Field Exchange?"
Dark's eyes went wide. He scanned the whole field but couldn't see the red Magic Sphere that [Sode no Shirokuma] had replaced.
"Could it be that it swapped not just positions but its own buff as well?"
Dark's mind raced, and he immediately landed on that possibility.
But that meant the red Magic Sphere was now in an "invisible" state, with no trace to follow at all.
"Bang!"
[Sode no Shirokuma] took another swipe from [Sin Blue-Eyes Baby Dragon], which followed right behind, and was blasted apart in midair!
Then Dark's Magic Guide Spirits immediately began searching for traces of the red Magic Sphere.
At the same time.
A huge summoning circle lit up again over the red summoning zone!
Angus Jeffrey had completed this Normal Summon.
A Magic Guide Spirit of only the first tier appeared within the circle.
"Don't celebrate too early!"
Jeffrey shouted, yanking one Magic Guide Card out of the hand he'd held back earlier, ready to begin summoning after the three-second cooldown.
With that newly summoned Magic Guide Spirit on the field, the card he'd held all along had finally found its use!
"A duel isn't over until the very end. You can't concede before then."
"Until the Life Barrier is completely shattered, anything is possible!"
…
Jeffrey's surging fighting spirit set the watching young nobles cheering.
But once they'd finished shouting, a faint sense of oddness crept over them.
In this duel between a fourth-year and a first-year, shouldn't it be the first-year saying those two lines?
…
In the private room, Charles had laced his fingers together and propped his hands under his nose, watching the duel with a deep gaze.
The duel was far fiercer than he'd expected, yet the Gatomon and Leomon he wanted to see hadn't appeared.
Fortunately [Honedge] had appeared first, and this [Holy Sword] still gave off a faint, tightly restrained holy aura.
And Angus Jeffrey was more tenacious than he'd imagined, actually managing to hold on!
"I hope he can hold out until the 'Hero' descends."
Without realizing it, Charles had gone from believing Jeffrey would win to hoping he would drag things out a little longer.
Not until Jeffrey's sudden burst of fighting spirit did his interest revive.
…
▼
[Granzort]
[Lust III - Moon] (Improved)
▲
The duel was not yet over.
Dark added the two new Magic Guide Cards to his hand and looked at the Magic Guide Spirit in the red summoning zone, a trace of gravity in his eyes.
The new Magic Guide Spirit Jeffrey had summoned belonged to a very famous type among the first-tier Magic Guide Spirits.
So he recognized it at once.
▼
[Card Name: Netherworld Ice Coffin]
[Type: Spirit Card]
[Level: ✪✪✪]
[Race: Undead Species]
[Attribute: Ghost-type/Ice-type]
[Magic Power: 2000]
[Attack: 0]
[Defense: 0]
[Ultimate Move: Road to the Netherworld, Coffin Dweller]
▲
The Magic Guide Spirit floating in the red summoning zone had a form like a miniature coffin. But it was made of ice, so the whole thing was crystal clear, like an ice sculpture, and exquisitely made.
[Netherworld Ice Coffin] was extremely fragile. It had no attack ability whatsoever, and no defense either.
But its magic power exceeded the top end of three-star, reaching 2000 points.
That figure wasn't much among high-star Magic Guide Spirits, but it signified a tendency.
As a Ghost-type + Ice-type Magic Guide Spirit, [Netherworld Ice Coffin] had a body made of "ice," and that cost it the special property of "ghosts" to ignore physical attacks.
It was so fragile it looked like a single punch could shatter it.
And in fact, that was true.
But legend said a "great terror" lodged inside an ice coffin!
The moment the coffin cracked, terror would descend.
The ghost that crawled out of the coffin would devour everything!
And [Netherworld Ice Coffin], as a Magic Guide Spirit, had been Forged in imitation of that legend.
The "great terror" lodged inside the coffin was… a Magic Guide Spirit recorded in it beforehand!
So the Magic Guide Card [Netherworld Ice Coffin] normally served as a "vessel."
Summoning it was equivalent to gaining a special route for summoning "the Magic Guide Spirit recorded within."
This was in fact akin to a "Ritual Summoning."
The Magic Guide Spirit recorded within also had conditions: first, it had to be Undead Species and Ghost-type; second, its star level had to be no lower than [Netherworld Ice Coffin]'s and no higher than twice that.
Jeffrey's [Netherworld Ice Coffin] was a three-star Magic Guide Spirit, so the Magic Guide Spirits it could record fell in the range of three to six stars.
Beyond that, there were still many extra restrictions that were hard to parse.
And the condition for the "Ritual Summoning" was "breaking out of the coffin"!
…
In other words, in theory, as long as [Netherworld Ice Coffin] wasn't smashed, "the Magic Guide Spirit recorded within" couldn't be Special Summoned.
Dark had thought the same at first, until a ten-second countdown appeared on Jeffrey's [Netherworld Ice Coffin]!
…
Dark had never heard of a [Netherworld Ice Coffin] that could open by itself, but Jeffrey's was clearly an unusual one.
Quite possibly, its coffin housed a "Coffin Dweller" of more than six stars!
…
"So this is the depth of a fourth-year?"
Dark casually activated [Lust III - Moon] (Improved), shoring up the weakest link in his current lineup.
Eevee-chan, curled into a ball, bathed in the radiance of Lust and evolved into [Umbreon] for the first time in a long while.
Pink ring-shaped markings appeared on its sleek, jet-black body.
The Moon Power rippling through its whole body was undiminished even in broad daylight.
"Umbreon, Dark Pulse!"
Before [Netherworld Ice Coffin] could break open, Umbreon let out a low growl. The malevolent aura released from within its body swelled slightly, then suddenly burst out!
The malice-filled aura turned into black light and radiated wildly in all directions like a tide!
Against an invisible opponent, besides "breaking the stealth," the most direct method was to blanket the area with a wide-range skill!
Umbreon deliberately lowered the damage of Dark Pulse and widened its coverage.
In an instant, the entire field was filled with black pulses.
The red Magic Sphere had nowhere to hide!
"Whoosh!"
Honedge reacted fastest.
With a sound like tearing wind, the long sword shot straight down from the sky and pierced the red Magic Sphere's Life Barrier in an instant.
[5666→2801]
After two rounds of strikes, the red Magic Sphere's Life Barrier had plummeted to 2801!
"Rise!"
Jeffrey slammed down the Magic Guide Card in his hand. The instant its face lit with strong light, he fired off magic power and steered the red Magic Sphere back to the red half of the field.
Dark's response had been faster than he'd expected, leaving him struggling to keep up.
But by now the countdown on [Netherworld Ice Coffin] had reached zero, and the Magic Guide Card he'd been pairing with it had been summoned successfully. The overall situation was settled!
Yet when he looked up at Dark, trying to read the change in his expression, he found Dark's gaze on him still full of mockery.
Jeffrey's heart sank in an instant.
Then a new Magic Guide Card flew out of his deck on its own, giving off a dim glow.
In the red summoning zone, [Netherworld Ice Coffin]'s [Road to the Netherworld] had reached its end. The ten-second countdown hit zero, and the coffin's lid was pushed open from within. A pale-skinned, humanoid Magic Guide Spirit, [Frost Lich], sat up straight inside the ice coffin.
The stately [Frost Lich] was tall and gracefully curved, its thin robe clinging to its skin, blue blood flowing beneath it, an ice crown on its head shimmering with light.
Its features were deep-set, its eyes long and narrow. Its face was gorgeous, yet carried a hint of cruelty.
As it stepped out of the ice coffin, a [Frost Scepter] fell from above like a meteor and abruptly stopped in midair before it.
It reached out and seized the [Frost Scepter], and at once icy-blue ripples spread out wildly!
The temperature plummeted.
…
…
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