In the evening, Hikaru returned to his dormitory, carefully examining the card in his hand.
Ancient Gear Golem and Ancient Gear Beast had completely fused into a single card—Ultimate Ancient Gear Golem!
[Ultimate Ancient Gear Golem] Level 10│Earth│Machine-Type
┗ Fusion Materials: 1 Ancient Gear Golem + any 2 Ancient Gear monsters
┗ Abilities:
–› Inherits the standard Ancient Gear effect: "Opponent cannot activate Spell or Trap cards when it attacks."
–› Retains Ancient Gear Golem's ability to deal piercing damage to Defense Position monsters.
–› Gains a unique effect: "If destroyed, Special Summon 1 Ancient Gear Golem from the Graveyard, ignoring its Summoning conditions."
As the ace card of Professor Crowler in the original series, its rarity far exceeded that of the regular one. After all, in the Yu-Gi-Oh! world, many duelists owned three copies of Ancient Gear Golem, but Ultimate Ancient Gear Golem had seemingly only ever been used by Professor Crowler.
Its raw power was naturally superior to that of the regular Ancient Gear Golem. And at any rate, any Ancient Gear deck aimed to fuse an Ultimate, Megaton Golem, or Chaos Giant as the final goal.
Ancient Gear Golem... was merely a material for these greater fusions.
But the real problem was…
"Where the hell is my Golem?!"
Hikaru ruffled his hair in frustration.
Obtaining a higher-level, rarer card was an absolute win in this world. Any duelist would take this deal in a heartbeat, with no losses involved.
Any Fusion Club member would be ecstatic to make such a trade, but for Hikaru, this was completely unacceptable…
He finally got his hands on an Ancient Gear Golem, intending to build new strategies around it with Fusion plays.
And now it got auto-fused?!
Without Ancient Gear Golem in his deck, how was he supposed to fuse Ultimate Golem now?!
'...Wait!'
A sudden realization struck him. He quickly grabbed his deck and flipped through it card by card. After a thorough check, the expression on his face became... truly spectacular.
'Damn.'
"I knew it! I've been drawing no monsters for the past few days, but today, I suddenly drew an Ancient Gear Beast... So it turns out..."
To increase his deck's consistency, Hikaru had included plenty of usable monster cards, including some HERO monsters to support Fusion Summoning.
But now that he carefully flipped through his deck—
Where were all the monsters?!
Everything had fused!
"No wonder all those Flame Swordsman-related Fusion cards showed up in my opening hand today…"
The low-level monsters had been Super Polymerized into Fusion Monsters! That's why the Salamandra cards increased in number, raising their draw rate!
It took Hikaru a moment to process this realization.
Not that he could have helped it—how was he supposed to know his deck would change on its own mid-duel?!
"I was wondering… I duel every day, and I can feel the power flowing into my body, yet I only ever got one Flame Swordsman… That's the issue!" Hikaru scratched his head.
It seemed Super Fusion didn't distinguish between 'useful' and 'needed' cards. It would gradually fuse his deck's cards into new Fusion Monsters over time.
"…No, maybe not." Hikaru pulled out Cannon Soldier and Giga-Tech Wolf from his deck.
"If that's the case, then Fusion Materials shouldn't be affected, right? The only reason Golem and Beast fused was probably because I didn't have Ultimate Golem in my Extra Deck, so they naturally merged into one?"
If that was the case, then this wasn't so bad after all.
A smile crept back onto his face.
Now that he understood the fusion printing logic of Super Fusion, he could start building his deck more efficiently.
One day, he'd create a smooth, powerful deck, instead of constantly drawing two or three completely unplayable cards at the start of every duel.
"What a shame... they took away that guy Ryu, and I might not get a chance to duel him again in the future. That's one less way for farming energy."
"Sigh, what a shame."
However, looking at the Fusion Club, there were still plenty of Blue Dorm students who weren't happy with him. There would be no shortage of people to farm energy from in the future.
Just as he was thinking about the fusion club—
At the top floor of the fusion club, inside the Dimensional Research Room, a violent burst of purple light flashed. Three students and two teachers, all dressed in purple uniforms, stood silently in front of a massive mechanical structure.
There was a giant purple ring, continuously rotating on the machine. At the center of the ring was a swirling mass of black and white, twisting chaotically like a void.
After a few moments, a man draped in a massive cloak stepped out from within.
"Professor!" Everyone welcomed him.
He was a stern-looking bald man. His uniform was more elaborate than the others, featuring a wide collar and heavy golden epaulets and medals. He didn't look like a professor—he looked more like a soldier!
He was the leader of the "Fusion Absolute Supremacy" faction within Duel Academy, a professor at the academy—Leo Akaba!
"Professor Akaba, how did the joint exploration with Kaiba Corporation go?" A Fusion Club teacher eagerly stepped forward to ask.
Leo Akaba shook his head.
"It was not the 'Underworld' that KaibaCorp's president was searching for, unfortunately, but we had some luck. It was a broken world with spirits."
Interdimensional travel was a large-scale and global initiative led by KaibaCorp, with participation from all over the world.
It was said that Seto Kaiba had been searching for an unnamed Pharaoh, hoping to finish a duel from many years ago. To that end, he had devoted all his energy to exploring parallel worlds and even space itself—so much so that he hadn't updated his deck in years.
Although Seto Kaiba was a peerless genius, unmatched in a million, capable of unraveling the mysteries of both machinery and parallel dimensions on his own, he was still just one person. Searching for the one and only "Underworld" across infinite dimensions was an overwhelming task.
To speed up the search, he even established dimensional gates within his company's departments and with various partners' facilities, all working together to explore different dimensions toward a united main goal.
Originally, each branch of Duel Academy had its own dimensional gate. At regular intervals, students would interact with these broken, minor dimensions, engaging with the spirits or duelists that resided there.
Of course, this was limited to small, broken dimensions. Larger dimensions, especially those inhabited by human civilizations, were beyond Duel Academy's authority to explore on their own.
Thanks to Leo Akaba, who, with his scientific expertise, improved the dimensional gate, earning Seto Kaiba's recognition and securing an exclusive dimensional gate for his department!
Because of this, the "Fusion Club" gradually rose to prominence, becoming a "new power" within Duel Academy.
This was also why the Fusion Club had so many Ancient Gear monster cards—they had obtained them from an old, decaying mechanical world!
"Has anything happened in the Fusion Club lately?"
"Yes, yes! Professor!" A teacher eagerly stepped forward. "Recently, a particularly outstanding talent has emerged—an absolute prodigy! His entire deck is fusion-based!"
In the grand scheme of things, in the Fusion Club, what was the ultimate symbol of loyalty?
The answer, of course, was a Fusion deck!
"All fusion?" Even Leo Akaba paused for a moment.
'What's this? Can a deck like this even win?'
The three student representatives, with the teachers, had different expressions: the Red Dorm student wore a smug smile, the Yellow Dorm student showed a proud look, and the Blue Dorm representative appeared downcast.
The two teachers excitedly told Leo Akaba the entire story, from the club entrance test to today's duel with Ryu. They were quite impressed with Akami Hikaru's understanding of fusion and his resonance with the monster cards.
They were just ordinary teachers at the academy, without any particular affiliations. Having an excellent student in their department would help improve their teacher ratings in the future, so they were naturally pleased.
"I see you discovered a new dimension, Professor Akaba. Should we call him?"
"No."
"Huh?" Everyone was stunned by Leo Akaba's words, waiting for his next words.
"Call that Ryu here."
"Professor, Professor Crowler has already disciplined him, there's no need for more punishment, right?" The Blue Dorm representative quickly spoke up.
Leo Akaba glanced at him, shook his head, and said, "What I mean is, bring him here, to this new broken dimension."
"Huh?!"
Not just the other students, the Blue Dorm representative, and teachers were also completely confused.
What does this mean?
Leo Akaba didn't explain anything further. With a flick of his cloak, he turned and walked away.
It's a simple matter.
The Fusion Club, as a "purple" department of the Duel Academy, even has its own dimensional gate. It has the opportunity to completely detach from the three dorms, so why has there always been discrimination based on color?
Why has Leo Akaba, as the head of the department, never interfered?
Because… it is… tacit approval!