Chapter 176: System Upgrade - Mind Reading? [2-in-1]
Staring at Masayo's affection score having jumped by twenty points in a single duel, Amano Rei turned a particular theory over in his mind.
It was possible, he thought, that the person this woman was actually drawn to was not Sakuya at all. It might be the Shiranui deck itself.
He did not know much about the lore connecting the card archetypes, but even from just reading the card text and looking at the artwork, the complicated relationship between Shiranui and Mayakashi was not difficult to pick up on. Two factions defined by opposing destinies, and yet marked by a mutual pull between them. The Shiranui warrior and Dakki, the Graceful Mayakashi, bound together by something that looked less like rivalry and more like a story that kept repeating across different card printings.
As the duelist who ran the Mayakashi deck, Masayo had spent years in close company with those cards. Her gene field had shaped itself around them. It was entirely plausible that the archetypes' inherited narrative had bled into her feelings, and that she had been pursuing the heir to the Shiranui lineage as a result of that influence rather than any genuine personal attachment.
Which would mean it had been a misunderstanding from the beginning.
Sakuya's true gene field was not Shiranui anyway. It was Sky Striker. The Shiranui cards came from family lineage, not from who she was as a duelist. Masayo might have spent years chasing entirely the wrong target because of a story written into her deck.
Getting your love life dictated by your card game was admittedly an unusual framework to apply to human relationships. But this was a world where everyone had a deck, and stranger things had already happened. Amano personally knew a white-haired senior at Synchro Academy who had become so identified with her card's anime character that she had decided he was her destined rival in some cosmic sense.
"Amano-aniki," Ryuuma said, his voice carrying genuine wonder, "you actually beat Jinguuji Masayo. With Shiranui Sunsaga."
The Nanki'in household staff, having witnessed the whole duel from start to finish, had apparently resolved any remaining doubts about Amano's worthiness to carry the Solitaire. The general mood among the assembled escorts had shifted entirely from protective suspicion to something closer to enthusiastic investment. A young duelist of that caliber inheriting the family headship? The estate's future was in good hands.
Several of them, Amano noticed from some of their glances toward Sakuya, also seemed to be quietly running calculations about timing and succession. Something about the particular warmth of their expressions suggested that the household had collectively decided that the sooner the young mistress and the presumptive new heir started working on the next generation of Nanki'in candidates, the better for everyone involved.
The stares were directed at him with an intensity that made his skin crawl.
Masayo retracted her Duel Disk. The holographic light and flame faded, and the night reclaimed the garden. The darkness helped cover the flush across her cheeks, though she could not have said with certainty whether that was the color of someone who had lost a duel or someone who had lost something else.
She was clear on one thing. She had made her bet and she had lost it.
"Per the contract," she said, holding out the card, "this belongs to you."
Ghost Ogre and Snow Rabbit passed from Masayo's hand to Amano's. As she handed it over she found she could not look at Yukki. Whatever version of herself the Nanki'in girl had just witnessed in this garden, she had a feeling she would be paying for it for a while.
Both of them probably hated her now.
She could not think of a worse outcome.
"That is not quite all, Jinguuji-senpai." Amano accepted the card, arranging his expression into something he privately considered his most harmless-looking smile. "We had a second wager as well, if you remember."
The additional verbal bet from the final turn. If Amano won on his last draw, Masayo would agree to one request. If she won, he would agree to one of hers.
"You have not forgotten, have you?"
The worse outcome had just gotten worse.
Masayo pressed her lips together. Inside, she was conducting a rapid and painful reassessment of the duel she had just lost. She had genuinely believed that no reasonable person could flip a game from that position on a single draw, with both a Spell negation trap and a damage reduction trap active. And then he had not only done it, but had capped it with Shiranui Sunsaga.
He had beaten her with Shiranui. On her own terms.
The verbal wager had no Eva system backing. It was entirely informal. She could decline to honor it if she wanted to.
Yukki tilted her head, looking at Masayo with an expression of the most innocent curiosity. "Masayo-nee, you are not thinking about backing out, are you? As the Jinguuji family heir, you would never do something like that. It would be terribly unbecoming. Sakuya-nee would be so disappointed."
Nice work, Amano thought. He watched the little schemer apply pressure with the precision of someone who had been practicing this for years.
Under ordinary circumstances being stirred up this way would have been mildly irritating. But watching it directed at someone else was oddly satisfying.
Cornered by Yukki's comment and by Sakuya's silent, watchful presence, Masayo exhaled and accepted her fate.
"Fine. Go ahead, Amano. But I am warning you right now: if you are about to make any kind of physical demand, the answer is an absolute no before you even finish the sentence."
This woman. What exactly did she think she was dealing with here?
Making that kind of demand in front of Sakuya, Yukki, Ryuuma, and the entire assembled household escort. Even if he had wanted to, he would never have walked out of the Nanki'in estate tonight.
"My request, Jinguuji-senpai, is that you challenge the Fusion Academy stage at the Academic Challenge Tournament next week."
Masayo blinked. "What?"
She had turned over every possible demand Amano might reasonably or unreasonably make. This had not been anywhere on the list. Not a single humiliating command. No crawling on all fours in front of Sakuya. No public declaration of anything. Just a tournament bracket request.
This person had staked his last draw on a near-impossible comeback, and all he wanted in return was for her to change which stage she was attacking next week.
Without the bet, she would have gone after the Xyz Academy stage. That had been her plan. The reason had nothing to do with strategy and everything to do with geography: the Fusion Academy Silver Stage was currently held by her older sister, Jinguuji Ryoushuu.
"Can I ask why?" she said.
"I want to challenge Kaiba Chiaki," Amano said plainly.
"You mean the Gold Seat?" Masayo stared. "Everyone knows Kaiba Chiaki is the strongest duelist at Fusion Academy. She will be at the Gold Stage."
"If that is your request, even agreeing to it, I cannot guarantee I can get there. I can hold my own against the Bronze Stage challengers. But the Silver Stage, my sister Ryoushuu right now, I honestly cannot beat her."
"The Bronze Stage is enough."
Because dueling without knowing the opponent's side deck, their full card lineup, or their playstyle was not a guaranteed win for anyone. Clearing one obstacle in advance meant two consecutive wins instead of three. The math was straightforward.
"All right. I agree to that."
Masayo had genuinely not expected him to ask for this. She had been living inside a framework of romantic pursuit and family politics, willing to run herself in circles chasing someone who had never given her a real opening. And this first-year student, freshly enrolled at Synchro Academy, had already set his aim on the strongest duelist at Fusion Academy entirely. His horizon had been further than hers the whole time.
She had not lost this duel unfairly. She had lost it in every sense that mattered.
She could understand now why Muramasa, who was not known for warmth toward outsiders, had decided this particular young man was worth his attention.
Jinguuji Masayo. Affection up 5. Total: 60.
Sixty in a single evening, from below zero. By the system's scale that put her just over the threshold into something resembling genuine friendship. Given that she had just agreed to coordinate tournament strategy with him, battle ally was probably the more accurate word for whatever this was.
"It really is getting late. Sakuya, I should head back."
Sakuya nodded quietly. "You worked hard tonight, Amano. See you at school tomorrow."
"Wait, just a moment, Amano-sensei."
The one calling after him was Yukki.
He had nearly forgotten about the three-point affection gain from earlier. Under those circumstances, why had Yukki's affection gone up at all?
"Amano-sensei." Yukki's voice was genuinely soft, the scheming edge from a few minutes ago completely set aside. "I have been thinking that saying thank you out loud for the Dark Game rescue is really not enough. So."
She reached into the card case at her hip, drew out five cards, bowed deeply from the waist, and offered them to Amano with both hands.
"Please take all of these."
Five copies of Ghost Ogre and Snow Rabbit.
Outstanding. The Ghost Ogre wholesale supplier had made her move.
"Yukki, this is too many. I will take two. Keep the rest in your own deck."
His own deck simply could not absorb five copies. And selling off gifts from a girl on the secondary market, even if a single Ghost Ogre fetched close to Monster Reborn prices at auction, felt like a genuinely terrible thing to do.
He reached over and smoothly drew two cards from the offered set.
Yukki's cheeks went visibly pink the instant he did it.
"Amano-sensei. That is so generous!"
Her definition of generous and most people's definition of generous seemed to have a meaningful gap between them. Though with her memories still missing, some misalignment in everyday concepts was probably to be expected.
"Mmm." Sakuya made a small sound beside her. Her expression had taken on a slightly pouty quality that she seemed to be trying to suppress. "You refuse everything I try to give you," she said, quietly enough that it was almost private, "and then you just take Yukki's gift without hesitating."
What you tried to give me is a mansion, Amano thought.
"Sakuya-nee's gifts are just too significant," Yukki offered cheerfully. "Unlike mine. I understand how to consider Amano-sensei's feelings about these things."
The little schemer was winding up for another round. Amano executed an immediate and clean exit, stepping onto his D-Wheel before he could be caught in the crossfire, and accelerated away from the Nanki'in estate at speed.
On the ride back, the system notification that had been waiting in the background finally surfaced.
Not a new affection update this time. That morning, when he had received the Millennium Puzzle fragment from Kuroshio Nagi, the system had flagged an incoming upgrade. The twelve-hour background update had just finished.
He had not noticed the system running an upgrade at all. It had been operating normally through the entire evening. Dual-threading a background installation while running normal functions without any visible lag. For a system that demonstrated all the hallmarks of a budget build in most other areas, this was unexpectedly sophisticated.
Amano opened the system to review the changes.
Affection-related skills: no modifications.
But the system's base functions had gained something new. Previously there had been exactly one built-in system skill: Affection View. Now a second skill had appeared directly beneath it.
Thought Reading.
And at the bottom of the interface, a notation: Millennium Puzzle (1/4).
Three more fragments needed. The total number of Puzzle fragments in circulation was presumably higher than four, which suggested the system had identified four specific pieces it was still missing.
But that question could wait. The immediately usable new skill was what mattered.
He opened the description.
Thought Reading: Once per day, activate by targeting a conquest target with 70 or more Affection Points. Read three current thoughts the target is having about you. Resets at midnight each night.
A targeting effect, just like several of the affection skills. Reading the target's actual thoughts.
Mind reading.
His first association was the Millennium Eye. Pegasus and his ability to see directly into a duelist's mind during their duel, reading every card in their hand, seeing through every face-down card before it was flipped. The original villain of Duelist Kingdom, and a genuinely oppressive deck to face on top of it.
This version was narrower. It only worked on conquest targets, only on thoughts those targets were currently having about him, and it was limited to three thoughts per activation. Not as broadly useful as the Millennium Eye.
But in a duel context, if the target happened to be thinking about how to beat him, three current strategic thoughts could be extremely valuable. If he activated it during a duel against Rin Seiya, for example, those three thoughts would almost certainly include what she was planning to do next.
A limited version of the Millennium Eye. Situationally very effective.
The limitation was the 70 Affection threshold. That meant he could not use it against Kaiba Chiaki yet. Her current score sat at sixty-eight, two points short.
He filed that observation away and kept riding.
By the time he got back to the dormitory it was nearly midnight. If the Masayo duel had not run long, he would have made it back earlier. Shio and Finesse were already asleep, which was standard at this hour. Beauty sleep, as the two of them called it with complete seriousness.
Which meant the light in the common area was on for the same reason it was always on when he came back late.
"You are back, Rei." Kikawayu rose from the sofa, long silver-white hair catching the light as she turned, and smiled. "Are you hungry? Have you eaten? Do you want me to make something?"
It was the most ordinary possible conversation.
Amano was nonetheless aware of a distinct awkward tension in his own chest that had absolutely no business being there.
Why was she still in this form? He had been out for an entire day. He had been genuinely expecting the situation to have resolved itself by the time he got home.
"Oh. I am fine. I probably should not eat this late."
"Rei." Kikawayu tilted her head, something thoughtful and slightly suspicious in her expression. "Are you hiding something from me? You have been acting strange around me for the past few days. Like you feel guilty about something."
"No I have not."
"Yes you have. You will not look at me directly. What, am I ugly?" She reached out, took his face in both hands, and physically turned his head to face her. "Look at me. Right now."
At this distance every detail was sharp: the silver-white lashes, longer than they should have been, moving with each blink. Definitely prettier at close range.
"Yuu. Actually. I think I am a little hungry."
The tension in her expression dissolved into a laugh. "I knew it." She let go of his face, still smiling. "Do not worry about gaining weight from eating late. If you want it, eat it. Let me go make something."
Amano watched her walk toward the kitchen.
And remembered the new skill sitting unlocked in his system.
This was not like the Back Seat Soul skill, which forced a target into a two-hour out-of-body experience and required mutual participation whether either party liked it or not. Thought Reading was entirely passive on the target's end. Undetectable. No effect on either party, no side effects, no way to know it had happened.
He opened the system and aimed it at Kikawayu.
"Thought Reading."
The next moment, a familiar voice surfaced in his mind, clear and present as if she were speaking directly into his ear.
Thought 1: What should I make for him? Late-night food should be light, something easy on the stomach. Maybe something simple.
Amano immediately felt guilty. She was in there thinking about his nutritional welfare and he was reading her private thoughts without permission.
The guilt lasted approximately one second.
Thought 2: Also, I touched his cheek just now, what an excellent night. So soft. Genuinely wonderful. If I could actually bite it and taste it I would die happy and it would be completely worth it.
Thought 3: I am going to use this as material before I sleep tonight. Start from the cheek, then I will [XXXX] Rei, then [XXXX] him, and then finish with my mouth doing [XXXXX]. So good.
The guilt was gone.
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