Chapter 141: Five-Star Underworld Degeneracy Rating

While Camula and Alexis Rhodes worked together to lay out a soft cloth on the ground, and pulled some bento boxes and other food out of their bags, Rowan, with nothing better to do, settled in and pulled up his system panel to look it over.

[Name: Rowan] [Skills: Spirit Vision, Superior Still Water Clarity, Mark of the Crimson Dragon — Dragon's Head / Dragon's Heart / Dragon's Tail (the Crimson Dragon's punishing power, usable when initiating a Shadow Duel).] [Current Decks: Dark Magician Deck, Lava Golem Deck, Stealth Bird Deck, Shadow HERO Deck, Ojama Deck, Buster Blader Deck, Herald of Perfection Deck.] [Emotion Points: 2100]

A couple of days ago he'd taken the opportunity to fleece squinty-eyed Professor Banner for a good chunk of change, pocketing over a thousand Emotion Points in the process.

Now he finally had enough saved up to redeem a brand-new Underworld deck.

Rowan immediately checked out the four newly refreshed redemption options.

[System Shop (Refreshes every two days)] Today's options: [Deck: Vampire Deck (Camula's version)] 500 points. [Deck: Valkyrie Deck (Underworld Infinite-Loop variant)] 1500 points. [Deck: Gravekeeper's Deck (Underworld Attrition variant)] 1500 points. [Skill: Aroma Strategy (the ability to know what the top card of your deck is in advance)] 3000 points.

"Well, would you look at that, a skill like this actually showed up."

Seeing the redemption option for the skill called Aroma Strategy, Rowan's expression twisted into something faintly odd.

If he remembered right, one of Duel King Yugi Muto's companions had used this exact trick, way back at the start of it all.

Dabbing different scented perfumes onto her cards, then sniffing them out to figure out what was coming up next.

He hadn't expected the system to roll this same skill out for him this time around.

Rowan muttered to himself internally. Except at this point, the ability felt like a bit of a waste, honestly.

After all, duelists in this world who could see spirits, or who shared a bond with their decks, had little use for a trick like that.

Not to mention he already had his Superior Still Water Clarity's card-marking ability, which more than covered it.

If the point cost had been lower, Rowan wouldn't have minded picking it up anyway.

But at a cost equal to redeeming a full Crimson Dragon's Mark, he lost interest immediately.

So, after giving that fourth option his usual once-over, Rowan moved straight on to the other three deck options.

Especially the two true-blooded Underworld decks among them.

The Valkyrie Deck clearly worked by chaining Special Summons between monster effects, then using Spell Cards to shuffle monsters from the Graveyard back into the deck, looping the combo endlessly, a proper Underworld infinite-engine build.

As for the Gravekeeper's Deck, compared to the genuine Gravekeeper archetype, this was a considerably nastier version, an Underworld Life Point attrition build.

If you were ranking them by sheer Underworld nastiness, the latter clearly won out.

Especially considering who he'd be facing this time, Rowan didn't hesitate. He went straight for the latter!

He remembered the system had rolled out this Underworld Gravekeeper's Deck once before.

He hadn't expected it to show up again this time.

If he didn't cash it in and show the Gravekeeper clan's Duel Spirits exactly what real, face-to-face grave-robbing looked like, live and in person, Rowan felt he'd practically be doing the deck a disservice, seeing as it was the second time it had shown up in the shop.

"Alexis, Rowan, please, you have to share some of your bento with your teacher!"

No sooner had Rowan finished redeeming his deck than he spotted squinty-eyed Professor Banner not far off, eyes brimming with tears, begging him and Alexis for food.

Beside Professor Banner sat a bag that had clearly just been opened, and was now empty.

Poking its head out from inside was a plump, tawny brown cat, rice grains still stuck to its whiskers, having just finished polishing off the bento.

Clearly, the bento this cat-slave of a teacher had brought along had already been devoured by his own pampered, plump cat, who'd snuck inside the bag to do the deed...

Rowan's mouth twitched.

He couldn't help but want to say something about it.

The man was supposedly the strongest of the Seven Stars' Shadow Duelists, a genuine alchemist, no less... and yet he hadn't even noticed his own fat cat hiding in his bag...

Still, seeing this play out, Rowan had a hunch that squinty-eyed Professor Banner was about to secretly set off whatever mechanism lay buried in these ruins, and bring everyone into the spirit world where the Gravekeeper clan resided.

With that thought, Rowan grabbed a ham sandwich and settled in to eat at his leisure, waiting for squinty-eyed Professor Banner's little performance to begin.

Sure enough, before long he noticed the plump cat named Pharaoh, guided along by some subtle hint from Professor Banner, slink over to a spot not far away and start pawing at the ground as if it had caught some scent.

Before long it had dug up a small, disc-shaped golden relic.

"Hummmm!!"

Almost the instant it was unearthed, a flash of green light shot across its surface.

In the blink of an eye, strange green light began surging up from the ground all across the ruins where Rowan and the others stood.

It caught everyone's attention at once.

"What is that?!" Alexis Rhodes cried, looking around in shock.

Not far off, Jaden Yuki, Syrus Truesdale, and Chumley stared at the scene just as stunned, a little rattled, with no idea what was happening.

"Could this be... the power of the world where Duel Spirits dwell!"

Camula, meanwhile, recognized it at once, faint surprise crossing her face.

One glance at the mechanism the plump cat had dug out of the ground was enough to confirm something was seriously off.

"The world of Duel Spirits...?" Before Alexis and the others could ask what that meant, confusion plain on their faces, a blinding flare of light suddenly burst to life directly overhead.

Rowan raised a hand to shield his eyes, and in that brief moment caught sight of the sun above warping and rippling strangely, splitting into three.

Thunder and lightning began crashing across the sky at the same time.

"Everyone, quick, take cover inside those ruins!"

Squinty-eyed Professor Banner called out to Syrus and the others the moment he saw it, sounding like a man who'd been ready for this all along.

He pointed toward a crumbling old ruin not far away as he spoke.