"Good duel. Looking forward to our next match."
Inside the Fusion Club activity room, Hikaru Amagi shook hands with his opponent and exchanged a friendly farewell.
"Haha, dueling you really taught me a lot, Hikaru! The limits of Fusion… they're way beyond what I imagined!"
"No way, no way," Hikaru waved it off quickly.
"I've still got a long way to go before I hit Fusion's true limits."
A pure Fusion deck?
Compared to something like Tearlaments, a "Fusion deck without Fusion"?
Felt kind of… embarrassing.
Ever since that duel against Yanagi a few days ago, Hikaru's name had spread like wildfire within the Fusion Club.
Yanagi had been a senior student—and Hikaru had beaten him using a theoretically weaker version of the same deck.
For the underclassmen, it was a rare moment of triumph.
After all, aside from the whole color-coded discrimination, bullying by upperclassmen was also a thing.
Still, most of the students who approached Hikaru were Slifer or Ra Dorm students.
Few Blues ever talked to him.
The ones who did were usually just curious about his Fusion-only deck.
Because Fusion should look like Fusion, damn it!
Watching the enthusiastic student walk off to tweak their deck, Hikaru didn't exactly feel inspired, but…
Everything was going according to plan.
Thanks to his influence, the Fusion Club was slowly shifting in the direction he wanted.
Not by much—but it was real progress.
After a week in the Fusion Club, Hikaru found more and more things about it… strange.
Too many bizarre rules.
Too many extreme ideas.
Sure, the club was theoretically all about advancing Fusion Summoning as the ultimate goal…
But internally, the conflict was even worse than outside.
Duel challenges that involved bets were far more frequent than in the rest of the school.
To Hikaru, it felt like the Fusion Club was being deliberately pushed to become more extreme, more fanatical—more insane.
"This isn't how a school is supposed to work!"
If this went on for a few years, he wouldn't be surprised if the Fusion Army actually became the lunatics from Arc-V—turning men, women, and children into cards without blinking.
In that sense, joining the Fusion Club really had been the right move.
Not only was the dueling intense—it let him keep a close eye on a ticking time bomb.
"Yo, Hikaru!"
A familiar, cheerful voice hit Hikaru's ear.
"Jaden?"
He was chewing on a piece of bread in the corner when he looked up and saw Jaden Yuki standing there.
What the hell's he doing in the Fusion Club?
They let him in?
Hikaru was honestly surprised.
In the original anime, when Jaden tried to enter Obelisk Blue's dorm to look for Zane Truesdale, the guards threw a bucket of water on him and knocked him over.
But then again…
This world only resembled GX.
For example, the number of Slifer Red students was way higher than in the show—easily nearing a hundred.
And with Hikaru being a minor celebrity in the Fusion Club now, maybe someone had escorted Jaden in. Not that strange.
"Whoa, Hikaru! That uniform looks awesome on you!"
Jaden's eyes sparkled as he admired the purple-cloaked figure before him.
Hikaru had always been good-looking.
Combined with the longer hem of the Fusion Club uniform, he looked taller, sharper—more charismatic.
"Big bro… this really isn't the time to be talking about fashion…" Sho said from behind Jaden, exasperated.
At this point in the story, Sho was still just your typical timid, nerdy sidekick with a hint of tsukkomi energy.
"Oh right! Hikaru, wanna do a Tag Duel with me?"
"Tag Duel? Against who? The Paradox Brothers?"
Hikaru asked instinctively.
In the original series, Jaden, Sho, and Alexis had explored the abandoned campus building and stumbled upon Dark Duels.
As punishment, they were forced to fight a Tag Duel against the Paradox Brothers—legendary duelists who had once given Yugi and Joey trouble.
That's marketing for you.
These two weren't total scrubs, but they weren't powerhouses either.
Yet just because they fought Yugi and Joey once, they got branded as "legendary duelists."
It was like Kakuzu boasting about fighting the First Hokage.
"Whoa, Hikaru, you've heard of them too?" Sho lit up.
"Did you see that duel live or something?"
"Back then, huh…"
Hikaru caught that detail immediately.
So, the duel had already happened in this timeline?
Then why was Jaden still looking for a Tag Duel partner?
"Hahaha, Hikaru, you're gonna love this—"
Jaden grinned widely.
"Dimensional Gates!"
"Dimensional what now?!"
"It's those portals invented by Seto Kaiba to search for the Underworld!" Sho chimed in excitedly, eager to explain.
With their help, Hikaru finally realized what set this world apart from the Yu-Gi-Oh! GX he remembered.
Dimensional Gates.
This was a world that had merged GX with the 20th Anniversary movie, The Dark Side of Dimensions.
From what Jaden and Sho told him, every Academy and every grade level was periodically allowed to enter known "Fragment Dimensions" via the Gates.
According to KaibaCorp, these fragmented dimensions were the remnants of destroyed Spirit Worlds or emergency shelters created by fleeing duel spirits.
Duelists who could defeat the spirits within were sometimes acknowledged by them and gifted their cards.
The dueling energy generated also helped sustain the dimension's existence—so it was a win-win deal.
KaibaCorp had even signed contracts with some dimensions to make them accessible as training grounds for elite students.
Honestly?
Sounded pretty sweet.
But still…
Fragmented worlds?
Refugee spirits?
It all sounded way more dangerous than he'd expected.
"The one we're headed to is a Warrior-Type dimension built for Tag Duels! You in?" Jaden asked, throwing a big thumbs-up.
And yeah—Hikaru was definitely interested.
This seemed to be the core anomaly of the world he'd landed in.
Plus, he'd never heard of this in the Ra Dorm.
With Jaden personally inviting him, of course he was happy to say yes.
Still, he had to clarify something:
"As a Ra student, am I even allowed to participate?
And why not bring Sho along? Didn't you two already do a Tag Duel together?"
"Well…" Sho lowered his head, looking embarrassed.
"After big bro dueled my brother… he told me not to go through the Gates lightly.
He said… I'm not ready yet."
Zane Truesdale's protection, huh?
Guess that proved it—
The other side of those Dimensional Gates was anything but safe.
"Don't worry about it," Jaden grinned.
"Different dorms can totally team up!
I checked with Professor Banner—he said I'm the only Slifer allowed into the Gate this term. So I can pick anyone else from the other dorms!"
"If you weren't interested, I was gonna ask Alexis next."
"Of course I'm interested!" Hikaru answered immediately.
"But I need to tweak my deck a little first, just in case."
"Sweet! Then tomorrow at ten, meet me in front of the Slifer Dorm!"
Jaden practically bounced in place with excitement.