#425 - International phantom attention

The duel ended, and Ansteel raised Tenjo Hikari's hand, accepting the cheers of the audience.

For Ansteel, whether he won or not wasn't very important. What he wanted to see more was the smiling faces of the audience.

Otherwise, he wouldn't have accepted the invitation from International Illusions to become a card tester.

Tenjo Hikari also had a good impression of him. He rarely encountered this type of duelist. Considering that he might encounter many "entertainment duelists" in the future, Tenjo Hikari was still willing to communicate with him.

"Ah, as expected of the rumored answer to fusion, you're really strong."

"Haha, you're exaggerating too much. I'm far from that strong."

Ansteel laughed and shook hands with Tenjo Hikari before continuing, "I'll tell you a secret, Tenjo."

"Huh? What is it?" Tenjo Hikari asked curiously.

"The president admires you very much."

President?

The president he was talking about was clearly not the same "president" that others were talking about.

"Mr. Pegasus? Is he paying attention to me too?" Tenjo Hikari wasn't too surprised and continued chatting with him.

"Yeah—well—" While speaking, he folded his hands behind his head, leaned against the wall of the road in front of the resting hall, and looked at the audience in the distance.

He didn't seem as "optimistic" and "positive" as he did during the duel. Instead, he looked quite irritable.

"Mr. Pegasus often talks to us about some of his worries."

"Worries?" Tenjo Hikari asked in surprise.

What was he worried about?

The Light of Destruction?

It seemed that he took the initiative to start searching for the Light of Destruction in the original work.

"Cards."

Cards!?

He was worried about cards?

Ansteel rummaged through his deck and took out a monster card. Engraved on it was the Machine God King, Barbatos Ur: "This card used to be Master Yagyou's ace card. It was originally a fusion monster, but some time ago, Master Yagyou redesigned it and changed it to its current form."

Tenjo Hikari had a slight impression.

It seemed that this was indeed the case in the manga's side story, but he didn't read "Yu-Gi-Oh! R" very carefully, so he wasn't very clear.

In short, this card seemed to have caused quite a stir in this world, but no one knew about it except for those at International Illusions.

"Easy to summon, extremely high attack power. To balance it, Master Yagyou added the side effect of dealing 0 battle damage to the opponent."

"This is also the philosophy of our International Illusions."

A flash of inspiration struck Tenjo Hikari.

"Ah—so that's what it is?"

"Looks like you've figured it out?" Ansteel nodded slightly. "In Mr. Pegasus's view, card design should focus on effects as a supplement, with ideas and design sense as the main focus.

A powerful card should not only have powerful strength, but also have difficult summoning conditions or relative side effects."

He stroked his chin and continued, "So, the president especially likes your classmate, Hayato Maeda's [Sunrise of Ayers Rock]."

Tenjo Hikari remembered this.

Hayato Maeda's Sunrise of Ayers Rock was appreciated by President Pegasus, and then he was recruited into International Illusions. When the GX tournament started, he even contacted Jaden.

It was said that he wanted to design a brand new Hero card based on this card and Jaden's Hero series.

Tenjo Hikari guessed that it was probably Sunrise Hero.

"But, have you seen those audiences, those spirits outside?" Ansteel shook his head slightly. "Because our world is connected to more and more dimensions, everyone is gradually discovering that there is a clear difference in the quality of cards.

Originally, pursuing powerful cards was almost the instinct of all duelists. Now that they see that the average strength of cards from the outside world is higher than their own, they will naturally instinctively pursue powerful cards.

It is said that a senior originally wanted to create a card that could rival the Egyptian God cards, but he became confused because of the dimensional exploration. During this time, he put aside some ideas and instead started researching dimensions with the president, wanting to figure out the ideas in his head."

He was probably talking about the genius designer in the original work who created "The God of Binding Family" and controlled The Winged Dragon of Ra.

That designer felt that he was not valued by Pegasus because Hayato Maeda was named the best designer of the year. He stole The Winged Dragon of Ra in resentment, wanting to prove himself.

That designer said the super famous line "Duelists always pursue powerful cards" in the original work. After losing to Jaden, Pegasus appeared and told him some of Pegasus's design concepts, and told him that he was the most talented designer Pegasus admired, and he followed Pegasus back in tears.

In any case, being able to design The God of Binding Family and actually control the copy card of The Sun God, that talent was indeed the top designer of the younger generation in the original work.

This time, I haven't heard of any emergency suspension from the Dark World, it seems that he really didn't act like in the original work because of the other dimension.

"But you are different." Ansteel continued, "The president has watched the videos of you dueling Mr. Dinosaur and Mr. Insect, and he has also seen some of your previous records. He thinks that although many of the fusion cards you use are very strong, your duels have never changed, which makes him very happy.

In this era where everyone is pursuing powerful cards, he is very happy to see a duelist who can slam on the brakes."

"Haha, is that so. I'm very grateful for his appreciation." Tenjo Hikari was quite happy. If he could get in touch with Pegasus, wouldn't he be able to get whatever original animation cards he wanted?

Ansteel put away the card and continued, "If there are no accidents, he should have watched this duel as well. He will be very happy that you used various fusion summons of Gem-Knight Prism Aura in this duel."

While speaking, he saw that his phone rang. He opened it, noticed that it was a new message, glanced at it, and then said, "Ha, look, Tenjo, just like I said, the president has decided to personally design a card for you based on your duel."

"Really?" Tenjo Hikari was excited.

There was such a good thing!?

Could it be Thousand-Eyes Restrict?

That card was an evolution of Pegasus's former ace, and Tenjo Hikari himself had used it several times.

"Actually, the president had been preparing for a long time, but he hadn't made up his mind. This time, he should have seen your performance, so he made up his mind. Ha, the president also said that my performance this time was very good - hahaha, Tenjo, if I get promoted and get a raise in the future, I will have to thank you a lot." Although he was still an intern, it didn't stop Ansteel from joking.

"No, even if you really get promoted and get a raise, that's because of your own performance, it has nothing to do with me." Tenjo Hikari shook his head, not wanting to take credit for it. "So, did he say what kind of card it is?"

Ansteel curled the corner of his mouth: "I can reveal a name to you. As for the effect, it depends on how Mr. Pegasus designs it."

Tenjo Hikari nodded.

"It seems to be called --- Dragon Magician Guardian."

Wow!

Tenjo Hikari's eyes lit up.