Who asked him to play Yu-Gi-Oh

"Heavy Storm! Destroy all Spell and Trap Cards on the field!"

The most powerful tool for clearing the backrow instantly swept across the entire field. You Xuan's "Insecticide Net" defensive line crumbled, and his three face-down cards in the backrow were also swept up by the storm.

"Then, at the moment of destruction, I chain and activate one of these Trap Cards, 'No Entry!!', changing all Attack Position monsters on the field to Defense Position! I use this effect to change 'Don Zaloog' to Defense Position."

[Don Zaloog, ATK 1400 → DEF 1500]

As for another one of the swept-up traps, its fading image before shattering vaguely resembled a "Bottomless Trap Hole."

Just glimpsing the afterimage of that retreating iconic red trap sent another chill down the spines of the spectators, further solidifying the thought, "I really don't want to be on the receiving end of that."

"Also, another Set Card you just destroyed was the Spell Card 'Magical Stone Excavation'," You Xuan stated calmly. "When this card is destroyed by an opponent's card effect and sent to the Graveyard, I can Set two Spell Cards of my choice from my Deck to my side of the field." (Anime effect)

This was a Spell Card used by Jaden Yuki in the anime, which was nerfed upon its real-life release to only search for Quick-Play Spells, and only one at that. Although its activation condition of having to be destroyed by the opponent was a bit troublesome, the effect of choosing any two Spell Cards was still very powerful.

"I search these two cards from my Deck."

You Xuan drew the two cards that popped out from his deck.

"I Set the Spell Card 'Reinforcement of the Army' and the Spell Card 'Monster Reborn' onto the field."

"But this way, you have no attack lock and no traps!" Watanabe Shuichi shouted. "Effect of 'Infernity Archfiend' in my hand! When my opponent controls a monster and I control no monsters, this card can be Normal Summoned without Tributing by halving its original ATK! Therefore, I directly summon 'Infernity Archfiend'!"

[Infernity Archfiend, ATK 1300]

"Then, I activate the Equip Spell 'Axe of Despair'!" Watanabe Shuichi yelled. "A monster equipped with Axe of Despair gains 1000 ATK, and its effects are negated! Infernity Archfiend's effect is negated, so the drawback of its self-compromising summon is removed, and its ATK returns to 2600! Then, receiving the boost from Axe of Despair, its ATK rises to 3600!"

[Infernity Archfiend, ATK 1300 → ATK 3600]

"Next, I activate another Equip Spell, 'Nitwit Outwit'!" Shuichi declared. "This card can only be equipped to an opponent's monster. When the equipped monster is destroyed by battle and sent to the Graveyard, inflict damage to your opponent equal to the equipped monster's ATK! I equip 'Nitwit Outwit' to 'Don Zaloog'!"

A dynamite canister was instantly strapped to the defending Don Zaloog, its rough face etched with utter despair.

"Infernity Archfiend, attack 'Don Zaloog'!"

[Don Zaloog, DEF 1500]

The giant insect easily crushed the miserable leader, triggering a chain explosion from the Nitwit Outwit strapped to him. With a loud boom, the flames of the explosion engulfed You Xuan's side of the field, and the shockwave of the blast swept over him.

[You Xuan, LP 3000 → LP 1600]

"Then I Set two cards face-down on the field. Turn end!" Watanabe Shuichi declared.

"..."

"As expected of Watanabe," the well-endowed senior girl in the stands continued her commentary. "To break through such a situation in one fell swoop and regain control..."

"Indeed. And from the looks of it, his backrow setup has also solidified his defenses; he's established a firm footing," the Dueling Club student beside her added. "Although that freshman managed to gain the upper hand through some... uh... special means, it looks like this is as far as he goes. However, his performance has been quite outstanding. The judging panel should probably pass him."

Watanabe Shuichi himself actually thought so too.

On his field, he had Infernity Archfiend with a full 3600 ATK. One of his face-down cards in the backrow was the Trap Card "Security Orb," which could switch an attacking monster to Defense Position. And if it was destroyed by an opponent's Spell or Trap, it could destroy one monster on the field. It was a quality trap that combined defense with baiting removal for a counter-attack.

The other card was the Trap Card "Draining Shield," which allowed him to gain Life Points equal to the attacking monster's ATK when an opponent's monster declared an attack—also a defensive trap.

His defensive line was practically flawless.

But at this moment, Shuichi didn't realize.

In fact, the moment he blew away that "Magical Stone Excavation," allowing You Xuan to trigger his deck search, this duel was essentially already over.

You Xuan: "My turn, draw."

The equation for victory was already complete.

"Activate Spell Card 'Giant Trunade'! All Spell and Trap Cards on both sides of the field are returned to their owners' hands!"

A storm surged. You Xuan's Set "Monster Reborn" and the opponent's two Set Cards all returned to their respective hands.

Watanabe Shuichi looked at the two traps back in his hand and pursed his lips.

His backrow defense was gone, but it shouldn't be a big problem. Even without the boost from "Axe of Despair," Infernity Archfiend's ATK would only drop back to 2600, which was still high enough. And he still had 2600 Life Points.

Could you possibly OTK me in one turn?

You Xuan drew another card that had been blown back to his hand by "Giant Trunade": "I activate this card searched last turn via 'Magical Stone Excavation,' Spell Card 'Reinforcement of the Army'. Add a Level 4 or lower Warrior-Type monster from my Deck to my hand. I add 'Gearfried the Iron Knight' from my Deck to my hand."

Gearfried the Iron Knight was one of Joey Wheeler's signature lower-level monsters in the DM era. However, by the GX era, it had become a common generic low-level card, even used by a random elementary school kid dueling Syrus Truesdale in his flashback.

You Xuan: "Normal Summon 'Gearfried the Iron Knight'!"

[Gearfried the Iron Knight, ATK 1800]

"Next, I activate the Spell Card 'Monster Reborn' that returned to my hand!" You Xuan declared. "Revive this card that was previously sent to the Graveyard via 'Graceful Charity'—Magical Beast Cerberus!"

[Magical Beast Cerberus, ATK 1400]

The Iron Knight and the Magical Beast appeared simultaneously. Any real-life duelist with even a little experience would now be thinking of that infamous card, possibly even preparing for a five-second surrender and a quick escape.

Because seeing these two things together, no one would be ignorant of what was coming next.

One of the very first maniacal combos in Yu-Gi-Oh! history.

Watanabe Shuichi frowned: "Summoning so many fodder monsters, what exactly are you planning to do?"

"Don't be hasty. The last card I'm going to use is this."

You Xuan gestured.

"Equip Spell 'Butterfly Dagger - Elma'!"

[Equip Spell, Butterfly Dagger - Elma

Effect: The equipped monster gains 300 ATK. When this card equipped to a monster is destroyed and sent to the Graveyard, this card can be returned to its owner's hand.]

At first glance, a very ordinary and trashy piece of equipment, clearly a worthless common card. Newcomers to Yu-Gi-Oh! in real life might be puzzled: how did such an unremarkable card earn the prestigious status of a lifer in the "little black room" (banlist)?

Evidently, no one on site currently realized the severity of the problem; no one saw what You Xuan was planning to do.

"'Butterfly Dagger - Elma', equip to 'Gearfried the Iron Knight', ATK increases by 300," You Xuan stated. "But 'Gearfried the Iron Knight' also has an effect. He cannot be equipped with any Equip Cards. When he is equipped, that Equip Card is immediately destroyed. Therefore, 'Butterfly Dagger - Elma' is immediately destroyed."

Shuichi: "?"

Destroying your own equip card, what's the point of that?

"At this moment, 'Butterfly Dagger - Elma's' second effect. When this card equipped to a monster is destroyed and sent to the Graveyard, this card returns to its owner's hand. Therefore, I retrieve 'Butterfly Dagger - Elma' from the Graveyard."

Shuichi frowned: "But even so, this is meaningless."

"Of course, it has meaning," You Xuan said. "I still have 'Magical Beast Cerberus' on my field. As long as it's on the field, whenever I or my opponent activates a Spell Card, place one Spell Counter on it. Furthermore, this card's ATK increases by 500 for each Spell Counter on it."

[Magical Beast Cerberus, ATK 1400 → ATK 1900]

Watanabe Shuichi: "A mere 500 ATK increase is nothing— Huh!?"

He began to realize something was wrong.

Wait, could it be...

"Equip Spell 'Butterfly Dagger - Elma' is again equipped to 'Gearfried the Iron Knight'. But due to Gearfried's own effect, it is immediately destroyed again. Then, due to Butterfly Dagger's own effect, it is retrieved from the Graveyard. Because another Spell Card was activated, 'Magical Beast Cerberus's' ATK increases by another 500."

[Magical Beast Cerberus, ATK 1900 → ATK 2400]

"You... you..." Watanabe Shuichi began to tremble.

No matter how slow the observing students were, they now realized what was happening.

This was an infinite LOOP!

One of the earliest, and one of the easiest to achieve with the fewest components, infinite loops in Yu-Gi-Oh! history.

Equipping Butterfly Dagger to Gearfried, self-destructing it via Gearfried's effect, then retrieving it via its own effect, allowed one to activate Spell Cards an infinite number of times in a single turn.

Correspondingly, Magical Beast Cerberus's ATK could also be infinitely increased through this infinite consumption!

However, from a practical standpoint, this wasn't actually a top-tier deck back in the day. After all, Butterfly Dagger - Elma was only banned in March 2005, and before that, it didn't have a great track record in World Championships. This indicated that although the infinite loop was brutal, it was ultimately still a gimmick in nature, and its practical performance couldn't beat the top-tier meta decks of that era.

Before You Xuan transmigrated, he had actually tried building this deck out of interest using the early card pool, but in practice, he found it far less brutal than he imagined. The success rate wasn't high, and even if you assembled the components, any single piece of disruption would kill it on the spot; it couldn't actually beat the top-tier decks in the same environment.

It was just that K Company had always had zero tolerance for infinite loop combos, and historically, anything related to infinite loops was basically locked away.

But so-called gimmicks were always things that, if successfully pulled off once, would make your entire day.

And once successful, it would look very cool.

In real-life card games, there was a time limit for operations in a single turn, but this world didn't have one. The anime world only specified that if there were no operations for a certain period, the turn would be forcibly ended, but there was no limit on the total time for a turn.

Watching that Magical Beast's ATK soar infinitely upwards, Watanabe Shuichi was almost suffocating from shock. His whole body trembled, and he was speechless for a long while.

"Junior... this... this..."

"Butterfly Dagger activates again, Magical Beast's ATK rises again!"

[Magical Beast Cerberus, ATK 12400]

He was about to cry.

He could hardly imagine how painful the holographic impact of an attack with that much ATK would be.

He wanted to say, No, Junior, we don't seem to have any grudges, do we?

Is this really necessary?

The other spectating students were already long numb. Even the announcer's jaw had almost hit the floor.

This kind of development even stunned Chazz Princeton, who thought he had already seen the true face of this damn dog.

He stared wide-eyed for a long time, unconsciously muttering to himself.

"Just what in the world are you?"

The entire venue was silent, as if everyone had been petrified, all watching You Xuan operate like a broken record.

[Magical Beast Cerberus, ATK 22400]

"Hmm, that should be enough."

Although he could continue to pump it, operating constantly was also very tiring.

Speaking of which, his Senior actually hadn't surrendered and run away yet; he was quite something.

Then, to thank his Senior for the kindness of not running away...

"'Magical Beast Cerberus', attack 'Infernity Archfiend'!"

[Infernity Archfiend, ATK 2600]

Watanabe Shuichi: "..."

Like a roar from hell, a terrifying impact swept over him with immense force.

[Watanabe Shuichi, LP 2600 → LP 0]

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