Stacking The Deck - Chapter 28.2 (Patreon)

The world shattering revelation Jasmine dropped on Yarden, had him following after Crowler and Zane in a daze.

One might have even confused him with a nasty zombie only card player instead of the chadly free style user he was.

Zane gave him an odd look, but didn't comment as Crowler led them from the assembly hall to his office.

"Now boys, I'm sure the two of you, as intelligent as you both are-" Crowler began as he took a seat behind his desk, only to pause as he saw the state of the boy clad in red, "Yarden my dear boy? What's the matter? You look like someone just stole your best card."

Yarden blinked, "Zane…Doctor…" he addressed them, before trailing off for a moment. He took a second to sigh, before he asked a most vital question, "Am I a nerd? A teachers pet?"

"…What?" Zane's cool guy emotionless facade actually broke for a moment and he gave Yarden a weird look.

"…I do concur," Crowler gave him a taken aback look, a confused look in his eyes, "What brought this on might I ask?"

"Something Jasmine just told me," Yarden sighed and shrugged, shoulders slumping, "She said Jaden is more of a delinquent bad boy than me. And said I'm just a potty mouth nerd who always abides by the rules, and I'm always on time for class and stuff, and that I'm a huge teachers pet."

That can't be right. He beat up a literal mercenary and stole his stuff! He beat up armed goons that were part of an illegal research station on the island. He got shit faced drunk and gambled! He blackmailed the headmaster even into giving him Cyber Dark Dragon!

It might have sounded and looked silly to be worrying over such a thing, childish even. But it was a big deal to him. his whole duelling persona going forward was being the bad boy!

The dashing loveable rogue!

Not the unstylish glasses, suspenders and pocket handkerchief guy!

"Well if Jaden is the standard for a bad boy, then indeed I dare say you are the farthest thing from a bad boy!" Doctor Crowler harumphed and Yarden resisted the urge to grasp his chest in phantom pain, "He's a bad, bad lazy no good boy! An utter buffoonish slacker! He sleeps through more than fifty percent of his classes, doesn't turn up for a third of them. And he's not turned in a single completed assignment this entire semester! He even eats mid class! Eats!"

Somewhere along the way the reply to Yarden's question turned into a rant about the sheer amount of stupid things Jaden did in Crowler's eyes.

…And admittedly, he kind of did have a point when it was laid out like that.

'Wow, she really gave you a dose of emotional damage didn't she?' Dark Magician Girl giggled in his ear, 'Neeeeeerrrrrrddddddd!'

Even the voices in his head were calling him a nerd now.

Crowler sighed as he finished ranting about Jaden, though only because he needed to catch his breath.

He could be doing with some cardio training to be honest.

"Well, regardless I wouldn't exactly call you a 'nerd' as dear Jasmine did, but compared to Jaden you are indeed a model student, I couldn't be more proud to have you in my Obelisk Blue dorm," Doctor Crowler beamed at him, "You are consistently at the very top of our duelling theory classes, you never miss vital classes, you've not missed a single assignment and while admittedly for the standard general classes you started off somewhere in the middle, you have admirably risen to the upper tier of you year. Indeed nothing at all like that Slifer slacker Jaden!"

Damnit he really was a nerd!

Why was being a bad boy and doing good in school polar opposites!? What was wrong with taking education seriously when it was at a premiere place like this?

Did a guy need to start wearing electric shock collars and walk around in big black leather trench coats or dusters to get a little props around here?!

…Admittedly that coat of Zane's was damn stylish.

Edgy as as all hell but that shiny black colouring, and the silver trim through it just looked damn good.

'I wonder if he has it right now in his closet or is it something he picked up later?' Yarden wondered, eyes flickering to Zane for a brief moment, who was just looking at him with a bemused smile, laughter dancing in his eyes.

He thought the whole discussion and Crowler all but confirming he was a real proper nerd was amusing, didn't he?

Bastard.

He was totally gonna raid his closet, and steal his jacket if it was actually already in his possession for that!

It wasn't like he'd need it anyway. He wouldn't be getting the Cyber Dark Dragons for his edgy phase, those were in Yarden's possession.

And honestly, them and the jacket went hand in hand right? An iconic duo, so he deserved the jacket. It was rightfully his even!

A clap brought him from his thoughts to Doctor Crowler, "Anyway, funnily enough your merits as a top tier student, and Zane's of course is why I asked you both to follow me here," the blonde teacher smiled brightly at them, "I'm sure you both already suspect, but it's about the school duel. Usually, as it has the previous two years, the role generally would have fallen to Zane as the undisputed best duellist in all of Duel Academy, but now there's a true contender for that spot, no?"

"Not really doctor Crowler," Zane shook his head, "As things stand right now, Yarden is my better. If we duelled right now, I wouldn't be able to win. For the moment at least."

He nodded his head to Yarden, "Yarden is the top duellist of duel academy right now, so I think he should take the spot in the school duel," he said, "Besides, I heard through the grapevine that North Academy is sending a first year this time around, it's only fair that another first year faces off against them."

'For the moment, huh?' Yarden couldn't help but laugh inwardly.

"Indeed?" Crowler's eyebrows rose in astonishment, before his big purple painted lips twisted into a massive smile, "Well then, that makes things simpler I suppose. Yarden, you will be the one representing us in the school duel then! Congratulations!"

Yeah, about that.

How about no?

He'd already long since considered that he would be nominated for the spot. Though, he'd thought he'd have to duel Jaden or Bastion or something for the spot.

And he'd already long since decided to take his name out of the running. Admittedly, that was only a decision he made after he defeated the baldie boys, aka the Paradox Brothers.

"About that Doctor Crowler," Yarden smiled at the man, even as he prepared to crush his happiness and expectations, "I don't think I should. I've been getting a lot of limelight lately, I think I should take a step back from this one. The other students might think the academy likes to play favourites and give you teachers an unfavourable reputation. Perhaps another first year should take the spot in the school duel."

Nailed it! That was earnest and seemingly well meaning, right?

"Hoh?" Zane raised an eyebrow at him.

"Haaaaaah!?" Doctor Crowler gaped at him.

"And while you have very valid reasons to dislike him, it's important we win the school duel," Yarden continued with a nod, "How about giving the spot to Jaden?"

Doctor Crowler went stock still, and his already pale skin, somehow lightened even further. He looked like he was having a nightmare.

"Jaden?" Zane's second eyebrow joined the first, "Not Bastion? Or Alexis?"

"Bastion would probably just lose." Yarden shrugged, and didn't mention Alexis. Simply because, Alexis would have eyes on her as well after the duel with the Paradox baldies.

Which meant the odds wouldn't be stacked against her. And in fact since she was known for being part of the tag team that took down the baldie twins, the odds would favour her.

But a Slifer red being put up against the top of North Academy, and one of the famous and rich Princeton brothers? Well, the odds wouldn't quite be like his and Alexis' against the baldie boys, but they'd be pretty well against Jaden.

…And Bastion again would just lose. He might have beaten Chazz before, but Chazz had duel spirits now. Sure, just a single Ojama at this point, but that was leagues higher than Bastion when it came to plot armour.

Or spirit shenanigans.

Same thing really.

___________________

"So," Zane struck up a conversation as soon as they exited Doctor Crowlers office a while later, the man being completely unresponsive after name dropping Jaden as a candidate for the school duel, it was kind of melodramatic to be honest, "What are you really planning? What scheme have you thought up this time?"

"Scheme? Me?" Yarden gave him an innocent look, "Can't I just be the nice guy I am and want to help out another fellow student to get their name out there?"

"Maybe if it was Alexis, I'd believe what you said," Zane snorted, crossing his arms, "But since it isn't, I'm going to go ahead and call bullshit. What are you really after?"

"No faith at all, huh?" Yarden snorted.

"Maybe I'd believe you if another of your little schemes didn't go viral over the weekend," Zane shook his head with a smirk, "You predicted someone would be foolish enough to steal Yugi's deck. And put off going with us to check the deck out, so you could instead record yourself beating Yugi's deck. And if you could predict that, then I'm sure you've already predicted that you would be nominated for the school duel."

Damn, that made him sound a lot smarter than he really was, didn't it? Future knowledge sure was useful.

And he wasn't wrong about that video against Dimitri going viral. He'd uploaded it both to his duellist page profile and to the web itself, and in total it had gotten over ten million views.

Which in of itself was awesome because he'd monetized that shit. Which should get him a good fifty grand more added to his bank.

And of course, it boosted his fame even more.

His prospects and stonks just kept rising.

"Well, I suppose you're not wrong," Yarden shrugged, "But it's pretty simple to be honest. I've got a lot more money to my name now, and I've saved up a ton of DP I can be more liberal with."

"…Ah," Zane nodded as realisation shone in his eyes, "The bookies huh? You want to make more money, but if you personally took part in it, the odds would be massively against your opponent instead of you, so unless you tossed your pride and took a fall, there would be little money to be made."

Zane cocked his head to the side, "Weird though, if you predicted all this, then you should realise the money going in both sides wouldn't come close to the amount trading hands when it was you and Alexis against the Paradox brothers," he noted, "That is, unless you know something I don't?"

Like say Chazz being the representative of North Academy and his brothers going to broadcast it live to the entire world? And had already begun advertising it?

Advertisements that were hyping the shit out of Chazz? For their big play into making him a famous, successful duellist?

The odds of course still wouldn't reach the same tier as the Paradox Brothers against him and Alexis, but he also had a shit ton more money and DP to play around with now to make up for that.

"Maybe," Yarden smirked, "I'm sure there's a lot of things I know that you don't. Like, did you know Scotland was the first country in the world to allow girls to attend proper schools?"

"Is that right?" Zane snorted, throwing his catch phrase back at him. Should he sue? Can he got a saying copyrighted? "Fine, putting that aside, there's something else going on with you, that I think I'm entitled to an explanation of."

Hmm, so it was already that time huh?

Honestly, he half expected it to have come up days before now, but he supposed Dimitri was the first person Zane had seen him use them against.

"The Cyber Dark Dragons, huh?" Yarden asked.

"Yes." Zane said simply.

Well, fair enough. He wanted to pick Zane's brain anyway about an agency to represent him and handle his affairs for him.

He already had his eyes on one who'd sent him an offer after looking through them over the weekend. Gardener Agencies.