After the duel ended, Zane collapsed onto the floor, panting heavily.
It was only then that he realized he had no strength left.
He coughed violently, spitting up blood. His chest throbbed with stabbing pain, and every bone in his body felt numb, as if he'd been struck by a massive hammer. Worse than any Shadow Duel he'd ever experienced.
Lifting his head, he looked toward the fallen robber, who had passed out with the strange symbol on his forehead flickering weakly.
As Zane puzzled over this, one of the cards from the robber's Deck suddenly floated into the air and drifted toward him.
His eyes widened at the supernatural sight.
A beam of white light shot across his vision. The light formed a hand, which snatched the card midair and pulled it over to Kite, who glanced at it before setting it aside casually.
Zane took a deep breath and slowly stood with the help of a nearby counter.
"You really lucked out, interdimensional guy!" the robot rolled up to him. "If it weren't for Master Kite, you'd be dead!"
Master Kite? Dead?
What does that even mean? Zane frowned, then glanced at the robber and was shocked to see the man's face rapidly aging, hair turning stark white before his body shriveled into lifeless decay.
"What... is this?"
Clutching his chest, the stabbing pain surged again.
Strange…
It wasn't like the Shadow Games fought against the Shadow Riders, yet the damage was real. Even worse than fighting spirits or the Shadow Riders.
"Numbers inhabit the souls of humans," Kite explained, stepping forward, his face cold.
That brief statement was enough for Zane to piece things together.
The robot quickly filled in the details. "Number" cards were special monsters from their dimension. They amplified the desires in people's hearts, granting supernatural power but also controlling the users. The man Zane had just fought was a "Number Hunter," an agent from their world named Amaki Kite, also known as the emissary of Galaxy-Eyes.
This time, Kite had come because their leader reported that a Number user had accidentally slipped into another dimension.
"Amaki?" Zane muttered. He didn't care much about the rest.
What mattered was this: Number monsters were dangerous entities, like the Sacred Beasts, and dueling against them was inherently a Shadow Duel. No wonder it was so painful.
But the name "Amaki" stuck in his mind.
At first, he hadn't made any connections. This man named Amaki Kite looked nothing like Amaki Hikaru. But after hearing the name spoken, he couldn't help but feel a faint resemblance.
Back in the S-Dimension, they had encountered someone who looked exactly like Celina. Maybe this guy was another counterpart of Hikaru?
Thinking of Hikaru made Zane sigh with a bitter smile.
Hikaru had repeatedly told him to reflect on what he truly wanted. Zane had avoided deep introspection until now. Seeing his Cyber Dragons stolen and turned against him over and over, with death looming over him, it finally became clear.
Victory.
The ultimate goal of a duelist is always victory.
Some people simply don't deserve respect.
As a senior, as a veteran, he'd realized it far too late.
He held his forehead.
"You look like you're in pain," Kite glanced at him, then turned to his robot. "Orbital 7."
"Yes, Master Kite!" Orbital 7 zipped over, opened a compartment in its body, and extended a mechanical arm, offering Zane a strange capsule.
Without hesitation, Zane grabbed it and swallowed it dry.
"Consider that payment for helping me hunt this Number," Kite said offhandedly.
The medicine worked quickly. Zane finally felt the pain subside and took a long, relieved breath.
Kite stood in silence, deep in thought.
Normally, after retrieving a Number, he'd head home immediately to check on his beloved little brother, Haruto.
But not today.
This duel, both the robber and Zane had revealed something terrifying.
The former showed that Numbers could appear in other dimensions.
The latter proved that even interdimensional duelists could, under the influence of Numbers, tap into the multidimensional network to perform Xyz Summons.
Put together, the answer was obvious.
Numbers could exist in other dimensions too.
Kite rubbed his temples.
This meant his job as a Number Hunter might now extend not just across space, but across infinite dimensions.
He glanced at Zane, who was still catching his breath and reorganizing his Deck.
Thinking it over, Kite started explaining how Numbers might appear in other dimensions. Orbital 7 elaborated further, and Zane's relief quickly turned to dread.
"Looks like we have a lot to discuss," Zane forced himself to sit straighter. "Let's talk seriously."
It couldn't be helped.
Kite nodded.
His job couldn't be made public. The Numbers were an issue of his world. His father, Dr. Faker, and Mr. Shinson had told him: only by hunting Numbers could he cure Haruto's illness. He couldn't let them remain in other dimensions.
In that case, finding an "ally" in other dimensions was crucial.
And through their duel, Kite could tell Zane was no lunatic. Quite the opposite. As a duelist, he was as pure and determined as they come, perhaps even purer now than before.
As the strongest duelist of his world, Kite trusted his judgment.
Perhaps it was the shared surname "Amaki." Perhaps it was the duelist spirit in Zane. Perhaps it was the fact that both had younger brothers. Whatever the reason, the two hit it off surprisingly well. Zane even mentioned a younger duelist named "Amaki Hikaru."
"A Fusion-only duelist? Ha! Master Kite is skilled in all summoning methods!"
"Shut up, Orbital 7."
"Y-Yes, Master!"
Amaki Hikaru…
Kite remembered.
A student who dueled in their dimension last year, wasn't he?
Someone that pure, he could respect that. After all, though Kite was the strongest, he had also discarded his trust in monsters, using them purely as tools for victory to save his brother.
In the end, Kite gave Zane several generic Xyz support cards and left him a dimensional communicator to contact him anytime. Then, after dropping Zane at Neo Domino City's hospital, he returned to his own dimension.
Zane lay in his hospital bed, staring at the ceiling. He pulled out his newly rebuilt Deck and grinned widely.
Hikaru, thanks for reminding me so many times.
My dueling wasn't pure enough after all.
Speaking of which... wasn't there also an "Over Cyber Style" variant?
His thoughts wandered, not just about himself, but about Numbers, about Cyberdark, about the Academy, about the pro dueling scene, and about what kind of gift he'd prepare for the next time he met Amaki Hikaru.
Thinking and thinking, fatigue finally dragged him into sleep.
Meanwhile, in another dimension far removed—the Skyscraper World—Celina had just finished her own duel.
She was gleefully hugging a Duel Spirit, rubbing her head affectionately against it.
It was a giant panda, Flowpunch Panda. Honestly, not that relevant to her Deck, but as the highest-grade Beast-Warrior Duel Spirit she could find in this world, it was pretty good.
At least now, Hikaru figured, if Celina got ambushed, she'd have some protection. No more helpless brainwashing like in the original timeline.
Even so, he still wasn't fully reassured.
After all, Yubel was coming.
And on top of that, Celina was still being targeted by Sera's Fusion Army. She could get captured and brainwashed at any moment.
This wasn't enough.
They'd need to build a dimensional gate inside the Fusion Club headquarters soon and help Celina gather more Duel Spirits for protection.