Get Your Game On!

"So, I hear that you want my help with improving your deck." Clay walked over to Alexis as he saw her walk in. She had an annoyed look on her face as he spoke, but he chose to ignore it and continue. "To know how I can improve your deck, I am going to need to have a look through it."

Clay held out his hand to ask for her cards, which although reluctantly, she did oblige in giving away. The two moved to one of the tables inside the store and began looking through the deck, listing strategies that could be used in the deck and what should or shouldn't be removed.

"Looking through your deck I am picking up a theme. Most of your monsters are female warriors. If you want, I can recommend some cards that will fit with the theme you're doing, or I can completely re-vamp your deck, making it almost unrecognizable from what it used to be."

Clay gave two choices to Alexis; this was after all her deck so she should get the final say on what sort of direction the deck would take. He gave her some time to think about it and walked around the shop once more, picking us some booster packs here or there and putting them down before thinking about buying them.

Five minutes passed and Clay walked back to the table to get the answer from Alexis.

"I don't want to lose my deck. I put my all into making this deck and I don't intend to use a different one. If you can show me some cards that will help my deck grow, then I will be grateful." Her frustrated attitude was gone, her words filled with conviction instead of judgement or frustration.

"Sure, I can do that. Now, you know how to ritual summon a monster don't you?" I knew exactly what cards I would add to her deck. Alexis had used a group of cards in the anime, yet currently they weren't in her deck, so I had the idea to just speed this development up and improve on it.

"Of course, we learned about ritual monsters the other week." Confirming her proficiency in the summoning method, Alexis had a look of confusion on her face.

"I know what sort of monsters I am going to have you add to your deck." Clay walked to the front desk and asked to look at the catalogue for the cards he was searching for. He also asked the young store clerk to look for any cards sharing the name 'Cyber Angel' or 'Machine Angel'.

After a few minutes the clerk came back carrying a small group of cards, some spell cards, the other blue monster cards, the signature look for ritual monsters. He instantly bought them right then and there, not even bothering to get Alexis' opinion on the cards as he knew she would like the cards.

Carrying the cards back, Alexis caught a glance at them and gave a questioning look at Clay. He didn't give an answer and just handed the cards in his hand to her and made her look through them.

As she read her eyes widened, noticing how powerful the effects of these cards were. Any one of these monsters were enough to change the tide of battle yet there was a whole series of them.

"Where did you get these cards? How much did they cost?" Sparkles were in her eyes as she looked like she had found a treasure that she would never let go.

"The cost doesn't matter, I recently acquired a large sum of DP, so just consider them as a gift for the upcoming duel." Not bothering to explain that they were actually very expensive, even for his large amount of money, Clay decided to play it cool.

"You're just giving these to me? Why, I haven't done anything for you?" Even though Alexis appreciated the gift, nothing ever came free in the world, nothing. There had to be a catch to this, she just didn't know what.

"Actually, I'm giving them to you so that you can help me in the future. Don't ask me about what I mean by 'The future', just know that one day I will call for you and I would like you to be there to help me." Clay wouldn't elaborate on this any further and got down to the nitty gritty of making changes in Alexis' deck to accommodate these new cards.

-----

By the end of the school day Alexis and Clay had finished the modifications to her deck and decided to call it a day. Alexis needed to practice with her new cards, and she would use Jasmine and Mindy for that.

Clay on the other hand walked over to the Slifer Dorm to meet with his friends. He hadn't seen Jaden and Syrus for a while now and he was starting to miss the two of them. It didn't take long for him to reach the old dorm, but when he knocked on the door no one answered him.

'Strange, are they still at school? No, Jaden wouldn't want to stay there for longer than he has to, so where would they be?' After thinking for a minute, Clay came up with an answer. He ran down to the cliff near the dorm and found the two he was searching for.

The two were in the middle of a duel, Syrus having his Steam Gyroid out on the field and Jaden having his Elemental Hero Clayman on the field in defense mode.

Steam Gyroid: Atk 2200 Def 1600

"Are you ready Sy, I activate the spell card Polymerization, fusing the Clayman on the field and the Sparkman in my hand to fusion summon, Elemental Hero Thunder Giant!" Dark clouds surrounded the sky and yellow lightning flashed in the air.

Elemental Hero Thunder Giant: Atk 2400 Def 1500

A large man with a large chest floated down to the ground. Thunder Giant was an impressive monster; his size was huge, and his effect wasn't half bad either.

"When Elemental Hero Thunder Giant is summoned, I'm allowed to target on monster on the field who has less attack than my Thunder Giant's attack points. Say goodbye to your Steam Gyroid!" Jaden declared his target and Thunder Giant began charging his ability to fire.

Moments later the ability had charged, and it was released towards the train monster. A dust cloud erupted and after it settled, there was no more Steam Gyroid where it used to stand.

"And you want to know the best part about this, since that is only his special ability, I can still attack you directly. Go, Thunder Giant!" Jaden declared the attack and Thunder Giant charged for Syrus, reeling back his fist to deliver a devastating punch.

Jaden: 3200

Syrus: 0

"Nooo!" Syrus cried out, having lost once more to Jaden. He kept hesitating when playing his cards, so Jaden decided that he should duel a bunch to give his friend his confidence back.

"Hey guys, sweet duel." Clay walked down to the two after the duel had finished, not wanting to distract either of them. He walked up to Syrus and pat him on the shoulder. "Don't worry, you'll win next time, I'm sure."

Seeing the smile on Clay's face Syrus perked up a bit. Getting any kind of encouragement helped the poor boy, and hearing it from one of his best friends and greatest duelist besides his brother he knew, it meant a lot.

"Hey Clay, what are you doing here? Don't you have a duel to practice for?" Jaden ran over when he saw his friend arriving. He had been worried ever since he had stopped coming to class for some reason, then when he asked Dr. Crowler why he wasn't showing up he said that he had an important duel to focus on.

"Actually, that's why I'm here. I was hoping that I could duel the both of you to help me prepare as much as I could." Having made a new deck Clay wanted to test it out immediately, but he didn't have anyone to test it with.

He also realized that he hadn't duel either of his friends before, so this gave him the perfect opportunity to do both of those things. He was really pumped to duel Jaden as well, knowing how good he was with his Hero deck made Clay excited just thinking about the duel.

"Heck yeah! I'm ready to duel when you are." Jaden with his ever-ready attitude ran a distance away and proceeded to ready his duel disk. "Let's go Clay, get your game on!"

A smile appeared on Clay's face as he too got his duel disk ready. Syrus ran to the side so as to not get in the way of the duel and cheered both of them on. With nothing stopping them, they began the duel.

Clay: 4000

Jaden: 4000