Chapter 10: Terrifying Oppression, Winning Without Fighting!

"Frost Falcon, tear apart my enemies!"

"Take the high ground, then dive down to gather energy."

Malite shouted loudly, giving orders.

As the countdown for the duel came to an end. 

Both combatants were forced to summon their monsters. Each only had one monster card, and both cards were immediately ejected and summoned into play.

A dragon-shaped creature, surrounded by lightning and shadowy weapons, slowly circled around, creating an eerie mist that enveloped the sky, exuding an overwhelming sense of oppression.

At the same time, Malite's summoned Frost Falcon followed the command and soared high into the sky.

However, upon seeing the monstrous opponent, the Frost Falcon immediately froze in mid-air, trembling uncontrollably!

It had once been brutally beaten by Dathumon and had even had its attributes drained.

Now, upon seeing the opponent, its legs went weak.

The falcon swiftly spiraled, retreating behind Malite.

"What are you doing? Attack now!"

Malite urged anxiously, but as his words left his lips, something even more surprising happened.

The Frost Falcon grew more frantic. It crouched down on Malite's shoulder, still trembling in fear!

Despite Malite's constant shouting and reprimanding, the monster card refused to move, and the more he scolded it, the more the Frost Falcon seemed desperate to flee!

Finally, in a panic, it shot towards the edge of the arena, crashing against the semi-transparent duel platform.

Thud!

With a muffled sound, the Frost Falcon was sent reeling, its head spinning as it collapsed to the ground!

The battle hadn't even begun, and Malite's monster card had already lost its fighting capability.

The students and even the tutor, Vainette, who were observing from the sidelines, were all dumbfounded.

"What is going on?"

"What's wrong with Malite's monster card?"

"Why did Frost Falcon knock itself out?"

...

Vainette and the students had only recently experienced Card Realm, so they couldn't make sense of this scene at all.

"Frost Falcon is in a state of fear. It refuses to fight the Shadow sys monster. I believe this is because the two monsters have fought before in the training area, and the strength gap between them is enormous."

"Frost Falcon must have been severely beaten before, which is why it is acting this way."

A staff member with White-tier strength was the first to understand and spoke up.

These words seemed to enlighten the students and Vainette.

"It really does seem like that."

Earlier, they had treated Card Realm like a game, thinking that the monster cards would just mindlessly attack during battles without giving much thought to the context.

But now, it seemed clear...

The Frost Falcon's posture was exactly like that of a wild animal encountering a natural predator. 

Overwhelmed with fear and panic, too terrified to resist, simply awaiting its inevitable defeat.

Once they realized this, the students and Vainette couldn't help but exchange awkward glances with Malite.

What…

This wasn't the atmosphere they had imagined.

They had scorned him, calling him shameless, and assumed he would easily defeat Moste and claim that precious monster card for himself.

In the end, just when everyone thought Malite was about to pull off something big, he ended up giving us a big disappointment instead?

His monster card... just slammed into the wall and knocked itself out?!

Forget about stealing Moste's monster card—at this rate, Moste might just defeat him and blow up his equipment!

At that moment, Malite finally realized the gravity of the situation, and his face turned an awful shade.

In online games, death doesn't mean real death, and killing isn't permanent, but losing face is definitely real!

Right now, he felt utterly humiliated!

Malite thought back to the smug look on his face earlier when he had been inwardly gloating, thinking that the other students were just delicate flowers in a greenhouse, and that he was the one with the true decisive edge…

He wished he could just dig a hole and crawl into it.

It was the height of embarrassment!

Now, he could clearly hear the scattered, mocking comments from the students below.

"I thought he was supposed to be some big shot, and this is all he's got?"

"Is Malite trying to kill us with laughter? This is too ridiculous!"

"He trained as a card apostle for a month, and even I could've done that! All he did was make his monster card perform a wall slam and self-destruct!"

The barrage of insults felt like a thousand arrows piercing through Malite's heart, causing his face to flush a deep red with shame.

Even Tutor Vainette couldn't help but chuckle. "Well, Malite, my student, how about you just concede? Looks like you won't be winning this duel…"

Vainette's kind suggestion only felt like further humiliation to Malite.

His eyes turned red with anger.

"No! I haven't lost yet!"

Grinding his teeth, he shot forward with determination.

Malite's thoughts were clear: "I'm a level 10 card apostle! My combat power is far superior to Moste, who only just got his first monster card!"

"If I just take him down, I can still win this!"

However…

Malite's optimistic thoughts were shattered the moment Moste made his move.

"Dathumon, use Dark Spikes!"

With a crackle of electricity and the surge of shadowy energy. 

The dragon-shaped smoke creature quickly conjured over a dozen sharp, deadly spikes, hurtling toward Malite!

Thud!

Thud!

Malite's face still bore the remnants of a smug grin, convinced he was about to land a sneak attack!

But everyone watching clearly saw that Malite had already been impaled by the pure black spikes, turning his body into a grotesque, bleeding mess!

The shadow energy invaded him further. 

Dissolving his flesh, corroding his internal organs, until all that remained was a desiccated skeleton, collapsing to the ground!

Victory was decided!

The semi-transparent duel platform began to shatter.

A blood-red orb of light fell into Moste's hand—it was his prize, guaranteeing at least one item from Malite's inventory would be awarded to him as a reward.

Moste casually opened the reward chest.

A dark crystal dropped into his hand.

"Damn, it actually came out!"

In the next moment, Moste's calm face was completely wiped away by a look of disbelief.

Aside from cards, Malite's backpack should've contained plenty of other items.

Moste hadn't expected to actually draw the grand prize!

To others, Raw Essence of Darkness seemed like just a regular evolution resource.

But Moste knew better—it was of premium quality!

This was the greatest stroke of luck from Malite's entire month-long journey in the game!

He was on a roll!

"With this, Dathumon's first evolution will be a lot easier!"

Moste smiled as he added the Raw Essence of Darkness to his backpack.

At that moment…

On the other side, Malite, who had revived in a flash of light, opened his backpack and his face instantly turned a deep shade of rage.

"Thank God Frost Falcon didn't drop."

"Wait, my evolution materials!"

His voice was filled with agony.

What made it worse for Malite was…

When the students heard what he said, they suddenly burst into cheers.

"Nice! Nice! Nice!"

"Great job!"

"This is how Moste should play!"

"Malite lost big time—didn't even get the monster card and also lost an evolution resource!"

"Malite deserves it! A person like him getting stronger doesn't do any of us any good!"

"Exactly, if we end up in a dungeon with him, we might just become Malite's cannon fodder. Malite, serves you right!"

Everyone wore expressions of relief as they mocked and joked.

It wasn't until quite some time had passed. 

That Tutor Vainette, with a faux-serious tone, finally spoke up.

"Alright."

"Alright."

"We're all classmates here."

"Malite may have made a few mistakes in the game, but in real life, he's still a good classmate."

"Moste, don't hold a grudge."

"I've heard that in online games, PKing for resources is pretty normal."

Vainette spoke, but the students merely nodded in a half-hearted, dismissive manner.

"You're right."

"We'll make sure to remember. We're all good classmates."

Clearly, after the incident, Malite's reputation in the class had hit rock bottom.

And let's not forget, he lost the duel!

Only Moste, with complete sincerity, nodded.

"Malite really is a good guy!"

He thought to himself.

Even with his SSS-tier talent, it would be incredibly difficult for him to acquire a premium-quality evolution resource in the early stages.

Malite…

He was definitely my good buddy!

And in the face of this situation…

Malite, who had initially intended to swallow his pride and ask Moste to buy back the evolution resource, now just gritted his teeth in frustration. His face alternated between shades of green and white, filled with rage. With a cold snort, he turned and stormed off toward the city gates.

Before he left, he shot Moste a hard, lingering glare, as if he wanted to etch his face into his memory forever.

But Moste didn't notice this at all. He was too busy right now. Just after reclaiming Dathumon, he was preparing to deal with Malite's tantrum. He didn't even realize…

The strange changes occurring in his own meditation space.