This story is centered more around my 4 OCs, the cast of the Yu-Gi-Oh! Anime do have important roles, and will communicate with the OCs. I always liked reading dueling fics that are crossovers so you see how other characters duel, but I couldn't think of a crossover I really wanted to do, so I made my own characters.

The story takes place after the Ceremonial Duel between Yugi and Yami, so there will be no Yami versions of the characters in this fic, the antagonists are all original.

I welcome constructive criticism, so feel free to give your honest opinions.

Disclaimer: I do not own Yu-Gi-Oh! This story is purely fan fiction.

Invitations Part 1: The Fire of New York City

In New York City...

Without much warning that day, one 17-year-old would get a letter with incredible news, and her name was Annie Erild. Standing at 5 foot 8, she wasn't too tall or too short, just the perfect height in her opinion, and her features were nothing to laugh at. With smooth, lightly tan skin, bright blue eyes, semi-curly light brown hair (of which she usually had in a half-to-the-side ponytail), beautifully done make-up, and designer wardrobe, this girl brought a whole new style to Duel Monsters. While walking back to her parents' apartment from the building's mail room, she couldn't help but tear open the envelope stamped with the official Kaiba Corp. insignia. She read the entire thing twice while in the elevator, the second time was to make sure she wasn't dreaming.

Dear Miss Erild, Annabelle,

As you may know, next month is the first official Duel Monsters World Championship, the tournament that will declare the world's greatest duelist. As the holder of the Northeastern United States Regional title, as well as the New England Champion Duelist title, you are hereby granted a place in this tournament. If, for whatever reason, you are not interested in participating, please contact us immediately by our Customer Service number, or E-mail, otherwise your plane ticket, tournament entry pass, as well as your travel instructions will arrive within the next couple weeks. I hope to see you next month in Domino City.

Sincerely, Seto Kaiba

Annie practically squealed with joy at the letter while simultaneously texting her best friends the grand news. She knew every challenge up till now was to prepare her for this championship; She was going to take the World Champion title just like she took the New England title only one year ago. She remembered that final duel like it was yesterday.

There she stood, in the New York City duel stadium, with hundreds of people watching as she stepped up to the dueling field, her duel disk ready for action. A slightly younger boy stood across from her, and in Annie's perspective, the last thing standing between her and that trophy.

The referee shouted, "Begin!" while the two duelists declared the familiar words, "Let's Duel!"

Annie (4000) / Boy (4000)

"I'll start," declared the boy, "And I'll Summon my Giant Rat (1400/1450) to the field in attack position!" he called out while a massive, dark-furred rat screeched.

"Gross..." she said with little enthusiasm, "Know what I say about rodents like that? Crush 'um. And that's just what I'm about to do, cause I'm summoning my Fire Kraken (1600/1500) in attack as well." the flaming squid-like creature appeared while Annie placed the card onto her duel disk, "Now... destroy that rat for me."

The duel monster opened its beak-like mouth and exhaled a wave of fire with incinerated the rodent monster, dropping the duelist's life points to 3800.

"My monster might be destroyed, but his effect will let me summon another monster in his place, so long as its an Earth monster with 1500 attack points or less."

"Lot of good that will do." she remarked, while checking her nails as if she were bored with the duel already.

"Maybe you wont be so cocky when I pick my monster. I'm special summoning Chu-Ske the Mouse Fighter (1200/0) to the field."

"I'm shaking..."

"Well you will be, cause now I have a monster to tribute, and I can summon my Twinheaded Beast (1700/1900)." the boy gave a grin while his two-headed flaming beast rose from the hologram.

"At least it isn't a rat this time." she remarked.

"Joke all you want, but this monster's going to take down your life points! I'll equip him with the Beast Fangs magic card, raising his attack to 2000, and now he'll destroy your monster."

The two headed monster charged Annie's kraken and ripped through it with brute force, dropping her life points to 3600.

"And he can attack twice per battle phase. Your life points are about to drop even further." The monster struck her directly, and her life points fell even more, stabilizing at 1600. "Not so strong now, are ya!"

"Oh, and our competitor, Annie, took a big hit to her life points, but she doesn't seem to be phased at all!" called the announcer.

"Please, try trash talking someone you can actually beat. Now, since it's my turn again, I'll play a magic card called Chosen One. Basically, I choose three cards from my hand, one monster, and two non-monsters," As she explained the details, a strange spinning top appeared, and three cards faced down circled the top. "Now, you have to pick one, if its the monster, I can special summon it, if it isn't, all three are destroyed.

With a bit of nervousness, the duelist picked the card to his left, revealing a magic card, Dragonic Tactics. "Ha! Too bad for you." he matter-of-factly grinned.

"Who said I wanted you to pick the monster?" the brunette gave a cheeky smile while crossing her arms. Annie had her opponent exactly where she wanted him.

"What!"

"Yup, you see, the monster I'll be sending to the Graveyard with my two spell cards is called Darkblaze Dragon. I'm going to use Monster Reborn to bring him back from the grave. And when he is special summoned this way, his attack and defense double. (2400/2000)" With the help of the magic card, a large black and red dragon with four wings rose to the field with a loud roar, causing some of the audience to "ooh" and "ahh".

"Oh crap..."

"You bet your duel disk, 'Oh crap,' because I still have a normal summon, so welcome my Divine Dragon Ragnarok (1500/1000)." Alongside her Darkblaze Dragon rose another dragon, this one white in color with lighting around its body.

"Double crap..."

"Now Darkblaze Dragon, eliminate the competition." With the order, black flames immediately poured from the dragon, engulfing the twin-headed beast and taking 400 more life points out of Annie's opponent. "And just so you know, when Darkblaze Dragon destroys a monster, you take more damage based on the attack of your monster." 2000 more points came from his life points, leaving him with only 400 left. "And now that you're wide open, my Divine Dragon can attack as well."

Just like that the duel was over.

"And the winner is... Annie Erild!" declared the referee, and the crowd cheered.

Annie simply smiled white nonchalantly rubbing her nail against her sleeve to shine it.

The duel was a piece of cake, not because the opponent's were pushovers, (although that didn't stop Annie from thinking they were), she had the skills of a world class duelist. Duels came easy to her, and she assured herself already that the trophy and World Champion title were hers.

9

Short Chapter, Just an introduction so sorry if it feels like its running fast. Believe me I plan to take a lot of time with this, and the plot goes through several fun changes, I've planned it all out... mostly...

So of the 4 Originals, your first is Annie... Let me know what you think of her. Even though she is the first of my OCs to make an appearance, she isn't the "Main Character" more than the other 3. All 4 will be sharing the importance, though I may make certain ones star during certain points of the story.

Fun Fact: (Every chapter I'll have a fun fact or two about the story written here. There will always be at least 1 fact per chapter, and it's meant to give you some back story on characters as well as the writing of the fiction.)

I originally wanted to have the story take place before Atem leaves Yugi, but after the Waking the Dragons Arc; however, there's virtually no time period where that could happen, as the anime's timeline just doesn't have space in between the arcs at that point, so I had to change it to after Atem left.

Annie was the first character I named, designed, and created, but the last character I built a deck for (of the main 4 I mean). I did, however, know I wanted her to have a lot of FIRE monsters as soon as I finished creating her. There's your first hint to her deck, but she has more than just that up her sleeve.