Disclaimer: I do not own Yugioh and never have.

"blah" speaking

/blah/ thinking

'blah' telepathic speaking

[blah] author's notes

(blah) side info.

Blah flashbacks/dreams

This is my first Yugioh story so please be nice!

Mana looked up at the elegant building she and many other Dark magical students were assembled in front of. It was to be their school until they were either chosen to be taught one on one, or until they completed the ten year program. She was nervous, but not overly so, as she was very excited for the first day of school. The part of the Shadow Realm she was in was quite nice and not as creepy as the few times she had been in the realm as a human.

/I wonder if Master Mahaado teaches here? / Mana wondered silently, looking around now at her fellow students. They, for the most part, wore dark colored clothes, and none of them had a wand, except for a few older looking spell casters. She saw a particularly nervous looking kid, and decided to say hello. "Hi, my name is Mana, what's yours?"

"My name is Marlius. How long have you been going to the academy? This is my first year here." Marlius replied quietly. He didn't know what to make of the strangely dressed blonde.

"This is my first year here too. I wonder what they'll be teaching us." Mana answered, and then asked "Where are you from Marlius?"

"I am from the Dark Forest, Where are you from?" Marlius responded.

"I'm not exactly sure; I was really young when… Someone found me and… It's a long, tangled story. Why do you ask if I've been here before Marius?" Mana asked curiously.

"Well you have a wand, usually only the students in 6th year and above have them. How'd you get it?" Marius asked, completely unaware of the pain his innocent question had caused.

Mana flinched, she knew her master was alive and in this realm, but the pain of loosing him when it was shown on the tablet that he had lost to Bakura still lingered in her mind and would so remain until she found him safe and happy. "It's… It's a long story." Mana replied, trying to hide her misty emerald eyes from Marius. A young Magician's Valkyrie, however, saw her wet eyes and decided to demand why the young trainee had hurt a fellow female spell caster.

"HEY! Leave her alone!" The Valkyrie shouted as she came over.

Marius blinked a couple times in confusion and defended himself "But I haven't done anything mean to her! I don't think I've said anything to hurt her feelings either, intentionally at any rate!"

The Valkyrie was about to rely when Mana cut in, "It's not his fault, he didn't know a certain question would hurt. What is your name by the way?"

"I am Masha." Masha replied, then turned and asked Marius, "What is your name?"

"Marius, nice to meet you." Marius replied politely.

The front doors opened and they were allowed inside. The three separated in search of their first class. Mana's was, to her amusement, a language class that they were required to take, as the more advanced spells were written solely in that language, Ancient Egyptian. [I'm going call this class from now on Egyptian because I'm kind of lazy that way] Mana went in to the class room door and found her name on the middle desk in the front row. The other students filled in and she wondered what exactly they were going to be taught first.

"Good Morning!" The teacher said cheerfully, "You may call me Mr. Matir, I am your Egyptian language teacher. Get your books from underneath your desks and read chapter one, then once you finish do these worksheets that have answers in the first chapter.

The class did as they were told. Mana read the chapter, and found it to be… Unenlightening, she knew what the stuff was and after twenty minutes of reading the chapter, she grabbed the worksheets. The words and sentences were basic Egyptian and not hard to decipher, nor was it hard for her to translate from English to Egyptian either. She had four worksheets to do, how ever easy they were, it was repetitious and boring so it took her about another fifteen minutes to complete the worksheets as there were many of the same variations of words and sentences on the pages. After she turned in the work, she looked around and noticed to her surprise that she was the only one done. Further more everyone else was still reading the chapter. Sighing, wondering what she was supposed to do for the next forty five minutes until the class was over or until everyone else had finished.

Everyone else finished at varying times, the last couple about five minutes before the class was over. Mana reflected on how she had come to attend the school she was at.

Mana saw a Kuriboh being taunted by a couple of Dark Elves. She ran in front of them demanding to know why they were harming an innocent creature. One of them replied "Why should we be nice to such a pathetic creature? We see no reason, so we amuse ourselves with it. What ARE you anyways? I bet you're just as pathetic as the creature you are protecting."

"The "creature" is called a Kuriboh, and you shouldn't under estimate someone you've never seen before!" Mana retorted, angered by their words. In reply the trio attacked her. She used a spell her master taught her, Mirror force, and neither her, nor the Kuriboh she was protecting was harmed. She lowered the barrier briefly only to get attacked again. She reacted instinctively and blasted the three of them with a Dark Burning Attack that sent the three into the Graveyard.

Just then, a strangely dressed Magician ran over to her and demanded "How did you know how to do that!!" A couple of times, but she didn't say a word and was dragged to the academy. She was locked up in one of the dormitories for a couple days and was let out, provided that she attends classes and not try to run away.

Mana sighed at the memory. They had let her out of the academy briefly, but there were guards at the gate that led to the school. /Then again, there's a good chance that Master is here. –sigh- He was such a wonderful teacher, I miss him so much!/ She left the room, still thinking, rather than paying attention to her surroundings, which was how she bumped into someone. She fell to the floor and looked up at the tall, muscular student "I'm sorry for running into you! I didn't mean to, I just wasn't looking properly."

"That is all right. I wasn't paying attention either. My name is Maticul, what it yours?" Maticul replied cheerfully, offering a hand to help her up.

Mana noticed in his other hand he held a staff similar to her Master's ka. "My name is Mana. I'm new here, do you know where the… Umm… Where did it… Yay! I found it! Let me see… The training field is?"

Then before he could answer her question, she was accosted by several girls all of whom tackled her to the floor. "How dare you try and hurt him! He is the best trainee mage in the school!" They said a couple other hurtful things, but did not notice when the subject of their protection helped up the person they had accosted had fled the scene. When they did notice, they shrugged and went on their way.

Meanwhile, Maticul showed Mana to the training grounds. "How long have you been going here Mana? Few students below 6th year have training staffs, but from the way you act, this is the first time you've ever been in this place."

"Well, technically this is my second time in this place, but I was locked up in one of the dorm rooms for the entire time. That was about three or four days, I think… But I have the "pleasure" of coming to this school. This is my first year here. As to why I have a wand, that I one of my secrets." Man replied bitterly. "I was attacked and defended myself and because I was the stronger than my three opponents, the teacher came over and locked me up here. He didn't even ask if I was doing anything. He just put a spellbinding circle on me and dragged me here."

"Why were you attacked, and what were you doing before you were being attacked?" Maticul asked curiously.

Mana smiled brightly, almost blindingly up at Maticul, "Did you know that those are a couple of the few questions no one has asked me and that I would most likely answer? I was protecting a Kuriboh that was being tortured by the three. As to what I was doing, I … I was searching for someone. I know that he is somewhere in the Shadow Realm, but I have no idea where, so I decided to look for that person." A touch of sadness entered her voice at the last statements.

"I'm sure you'll find the one you seek sooner or later. Come on, the training grounds are right over there. 'Bye and good luck!" Maticul responded in farewell. The two parted and Mana entered the open air court yard. She came over to where her classmates were clustered around a table.

The instructor was handing out practice wands and, noticing that Mana had her own, came over after handing out wands to the rest of the class, came over and asked "Where did you get that wand?"

Mana reflexively gripped her wand tighter, "Someone close to me."

"Give it to me. I need to check if it is fit for what you are going to be doing." The teacher demanded a touch haughtily in Mana's opinion.

The haughtiness, and the tone in which the instructor used in ordering her, made Mana very reluctant to obey him. "What are we doing today? Perhaps if you tell me I can prove that this wand is fine for the job."

Before the instructor could respond, a second teacher came over and addressed her fellow teacher…In less than polite terms, in Egyptian too. "Hey Lunatic! This is the special case! Her wand is battle grade; all of us teachers were told that, which is why we have our battle staffs if she tries anything!"

Mana completely understood what the teacher had said, but from the clueless looks of her classmates, she was the only one to have understood. Mana considered spooking the teachers with the knowledge of her native tongue, or keeping quiet about it and possibly gaining more information, via the teachers without them knowing it. She decided to go with the latter option, as her knowing Egyptian that well would have taken a lot of explaining that she really didn't want to do. "Hi!" She called to the other students quietly, "How long have you been here?"

"Four years." The class responded in unison. Mana blinked in surprise. /why, if I am a first year student, am I in a fourth year class? /

"You must be very talented to have gotten into this class. It's the advanced one." One student noted.

Before Mana could respond, their instructor came over and told them "We are practicing the Levitating Charm today. I know that you have done this charm before, but as this is the first day, I thought some review would be in order. Let's see how long you can hold a levitating charm on one of those stones. There is enough for one each. Get one and get started."

Mana sighed internally, but did as she was bid. Levitating was hard for long periods of time, as Mana found out, but she was glad for the challenge in endurance. About half the class lasted for about forty minutes, and the rest (except for Mana) lasted twenty more minutes after that. Five minutes later, Mana's rock shakily went down onto the floor and Mana swayed slightly and shook her head, trying to clear it. She noticed, after a bit, that her classmates were staring at her in shock. "What?" She asked, everyone else but her noticing the exhaustion in her voice.

"That's the longest anyone in this class has levitated an object." One classmate answered.

A second asked, "Just who are you and where did you come from?"

Mana smiled sweetly through the exhaustion, but noted that darkness seemed to be eating at the edges of her vision / Odd./ She thought /I wonder why that is happening. / Her mouth formed words, and her smile intensified "I am from Thebes, Khemet. I am Mana." With that, the darkness claimed her as the class exploded around her, a thousand, thousand questions raining on her beleaguered frame.

"Move away. All of you!" Ordered the teacher, rushing forwards. "She used too much of her magic. Someone needs to get her to the infirmary!"

"I will!" Volunteered one of the students and picked up the unconscious Mana.

As he left, another student asked "What manner of creature is she? I've never seen anything quite like her before."

"None of you would have. She is the first, and last as far as we can tell, of her race." The teacher answered cryptically.

"But what is she?" Another student asked, reiterating the question, impatient for the answer.

"She won't tell us. She's very determined about something though. But what, that is what we teachers are trying to figure out. She is young, strong in magic and will, and won't tell anyone who she is, where she comes from, and where she learned magic." The teacher answered.

The fourth year student passed by a tall, tanned man, who was waiting for the headmaster (The Dark Sage) to let him in. The student didn't noticed the man, as he was concentrating on not falling over and finding the infirmary, as he had only been in the place once a couple of years ago. The man noticed the unconscious girl in the young one's arms and froze slightly. / Could that be? No… No, it can't be! She was safe when… But what does that mean? What happened? Calm down, just calm down. It's not her, just someone who looks like her… And has her magical strength./ The man was let into the office, but his thoughts were on the girl.

Dan Keto was in the infirmary as a fourth year student came in and deposited a blond girl that he had never seen before in the school. "Who is she?"

"A new girl in my class. We were levitating rocks for as long as we could. He lasted sixty five minutes, and then collapsed after placing her rock down. She called herself Mana, I think. She was speaking in a different language when we asked her some questions. The language seemed familiar, but I don't quite recognize it." The student informed the doctor.

"Ah, well she was very tired and was probably speaking in her native language." Dan replied. "She will be safe here. You may return to your class." The student left and the healer turned to the resting magician-in-training. He did several diagnostic spells and found that she was rapidly recovering. Her rate of recovery, if it held steady at the pace it was, she would be fully recovered in about an hour and awake in another twenty after that.

Dan Keto went into his office to do some paperwork that he was almost finished with. He was nearly completed when he heard a squeak of terror from the other room. Moving swiftly he checked the room for any sign of trouble. Everything was fine, but he heard a voice, soft with fear cry out in Egyptian "NO! Why, why did that evil thief best you? How did he…"

Seeing no one else in the room, Dan Keto looked at his patient. She seemed to be in a terrible nightmare, so he walked over and gently woke her up. Her reaction was rather unorthodox. When he lightly tapped her on her shoulder she flew up out of the bed, onto the ceiling and sent an attack his way, before she even opened her eyes. He easily avoided the blow, but was surprised by its strength. Her robes marked her as a first year, yet the blast was at a fifth year level at the very least.

When she fully opened her eyes she noticed that he was wearing healer's robes and blushed. "Sorry for attacking you Master Healer, but your magical aura was a powerful and unknown one to me and I reacted on instinct. Please forgive me Master Healer."

She spoke well, quite well for a young one her age. Most were more relaxed in their speech around everyone except for leaders, as they were expected, yet she was more formal. He had researched in the school archives about her. Her name was Mana, she was powerfully magical, and that was about all they knew of her. Dan thought /Mana is a name from Khemet, and she spoke in Egyptian as only a native could, I know I have treated a few. That poor young dragoness and that powerful magician were both very low on magic and had been attacked repeatedly. I wonder what has happened to her to make her that jumpy around strangers? / He thought with some melancholy. "Of course I forgive you young one, it was a reflex that you attacked. You don't have to tell me, but what has happened in your life so that your body reacts in that way? I won't tell anyone, I promise."

"You know the recent war between Pharaoh Atem and Thief King Bakura? Well… I was there. I was the apprentice of one of Pharaoh's Guardians and his most powerful sorcerer. He…He fell to the thief king's Diabound… He fused with his ka, and became, well he could protect Atem forever." A small, sad smile graced her lips, "I wanted to help, so I did, I summoned my ka later in the war and my magic was almost gone, but the thief king was relentless. So with my remaining energy I fused with my ka. I battled as much as I could, but a blast from Zorc got me... And I woke up here. But I knew that we won, or no one would be alive right now, Zorc wanted to destroy the shadow realm and Earth. Please don't tell anyone. I'm searching for him, master, or I was until I was imprisoned in this place." Bitterness was interjected at the end of her talk, "All they have done since they forced me here is ask me questions, and I won't answer any of them, never, they can't keep me in here forever." Her green eyes were darkened with anger, and scowled at the memories.

Dan Keto was startled Blends were rare, very rare, and usually quite powerful, as she could attest. "Well, as you are fine now, you may go to your next class. So you know where to go?"

Mana looked at her piece of paper and read out "Magical history class. It says it is in the blue corridor. Do you know what that means?"

Dan smiled, "Yes, but it is rather far from here. Another student going in that direction is in here and recovered as well. Maticul, would you please escort Mana to her class, it is also in Blue corridor."