. . . Seriously, I have no idea what inspired me to write this, but I was listening to "Apologize," by OneRepublic and Timbaland at the time.

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Mahado sat alone under the tree where Mana and his Pharaoh Atemu use to play around, on, and at one point under—literally—at a point certain point in their lives. The Priest knew what he was seeing was no more than a faint memory he had casted a spell on to visit the place, but he didn't enjoy his destiny and had to find comfort in the weirdest of ways. "I remember when Mana, the Pharaoh, and I all tripped and fell into that little pond over there together," The Priest grinned to himself as he thought of that very day, then suddenly sighed and shook his head slowly back forth.

"I need to stop talking—" The High Priest looked down shamefully. "To myself. . ." He finished then looked up at the sunset he was making with his memories and his spell he casted. "Ah," He said happily. "My favorite time of day," He chuckled lightly. "'Hi, Master!' 'AH! Oh, Mana. It's you. Heh.' 'Ha-ha! I scared you again,'" The Priest was apparently recalling something from before, then anime sweat dropped as he realized he had said that out loud.

"I seriously need to stop doing that," He then growled in frustration. "I SERIOUSLY NEED TO—!" He yelled jumping to his feet, then looked down and began to cry. "Why?" The Priest whispered to no one. "Why did I choose this destiny?"

He began to cry harder and so the scene around him faded into the bright white lights of his sleeping tablet where he forced himself to dream again. He was waiting. He was waiting for his Pharaoh to call upon him. Waiting and waiting to be 'alive' again in the world he once knew that had changed so much since his leave.

Suddenly, the sleeping mage was engulfed into a blue, purple, and indigo swirled ball and lifted by it like a bubble full of air. 'Finally,' The depressed mage thought to himself slightly happier than he was a moment ago. 'My Pharaoh is summoning me," The bubble had burst while he was inside it with a flash or green and mysteriously ended with a vivid, plum purple burst before his eyes.

The magician must have known immediately that something was wrong. He was use to be being summoned to the field in a more fetal or ready-for-battle position, but why was he laying down on some sort of cold floor? A chill went up than back down his spine as he realized something was wrong. His clothes weren't tight to start things off, his armor wasn't as light as it was a bit earlier, and his hat was way too light—not to mention he felt like he weighed a ton and wasn't sure how to move or open his eyes.

He heard voices. One voice sounded like his Pharaoh, the other one sounded like a slightly more sinister version of Priest Seto's voice, one was a young boy's voice, another was a slightly older boy's voice, and another one he heard sounded so familiar, but he just couldn't put his finger on it—that is, if he could move any of his fingers. 'Pharaoh?' Mahado asked in his mind as he tried to get his lips to move, but to no avail.



After a few moments of echoing voices in many different emotions at once, Mahado finally made his voice come out—for real, because before he was just talking out loud in his mind. "Pharaoh?" His voice asked surprisingly light compared to what he, himself, had expected to come out. All at once the voices became clearer to him.

"Mahado?" Asked a soft, proud voice he recognized. "My pharaoh," I replied and I hadn't even opened my eyes yet.

"Mahado, is that you?"

"You remember me, Pharaoh?"

"Yes, Mahado," The mage's Pharaoh replied. "I have gained back all of my memories now and Yugi had revived me from the afterlife," The mage struggled to open his eyes, finally he had managed and waited for his eyes to adjust. Kneeling beside him was his Pharaoh dressed in his High School Uniform, but no puzzle was around his neck at all. And, next to his pharaoh was little Yugi who was wearing the same exact thing as Atemu.

Standing behind his Pharaoh was Kaiba—who looked like Priest Seto's clone—and he was standing with his right side facing Mahado, Atemu, and Yugi with his head turned the opposite way and his arms crossed. "How is this even possible?" The reincarnated Priest with dagger glaring blue eyes asked no one for the hundredth time.

Mokuba was soon also by Mahado. "Who are you?" The little boy asked. The High Priest looked up at him with dazed, slow eyes. "I. . . I am Mahado Ishtar," Came the only reply as his eyes almost gave out and closed up on him.

To the side where Kaiba was looking was a horrified Arkana sitting on his knees, holding his mouth with both hands—obviously as though not to scream, and crying like crazy. He was so scared to see how real his Dark Magician was, though it had come to them into a newer form it—the mage—was alive. Arkana was horrified, shocked, sorry, and sympathetic all at the same time.

The mage Arkana sat by was wearing almost the exact same outfit Mahado was, but it was made of red material and the metal this mage wore for his shoulder pads, helmet, and belt was different from the Priest's as well, for that part was made of silver and not gold. Another key difference was the amount of metal bands around his arms—Mahado had twelve total and this mage had only ten total.

The hair of the strange mage was a silver-grey color and his tan was darker than Mahado's own. The limbs of his arms were only a little longer than Mahado's by an inch or two, so the mage could reach a bit higher than the Priest. If you looked close enough and payed good enough attention you might notice one of his canine teeth was on top of his chapped bottom lip—it was actually quite sharp, too, but not vampire like even still.



Arkana finally found himself laying himself to the floor as if preparing for a tornado to hit him and suck him away. "I'm sorry," His little voice—he didn't say it very loud, kay?—begged out for forgiveness, as it was filled with the pure sadness and shame as if he'd just let one of his own children die.

The strange mage's plum eyes opened suddenly in a violent manner.