Author's Notes:

I was aiming for a once-per-week updating schedule, but I missed last week. I'm terribly sorry for that, and I'll try to do better with this schedule from now on. Thanks for reading!

Also special thanks to YamiRuss who pointed out a few mistakes in the Duel I didn't notice myself!

Chapter 3: Nuclear Monster

Masaki checked his watch. 9:55. The opening ceremony would begin in five minutes. All students of the school were gathered in the school's largest Duel Arena for the opening ceremony. Masaki and Lea decided to sit next to each other. As expected, the audience could be divided in three parts, one for every dorm.

Masaki and Lea looked around, but they didn't see Alec anywhere. They concluded they couldn't spot him between all those Yellow-people, seeing as there were a lot of them. Four minutes later, it was 10 AM. The ceremony was about to begin.

Principal Samejima entered the center of the dome and started his speech. It was as everyone would expect it to be, "May all of you end up fine duelists!" blah, blah, blah.

But after this speech, he began talking about something far more interesting.

"As you all know, access to the Obelisk Blue dorm from the beginning has become completely impossible the past few years. After a lot of discussion with the other teachers and administartors, we have decided to grant one student access to the dorm from the get-go. For this, we have picked out the two students who performed best at the entrance exams. This is an experiment put together by us to see if we really need to block access of the Obelisk Blue dorm for new entrees."

The audience applauded.

"Now now, don't applaud for me, applaud for these skilled duelists instead!"

The two duelists opposing each other entered the field. On the one side was Randall Gainsworth. As he entered, whispers from the Obelisk Blue dorm could be heard.

"I think I've seen him somewhere before..."

"Wasn't he in Blue already...?"

"Did that guy scam us?"

Randall ignored these whispers and kept marching on, his eyes focused on his opponent, Alec Haven.

"Alec?!" Masaki didn't believe what he saw. "That's impossible!"

Lea responded. "Why would it be? You know as well as I do that he's a great duelist."

"True, but I didn't expect him to be THAT good."

As the two of them stood on opposing sides of the field, Samejima left with the words: "The Duel begins now. Both of you, please do your best!"

Randall and Alec engaged in a small conversation.

"And here we are, Haven. Opposing each other in a duel for a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Let's make it a nice duel."

"Agreed, Randall. We'll see who's the better of us!

After hearing the names, Samejima suddenly realized that he hadn't introduced them yet. He quickly did so, but this raised another question. As Masaki noted:

"Wait, those two KNOW each other?"

Without dwelling on the question much, the two of them started to duel.

Duel: Alec VS Randall

Lifepoints: 4000

Randall: "Ladies first."

A collective "OOOOOOOH" could be heard.

But nothing happened.

Randall: "Aren't you going to draw or something?"
Alec: "I thought you called first turn?"

A collective "OOOOOOOH" could be heard.

Randall gave in. "Very well. Draw!"

Right from the get-go, Randall opened up his Field Spell drawer and sticked a card in it.

"I activate... Skyscraper!"

"Elemental Heroes? Wow, you're really old-school, aren't you?"

Randall just laughed. "Oh, you won't be seeing any Elemental Heroes today, Haven."

And with those words, Randall proceeded to summon his first monster.

"I summon Nuclear Monster: Lizard!"

As he placed his card on the monster slot, a giant lizard/dinosaur-like beast entered the battlefield, reducing the Skyscraper city down to a large pile of rubble.

(Nuclear Monster: Lizard: 1700 ATK, 2000 DEF)

"When Skyscraper is on the field when I summon this monster, I can destroy it and replace it with this card from my hand, deck or graveyard: Skyscraper 3: Monster Battlefield!"

With those words, Randall replaced his Field Spell with the one popping out of his deck. Immediately, skyscrapers fell down, and the city turned into some sort of wasteland.

Alec realized that this was starting to get dangerous. Nuclear Monsters were a perfect counter-type for duelling Armed Heroes. No doubt Randall saw his duel with Lea and built a deck based on defeating Alec's Armed Hero strategy.

He decided to run through everything he knew about Nuclear Monsters.

Nuclear Monsters had the ability to disable the activation of any Trap and Spell cards when they attacked, much like Ancient Gear monsters. Armed Heroes got their power from these Trap Cards, allowing them to sacrifice themselves for other monsters, avoid the attack altogether, and more. What made matters worse was that their Attack and Defense was always very high, even for their low-level monsters.

And then there's the Field Spell Randall conveniently set in place. Skyscraper 3. All Nuclear Monsters gain 500 ATK, and if another monster attacked a Nuclear Monster, they had to flip a coin. If the result was heads, the attacking monster would lose 500 attack.

(Nuclear Monster: Lizard: 2300 ATK, 2000 DEF)

Alec could see that this might actually get challenging.

After setting the stage, Randall ended his turn.

Alec drew his card, oversaw his hand, and made his decision.

"I set three cards, and summon Armed Hero Green Protector!"

And with those words, the new Armed Hero entered the stage. As was to be expected, it looked almost identical to the other two, with the exception of a palette swap.

(Armed Hero Green Protector: 1300 ATK, 1700 DEF)

"And I end my turn."

Randall grinned. "That's your defense? A silly little action figure? I draw!"

Alec immediately replied "I activate my Trap Card: Motorcycle of Arms!"

Next to Green, a motorcycle appeared, in his color and everything.

"When I activate this card, I can equip it to an Armed Hero. Now, once per turn, if Green Protector would be destroyed by battle, it will not!"

"A futile defense, Haven! Because if I summon my second monster, your monster will be wide open! I summon Nuclear Monster: Hercules Beetle!"

Another giant monster appeared, this one looking more like a giant hercules beetle, surprise surprise.

(Nuclear Monster: Hercules Beetle: 2100 ATK, 1600 DEF)

"Then I activate my Trap card, Bottomless Trap Hole! This sents your monster right to the removed from play zone!"

"What!? Why would you revert to such cheap tactics?"

"Actually, I always wondered why nobody else does."

A trap hole appeared under Hercules Beetle, throwing him into eternal void.

"... That's a good point. Anyhow, even though Green Protector won't die, you'll still take Battle Damage! So, Lizard, attack!"

As were the rules of Skyscraper 3, a coin was tossed. The result was in Randall's favor, and for the battle, Green lost 500 ATK.

The giant lizard fired a giant blast of energy from his mouth. Green Protector managed to dodge the blow, but Alec still took a heavy blow.

(Alec: 2500/Randall: 4000)

"And thus endeth mine turn."

Alec knew he had to draw a card able to destroy that Nuclear Monster, or else he'd be in big trouble.

After he drew his card, he noticed he was in luck.
"I activate Fissure!"

"Another one of those cheap cards of yours! Fine, I'll destroy my monster with lowest ATK. And seeing that there's only one on my field, I guess I have to say bye to my Lizard."

A trap hole appeared under Lizard, too, and the monster disappeared. Now, the path was open for a direct hit.

Masaki couldn't resist. "Looks like Alec's deck is full of holes!" Lea hit him for this terrible cringe-worthy pun.

"And now for my next trick! I summon Legend Hero Armor Protector!"

A giant medieval knight filled to the brim with armor and shields, yet no weapon, appeared on the field.

(Legend Hero Armor Protector: 0 ATK, 2500 DEF)

He immediately crouched, shields in front of him.

"When he is summoned, I can set him in Defense Position."

Randall couldn't believe this. "What's another Hero type doing in an Armed Hero deck?!"

"This isn't an Armed Hero deck. It's Hero Link."

"Alec, what the hell is Hero Link?!"

At that point, Randall just screamed out what everybody in the arena was thinking.

Alec couldn't believe this.

It's true that the Hero archetypes were quite infamous after there being so much of them, but this was ridiculous. Nobody's ever heard of this powerful strategy? Man, Duel Monsters advertising works in mysterious ways.

"Fine, I'll show you all what Hero Link can do! Reverse card open: Crossover!"

Alec's final set card showed itself. "This card allows me to fuse two monsters, each from a different Hero archetype, to summon monsters from the Hero Link archetype!"

Randall just looked at what was happening, completely flabbergasted.

Alec continued. "I summon Hero Link: Master Protector!"

(Hero Link: Master Protector: 0 ATK, ? DEF

Fusion Material: Two separate monsters who both have the words "Hero" and "Protector" in their names)

"This is the true power of the Hero Link, Randall! Anyone can make a deck consisting of a Hero archetype, but with Hero Link, you'll be pushed in having at least three different kinds of heroes at the ready!"

Randall quickly regained his cool and said: "Well, that's all fine and dandy, but what does this monster do?"

"This monster's Defense Points and effects are equal to the Defense Points and Effects of the Fusion Material monsters! That means that my Protector is set directly to Defense Mode, and gains 2500 + 1700 Defense! That's 4200 Defense points! On top of that, he can't be destroyed by battle!"

Master Protector immediately crouched down, shield at the ready, as was expected.

Alec continued on: "I hope you have a Blue Eyes Ultimate Dragon with Big Bang Shot at the ready, because otherwise I see no way for you to win this battle! Turn End."

Randall obviously wasn't defeated yet, he just had a minor setback. He drew his card and liked what he got.
"I activate Double Summon to summon out a new Nuclear Monster: Lizard! Then, I'll tribute him to summon Nuclear Monster: Giant Lizard!"

The lizard, who was already huge by itself, turned even bigger, causing the Duel Disk holograms to zoom out, making Master Protector much smaller in comparison.

(Nuclear Monster: Giant Lizard: 3000 ATK, 0 DEF)

Randall explained: "When this monster attacks, it is turned to defense mode, and all battle damage done to this monster in Defense Position will be transferred to the player, too. But that's a small cost for the one attack that'll destroy you!"

"Destroy? Your monster doesn't even have enough attack points to attack!"

"He will once I activate this card!"

"... You're not telling me..."

"Yes! I activate Enemy Controller to turn your Master Protector in Attack Mode!"

Master Protector stood up, with no possible means of striking back.

(Alec: 2500/Randall: 4000)

"Giant Lizard! Attack!"

With no reverse card in place, Randall could do nothing but smile. Alec was a good enough opponent, just not ready to defeat Randall yet.

"Get ready to meet your maker!"

The Nuclear Monster got ready to attack. As by Skyscraper 3's effect, a coin was flipped. It was in Alec's advantage, but that didn't change the situation anyhow. As the HUGE giant Lizard readied his attack, there was nothing Alec could do to stop it. His Protector was gone.

Nuclear Monster Giant Lizard fired. Protector was destroyed.

(Alec: 2500/Randall: 4000)

Alec sighed in relief. "Thank God for Kuriboh."

Randall couldn't believe this. "KURIBOH?! Your inevitable defeat has been evaded by that little hairy puffball? Man, I hate that thing."

"Uh, Randall? It's not inevitable if I evaded it."

"Just shut up and draw! My Lizard turns to Defense Position, Turn End!"

Alec drew his next card. It wasn't anything to turn the tide with, but it could give him some breathing space. And that was exactly what he needed with the way this duel was going...

To Be Continued.