Duel to the Death

Chapter 7: Swissed

The time had come. It was Saturday, and the whole shop was prepared. The top four in this small, local tournament would receive invitations to one of the biggest tournaments any of them had ever heard of; Malmid's Underground. No one, however, was as excited as Bolu, or as his friends call him, Silencio.

"Five dollars in the bucket if you wish to participate!" Russ was yelling loud, trying to make sure his voice was heard over the overwhelming crowd that was flooding the card shop.

Duelist Name: Russ

Appearance: A big guy with brown, curly hair, and wearing a tan shirt

Favorite Card: Green Gadget

His voce was deep, loud, and yet could hardly be heard. Tables were set up outside, just to make sure everyone can duel at once. "The tournament will be in Swiss format! You will all duel a total of five duels! The eight with the best record at that time will move on! Any questions?" A little boy raised his hand.

"Is Chaos Emperor Dragon allowed?" All the regulars stared at the boy. The many new comers, however, seemed to either be used to it… or even wondering the same thing. Russ sighed. He looked at Devon, who nodded.

"This will be advanced format only! Deck checks will be provided to make sure that your deck follows the proper format!" That had never been done before, not at that shop at least, but it seemed to be the best choice. The bucket was two feet tall and a foot wide, yet half filled with one-dollar-bills by the time sign-ups were complete, an hour after they started. Devon would definitely not be closing at 6:00 tonight. Raiz was in the third duel announced, assigned to duel someone who came just for the tournament. Almost no regulars were paired together. His opponent was an old man, his black hair all over the place and breath smelling of alcohol. Raiz looked at the man's deck. It was a good 60 cards.

"I go first…" the man said lazily after winning the dice roll. They both drew their cards. "I play… this." He put down an Elemental Hero Avian (1000/1000), a green man with wings. "Then I set this…" he played a facedown, and then waved Raiz on. He drew.

"I play Mystical Space Typhoon." The man jumped in his seat, shocked apparently.

"Man…" he said, placing Shift in the graveyard. "My best trap card…"

"I summon Lily," he said, placing his favorite card on the field. "And I attack Avian, using her effect." The man was in shock as he placed his monster in the graveyard. 6000-5600.

"That card should be banned…" he said, swaying from side to side. "You're a cheater. I give up." And so the man wobbled away, waiting his next duel, hoping for a fair one. The strangest people lived in that area. Seridan's duel wasn't much harder, as she was already done by the time Raiz's drunk disappeared.

"Man," she said, laughing. "I faced a B.E.S. deck. Seriously, Silencio might actually stand a chance here."

"Doubtful," Gus said, walking up to them.

Duelist Name: Gus

Appearance: Tall with red hair in long dreadlocks and always wearing a dark green shirt

Favorite Card: Nimble Momonga

The guy made top four in every tournament, taking first quite a few times. He was one of the shop's elites. "The poor guy got paired up with a regular, arguably the best." Gus smiled to himself, laughing silently. "It's not that I like watching your friend get his ass kicked, but the duel is so one-sided… he's screwed."

"Don't tell me…" Seridan said, a droplet of sweat running down her cheek. "He didn't get paired up with…" Gus nodded.

Duelist Name: Flamer

Appearance: Not all that tall, though taller than Bolu. His hair is short and brown and he always wears a red jacket

Favorite Card: Anything OTK-Related

Flamer was a legendary duelist around these parts. His decks all focused around fast kills, sparking when Magical Scientist first came out. No one knows the origin of his nickname, and few remember what his real name is, but all shake with fear the second they hear their name paired with his.

"What's the score?" Seridan said, running up to Devon, who was eagerly watching the match himself.

"Silencio won the first duel by pure chance," he said. Raiz and Gus just caught up, surprised at how fast Seridan ran. "Flamer drew no good cards. Now he's… um… not too happy. Lifepoints are full." Silencio's field was a Gene-Warped Warwolf and a hidden spell/trap card. Flamer had no field at the moment.

"I activate Heavy Storm," the regular said in a raspy voice, throwing down his potential 1 for 6 for a 1 for 1 exchange. Silencio placed his Mirror Force in the grave, sighing. "Now I summon Manju of the Ten Thousand Hands! I'll use it to add Advanced Ritual Art to my hand!" Searching his deck, Flamer found the card he wanted. "Now I activate it, targeting Demise, King of Armageddon (2400/2000). I remove Insect Knight (1900/1500) and Neo Bug (1800/1700) from my deck and special summon my monster. Now I pay 2000 lifepoints to activate Demise's effect, to destroy every other card on the field." 8000-6000. Flamer stayed so calm, his voice never exclaimed. Silencio…

"Crap!" he yelled, slamming his Warwolf onto his graveyard. "This isn't fair…" Flamer shrugged.

"I wanted to run Ben Kei, personally, but with so much at stake… well never mind. Where was I…" Flamer searched his hand. "Ah, right. Okay, I remove my two insects in my graveyard from play to special summon Doom Dozer (2800/2600). And with this Megamorph on Doom Dozer, I have my monsters attack. The total damage comes to 8200." 0-6000. "Round three." Raiz checked Silencio's hand. No Exodia, so it must be a pure agro normal monster deck. He stood no chance though, either way.

"I'm winning this time," Silencio said, drawing six cards from his freshly shuffled deck. Flamer was fanning himself off with his five.

"Feel free to try," he said.

"I pay 1000 lifepoints!" Silencio said, throwing a spell card down. "Go, Prohibition! This card allows me to call out one card name, and ban it from being played! I call Advanced Ritual Art!" 7000-8000. Flamer yawned.

"Okay," he said. "Guess I'll have to destroy that thing… or just break out Doom Dozer and destroy you with it without Demise. Either one makes me happy." He sat back. "Go on."

"I summon my Gene-Warped Warwolf and end my turn."

"Finally," Flamer said, drawing. "Let's see… I'm kinda restricted… so I'll set a monster and this facedown. Go ahead." Four cards in hand, he continued to cool himself. Silencio got angered by the mockery.

"I draw!" he said, picking up a card. "Now go Ancient Rules! This card lets me special summon one level 5 or higher Normal monster from my hand, and I choose my Blue-Eyes White Dragon!" The moment seemed intense, until everyone saw the SDK Blue-Eyes hit. They all laughed. "Warwolf, attack!" Flamer placed his Neo Bug in the grave. "Now go, Blue-Eyes!" 7000-5000.

"Not bad," he said. "That damned Prohibition has stumped me. You must've had Seridan build your side." He drew his card. "And since my luck is bad right now, I can only concede. Congrats, by a stroke of pure luck, you've beaten me." Not one person was left in the shop not gasping, or no regulars were at least. The worst duelist, no matter what the means were, just defeated the best. It's an event that would be talked about forever… or would've been at least. "Meh, I was just going to give up my invite anyway. I don't care about some stupid tournament. I hereby drop out." He snapped his fingers, and Devon looked up. "My next opponents get the wins. I'm out. I didn't really expect to win anyway." Flamer flipped his hand over. Mystical Space Typhoon, Manju, Advanced Ritual Art, Megamorph, Doom Dozer. The perfect hand to win. "I'm just too bored to go on. So many weak duelists, it'd be selfish to take the poor kid's win away when I'm not even going on." And so, Flamer walked out, leaving Silencio in a pool of embarrassment.

Silencio's luck continued, as he faced many weak duelists after his defeat of Flamer. He ended up with a 4-1 record, possibly enough to make the top 8. Struggling, Raiz managed to get a 5-0 record, facing 2 idiots, getting one of Flamer's bys and scraping out a win against a middle-ranked regular. Seridan easily got 5-0, no problems at all. With the dueling concluded, Russ took over the announcements again.

"All right," he said, holding up a new sheet of paper with eight names on it, branching to the right in traditional tournament style. "We had seven people get a record of 5-0, meaning we could only allow one person with a 4-1 record into the top 8! We checked the rankings, assigning all nine of them points based on previous shop performances. For defeating the best in the shop, Bolu was chosen. The rest of you know who you are. The duels will go like such!" Seridan and Raiz both patted Silencio on the back, congratulating him on his shot to acquire an invite.

"This is going to be awesome!" Raiz said. "If we got three of the invitations! We'd all be in the ultimate tournament together!"

"I doubt that'll happen," Seridan said, looking depressed. "I think I'll be the only one getting in."

"How selfish!" Silencio yelled. "Why do you think…"

"I saw the brackets," she interrupted. "I got a by my last round, so I checked them out while they were being made."

"The first duel!" Russ declared. "Horton versus Dellino!"

"The brackets?" Raiz asked.

"Second duel, Kori versus Yours Truly!"

"Here comes my first reason," she said. "Note how none of us have been said yet." Silencio and Raiz looked at each other, nervous as hell now.

"Third duel, Bolu versus Gus!"

"Damn!" Silencio said, shocked. "Things aren't looking too good…" Then something hit him. "But wait… that only leaves…" Seridan nodded gravely.

"That's why I said that."

"And the fourth duel!" Russ declared, seemingly angry at the randomization process himself. "Raiz versus Seridan!"

"Five-thousand invites," Gora said, standing before the shadowed figure in front of her. The room was pitch black, and her beautiful, young face with the long blonde hair was only made visible by two torches on either side of her. "All of them have been handed out, and only four currently don't have owners." The dark figure picked up his deck from the table beside him and drew a card, glancing at it.

"Does her owner have one yet?" he asked in a somewhat high voice, almost contradicting the environment he was in.

"He is currently fighting for the invitation," she said. "The boy who owns the Spirit of Lily, correct?"

"Exactly." The figure stood, then stepped down to where he was also illuminated by the fire. His face was round and his long, stringy, bone-dry hair was covering one eye. Under the other eye was pitch-black mascara. His lips had black lipstick stained on them, resembling crawling black worms as they twisted into a smile. "My cards are getting anxious. Oh, and before I forget." The figure reached into his pocket and pulled out a deck. He handed it to Gora. "This is for Deryl. I'm afraid yours is still in the making. Master has been… a bit lazy lately."

"What else is new?" Gora asked, leaving against the throne. "You really need to redecorate this place, Malmid. It's kind of creepy and hard to see in."

"I have bigger concerns for now," Malmid rejected angrily.

"YOU ASSHOLE!" came a deep voice from down the hall.

"Deryl's here," Gora pointed out.

"I noticed…" Malmid sighed. Derl came crashing in. His face was half lit by the fire, and in it only rage could be seen. His clothes were still illuminated by the light outside the door. None, just in his boxers, blue plaid ones.

"I told you not to wake me with these fancy meetings," he said, annoyed. "I don't care if you're Master's favorite!"

"He favors none of us," Gora said, reassuringly.

"It's not good to lie," Malmid pointed out, laughing. "Gora has the deck you ordered, by the way. It was very… expensive. Master said he'd accept that Lily for payment. Here's to hoping the kid wins his next duel."

"He'd better," Deryl said, grabbing the deck and turning around. "We've spend millions setting this "Underground" up, and I don't want something like this to mess it up!" he slammed the door, shaking the room.

"Not the most chipper of us," Malmid said. "Is he?"

"I'd better be going to bed too," Gora said. "You have your report, now let's just hope your faith in the kid wasn't for nothing."

"Trust me," Malmid said. "By the time we're done, that card will be ours, even if we have to kill her owner."

End of Chapter 7.