Duels with the Negaverse

by RealHydros

Dreams of monsters dancing in the Sailor's heads lead them to Yugi Moto and Seto Kaiba. At the same time, Kaiba is setting up another Battle City tournament. When Queen Beryl, the Negaverse and an old enemy from Atem's past unite, the Sailors will have to enter the tournament to protect Domino City! SLIGHT AU, the only change is that Atem is not gone, but rather his own person.

25. THE AUTHOR SPEAKS

I'd like to apologize for not updating sooner. I wrote a few chapters in quick succession and rewrote them several different times in several different ways until everyone was in character and I felt satisfied with the length of Serena and Beryl's duel.

I also would like to know in the reviews how I'm doing keeping the story interesting. I'm attempting to keep the audience guessing; in the anime, in all but one duel Yugi/Atem always found a way to win. You could count on him winning no matter what when losing would be dire. It was predictable and I honestly kind of hated pretty much knowing beforehand that he would win. I've tried to mix things up a bit; Serena losing when her friends' lives were on the line, Atem losing to Serena, etc. etc.. Am I keeping it spiced up? Am I keeping the people in character? Let me know.

I almost feel as though Amy's duel with Jack was generic and phoned in, but honestly I'm trying to portray her as uncharacteristically angered when she or her cards are snubbed or otherwise disrespected. I've tried to reserve Amy's best plays, her Synchro Ice Barriers, to represent that anger channeled into her strongest cards. The shortness and highly-aggressive playing on Amy's part was fueled by Jack and his crew's remarks.

Lastly, while on the subject of Synchro Monsters, it did come to my attention some time after I introduced the Stardust Dragon and Brionac that Synchro Monsters could not have been a part of the game at any time in Yugi or Jaden's lifespan. However, I do have an explanation, and it is as follows:

Paradox dueled Yusei in order to steal his Stardust Dragon and fought monster to monster to monster with Jaden for Neos. Paradox stole Kaiba's Blue-Eyes White Dragon in a duel, using Malefic Paradox Dragon in the process and thus introducing Kaiba to Synchro Summoning. After the events of Bonds Beyond Time, KaibaCorp began production of the Synchro Monsters, starting with Yugi's knowledge of Yusei's Stardust Dragon and what Kaiba remembered of Malefic Paradox Dragon.

Thank you for taking the time to read this note. I'm currently writing Chapter 25, which may or may not conclude the duel between Alexis and Serena.