A Legacy of Souls: Execute the World

by Medigo

The world is ever changing, and dueling changes with it. They have finally come to the point where they can create their own world, inside the reality of the dueling network. There the artificial meets the real. But not everything sticks to their program. What starts as small glitches soon grows into chaos, and the duelists are caught in the middle of a terrifying revolution.

119. A Disconnect Among Networks

Line 119: A Disconnect Among Networks

"He summoned the Crown!?" Scura never thought she would see it again, the card that represented the power of Anders. "Yeah well. Void and Crescent are giving it all they got!" Donna cheered excitedly. "Perhaps. But what if the card has some influence over its user? I hope Void knows what he has unleashed." Zettai stated her concerns. This had never happened before after all.

Team Chalice Shield's LP: 6000 Ezra's LP: 8000

Once the World Crown(6/2000/2000) [Zone 3] hit the field in defense position, Ezra realized which shackles had to be broken. "I see another death on the horizon! I activate Absolute King Back Jack from my graveyard!" Ezra banished his tiny robotic fiend with blonde hair, and excavated the next card from his deck. "Doing so allows me to set one trap if it lied on the top! And it can be activated this very turn!" His predictions still clung close to reality, as he revealed a trap card: Danger! Zone. "Now three cards are drawn, and two are discarded!" And one of the two cards he discarded (Danger! Bigfoot, World Legacy Clash) could destroy another monster. "Bigfoot's effect activates!" The beast of the woods rose from the grave and grabbed Update Jammer(2000/LINK 2) [Zone 4] by the legs. The unfortunate kid got pulled down to its own death along with the discarded Bigfoot, leaving Void's V-LAN Hydra(1900/LINK 3) {Up/Left/Down} [Extra Zone 2] with no monsters to link with.

"Not good." Void muttered. None of the co-linked Knightmares could be destroyed as a result of battle as long as Ezracontrolled the Knightmare Phoenix. So he could not destroy it or the Knightmare Goblin(1300/LINK 2) {Left/Right} [Zone 3]. "V-LAN Hydra attacks Knightmare Goblin!" Still, the three-headed snake's attack still did some minor damage to Ezra. "I.. set two cards and end my turn!" And he could fill the backrow with two of his traps [Zones 4 & 5]. "Now you see your own limits, and you will know fear once more." The volcanic landscape rumbled, more mountains erupted behind Ezra as he prepared his own turn.

Ezra's LP: 7400

-TURN 04-

"... During my draw phase, Knightmare Unicorn can draw one more card for each co-linked Knightmare I control!" With the Unicorn Knightmare Unicorn(2200/LINK 3) {Left/Down/Right} [Extra Zone 1] linked up with Knightmare Phoenix(1900/LINK 2) {Up/Right} [Zone 2] and Goblin, Ezra could draw three cards. And his draws did not displease him. "I wonder. What do you still fear? Let us see. I activate World Legacy Succession! Knightmare Cerberus will be summoned to my field once more!" Even though Void and Crescent escaped his nightmare before, they did not get far away. The return of the Cerberus(1600/LINK 2) {Left/Up} started the far too quick return to the extra link lock. But Ezra had bigger plans. "And then I link summon the Knightmare Gryphon! When it appears, I can discard one card to add one card from the graveyard to my hand! Your World Crown cannot prevent this from happening, as the Gryphon also negates the effects of all unlinked monsters!" Plans involving the dark feathered gryphon(2500/LINK 4) {Left/Up/Down/Right} [Zone 3], born from the link materials Knightmare Cerberus and Knightmare Goblin.

"Ezra. You forget one thing. The more you understand your own fears, the less effective they become!" Void had his answer, a continuous trap [Zone 5]. "I activate Invincibility Barrier! Each turn I can banish one extra deck monster on my field, to negate the effects of all monsters with that same type! I banish V-Lan Hydra, which means.." All three of the cyberhydra's heads disintegrated into energy particles, to fuel a bright divine forcefield. "His monsters effects are negated!" Crescent watched as the Barrier imprisoned the Knightmare Gryphon, preventing its effect from entering the graveyard. "I have been scared of a lot of things in my life, Ezra. I let that control me more than I should have. Made me too worried to try anything outside of my comfort zone. Not anymore!"

"Then you are blind. Fear is the first teacher! Your reckless bravery has only left you weak! Your extra zone is no longer protected and neither are you!" Ezra activated two more spells. A continuous World Legacy Corruption spell [Zone 5] would avenge any link monsters death. The second, Dark Eruption, claimed a DARK monster with 1500 attackpoints or less from the graveyard. "Return to me, Danger Jackalope!" He took the green rabbit with antlers, cluing everyone in on what would come next. "And leave me, through this spell! I activate the trap: Second Expedition into Danger! It returns to my deck, to trade in one Danger monster for a new draw!" The next card activated from the graveyard, which discarded the Danger Jackalope.. and drew the last Knightmare Corruptor Iblee card.

"You have come, my Corruption!" Before he could normal summon her, Ezra resolved Jackalope's effect to special summon another Danger! monster from his deck. He chose Ogopogo, a fishfaced dark seaserpent(8/1200/3000) [Zone 1] with a spine full of spikes. "Let us spread the Knightmare anew!" Nothing stopped him after that. The normal summoned Iblee(2/0/0) [Zone 5] could special summon one link monster from the grave with its powers sealed away. The Knightmare Goblin(0 atk) {Left/Right} [Zone 4] returned and formed a link with the Gryphon. "I link summon the Knightmare Cerberus and Knightmare Mermaid!" Two more monsters finished the extra link: the fiery Cerberus(1600/LINK 2) {Left/Up} created from the Goblin and Ogopogo, and the aquatic Mermaid(1000/LINK 1) {Down} [Extra Zone 2] created from Iblee. "There it is..." Blanche shuddered. Even from afar, the heroes could see the horrifying field Ezra had created. "You feared this, and that is why you could not stop this. Now your items belong with me! Knightmare Gryphon, attack them directly!"

"You wont be attacking us this turn, Ezra!" Void smirked. Recklessness did not guide him, confidence did. "I activate World Legacy Landmark! It banishes a World Legacy monster to summon two monsters from my graveyard!" The confidence to give up the World Crown and split it into two revived monsters: Cyberse Witch(800/LINK 2) {Downleft/Downright} [Zone 1] and Lady Debug(4/1700/1400) [Zone 5] in defense mode. "Lady Debug adds Swap Cleric to my hand!" Since she was special summoned, the Debugger could use her powers before the Knightmares came in to destroy her. Cyberse Witch got targeted first however, and would have died if not for a certain card. "And when a link monster is attacked, Cluster Congester activates from my graveyard! I banish it and Cyberse Witch, to special summon one Cluster token for each link monster you control!" With exactly five link monsters on the field, Void could create an entire row of the tokens(1/0/0) [Zones 1,2,3,4] in defense position. "As if I would leave an opening for you, Ezra! I have someone else to protect as well now!" He nodded at his partner in dueling, who also could hide behind the Cluster.

"That only means that you have to divide your power! Your strength is still misplaced!" Ezra ordered more attacks in spite of this setback. The Gryphon let out a petrifying shriek that turned Lady Debug into crumbled dust. The remaining Knightmares each killed one of the four tokens. "And now your curse ends." Ezra had been waiting for this moment. The effect of Invincibility Barrier only lasted for one turn. So he ended his. In the next turn Knightmare Gryphons effects were released upon the field.

"You're here!" At that point, Therese Hansen suddenly showed up in the scorched paradise. "What happened.. here?" She seemed rather shocked by the drastic changes to the landscape. "Ezra happened. Maybe you should not have come here." Zettai scoffed. "I had to. I wanted to tell you that Exeter's people found Neo and brought him to an emergency ward." The Exeter duelist said with a moderate smile. "Neo!? How is he? Is he awake?" Bionis immediately wanted to know more. "His condition is stable but critical. His mind has shut down, they.. cannot say when or if he will recover." She could not give them all good news. "He will pull through. He has too! Either way that bastard is gonna pay!" Bionis felt his blood boil all over again.

"Aurora? She is dueling Ezra?" Therese finally spotted the duelists. "With Void yeah. She's doing alright. But that freak rebuilt his extra link again. Now their unlinked monsters cannot activate their effects." Donna summed up the dire situation. "And it's Aurora's turn." Therese's face turned pale with worry. Even if Crescent did have a link monster or two, she could not link summon anything since none of the Knightmares had markers pointed towards her field. At times like these, she wished she could read Crescents face better.

-TURN 05-

Because then she might have known... "I activate my Monster Reborn. And I summon your Knightmare Goblin." That Crescent Aurora found the way out. "My Knightmare?" With the Goblin [Zone 3] now on the other side, Crescent could potentially link two monsters and give them their effects back. Except her desires went a little further than that... and deeper. "Ezra. I thought I would hear something, if I could bring your power a little closer to me. You did help me, you taught me how to find the light of the creator. And now I can shape it on my own. But.." The girl looked down at the misshapen creature that she had special summoned. "I do not feel him in here. Its light is dense and black. It is a lie." And she promptly banished it to reactivate Invincibility Barrier. "Aha! Good!" Void nodded. Since they were teammates, she could use his trap just like he could. The barrier once again stole the powers of all Link monsters, including Knightmare Gryphon.

"A lie? The creator does not lie, Aurora." Ezra felt more attacked by her words than her cards. "But he can be misinterpreted. Maybe you do not even see the lie yourself, or maybe you do not want to see it. Because you cannot create, you can only feign creation. We needed each other.." Crescent surveyed the field. "But I do not want to paint what you envision. I activate the World Legacy Scars. My new field. All Mekk Knights gain 300 attack and defense points. And each turn I can discard one to draw a new card." As expected, her field changed part of the landscape dramatically. The sun broke through the clouds of volcanic ash, and its light revealed a scarred and partway sunken city. Crescent threw away her Mekk Knight Orange Sunset, to gain a new color.

"When two or more cards exist in the same column, I can special summon a Mekk Knight to that column! I summon the Mekk Knight Blue Sky!" Crescent selected the column with the Knightmares Mermaid and Cerberus, casting a pristine blue light on every zone. In it a gold and silver knight(5/2000/2500) [Zone 4] wielding two silver curved swords arrived. His flapping cape and crystal visor had the color of the brightest and clearest skies. "The Blue Sky adds two Mekk Knights to my hand when he is special summoned! I choose Purple Nightfall and Red Moon, and special summon them as well!" Crescent painted two more columns with her colors of the night. Red Moon, a cyborg psychic knight(7/2600/2900) [Zone 2] with an axe for a hand, appeared in front of the Knightmares Unicorn and Phoenix and her World Legacy Secret trap card. Purple Nightfall, a more foreboding lance-wielding knight(8/2800/2300) [Zone 5] with the starless night as its cape appeared at the outer column in front of Invincibility Barrier and World Legacy Corruption.

"Each turn Purple Nightfall can banish one Mekk Knight until my next turn, to add another Mekk Knight from the deck to my hand! I add another Indigo Eclipse!" The Nightfall knight spun his cape around Mekk knight Blue Sky and made him disappear in a blast of smoke and shadow. Since the number of cards in its column has not changed, Crescent could immediately special summon the new Mekk Knight to the field. Nightfall pulled his cape back, revealing the copy of the darkblue eclipse knight(8/2700/2700) that took the place of the Blue skies. "Ezra. It is a dark night, and a red night... Because blood will be shed." Crescent gestured straight at the opposing side. "The blood of the nightmare, and the lie. I will destroy it all in one turn! Red Moon attacks and destroys Knightmare Mermaid." battle phase, the Red Mekk Knight used the pile spear on its other arm to impale the glass Mermaid, clearing the first extra zone. Ezra could not stop the destruction while Phoenix had its effects negated.

Ezra's LP: 5800

"Then, the dimming night drowns the light of the Unicorn! And the clearing morning vanquishes the hound of hell!" Purple Nightfall hurled his spear across the volcanic gap and skewered the wings of the Unicorn, causing it to plummet to its fiery demise. Mekk Knight Indigo Eclipse on the other hand made a straightforward attack against Knightmare Cerberus, cutting off all three heads by spinning its razor-sharp ringed body around.

Ezra's LP: 4100

"Yet that is as far as you may go! When my link monster is destroyed, the World Legacy Corruption spreads! It special summons a World Legacy monster from my deck: the World Armor!" Ezra saw an opening, an untouched zone. "Not again!" Blanche and the heroes on the sideline winced as the land rumbled and split open. An untarnished giants armor(8/2500/2500) [Zone 1] crawled out of the molten lava. It found one of the few zones not colored by Mekk Knights, meaning the World Legacy Secret could not negate its effects. "I can add one World Legacy card to my hand, when this card is special summoned! I choose the World Legacy World Lance!" And Ezra also managed to snag his own item's card. The Lance could reduce a monsters attackpoints by 3000 if it battled a link monster.

"Ezra. Melyria was your friend too, wasn't she? Did that bond also mean nothing?" Crescent had to end her battle phase regardless, but she wanted more out of this turn still. "Millennium was her desire. But now I see the Creator demands something even greater. I have to carry on without her. The items were never meant to be apart." And Ezra's answers did not give it to her. "Then you want to create a bond, of just one? Millennium was a lie all along? How could you..." Crescent shook her head. "The moon still shines! Mekk Knight Red Moon can banish a Mekk Knight from my graveyard to destroy one card in his column!" Her dark and red knight of the midnight hour lept into the sky and absorbed the blue soul of Indigo Eclipse, giving his axe a dark hue. The axe came down and cleaved Knightmare Gryphon in half. "One remains, the Phoenix! The Blue Sky's effect switches the Red Moon to its column! So that it is also destroyed!" Right after its swing, the Red Moon Knight[Zone 4] changed his place on the field, and banished Mekk Knight Orange Sunset from the graveyard to destroy Knightmare Phoenix as well.

"You were not kidding." Void was impressed. Crescent had done what she said she would: dismantle Ezra's entire link. "I do not lie. But I could not have done this without your assistance, Void." Crescent moved on to the second main phase to set a trap card down. "That is the truth, Ezra."

-TURN 06-

"The truth? What is the truth? The truth spoken by those in power? They know nothing, they have existed for what amounts to nothing. Just like I once existed as nothing. I deserved nothing." Ezra reached deep into his skull, which had started to crack like marble. "Nothing? That's not.. Everybody deserves something! To live, to be!" Void tried to counter his claims. But Ezra simply returned his words with a cold stare. "Is that what you believe? What you tell yourself to give your actions meaning and purpose? I know, I can see my past self in you, Void. Like you I was hollow as well until I found the creator's gift, I filled my experiences with empty pursuits like dueling in a world of fantasy. But that past no longer matters to me. It is not important who I was. What I have become is what matters; the prophet of the creator. I tried to shepherd the hollow people towards a richer world. But they fled, betrayed me or continued to use their freedom for the same pointless desires. No more. This world came before them and will survive any power that tries to reshape it."

"And I will make sure it does, by destroying everything it does not want! I activate the spell: The Beginning of the End! I banish five creatures of the dark from my graveyard! And draw three cards!" The nightmare ruler had sent more than seven DARK monsters to the graveyard by now. So he could immediately and permanently remove five (Knightmare Mermaid, Knightmare Cerberus, Danger! Ogopogo, Danger! Tsuchiniko and Danger! Mothman) with the spell of Armageddon. His handsize shot up from three to six cards. "The cards, the world agrees with me! I activate Danger! Disaster! When this field spell exists, it can banish three Danger support cards from my graveyard!" Ezra raised both hands to the sky, as the volcanic field consumed two spells and one trap (Danger! Zone, Danger! Feets of Strength, Realm of Danger!). "And all that exists will be burned away! The field spell destroys itself and every other card!" The rumbling reached its peak, and the top of the black mountain exploded, shooting molten lava into the sky.

"Yikes! We have to get out of here! Or we're gonna go the way of the dinosaurs!" Scura panicked. Fire and rocks fell down everywhere. "But it's just an illusion, isn't it?" Donna wondered. Even as one rock landed right next to her. "I do not wish to stay here and find out." Yoro-Himiko winced. Fortunately they were protected.

"Ezra! Leave them out of this!" Void yelled while Crescent focused on her defense. She used the World Shield itself to cast a wall of light between the duelists and the rest of the heroes, keeping the eruption contained to the battlefield. "Purple Nightfall!" She also managed to save one of her cards. The Purple Knight banished the Red Knight until her next turn, adding a Mekk Knight Avram card to her hand in the process. Unfortunately, with the loss of the Defense Zone, none of her spell and trap cards could be salvaged. All of Ezra's cards were purged as well. Invincibility Barrier, World Legacy Scars World Legacy's Secret, World Legacy's Corruption, the Blue and Purple Mekk Knight and the World Armor. Nothing survived the disaster.

"They should not have been here in the first place. I understand now, what my mistake was. Melyria tried to tell me, Prospero tried to show me. I tied myself to others too much, I started believing in distractions, I clung too much to their memories and my own." By now even the ground beneath Ezra's feet had been reduced to rubble, and the wielder of the lancer hovered above the cracked ruins. "But such emotional tethers were weighing me down and holding me back! No more, I am Ezra! I am the prophet of the creator! I will continue his path on my own! I set two card facedowns and activate Danger Chupacabra from my hand!" The next of his cards revealed itself but stayed in his hand. Another Danger Chupacabra, which shuffled itself back in with the two other cards.

"Ah? The left one is..No..right." And Crescent, who could normally see which card was which, did not feel as confident about it as she did before. "Void. I think his illusions are getting stronger!" Even without her ability, they had a 33 % chance of correctly guessing where the monster had gone. But in this case they wanted to miss, to avoid Chupacabra's revival effect. "Then, we have to choose..the middle one!" Void settled on the card Crescent felt the least weird about, and she nodded. "Then you failed." And Ezra flipped the Chupacabra around. They had picked it, and made him discard the card. "Danger Bigfoot revives! AND ATTACKS DIRECTLY!" Ezra's screams reached every end of paradise as his Dangerous beast(8/3000/0) resurfaced from the smoke and tossed a giant rock at its opponents. "Ah!" The attack shattered against Crescents shield, and made more of their platform crumble away.

Team Swordchalice's LP: 3000

And it was at that moment that things would go from bad to worse. "Guys! Bad news!" Blanche and Asterisk popped into paradise, too panicked to notice the ongoing duel or the hellish environment. "They're going to flip the off switch on us! We dont have a lot of time left now!" Blanche yelled as loud and hard as she could.

"What? I thought you put a stop to that! What did Hansen crawl out of his hospital bed to push the button himself?" Scura shouted, forgetting for a moment that Hansens sister stood right besides her. But Therese let the remark pass as she focused on checking her online mail. "Yeah no, whatever is going on has nothing to do with the champions. Dyzanthium warned me in the first place that this stuff was about to go down. Maybe one of Exeter's fancy CEOs made the call. It doesn't really matter!" Blanche had seen enough companies by now to know that Hansen had people to answer too as well. He only led the technical aspects the network after all.

"No. That can't be right.." But the answers were not even that simple. "A mail was sent out to every employee just now. The government ordered a direct investigation in the company's activities, pertaining to the crisis that they have been unable to keep in check. And because of that the shareholders themselves are threatening to dissolve the company itself and let its assets be absorbed." Therese summarized the mail, and figured she would have to trim the explanation even further. "Basically, Exeter is taking the fall and will cease to exist at this rate. So they are forcing the servers to be reset across the board, and there is nothing we can do about it. The shutdown is scheduled to happen in less than ten minutes! You have to log off now, they don't know that you are still inside the system!"

"But what if this is what they want? Those shareholders are the ones with the dirty hands." Asterisk spoke up again, voicing his reservations. "Shareholders? You mean like my father and mother?" Yoro-Himiko knew what Asterisk was getting at, all too well. "I did not mean to accuse anyone directly. But we have seen what Exeter created for them. Why would they shut it down now? They wouldn't. Vigionair already found out about their secret project, their ability to rewrite the memories of everyone using the network. They might just want to flush us out so they can 'clean up' their mess and make us forget what we learned." The agent did not want to leave, not now. "But if we stay we could lose our minds, right? Do we have a choice here?" Bionis wanted to leave, he felt himself twitch from head to toe. "This is not right! What about Sundown? What about Echo? Where would they go? What about Scarlet? Even she deserves to be warned about this! What can we do!?" Donna stomped on the ground, their hands were tied.

"There is nothing you have to do. It is already done."

"Huh?" For the first time since the duel began, Ezra spoke directly to the remaining heroes. "The lance has shown me the future again, it has shown me that nothing will happen to us. They cannot shut us down. They have already tried many times." The prophet laughed darkly and madly. "They want to take this world away from us, but it is not theirs to claim. It belongs to everyone, it belongs to the minds of billions. And they cannot destroy it. All they are doing now is removing the tapestries, the game elements and scripted units. But when you strip it all away, you are still left with STHEREA itself. Run if you must, the creator will protect me anyway."

"You want us to call their bluff?" Void could not accept it. He was sure most would agree, but what could he do? "Crescent?" What did his partner want to do? Crescent Aurora said nothing, as if she wanted to wait for the end to come. "You have to do nothing. It is already happening. Face you fear, Void. Wait out the storm.." Ezra waited as well, as the minutes remaining turned to seconds. "Let the darkness fall." And seconds turned to nothing... the great network collapsed all around.

(To Be Continued ?)

New Cards used by Void
Invincibility Barrier
World Legacy Landmark

New Cards used by Crescent Aurora
Mekk Knight Blue Sky
Mekk Knight Purple Nightfall
Mekk Knight Red Moon

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Monster Reborn
World Legacy Scars

New Cards used by Ezra
World Legacy - World Armor
Danger! Ogopopo

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World Legacy's Corruption
Danger! Disaster!

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Second Expedition into Danger!