World 124: To Have and to Hold

"Your world? A world where we can only be happy? That is what you wanted? How is that any different from what Continuum wanted!" Abigail yelled. The third entity was gone. But now the first unveiled her own equally troubling desires. "You do not understand. I knew you wouldn't, just like Midsummer." And Echo did not see the need to justify herself either anymore. "Midsummer? Did he hear this too? Is that why he's missing?" Her words just left the duelists more and more in shock and dismay. But only a few like Abigail were vocal about it. "He's resting now. I did not want to make him suffer. I have to do this, and I will." But Echo did not let them stop her. She opened her hand and activated her skill card. "What?" And she activated the skill cards of everyone around her too. "Delay them. But do not hurt them." Her voice echoed through each one, and reached each duelist.

"She's controlling them?" Juan gasped. Thousands of duelists began to advance on the heroes of Pandemonium. "Ugh... this is why? This is why she and Scarlet created that simulation." Charles noticed that even the likes of Hydra and Nakana were following Echo's command without a hint of protest. It seemed like only the ones who had not lost during the illusory tournament were able to resist her. Echo took her delayed skills away from them instead. "She's getting away!" And as Donna loudly pointed out, the lady in blue eventually used this chaos to make her getaway. She flew up into the air and headed straight towards the cracked orb of memories. "If she gets inside there, it will begin all over again! Gah!" Charles stumbled as he tried to get up. He'd exerted himself too much by using the Creators power. He could barely move now.

"What do we do? You're the only one who can stop her!" The blue-eyed duelist cried out. "No.. That is not true, Dharma. I am not the only one.. with this power." Charles coughed. "Power? What do you mean? You think I can do something?" Dharma flinched. "You and Aurora both. You were there when you defeated the Creator too. Maybe you dont know how to use his powers. But you should have the right to challenge her. And I think.. its better if you try to talk her out of this than me." Charles knew his own weaknesses. He understood hate and logic a lot more than the things Echo wanted and the things Echo did not want. "Hm.. Maybe you have a point." Dharma stared at the planet up in the sky and the orb in between the seven obelisks. She did not have a lot of time left. Aurora was on the other side of the obsidian globe, they could not wait for her to show up. "Charles, you better not do anything stupid while I am gone."

"Oh I wouldn't dare" He laughed.

"Alright!" The blue-eyed duelist closed her eyes and let her imagination run wild to summon the first dragon she could think of. Of course, the Blue-Eyes White Dragon appeared in front of her when her eyes were opened. "All aboard!" She mounted the dragon and took off, treating it like a speedboard of the most extreme kind. In less than a minute she crossed the distance and landed on the orb of memories, never looking back down. "Echo!" Instead she faced her final opponent, challenging her before the lady could utter another word.

Echo's LP: 8000 Dharma's LP: 8000

"Dharma?" Echo looked a little surprised, but also a little relieved to see her. "I wouldn't be so happy if I were you. Why do you have to do this? Why now? Is it because you dont want to be stuck in STHEREA? We could have worked something out!" Dharma shouted. "No it is not because of that. I am tired of talking, Dharma. It is better to show you what I mean.." The first entity had already repaired some of the cracks in the orb of memories it seemed. "By that time it would be a little late, dont you think? You cant just decide for the whole world!" Dharma could feel the power of all those souls brimming under her feet... "Why not? I can feel their joy. You cannot. I can feel how much happier this would make them, if only bliss existed." .. every soul Echo wanted to control. "Do you think they want that? Even the people down on their luck. They'd not choose something like this. Why does it have to be so drastic? You can do a lot of good with the way the world is now!"

"No. This world is already too far gone. There is no good I can do for it. My children suffered because I made them from an already corrupted source. This world will be the same."

The first turn went to Echo. "Before there was light in this universe, there was darkness..." She activated her spell card; When You and AI First Met. She revealed the Fire Phoenix AIgnister from her extra deck to add an AIgnister with the same type, Achichi AIgnister, to her hand. "It took a flame to scare it all away. We had to create that light ourselves.." Once she normal summoned the flame AIgnister(2/800/800) [Zone 3], she could add one AIgnister from her deck (Doyon AIgnister) to her hand. "I summon Dark Infant AIgnister. He adds the field spell AIgnister AILand to my hand." Fire became shadows within the darkened link circuit. The Dark Infant materialized as a purple cyberse cyclops(500/LINK 1) {Left} [Extra Zone 1] with a glowing green eye and green core. It added the field of the AIgnisters to her hand, but that spell activated as a dimly lit background this time instead of a properly glowing and charged up theme park. "But no matter how brightly we make our light, it will always burn out in the end. Even if what we burn is made of more than flesh and blood."

"Are... you talking about Olympia?" Dharma knew that each of these AIgnisters were based on Echo's friends. "Yes. She burned out before she could become truly happy. That is all I ever wanted for her to be." Echo sighed. She looked and sounded tired. "Echo, I understand wanting to honor her. But if you keep reminding yourself of what happened, then it's no wonder that you feel like this. But losing someone is just another part of life." Dharma tried to tell her. "It should not have to be." Echo responded by flashing her opponent an almost delirious smile. "I just have to burn everything there is... When there are no monsters in my main zone, AILand will special summon one AIgnister from my hand." Her theme park brightened up a little when Echo special summoned the cyberse blob of the DARK attribute: Doyon AIgnister(4/400/1600) [Zone 2]. Its effect added another level or lower AIgnister from the graveyard to her hand: Achichi AIgnister. "Now.. If I negate the effects of my cyberse monster, my Doyon AIgnister, Gatchiri AIgnister can be special summoned from my hand." The lady Echo called out another one-eyed cyberse droid(8/0/3000) [Zone 3], this one made of gold and wielding a spiked cybershield with a demonic face on it.

"Link summon! Fire Phoenix AIgnister!" Her materials were at least two cyberse monsters. Dark Infant, Achichi and Gatchiri dove into the link circuit and came back out as the blazing phoenix(2300/LINK 3) {Left/Down/Right}[Extra Zone 1]. "And when Gatchiri is sent to the graveyard, I can target one monster on my field. That monster cannot be touched by your card effects for the rest of this turn and the next!" Doyon targeted the When AI Met You spell and returned that to the hand. Since there were no monsters in her main zones anymore, Echo could also special summon Bururu AIgnister from her hand. The wind-eared AIgnister(3/600/1000) [Zone 5] sent one AIgnister (Pikari) from the deck to the graveyard. "She is not the only one I lost.. Cierze was taken from me too. Olympia and Everest were hurt because of people who thought they were not alive enough! They were alive enough to me. And they are not gone either, Olympia can still come back and Cierze can be remade. But before I bring either of them back, I have to make sure that they will never have a reason to burn down or to be burned down again." Echo ended her turn by placing one card face down in the spell/trap zone.

-TURN 02-

"But if you burn down everything, then people wont even get the chance to learn. There has to be a lesser extreme here, Echo." Dharma pleaded with her opponent again. "There wont be a need to learn anything. Everything already will already know everything there is to know. Nobody will want anything else ever again!" All pleas were ignored. "But that just does not sound like life to me.. Echo. I wish I could help you understand." Dharma had no choice here. "But I can only do this now." She started her turn proper by activating Cards of Consonance. It discarded one dragon tuner (White Stone of Legend) from her hand and replaced it with two cards drawn from the deck. Sending the White Stone of Legend to the graveyard also activated that card's effect to add the Blue-Eyes White Dragon from Blanche's deck to her hand. "I will try to make this quick." The cards in her hand now promised a victory that could come in one battle phase.

"I summon the Keeper of Dragon Magic! She sends one card from my hand to the graveyard, and then I can add a Fusion normal spell card to my hand!" The lancer(4/1800/1300) [Zone 2] in blue dragon armor took the Blue-Eyes White Dragon as the cost, and fetched a spell called 'Greater Polymerization'. "She can also set one of the fusion materials for my fusion dragons back on the field!" Dharma's next act gave a glimpse of the destructuve future to come. he Dragon Magic Keeper revealed Blue-Eyes Neo Ultimate Dragon and summoned the previously discarded Blue-Eyes White Dragon[Zone 3] face-down. "I also activate Fusion Deployment, which I can use to special summon one of the fusion materials of my fusion monster from the extra deck!" She again revealed her Neo Ultimate Dragon and now special summoned the second material face-up: Blue-Eyes White Dragon the second(8/3000/2500) [Zone 4]. "And then I discard Sage with Eyes of Blue from my hand! I sacrifice an effect monster, to summon a Blue-Eyes monster from my deck!" This time she picked a slightly alternate version: Blue-Eyes Alternative Dragon(8/3000/2500) [Zone 5]. In name it still counted as a classic Blue-Eyes however.

"Blue Eyes. I wonder what it would have been like.. if I had given life to her too." Echo lamented openly. She never made it a secret that adding the White Dragon to her circle of friends had been one of her own wishes. "Uhm. I dont know.. She would have been a dragon, I guess?" Dharma could not exactly say she'd ever seen Blue-Eyes as anything more then a majestic yet strong monster. "Yes.. would she have been a monster, because that's how the people perceive her. Or would she have been kind and gentle because of the way I would make her? But then.. she would still be feared. Even Olympia was feared, and she never hurt anyone."

"Yeah well. Thats just how people are. A little fear is good too you know. It tells us when we're in danger and when we're about do something bad. There is nothing wrong with being affraid.." Dharma wondered if Echo would show fear, as she enacted her fusion combo. "I activate Strength in Unity, and I also activate Greater Polymerization now! That spell fuses three or more monsters, and the fused monster cannot be destroyed by card effects! Plus it will inflict piercing damage!" One face-down White Dragon, two face-up White Dragons: six blue eyes were mixed together inside the gigantic fusion maelstrom and they came together as the new incarnation of the three-headed Ultimate Dragon: Blue Eyes No(10/4500/3800) [Extra Zone 2]. "Now Strength in Unity's effect activates. I can banish one card on the field when I complete a fusion summon of my dragons!" Dharma knew her effect wouldn't do anything to the Fire Phoenix as long as Gatchiri protected it. But her own fear focused more on the spells and traps set by Echo. "I banish the card on your left!" One of those could very well be the card to take down the Ultimate Dragon.

"You are affraid of me too, aren't you? But look what that's done to you." Echo revealed the card that got banished: A.I. Shadow. "Huh?" Removing the card from play only appeared to help Echo in the long run, since A.I. Shadow would draw a new card from her deck if an effect destroyed or banished it. "I could never feel that way about you, Echo. I know what you've gone through, and I know what pain can do to a person.. Its not that I am not affraid of you. I am affraid of what you will do to avoid the pain and fear. I am affraid of what you will do when you're all alone." Dharma sighed and activated the second effect of Strength in Unity. She sent the continuous spell to the graveyard and added one Blue-Eyes White Dragon normal monster back to her hand. Then came the time for the first attack. "Neo Blue-Eyes attacks the Fire Phoenix!" At the very least the burning cyberse bird could only inflict effect damage during her own attacks. Killing the Phoenix now would only harm her master. And harm her the attack did, the death of the phoenix forced flames to fall back towards miss Echo.

Echo's LP: 5900

"I'm also affraid that this is just starting, Echo! When Neo Blue-Eyes ends one attack and there are no other cards on my field, I can discard one Blue-eyes from my extra deck, to let it attack again!" Blanche sent the Blue-Eyes Alternative Ultimate Dragon: one three-headed fusion would recharge the other. Neo's second head charged white light between its jaws and sent the beam of destruction towards the defending Bururu AIgnister. "Then I will activate Donyoriboh AIgnister from my hand. The battle damage done to one of my AIgnisters is negated." At the last second, a cloud of darkness emerged and swallowed the beam. Most of the energy exploded inside it, inside the body of Donyoriboh. Some small rays pierced through to painlessly destroy Bururu. "Oh. Well, I still have my third head." With a hesitant hand, she directed her fusion monster to attack Echo directly. The third beam enveloped her completely, but the lady in blue took no visible damage at all. Her lifepoints went down by the proper amount while her smiling expression lasted. "Was that all?"

Echo's LP: 1400

"Echo..Ugh." Dharma shook her head. She could not let her sympathies get in the way now. Since she failed her one turn kill, everything would have to go on the defense. "I set one card face down! And I also activate Super Rejuvenation! During the endphase I can draw one card for each dragon I tributed or discarded this turn!" She'd discarded the White Stone and her Blue-Eyes White Dragon, meaning she could draw two cards. The blue-eyed duelist hoped to get her hands on an Honest or an Effect Veiler, but she saw no such cards. "What?" She saw something else instead, an image from her past. "H-hey." It was him, the boy in the hospital bed. For that brief moment that moment felt more real to her than this duel right here. "Why did I.. see that?"

-TURN 03-

"We are in the world of memories still, Madam Blanche. Yours are a part of it too." At the start of the turn, the Fire Phoenix[Zone 5] returned. Its effect would bring her back to life after every destruction she faced. "This is what you would want to hold on to as well, all of your painful experiences. I do not understand why. It's brings you nothing but misery. Olympia remembered her own torture, and it drove her over the edge." Miss Echo started out hot, as she normal summoned Achichi AIgnister(2/800/800) [Zone 1] and added Hiyari AIgnister from the deck to her hand. "When I control an AIgnister, Hiyari AIgnister can special summon himself! And he can tribute one link AIgnister to find and claim the ritual spell and monster of my AIgnisters!" Her waterdrop cyberblob(1/300/400) [Zone 2] let the rain fall down on top of the Phoenix, smothering its flame for good in exchange for the A.I. Ritual spell and its monstrous partner Water Leviathan AIgnister. "People will always remember the bad. Even if I try to make them forget. So the only way to make sure it stays gone.. is to make my new world where nobody can ever be miserable ever again."

Echo's next few moves came rapidly. She reactivated the When AI First Met You-spell and revealed her EARTH type Earth Golem AIgnister to add the earth type Doshin AIgnister to her hand. While she controlled her AIgnisters, she could special summon the cube-sized Doyon AIgnister(1/100/800) from her hand. Doshin returns one link monster from the graveyard to my extra deck, to add the AILove Fusion spell to my hand!" The effect targeted her Dark Infant AIgnister, and added the spell where it stayed for a while. Finally she activated the continuous spell YOU and AI, to prepare for her final combo. "Link summon! Dark Templar AIgnister!" The materials were three differently named monsters. Achichi, Hiyari and Doshin all disappeared inside the darkest link circuit yet.

"Oh yeah. That thing, the card you made because of Charles.." The AIgnister Dark Knight(2300/LINK 3) {Downleft/Down/Downright} [Extra Zone 1] still looked too much like Decode Talker for Dharma's tastes. But at least she would not mistake it for one of Charles' cards due to its far more dangerous effect. "When a dark -type cyberse with 2300 or more attackpoints is summoned from the extra deck, You and AI will create an AIgnister token! I will use that token to link summon Dark Infant AIgnister again!" When the token(1/0/0) [Zone 3] appeared, the Dark Templar could have activated that dangerous power. But it only did so when that token turned the child cyberknight[Zone 3]. "If a monster is summoned to one of its linked zones, the Templar will revive more AIgnisters to those zones... But Dark Infant can also switch itself to a different zone on the field, when another AIgnister with two thousand and three hundred attackpoints activates their effect!"

"Wait what?" Dharma discovered Dark Infant's secondary effect the hard way. It[Zone 4] jumped to the next zone on the field, giving the Templar three linked zones to summon monsters to instead of two. The Dark knight resurrected Bururu[Zone 1], Pikari[Zone 2] and Achichi[Zone 3] all at once. In the mean time the link summoned Dark Infant placed a second AIgnister AILand field spell in Echo's hand. "Synchro summon! Wind Pegasus AIgnister!" Now the wind took form. Bururu tuned itself with Pikari in order to create the flame-winged white horse(7/2300/1500) [Zone 1]. The effect of the synchronized tuner allowed Echo to special summon Pikari AIgnister(4/1200/600)[Zone 2] back to the field as well. The white cyberse wizard could add one A.I. spell from the deck to her hand. "I add this spell, AI Contact! Contact returns one AILand spell from my hand to my deck, if I already control one on my field. Then I draw three cards." Echo smiled and replenished her almost empty hands. "And now Wind Pegasus will destroy one spell for each AIgnister I control!" Five AIgnisters were definitely enough to destroy one single trap.

"Oh. I guess you are affraid of something too." But Dharma's trap would pay Echo back as well. "Waking the Dragon!?" The lady realized her error only after Wind Pegasus committed to it. "Yeah! I activate this trap.. after its destroyed! If my opponents effect sends Waking the Dragon to the graveyard, I can special summon any monster I want from my deck! And I choose Seleglare the Luminous Dragon!" With the extra zones all occupied, Dharma could only call out a card from her extra deck. She selected a rather small looking wyvern(6/2400/1000) [Zone 4] at that, though Seleglare did have scales that shimmered brightly like moonlight. Seleglare also had a very useful effect. "I can return Seleglare to my hand! Then I take control of one monster weaker than her!" All of Echo's monsters stayed beneath the 2300 ATK barrier, she could choose any single one. Though she figured she would be better of if she waited to see what else would come. ""I am impressed that you can still find enjoyment in this fight, even now. There is none for me anymore. There never was."

"Hey I cant help it, you keep showing off. Besides, you had fun when you dueled those Live stars! Didn't you?" Dharma protested. "I do not even remember how I felt back then. Not anymore.. But I do know that what I feel now is satisfied. I am satisfied that you are here to see this too now, Madam Dharma.. Pikari AIgnister can raise another monsters level to four!" The wizard cyberse performed another spell, targeting Achichi AIgnister(4/800/800). "I XYZ-summon Light Dragon AIgnister, in defense mode! And when I summon a Light AIgnister from my extra deck, You and AI will negate one card's effect" Doyon and Pikari, two level 4 cyberse, opened the XYZ-portal into the extra deck and started orbiting around the gold-covered Light Dragon(R4/2300/1500) [Zone 2] with its destructive powers "I guess I really can gotta go with this guy then, Seleglare controls Light Dragon AIgnister!" Blanche activated her Luminous monsters power before the continuous spell could negate it and chose the Light Dragon. It [Zone 1] moved to her side of the field, fitting right in with her other real dragons.

"Then I revive the Fire Phoenix AIgnister!" The spell card FAIghting Spirit targeted the Fire Phoenix in the graveyard and put the fiery link bird[Zone 2] back on the field. "And I ritual summon the Water Leviathan AIgnister!" Her AI Ritual spell then banished the water's sacrificial materials from the graveyard: Doyon and Bururu AIgnister. Seven levels tributed equaled the seven stars of the great sea dragon Water Leviathan(7/2300/1500) [Zone 5]. "I cannot destroy your fused monster, but I can weaken it! Water Leviathan returns all link monsters to my extra deck and drains your monster of all her attackpoints!" The Leviathan unleashed a pressurized water blast straight at the Neo Blue-Eyes, effectively making the fusion dragon(0/3800) into a non-issue for the rest of the turn. "And I fusion summon! Earth Golem AIgnister! For the rest of the turn all damage done to me is negated!" Finally, AILove Fusion merged the Fire Phoenix AIgnister with the Dark Infant AIgnister to form the body of the cybernetic Earthen Golem(8/2300/1500) [Zone 3].

"Holy.." The fact that Echo held nothing back became crystal clear to Dharma now. "You can create all of this?" It cost Dharma a proverbial arm and a leg to just summon one fusion monster, and here Echo went and outpaced her five times in one turn. "I only got to be this strong, because of their sacrifices. They learned to duel, so I could learn with them. So I could create and destroy. Ishmael the Fisherman... I have to remember the way he was, miss Blanche. Otherwise, I wont know how where I went wrong with him. He was too focused on me, envious even when someone else tried to come close to me instead. That was his darkness. And Cierze, I gave her too much freedom. I made her think she was better than everyone else. That was their darkness. When they comes back, they wont feel that way again. Nobody will." Miss Echo finally entered the battle phase.

"When the Templar destroys a monster, he can special summon one monster from my graveyard." Darkness clashed with light, and the Templar's sword found its way into the heart of Echo's own Light Dragon. That very same death would lead to a glorious new life. "I summon Light Dragon!" The darkness revived the light, returning the Light Dragon[Zone 2] to its original master. "Then there was Everest. He never got the chance to face his own darkness. But it was there, waiting to grow stronger." Echo clasped her hands together. "When the Earth Golem attacks a monster summoned from the extra deck, his attackpoints will double!" The second AIgnister(4600 atk) to attack struck with a fist of rock and cybermatter, and punched straight through Neo Blue-Eyes Ultimate Dragon.

Dharma's LP: 3400

"Well this would be a problem for me, if I planned on letting that stick. But I can do this! If I take damage, Fairy Dragon Mahaama will summon herself in defense mode and increase my lifepoints by the same amount!" The gold-feathered dragon angel(6/0/2500) [Zone 3] could also reflect the damage back towards Echo, except the Earth Golem would prevent that too. Especially not since the effect of Light Dragon AIgnister caused its own problems. Echo still hurt her, and her XYZ-monster could special summon a cyberse from the graveyard if the opponent took battle damage. So she handed the Fire Phoenix AIgnister[Zone 4] its third resurrection. "Dharma. You cannot win this fight. But don't let that trouble you. This will be the last fight anyone will ever have to suffer through..."

Dharma's LP: 8000

(To Be Continued in World 125: The Brightest Side of Life)

New Cards used by Miss Echo
Gatchiri AIgnister

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Dark Infant AIgnister

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A.I. Contact

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A.I. Shadow

New Cards used by Dharma Bonnet
Seleglare the Luminous Dragon

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Greater Polymerization
Super Rejuvenation