UTTERLY IMPORTANT AND URGENT ANNOUNCEMENT!

Hello again my dearly beloved readers. I was not expecting this to happen or to be writing another update chapter so soon. Before I go on, don't worry, it's not bad news I bear, quite the opposite in fact, but this is going to likely bring about a change in my schedule regarding "Signs of Renewal" and my other fanfictions.

I have recently been given an utterly miraculous opportunity. Those of you who have read my profile page know that I am LDS (Latter Day Saint, not Leo Duel School) so I wish to take a moment to thank my Eternal Heavenly Father for the limitless goodness He has shown me. I thank Him from the bottom of my heart for His blessings and this true unadulterated miracle in my life.

I have recently been given the opportunity to become an English teacher for the Ute Tribe in Ft. Duchesne. If I am accepted into the program, it will mean that I will have a full-time job on top of my college education. It still utterly blows my mind that a lowly fanfic-writing dork like me would even be considered for this opportunity. While I cannot express what an immense blessing this is, I understand that you, my readers, may have to deal with some changes regarding the release time of new content.

I do not wish to slow down in my writing, but it would be ludicrous to think that my having a full-time job would do anything but slow down progress, and it would be ludicrously irresponsible for me to prioritize fan fiction over teaching. However, I believe you, my readers, and I can work together to keep "Signs of Renewal" chugging along with new content being released (hopefully a minimum of 1-2 chapters every month.)

I am opening up to the idea of Co-Writers. In particular, I am interested in people with skills writing duels. While I absolutely enjoy writing duels, this is one of the most time-consuming aspects of writing "Signs of Renewal." This is where you, my readers, can come in. Co-Writers I choose will be given the opportunity to craft certain duels between characters, and possibly, if it is absolutely necessary, provide suggestions for future plot details, character development arcs, etc. Another area where Co-Writers would GREATLY help would be in the area of helping to archive and develop OC characters and decks submitted by the fans. This is another aspect of the fanfic that is greatly time consuming. I enjoy every bit of the time, but if I can delegate the responsibility of say, creating some new fan-archetypes for an OC character, that would greatly alleviate some of the workload I face.

So how does one become a co-writer? I'm not too formal. I don't need people to stop by for an interview or answer a questionnaire, however, I am looking for people who have some experience writing fan fiction, particularly Yu-Gi-Oh fan fiction. Currently, I am thinking of partnering with Corinnetheanime, Nox Descious, and/or Shimmering Sky, all of whom are wonderful authors who have written beautiful fan fiction you all should check out. If any of you wish to assist me in this work, please just send me a PM listing your strengths, weaknesses, and what you'd be willing to do as a co-writer. If I am unfamiliar with you, I will check out your profile page and give you a look-over to see if you meet the qualifications I expect (i.e. have written at least one fan fiction, and bonus, have written any number of Yu-Gi-Oh related fan fiction.) Please understand that unlike the OC submissions, I cannot and will not be accepting everyone's request. I may be able to delegate a lot of work to different people, but it would be unrealistic to have five people writing their own version of a duel between two characters. (Teamwork between two co-authors would be greatly appreciated, but I would need to receive just one version of the final product, not two versions from two co-authors.)

UPDATE! WE OFFICIALLY HAVE OUR THREE CO-WRITERS! EVERYBODY GIVE A WARM WELCOME AND YOUR PRAISE TO THE NEW MEMBERS OF THE "SIGNS OF RENEWAL" TEAM!

OFFICIAL "SOR" STORY EDITOR: CORINNETHEANIME

OFFICIAL "SOR" DECK CREATOR: EPSILON TARANTULA

OFFICIAL "SOR" DUEL CREATOR: NOX DESCIOUS

EVERYBODY GIVE THESE PEOPLE YOUR SUPPORT! YOU WILL BE SEEING THERE WORK VERY SOON!

Thank you everyone for your continued support. It is a true delight and honor to get to know all of you and write for your enjoyment. This is NOT an announcement that "Signs of Renewal" is dying. On the contrary, I think this will be a great opportunity to give this series just as much, if not more, diversity, variety, and flavor as all of your wonderful OCs have already given this series. I look forward to hearing back from all of you. Until then, in order to comply with community guidelines, please enjoy this short bonus content for "Signs of Renewal."

Signs of Renewal Bonus Content: Automated Replacements

"You want to make sure Shun does not win his match against Crow?" a voice on the intercom asked.

"Correct." Roger replied in the affirmative. "I have need of Ruri's brother if my plan is to succeed. I don't care what you have to do to make sure he is defeated. Redirect lanes, sabotage his bike, tear up his tires, hack his Duel Disk, but make sure he loses and that you bring him to me alive and… relatively unharmed."

"Affirmative sir." The voice on the other end replied. "I should be able to easily pull it off without the least suspicion of sabotage arising from the public."

"See that it's done." Roger ordered, wiping some sweat from his brow before pushing another button on his computer. On the screen, an image of an officer driving one of Security's Mobile Infantry Barracks and Riot Suppressor, or MIBARS, appeared.

"Report!" Roger ordered, "When can I expect Yuya to be here?"

"There was an explosion in sector IL-135." The officer apologized. "Three officers were caught in the blast. One has been killed, two are headed to the hospital with critical injuries. Unfortunately, the area has been roped off so we've had to take a detour."

"Stupid Security officers!" Roger thought to himself. "If his necessary brain control didn't make them into shambling incompetent zombies, then trusting in their human skills would make them rebel against him. It was a no-win situation, and yet, he had absolutely nothing he could replace them with!"

"You have five minutes to be here." Roger snarled. "I don't care how many miles you have to drive over the speed limit, I don't care what pedestrians you have to run over, just bring that boy over here before one of the Dark Signers intercepts you!"

"Confirmed." The officer replied, flooring the gas pedal of his vehicle.

Roger quickly ended the call and proceeded with the rest of his work. It was maddening how fast he had to keep switching from task to task just to keep things in order. He had never been a man to consider taking a break when there was work to be done, but if he managed to keep the Synchro dimension intact after the day was through, he seriously considered the possibility of leaving the dimension in the hands of one of his subordinates and taking a brief vacation.

That was of course, assuming any of his subordinates were worth anything! Much less capable of managing the city in his absence.

"Get me Sergey's therapist on the line!" Roger barked to one of his subordinates, who began quickly dialing up the man's number while Roger scrolled through some information regarding Rin. Despite their incompetence, his staff had managed to dig up some interesting details on Rin's past. In addition to the info they had uncovered on her orphanage, which was soon to receive a well overdue visit from Security, they had uncovered another detail that had left Roger in even greater spirits. Apparently, Rin and a participant in the Friendship Cup, Yugo, had grown up in the same orphanage together. Doing some extra digging, it looked like the two had become close friends. It seemed an act of divine providence that Yugo should be participating in the Friendship Cup, exactly where Roger had absolute power over the boy's fate.

"Chief!" the therapist's voice called from Roger's computer screen. Looking up, Roger noticed his therapist standing in front of the screen. Behind the man, a team of surgeons and engineers were working behind a curtain on what Roger was certain must have been Sergey.

"Report." Roger sternly ordered.

The therapist actually seemed to be relieved. "Things are going well sir." The therapist explained. The integration of the card's dark energy was a success! Better than a success! We've not only been able to keep Sergey alive and functioning throughout the modification process with the energy, but I've been able to use his ace monster's energy in order to power some extremely versatile pieces of bio cybernetic augmentations. We are right on schedule and we should have Sergey functioning beyond your specifications! If I am right, by the time we are finished, Sergey will be able to lift approximately one-hundred times his own body weight, or about twenty tons, run at speeds of over one-hundred and twenty miles per hour, and withstand the impact of-…"

"Good." Roger curtly replied, cutting off the therapist's ranting. "I need you to prepare three operating tables for some special guests who will be arriving at my headquarters later today. By next morning, I will need each of them to receive the same type of brain surgery Sergey received."

Any confidence the therapist had seemed to vanish away. "Y-yes sir." He nervously replied. "A-anything else?"

"Back to work doctor." Roger ordered. "You'd better make sure you maintain your current progress or, and let me be literal with this statement, there WILL be Hell to pay!"

Cutting the feed to the therapist's operating room, Roger next turned his attention to his engineer.

"Engineer, report!" Roger barked, when the Engineer's lab had shown up. However, instead of the engineer dutifully rushing up to give his report, something even more interesting caught Roger's attention.

The engineer was at one of his computers, furiously typing commands into the screen along with a team of other workers. In the center of the room, behind a massive wall of reinforced glass, a duel was in progress between a team of what looked like three humanoid androids and a smaller machine that was little more than a Duel Disk with an arm. While the five androids each controlled one copy of Ally of Justice Catastor, and one copy of Ally of Justice Decisive Armor, the Duel Disk controlled a single shadowy monster that towered over the other monsters while seemingly flickering in and out of existence.

"Attack!" the engineer ordered, "Contain Sergey's monster!"

"We can't!" one of the scientists panicked. "It's not responding to any of the machine's orders, and none of our monsters have managed to dent it!"

"I'm not accepting that excuse!" the rotund little man barked. "Alternate your strategies any way you have to, but make sure you-…"

The rest of the man's sentence was cut off as the monster suddenly flashed forward before tearing all the Ally of Justice monsters apart and immediately smashing to pieces each of the monster's robotic controllers.

"It's rebelling again!" a scientist panicked, furiously typing away at her computer.

With a mighty roar, the massive monster began beating at the glass with its colossal paws, sending tremors through the entire lab as it fought against its prison.

"SHUT IT DOWN!" the engineer ordered. "PURGE THE CHAMBER!"

"Confirmed!" one of the scientists acknowledged, slamming down on a red button.

Immediately, the entire glass chamber was flooded by a wall of raging hot flames that blew up from the ground like the engine of a rocket. When the flames died away, every bit of metal from the robots was completely gone along with everything else, save for a single lone black card, which floated back onto the ground, eerily looking like it had been completely undamaged by the flames.

As Roger thoughtfully looked on the scene, the Engineer quickly waddled up to the camera before nervously looking into it and addressing Roger.

"We… we… we are making… some progress, chief." He nervously explained. "Uhm… though we haven't managed to tame that creature to a level in which it is safe to use, we have, as you can see, found a safe way to test the card."

"You'd better hope you're making good progress…" Roger warned, "…I still need it usable by tonight."

"Understood sir." The engineer nodded, sweat pouring from his brow. "I'll get right back to work."

"What were those androids I saw?" Roger asked, a look of growing interest coming over his features.

"Oh… well…" the Engineer looked relieved, as if he was eager to share the info with the Chief of Security. "…you see… after you gave the order to draw energy from Sergey's ace monster, I am happy to report that the extraction process was a success. The energy that card emits is… beyond my scientific understanding, and yet, it has enabled my work to advance at ten times the rate! Among other things, especially Sergey's augmentations, it has provided a uniquely powerful energy source for an old project that had been mothballed for some time due to a lack of funding. But with this power source, I've been able to successfully resurrect an old project to create artificially-intelligent self-powered robotic Security androids and put them to work testing the Ace Monster without the need of risking human lives."

"Tell me about these… androids." Roger pressed. "How good are they?"

"Oh well…" the man began, "…back when the project, the G.H.O.S.T. project, short for Government Hierarchy Operated Special Teams, was first proposed, it was an initiative designed in order to create an artificially intelligent Security entity capable of gradually replacing the then unreliable teams of human Security enforcers. The G.H.O.S.T. drones are designed to analyze duels on multi-dimensional levels and adapt to any emergency situation they are confronted with without the drawbacks of human emotion, fatigue, etc. Theoretically, though it hasn't been extensively tested, one G.H.O.S.T. drone is capable of outperforming twenty well-trained Security officers. A standard team of three to five G.H.O.S.T.s would be capable of suppressing an entire mob without even one casualty. As I said before, the project was abandoned about a decade ago due to lack of funds and effective technology, especially in regards to an effective power source, but now with the energy from Sergey's card, that problem has been alleviated, and now I have been able to create just the sort of efficient machines the Executive Council first conceived of. Naturally, I thought they would be perfect for performing the task of subduing Sergey's ace monster."

"How many have you built?" Roger interrogated, the excitement in his voice rising despite his efforts to contain it.

"Well…" the Engineer hesitated, "…there are about five that are ready for service at the moment with about another dozen in production, but… well… one of the reasons I've been confining them to the task of taming Sergey's monster is because… I wouldn't say they are entirely ready… for official field work that is."

"What do you mean, you wouldn't say they are entirely ready?" Roger snapped, annoyed by the Engineer's waffling.

"Well… uhm… I'd need to run some more tests and…"

"Then let's test them." Roger ordered. "Dispatch the active ones to the field immediately. I believe I have a more important use for them if what you advertised about their capabilities is true. In the meantime, send orders to our production teams to halt work on the MIBARS and switch production to G.H.O.S.T. drones. Once any drone is complete, immediately dispatch it to the field to assist in the protection of the city. I could use some competent subordinates under my command for a change."

"Uhm…" the engineer began sweating even more vigorously, "…w-what about Sergey's ace monster? May I have some drones to continue research? I-I will need them to duel the creature."

"What's wrong with your staff?" Roger snapped, growing annoyed.

"Well… I-I can't use them! They'll get killed!"

"I suggest you use whatever man power you have." Roger coldly replied. "And for the sake of your wife and children, I would hope any human casualties that accumulate do not hinder your progress. Otherwise, I might have to arrange a special bring-your-family-to-work-day just for you. Understood?"

The man's face blanched with horror. Eyes bugging out of his sockets, he simply nodded his head, unable to even speak.

"Glad we have an understanding." Roger smiled. "Recalibrate the drones to the defense of this city. I do not want to hear you've wasted another of these investments on Sergey's monster. People are much cheaper than equipment and much more easily replaced, including you."

Leaving the engineer to gape at the screen like a fish dropped on the grill, Roger quickly shut down the feed before returning to his work.

"Whatever the cost…" he muttered to himself, "…WHATEVER THE COST! I will NOT let you have this city, Dark Signers! I would sooner destroy it than watch it fall into the hands of someone else!"