The Rise and Fall of History II: Opposing the Present

by Medigo

The world of dueling has reached its climax. Many stories have been told through these cards, and the final story brought everyone together. People are united and yet, an unknown world suffers in their shadow. The fallen one returns in the midst of their peace, pursued and still a stranger to those around. There is not much time to save both his home and his friends.

63. Monsters

Redux 28: Monsters

"Well. This place cleaned up nicely." Uno was told that the fight at the throne room had been intense. But he could not even spot any signs of that when he returned there. "What happened to all of Martels.. followers?" He asked Iria, one of the few who who could retell the story. "Why are you asking me like I am in charge? It is bad enough that all the palace guards are confusing me for the Inquisitor." She grumbled. "The enforcers are taking care of them, putting them in the infirmary for now." This report sounded rather familiar to the one who used to be called Bishop. "With a barrier wall I presume?" He was here for different reasons. "A lot of them came from the Monument. We need to sort those out. I meant no offense." Iria said. "I took none." He shrugged. "Bishop.. no.." Uno corrected himself. "Dorian. Now that we have your real name, we know where your family is. Have you thought about what you want to do?"

"I.. I don't know. I thought things would be better once Martel was.. gone. But I still don't remember them well." Even now he responded to the name 'Bishop' more than to his own name. "I don't know how long I have been gone. Going back to those people now.. would be like going back to strangers." Bishop sighed. "Strangers huh." Uno looked at the corner of the room, where Anastasia lingered. "I am positive that will change. Maybe you can see June about that. The bottom line is though, you are free now and so is your mind." Uno knew a thing or two about amnesia. He could tell Bishop a hundred things, but he did not want to make this all about him again. "your family will appreciate your return, even if you cannot." Anastasia mused. "I agree. If nothing else, you can give them good news." Iria added her two cents as well. "I guess that does make it worth it in the end.. And Martel, will never haunt anyone again." Bishop could not remember when he was this relaxed either. It was a blessing. "no he will not.." Anastasia held the odd doll in her hands. "You are welcome to stay, if you need time to think." Uno offered. "No. I think I will go today. A new life begins now." Bishop decided. "Okay. Then I guess this is goodbye for now. Good luck Dorian." Uno nodded. "Thank you, lord Fortuno."

"Please, call me Uno."

...

"Man. Am I glad to get out there!" Eric barged into the recovery room. "Oh, sorry. I forgot..." He toned his volume down when he saw Tory and Alice watching over his mother, an unconscious James and Stonewell. "Hey Eric. You look better." Alice smiled. "Should you be walking already?" Tory raised an eyebrow at eric's rather fast recovery. "Sure! Uno showed me one of those treatment pods further down the aisle. They revitalized me right away. It was just a bit cramped in there." He stretched his arms until they made a popping sound. "Ow, okay. Bad idea." He laughed his pain away. "The hospitals these days must really be awesome." Alice couldn't see any bruises or clothing damage. That pod fixed everything. "Yeah, although not everyone can afford one apparently." Tory had never seen the inside herself. Luckily she didn't need one. Stonewell on the other hand. "I don't think they can treat him. Uno would definitely have let everyone use it if they could." Alice figured the pods only worked on physical ailments. "Just let them wake up on their own time. My mom'd probably like a rest from all the craziness anyway." Eric said.

"But please you have to let me join you on the mission!" They heard someone shout. "Hm?" Out of the corner of his eye Adamant talking with someone else. "Ohey! You're that pawn guy! When did you get back up?" He shouted once he recognized the other duelist as the one from Martels first club. "Sir?" The man flinched. "At ease. He is an ally." Adamant calmed him down. "Eric. This is private Winters. Winters this is Eric." He introduced the two. "Yo! What mission were you talking about?" Eric asked. "The mission to infiltrate the fusion guild. I told Winters that he was not fit for duty yet." Adamant commanded. "But sir!" Winters protested again. "That's the last I'll hear of it, Winters." Adamant raised his hand. "Bummer, dude." Eric chuckled. "The same goes for you, Eric." The XYZ-duelist said with a firm tone. "What? Aww why? I can help!" He whined. "That I do not doubt. But I'd rather see both of you regain your energy the normal way before throwing yourself at danger for our sake." Adamants words were final. He turned away. "But, you can wish us luck." He walked out of the room, leaving the two in silence.

"Okay.. Good luck!" Tory bellowed.

...

"So if we know where they are, what are we waiting for?" Was what August wanted to know, as he paced from one end of the enforcers office to the other. Thanks to June they could prepare an attack on the fusion guild, but he would rather skip the planning part and go right to it. "We need to be prepared. We don't know how many duelists the guild will have stationed at their headquarters." Zach stated the facts. "Not to mention all the stuff they pilfered from my vault. Pilfer is too nice a word! They outright ransacked me!" Dom growled. "That is to say; the guild will have the cards that normal duelists were never meant to have." Zach clarified. "We have faced powers like that ourselves. If you have us on your side, you wont need anyone else!" August boasted. "The main focus is getting 'someone else', August." June coughed. "If we can secure the portal, we can bring December and January in. Luckily, infiltration is my specialty." If it was up to her, they would not even need to duel. "Tch. Stealth is no way to proceed. All our enemies must be stomped into the ground."

"While you phrase that very nicely, I have to agree with June." Iria and Adamant walked into the office. "I have spoken with Uno. He'll come with us as expected. We need his help to reach the location at any rate." The Nisells were the only ones who could use their crystals to teleport somewhere. "Yeah. Why can't you two do that trick anyway? With the flashing and all." Dom bluntly asked the two timetravelers. "Because a pendulum is not a tool that comes with basic skills, you need to add powers to it on its own. January was our traveler. I chose to let it enhance my telepathic powers and August went with physical and regenerative feats." She prodded his muscular arm. "Yes, because of me that you still look as young, June."

"Madam Silver! I think we found Lord Amadeus, check the network!" One enforcer suddenly yelled, breaking up the meeting. "For the last.. What?!" She quickly turned the disk on. "What is he.." Marco's face popped up, it was a virtual message against an open sky background. [Good afternoon, My dear Family and Honored citizens of the Union.] His voice not only came from the device, but it was heard throughout the city. "Where is this coming from?" Adamant shouted. He could see his face on every screen. "From all over, it's uploaded to the network and its live!" One enforcer claimed. "Then the whole world is seeing this!?" From the infirmary to the outside of the palace to the throne room itself; Marco caught every eye. [Allow me To introduce myself. I am your Lord Marco Amadeus Nisell.] Marco bowed to his audience. "He's giving his identity away? Why is he doing this?" Uno did not understand how this could benefit his brother. "we were never supposed to.." Anastasia feared it would get worse than that. [And this Is my family]

"!?" And it did. Marco posted two images on the screen, of his own brother and sister. [Christopher Fortuno Nisell and Winnifred Anastasia Nisell. Together we are the Founders of Millennium. You may be Wondering why I am Telling all of You this now. Because it is Time for a Change. The system we Built has become Corrupted. My brother let his Power go to his Head. He did Horrible things in the Name of Peace. And the Proof is there.] He flashed other images on the screen, documents about the creation of the carding system and the Monument. [He created the Templars, he Arrested Innocents to preserve his Own glory. And Now, he Cast me Out when I tried to Stop him. So I ask you now, you who Enjoyed the Peace we started. Fight him, Fight him as Duelists or as Warriors. But Fight him, and do not let the Union crumble under his Sins] His face turned to the center of the screen. [Christopher. I know You are watching this Too. So please, Surrender now, and Prevent bloodshed. Let this.. be a new Beginning] The screen blacked out, the message was over. "marco.."

"Marco.. what the heck was that? Is he trying to tear the union down from within? He's accusing me of things he's done himself!" Uno could not believe the things he heard. "not.. all of them. your designs for the monument helped create the templars." Anastasia checked the video again, the documents were attached as separate files. It would be impossible to completely deny Uno's involvement. "If we had time, the Union could solve this. But time is what we don't have. This is exactly what Marco wants, to keep me busy. But why now.. why.. Oh!" Uno realized that this was timed purposefully. "The prisoners!" He opened a channel with the throne's console. "Iria. I presume you've seen that video too. Did you find all the prisoners?" If one of them saw that video, they would not be too happy. "We rounded up all that we could find. But we compared their number to what's missing from the Monument's records and there are a few unaccounted for." There was good and bad news. "No.." And the bad news kept coming; an enforcer ran into the room. "My lord. There's a situation at the bridge! One of Martels followers escaped the palace and took a hostage. He wants to talk to the Lord!"

"Oh no." Uno got up immediately. "you don't.." Anastasia knew what he was about to do. "I do. I am the lord." He grabbed his pendulum..

An instant later he appeared on the bridge, in between the two parties. "Okay. I showed up. What do you want" The enforcers were forming a barricade on one end. "My Lord, you should not be here!" Meanwhile on the other side was the hostage taker, a man with short unshaven beard, black hair, and a grey labcoat. "There you are. I do not know how you did it, but I suppose that's another invention of you Lords." He held a dueldisk on one arm and an unfortunate citizen from the villa area in the other. "Yes. You have me now. You don't need him. We can talk about this." Uno held his hands up. "There is nothing left to say that your 'brother' has not already said. But, if I have your attention." The man let the guy go, who hurriedly scampered off towards the enforcers. "I do not need anything else!" The man himself activated his dueldisk and challenged Uno. "Lord Nisell!" The guards grabbed their own decks. "Leave it. I will handle this." Uno stepped forward and prepared his cards. "What is your name? Where do you come from?" If he was going to duel someone, he at least wanted to know more about them. "Rujan. And you know where I came from, you were the one who put me inside that two-dimensional prison!"

Rujan's LP: 8000 Uno's LP: 8000

"A duel it is then." Uno sighed. The two players started drawing. "Even the machines take your side." Rujan scoffed when the dueldisk gave Uno the first turn. "I do not control the network, Rujan." Uno placed his two pendulums on the field; Performapal Camelump (Scale 2) and Performapal Lizardraw (scale 6). "And you think you can placate me with innocent looking monsters?" The opponent growled. "I am sorry if you were expecting something monstrous." Uno activated the effect of Lizardraw, tributing it from the pendulum zone to draw one card. Then he placed Performapal Odd-Eyes Unicorn (Scale 8) in the empty zone. "Pendulum summon!" Using their scales, Uno could summon Lizardraw(3/1200/600) from the extra deck and Performapals Longphone Bull(4/1600/1200) from his hand in defense mode. "Longphone Bull lets me add a non-pendulum Performapal to my hand!" The bulls horn-phone rang and called in a Performapal Elephammer with its noise. "I summon this guy too!" While Uno controlled two Performapals, the hammer-trunk elephant(6/2600/1800) could be summoned without tributes. "I set a card and end my turn!"

"You are not fooling anyone with your act, Lord Nisell!" Rujan drew his card and activated it. .. "Kyoutou Waterfront!" The spell spread out over the river around the bridge. A japanese tower sprang out from the water. Each time a monster was sent to the graveyard, one Kaiju counter would be added to this Kyoutou tower. "The Kaiju?" Now Uno recognized what he was up against. "Yes, you know this deck. You made it to soothe a nation that no longer exists. Just another example of your naivety... I know what kind of monster you truly deserve!" He placed one monster on the field, on Uno's side. "Geez." Performapal Longphone Bull was sacrificed and replaced with a giant spider monster(7/2400/2500). "Kumongous the Sticky String Kaiju! Each Kaiju can be summoned to the opponents field by tributing one of their monsters!" Meanwhile the field spell gained its first Kaiju Counter. "And.. when a Kaiju terrorizes my enemy's side, I can special summon one to my zones!" Rujan summoned another monster, the intergalactic dark giant Kaiju Radian(7/2800/2500). "And I activate Upstart Goblin!" By giving Uno 1000 lifepoints, Rujan could draw one new card and add another counter to the Waterfront.

Uno's LP: 9000

"Radian creates one copy of itself by removing two Kaiju counters from the field. Only one Kaiju can be face-up on each side, but tokens do not count towards that!" Radian took two of the counters on the Waterfront and formed a shadowy duplicate(8/2800/0) of its own body. "Time to rid the field of these lies! Radian attacks Performapal Lizardraw!" The dimensional giant launched a black hole blast towards the dapper lizard. "Not so fast!" Uno countered with his gambling quickplay spell; Roulette Spider! "We'll have to see who gets attacked!" The spider attached itself to Radians face and made the wheel spin. "Are you going to let luck make your decisions?" Rujan yelled, as the wheel stopped on the third slot. "Oh!" That was not one of the better outcomes. Roulette Spider still pointed at Uno's field, forcing Radian to attack one of his other monsters. "Then I change the attacktarget to Kumongous!" At the very least he could mitigate the losses this way, Radian slaughtered the spider with ease. "One time when a monster dies to your cards, Lizardraw can draw one card for each Performapal I control!" Since he controlled two, Uno drew twice. "Gheh." The Radian token attacked as well and sucked Elephammer into another dimension.

Uno's LP: 8400

"I activate Creature Swap!" Rujan used a spell next, which forced two monsters on the field to change positions. Rujan gave Uno the original Radian Kaiju. "You really want me to have your monsters, dont you?" Since Uno controlled just one card, he could only give Performapal Lizardraw to Rujan. "You wouldn't know what I want, Lord. So you wont get what you want! Kyoutou Waterfront has three counters!" Three more cards entered the graveyard (Roulette Spider, Elephammer, Creature Swap). "Once each turn, when my field spell has three or more, It can take the next Kaiju from my deck!" Rujan claimed a level 8 monster. "Gameciel! I tribute the token and your monster to summon it!" Gameciel the winged Sea Turtle Kaiju(8/2200/3000) was tribute summoned in defense mode by the Kaiju spell. At the very least pendulum monsters couldn't go to the graveyard, so the sacrificed lizard didn't give the Waterfront any more Kaiju counters. "Kaiser Colosseum!" But now a circular arena rose up next to the tower, and trapped the two duelists on the sandy battleground. "Ah! You're limiting my monsters?" This was not good. Kaiser Colosseum prevented Uno from using more monsters than his opponent. "Exactly." Rujan placed a trap down and ended his turn.

"In that case.. I activate my spell, Pendulum Storm!" If Uno wanted to get anything done, the Colosseum would have to be the first target. "You wont get off that easily! Gameciel can negate a card or effect and banish it by removing two Kaiju counters from anywhere on the field!" Rujan took the two counters from Kyoutou Waterfront and Gameciel pulled the water from the river up to sweep Pendulum Storm away with a tidal wave. "I figured you would, Rujan. But.. you are right about one thing, when it comes to me." There was only one Kaiju counter left, this was Uno's chance. "I know the cards! I activate Pendulum Rising!" The Kaiju Radian transformed into a portal of light. "What!?" And Odd-Eyes Pendulum Dragon(7/2500/2000) dashed through the portal. "Pendulum Rising can sacrifice one monster to summon a pendulum monster from my deck with the same level!" It had been a while. Thanks to Martel, Uno could use his trusty dragon once more. "This is who I am, Rujan. Uno the duelist, not Fortuno the lord!" The red dragon charged the sea dragon and smashed its shell open, destroying the Kaiju.

Rujans LP: 7400

"You expect me to believe that this is who you are?" Rujan started his turn. "Your brother exposed you, Lord!" He reactivated Kyoutou Waterfront (which now had 3 counters due to Pendulum Rising and Gameciel going to the graveyard) to add Gadarla the Mystery Dust Kaiju to his hand. "I activate a continuous spell, Kaiju Files! Kaiju Files adds one Kaiju counter, each time a Kaiju appears! So, disappear!" He tributed Odd-Eyes Pendulum Dragon for to summon the giant moth Gadarla(8/2700/2600) to Uno's field. "Now I can summon Dogoran, the Mad Flame Kaiju!" The giant fire reptile Dogoran(8/3000/1200) appeared on his side, and breathed his fire across the Colosseum. "Dogoran can skip his next attack to destroy all monsters on the field!" The fire reached Gadarla in the air and burned her to cinders.

"And now.. Kaiju Files' second effect! Each turn I can trade one Kaiju for another in my deck!" The original Dogoran vanished into the ground. And the earth split open to unveil a mechanized version of Dogoran(0/0). "Super Anti-Kaiju War Machine Mecha-Dogoran!" Mecha-Dogoran copied the attackpoints of dead Kaiju. The warmachine targeted Dogoran in the graveyard and it (3000/0) absorbed its power. "Tell me, Lord. Did your brother lie? Did you or did you not make the templars?" He asked before he made his direct attack. "...We both did, in a way." Uno would not lie. "You did it, is all I care about.." And Mecha-Dogoran struck Uno with pure white flames. "So you deserve the same fate you gave me. Lord Nisell! You see this?" Rujan touched his dueldisk. "I do not remember how or why, but that strange kid took me out and gave me this. And when I could walk again on my own, I made sure to keep it. This is the same kind of dueldisk you enforcers use when templars just aren't good enough. With this I can 'card' you, Lord.. And I will! I'll let you rot as a card for years to come!"

Uno's LP: 5400

(To be Continued in Redux 027: The Emperor's New Play)

New Cards used by Uno Nisell
Performapal Longphone Bull

Cards used by Rujan
Kumongous, the Sticky String Kaiju
Radian, the Multidimensional Kaiju
Gameciel, the Sea Turtle Kaiju
Gadarla, the Mystery Dust Kaiju
Dogoran, the Mad Flame Kaiju
Super Anti-Kaiju War Machine Mecha-Dogoran

-
Kyoutou Waterfront
Upstart Goblin
Creature Swap
Kaiser Colosseum
The Kaiju Files