My dearest Magician Michelle Jensen
"I use the spell card Bound Wand! And I target my Magician of Black Chaos! This card allows me to raise my monster's ATK by 100 multiplied with my monsters level, and since Chaos' level is 8 he gains another 800 ATK, giving him a total of 3600 ATK!" Mitsu shouted fumbling with the rest of her cards. She might have bitten off a bit more than she could chew, but she had a feeling that victory was just around the corner.
At the moment she was dueling a high-class guy from the center of town, she never got his name but it wasn't all that important. The important thing was that in a matter of seconds he had slaughtered her lifepoints leaving her with a mere 700.
At the moment her only defense was her Magician of Black Chaos, which she miraculous had been able to summon at the cost of her Magician's Valkyria and her Skilled white magician. She also had Blast magician on the field, but he only had 1 spell counter left, the high-class guy didn't have any monster out with any less than 700 ATK, and that was not so good. He had five other monsters on the field, plus 2700 lifepoints.
But she took a deep breath and focused on her hand. A bright idea hit her and she attacked with Chaos, successfully sending one of his most powerful monsters to the graveyard. But after that she couldn't do anything, anything but this. There was no way she would be able to take all of his monsters out with her own monsters, so she had to gamble and take a chance. Ending her turn she placed a trap card face-down.
Her opponent had proven to love summoning monsters, the more the better. And he didn't disappoint. As she had predicted the first thing he did was summon a monster but before he even finished his sentence she shouted loudly.
"Oh no you don't! I activate my trap card, Torrential Tribute! Which send all of our monsters to the graveyard!" As if on cue all monsters was got swallowed up by a black mass, all disappearing, all except Magician of Black Chaos.
Her opponent stood shocked. "That's not possible, how is he still there!?" He sounded furious, baring his teeth and fisting his hands. "You remember the spell card I used last round right? When the monster equipped with that card is sent to the graveyard, the card is destroyed. But my monster gets to stay!" Mitsu smirked as she explained, victory was drawing near.
Mitsu's eyes glistered like they were on fire! And as she looked her magician over, she saw that he too was smiling. His usual cold and indifferent demeanor broken by something as simple as this.
Her opponent cried out in anger, but as he only had two cards left, and obviously nothing to do he ended his turn, leaving himself open for the final attack. The battle ended and Chaos looked at Mitsu with a small smile before he disappeared. Her heart fluttered and her cheeks burned slightly.
Did he have to look at her like that? He had never looked at her like that before, and it all started after she had started getting those terrible nightmares. After the first night, the nightmare had become worse and she feared sleeping now, pushing her bedtime and lying awake for as long as possible. She would actually experience pain in her dreams now and she was terrified by the mere thought. Just last night she had "woken up" at the bottom of the ocean. She hadn't been able to breath and she had panicked and struggled to reach the surface only to fall even deeper.
She had thought that she was going to die. But then Aqua Madoor had showed up, jumping into the ocean after her. She had woken up for real after that, bathed in her own sweat and she had cried. She still had trouble breathing regularly hours after the dream but she knew it wasn't real. It couldn't be, it was all just in her head.
"Cheater!" Mitsu snapped out of her thoughts and glared angrily at her opponent. "There is no way that that was a legal move! You cheated!" He shouted stomping his feet furiously.
Mitsu snorted at that. "Don't be stupid, that was totally legal!" She said calmly. "Now we agreed on 30 yen." The guy screeched loudly. "What a spoiled brat" Mitsu thought, getting impatient. Something told her she wasn't going to get her money.
"What a dick!" Naomi yelled, almost dropping her ice-cream cone. "And see, this is why I tag along when you go dueling, or else you will never get your price money!" Mitsu chuckled a bit. Naomi was her best friend and she was completely hooked on the idea of Mitsu dueling, always supportive, always excited and always making sure Mitsu got her price money.
As predicted Mitsu hadn't gotten her money from the high-class guy who had just stomped off, refusing to even look at her. "Oh come on now, I do get my money-" the look in her friends eyes told her to stop.
"Mitsu, dear, you never get your money unless I'm there…" Mitsu knew that wasn't completely true, yes, a lot of duelist refused to pay up but there were some who actually did and it was those who she had most fun dueling, honorable people. But she didn't want to start an argument so she kept her mouth shut.
Mitsu finished her cone and yawned loudly, checking her watch, it was almost 5 pm. Naomi looked at her with a worried expression. "Hey, are you still having those nightmares?" She asked carefully finishing her cone as well.
Mitsu smiled warmly. "Yeah, but don't worry it's starting to get better." She lied still smiling widely.
"Mitsu, it's almost been a month now!" Naomi complained. "Almost two" Mitsu corrected in her mind. After a month she had decided to tell Naomi about the nightmares, but she didn't want her to worry so she had only told her about a few, really bad ones.
The funny thing though, was that every night one of her duel monsters would come to her rescue. Her Magician of Black Chaos had done so a couple of times and her Chaos Sorcerer too. He still freaked her out but it had become better, though she never allowed him too close to her.
"So! What did the academy say?" Naomi asked, switching subject completely. A little under two weeks ago Mitsu had finally applied for a dual academy, her parents had found out and had freaked! Literally. They didn't talk to her for a few days, but after some time they had forgiven her and even though they disagreed with her decision they had calmed down and accepted it.
"Still waiting for a reply" Mitsu said sadly. Naomi hummed thoughtfully before checking her watch. "I should probably head home now." She said more to herself than to Mitsu, but she did nod anyway. "You should." She said and took a right turn. "See you tomorrow!"
Naomi waved frantically before springing around, running towards the nearest bus stop. While Mitsu lived close by, Naomi live on the outskirt of town and had to either catch the bus or be prepared to walk for an hour.
Mitsu barely made it home for dinner, but she did make it. Her parents chatted away while they ate but the younger girl didn't really feel up for it today so she ate her food in silence. As the night drew nearer It was clear that Mitsu grew more and more afraid, she sat up a few hours after her parents had gone to bed, fumbling with her cards and other things in an attempt to distract herself. But nothing worked.
By the time she was too tired to stay awake any longer, the fear had already settled in her chest. In the end she ended with going to bed, lying under the covers with her deck on the table next to her, preparing herself for yet another nightmare.
She had noticed a pattern after the first month. The nightmares would always start out with her walking alone in the dark. She would never be able to see anything, just walk. When she had tired herself out she would finally she a light and sort of regain all the lost energy. The monsters usually didn't creep in the dark like the first time, not anymore, instead they would manifest deeper inside the dream and attack her when she was least prepared.
This night it was no different.