Chapter 3

August 10, 9:10 a.m.
SIC Laboratories – Tokyo Branch
Tokyo, Japan
–

Sugoroku scowled at the bumpy gravel road laid out before the van. "Well, this is a fine mess," he groused. "You would think they'd keep places like this in a more industrial section of Tokyo instead of out on the catskills."

"Except there probably isn't any more space in industrial Tokyo to fit anything," Ryou reasoned. He was seated on the bench behind Sugoroku and gazing out the windows at the row of trees lining the left side of the road. "And if they deal with advanced holography, like the letter Yuugi got says they do, shouldn't it make sense they be able to have a more remote location so busybodies don't go poking about?"

"Hrmph. I suppose."

For about the fiftieth time on the drive, Téa glanced through the rear windshield and at the stylish black car following them. Tristan noted the motion and chuckled. "Otogi knows his way around Tokyo pretty well, Téa. He has business here all the time. He's not gonna get lost."

"That's what I'm afraid of," she muttered under her breath. She knew he'd gone and picked up Rebecca from the airport, and though she disliked Rebecca less than she used to, she still found the child to be... well... a child. Why invite her along, anyway? Not like she's really been anything but a thorn in Yuugi's side since the day they met...

... No, that's not really true. She helped out in a big way during the incident with Dartz, getting Yuugi and Kaiba back into KC headquarters. Not like she was ever thanked for it, of course, but that's Kaiba for you. Not sure I'd be thankful that a twelve-year-old managed to hack through my own security systems, either, come to think of it.

She turned back around and looked up toward the front. Yuugi was sitting shotgun and had a pensive look on his face. She could only imagine what could be going through his mind. Probably the Pharaoh, advising him to be careful, she surmised. As unpredictable as the Pharaoh could sometimes be, that was the one behavior they had all noted seemed to be commonplace. Then again, Yuugi's the one who's feeling cautious about the whole business. He was reluctant from the start, I could see it. I sure hope Joey and Tristan didn't inadvertently pressure him into doing it. If something happens...

Why should anything happen? It's supposed to be just a game, right?

Right.

She swept a stray lock of brown hair away from her face and chewed the inside of her bottom lip, forcing a slight pout onto her features. Joey, seated next to Ryou and looking a little pensive himself, saw the expression. "Something the matter, Téa?"

She shook her head. "Not really. Just thinking."

"Alert the media," Tristan snickered.

Before she could come up with a smart reply to that, Sugoroku made a noise of exasperated triumph. "Finally! There it is, SIC Tokyo Labs." And indeed, there was a sign up ahead that delineated precisely the name of the location – beyond it was a wide gate with a checkpoint booth and a bored-looking guard sitting inside. Sugoroku pulled the van up to the booth.

The guard hung his head out the window and offered a polite smile and nod of his head. "Welcome, Mutou-san. We have been expecting your party. How many are here today?"

"Six in this van, plus two in the car behind us," Sugoroku answered.

"Very good, sir." The guard pressed a button in his booth – it appeared to be one of only two on the entire console – and the gate began sliding open. "There will be a representative waiting for you at the front door."

"Thank you," Sugoroku said, and nodded his head once in deference to the guard, then slowly moved the van inside the gate. Beyond the fencing, in direct contrast to the road on which they'd traveled for no less than ten minutes, there was a well-paved parking lot whose many spaces were mostly occupied, presumably by the cars of employees developing the various technologies SIC had become renowned for.

Téa blinked in surprise at the place. "Wow, the building here sure looks futuristic," she noted. The building in question bore structure vaguely reminiscent of an ovoid Tower of Pisa, save that it stood up straight. Well-washed glass panes covered nearly every surface. On each level was a catwalk that circled the entire building; guardrails ensured the safety of those who traveled along it, and there seemed to be quite a few who were doing just that. With the morning sunlight reflecting off it, it was a glimmering beacon in the middle of nowhere.

Ryou turned to Téa as Sugoroku parked the van in a spot relatively close to the building. "You mentioned that Rex and Weevil had been invited as well. I wonder if they're here today."

"Why would those losers get invitations, anyway?" Joey grumbled. "They didn't do nearly as well at Duelist Kingdom or Battle City. Let's all be clear that I'm here because I, on the other hand, was stellar in both."

"You never got an invitation," Tristan pointed out.

"They must have sent it to the wrong address!"

Tristan smirked. "Riiight. Well, at least we know that Yuugi is here as a champ."

Joey hopped out of the van, a vein throbbing in his forehead. "That's it! C'mon, I can take you, let's go right now!"

Téa got out and stood directly in Joey's way, her eyes blazing. "Stop it, Joey." Then she turned to Tristan. "And stop baiting him. This isn't the time or place to fight. We're all here and we're all going to play, so can we just leave it at that, please?"

Ryou stepped out behind Téa and gestured toward the building's main entrance, where a rather imposing-looking gentleman wearing a dark suit and a pair of shades was waiting. "Look. That's probably the man the guard was talking about. Shall we go?"

Joey muttered something under his breath, but turned to follow Ryou's suggestion. Yuugi and Sugoroku were quickly behind them, and they were both just as glad that the situation had been defused peacefully. Sugoroku had no broom with which to whack Joey this time. But as they approached the waiting gentleman, Yuugi, Joey, Téa, and Tristan all had a flash of recognition. It was hard to miss the spike of hair striking straight up in the front, not completely unlike Tristan's own choice of style. Téa and Tristan, in particular, had reason to remember this man – they'd spent the better part of ten minutes barricading a door he'd tried to break down.

But upon their approach, he merely offered them a smile and a bow of his head. "Mutou Yuugi. A pleasure to see you again."

The others noted a distinct flash in Yuugi's eyes – they seemed to almost change color, from their already unusual violet tint to a near dark-blood maroon shade. His voice suddenly bore a bold tenor that likewise wasn't usually there, and he said something that nobody at school would have ever thought he'd say to a man this much larger than he.

"You'll forgive me if I don't exactly share the sentiment."

Oddly enough, the gentleman seemed to take no offense to that statement. "Of course. That's to be expected. But times and people change."

"You know this guy, Yuugi?"

The group turned collectively to the sound of Otogi Ryuuji's approaching voice – he and Rebecca Hopkins had parked a few spaces away from the van and were only now getting to the sidewalk in front of the laboratory. As was his habit, the owner of Black Crown Entertainment was rolling a die between his fingers much as one would roll a coin in its place. Rebecca, meantime, was rushing up to tackle Yuugi in a hug.

The maroon in his eyes and the boldness in his voice instantly vanished, and he let out a surprised "Oomph!"

Rebecca let out a girlish giggle and snuggled her head against his shoulder. "Thought you'd get away from me, huh?"

Yuugi blushed and squirmed slightly in her grasp. His voice was positively tinny. "Well, I won't say the idea hadn't occurred to me..."

Otogi raised an eyebrow, his default expression when he was witness to something he believed there was a chance he would regret having seen later. "As I was saying..."

"Uh, yeah, we've met a couple times," Tristan volunteered, making a point of ignoring the annoyed look on Téa's face. "Not exactly under the best of circumstances, either."

"Perhaps these circumstances will permit you the benefit of the doubt," said the gentleman. He gestured toward the main doors. "If you'll all follow me, I'll take you to the main lab. It's where we house the simulation technology for Kingdom." He turned and began walking that way. The group followed, though several suspicious glances were cast about and exchanged.

Joey muttered an explanation to Otogi. "He was running security at Duelist Kingdom. He nabbed Mokuba because Industrial Illusions wanted to force a takeover of KaibaCorp, then made Yuugi duel... well... I'm really not sure what he dueled, now that I think of it. But he vanished before Yuugi could win and he took Mokuba with him."

Otogi hummed. "Not everyone obeys the honor system."

"After Duelist Kingdom, the Big Five wanted control of KaibaCorp for themselves, so they locked him in a virtual simulator game, and then Yuugi, Mokuba, and I had to go in there to get Kaiba back out."

That brought a scowl to the young business owner's face. "Now, that does sound awfully familiar. What was this guy's role?"

"Real-life muscle," said Tristan. "Mokuba took us to a secondary lab so we could get into the system, but the Big Five knew about the lab and sent him and a bunch of cronies so they could unplug it with them still inside."

"In that case, I'm a little surprised they didn't try that with the rest of us when we all were in there..."

"Maybe it was whatever thing Noa set up with them," Tristan reasoned. Then he shuddered. "I'm just as glad they didn't do it that way. That whole thing did make me brush up a little on Dueling 101..."

Joey snickered, and couldn't resist the opportunity to take a shot at Tristan. "Not as easy as it looks, is it? I'll bet it drove you bananas."

Tristan was about to slap Joey upside the head for that comment, but the bickering was interrupted by the man leading them. "It occurs to me I never told you my name – Kemo Saruwatari, at your service. And it's been quite a while since I worked for the Big Five, gentlemen."

Joey winced. "Jeez! He heard us."

"Probably just you," Tristan muttered.

"What's that supposed to mean?!"

Yuugi piped up before the arguing could begin anew. "What do we need to know about this game that the manual won't tell us?"

"Strictly speaking, Mutou-san, there is no manual as of yet. We've been working on it, but trimming it down to the basics is a bit difficult, given how complex this game is," Kemo responded. "So allow me. The game does contain tutorials, of a sort, that will tell you about the basics, pretty much everything you need to know in order to get started properly. As you progress, and the difficulty advances, you'll learn about methods of combating the various challenges you find throughout Kingdom in more complex manners. And make no mistake, your range of tasks will be quite varied. This is an interactive world you'll be playing with."

"So it's like Final Fantasy?" Otogi inquired.

"More like Final Reality," Kemo responded. "Though fantasy-based, there are realistic goals to be achieved and realistic people with whom you'll be interacting. The environment about you will react to you and your actions in appropriate fashion."

"And what sorts of goals are we supposed to be achieving in this game? Sugoroku asked.

"That, Mutou-san, is what you're here to discover." Kemo offered a small smirk, then approached a set of double doors and pressed a five-digit code into the keypad. "This is the main lab."

Rebecca grinned at Yuugi, clasping his right hand in her left as they followed Kemo into the lab. "Isn't this exciting?" she enthused.

He gave her a somewhat strained smile. "Uh, yeah. Exciting, all right."

She pouted. "Aww, c'mon! You've gotta get into the spirit of it, Yuugi."

"I'm doing my best. Just feeling a little cramped, is all."

Everyone stopped about ten steps in. The lab was a large, cylindrical room with an equally cylindrical pillar rising through the center. Several segments of that pillar bore extended trays of exposed circuitry; robotic arms extending from the ceiling were manipulating the trays with care and precision. Several technicians looked up from their work, smiled and nodded at the approaching group.

Lining the round wall of the room were pods very much like the ones in which nearly everyone here had been trapped on Noa's submersible station. However, they seemed to be designed more for comfort than anything else, and they were not enclosed, as the previous ones had been. Yuugi let out a small sigh of relief at this. Being inside the virtual pods had given him a touch of claustrophobia. Resting inside each pod was a streamlined helmet that bore a single cable in the back; that cable led into a small opening in the back of the pod, and presumably connected to the machinery within the central pillar.

Everyone was slightly apprehensive about the pods, but Joey was the first to voice his concern. "Tell you what, you might remember we had a couple bad experiences with this stuff..."

Kemo chuckled. "Not to worry. This machinery is completely safe. There's no malicious intent here, it's merely a game. But while we're on the subject of familiar technology, we're developing a more mobile version of the simulator that will allow players to interact with the game anytime, anywhere."

"Like MMORPG's?" Ryou asked, now even more intrigued.

Téa blinked. "What's an MMORPG?"

"Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game," Yuugi supplemented. "Think World of Warcraft or City of Heroes. Bunches of players from all over the world, connecting to a central network and playing out scenarios with each other, the idea being strength in numbers."

"We haven't reached that level of sophistication quite yet," Kemo said. "But we're getting there. This is a linear game, with clear beginning, middle, and end. Jumping into the middle of it would cause something of an imbalance. However, if Kingdom is the success we project it will be, there is every possibility a sequel to it would be like the games you have in mind."

"You guys are pretty optimistic," Otogi noted. "What's this miniature version you were going on about?"

Kemo gestured to a nearby console where three technicians were milling about. Atop the console was another of the pod helmets, but this one's cables were directly connected to a device that, despite a few cosmetic differences, appeared to be a standard-issue KaibaCorp duel disk. Yuugi's eyebrows shot up in surprise. "What in the world...?"

"This is the Kingdom mobile simulator," said Kemo. "It's a prototype, of course."

"Looks like a duel disk to me," Joey replied, his tone at once suspicious and yet curious.

"Our people found that the duel disk housing was surprisingly efficient for carrying the sensitive equipment inside. All the hardware with the housing is original SIC material. The game doesn't interact with Duel Monsters cards, but you'll be able to purchase upgrade cards to insert into the disk's various slots. This will update your system's information automatically. Of course, once an upgrade card is inserted, it becomes useless to anyone else."

"Ensuring you make a huge profit," Sugoroku noted.

"Exactly." Kemo gestured at the virtual pods lining the walls. "But for the moment, this is where the beta test will be taking place. The simulator will be able to support all of you as different characters. You'll even be able to choose what sort of character you'd like to play, and the first Duel Monsters that will be at your disposal."

"What makes this so different from the KaibaCorp simulator games we've been in?" Tristan asked. "A lot of this same stuff was available to us through that, if I remember right."

"Most notably, you won't be dueling, in the sense normally associated with that term. The Duel Monsters within this world are alive and just as interactive as the non-player characters are. Random encounters will occur in which you'll have to confront and even battle other Duel Monsters. Overcome these encounters, and they'll join whatever cause to which you've pledged yourselves."

Looks of surprise and sudden anticipation abounded among the group. Rebecca cuddled Yuugi's arm in excitement; he squirmed again, but allowed a smile of appreciation at this twist. "When do we get started?"

"Whenever you're ready."

Joey grinned. "Cool! What're we waiting for, then? Let's play!"

At those words, a cadre of technicians grinned and came over to guide each prospective player to a different virtual pod. "I wonder what it'll be like," Ryou mused, as he was led to a nearby pod.

So do I, thought Yuugi, as he was also taken – much to Rebecca's dismay – to a local pod.

"Yuugi... are you certain this is all on the level?"

Of course I'm not, mou hitori no boku, but Tristan is right. I can't very well just sit around and do nothing with all my spare time. 'Sides, you can't tell me you don't find it exciting, too.

"... Very well. But it does seem suspicious, nevertheless. Even more so with this Kemo acting as tour guide. It is a waste of his talents – he was much less suspect when being a bully."

Maybe times and people really do change, mou hitori no boku.

"You never cease to astound me with your optimism, Yuugi."

Nor you, me, with your pessimism. Yuugi sat down in the chair and immediately felt himself relaxing; it was even more comfortable than it looked, and that was a feat in and of itself. The technician helped him don his helmet properly, and strapped it snugly. There was a slight pricking sensation at the back of Yuugi's neck; the tech explained it before he had a chance to express his concern. "That's the neural circuitry you're feeling, there – your brain will be in direct contact with our computers."

The visor's dual eye screens showed an uplifting "Hello!" message from a Kuriboh and Watapon bouncing back and forth like a screensaver. Kemo's voice filtered through the headphones. "All we'd like you to do is play through as you normally would. The game is set for a few hours, and we'll be recording your play data from the central computer. I hope everyone's ready, because here we go."

Then a soothing female voice, clearly synthetic, took over. "Use the keypad on the right arm of your virtual pod to review character information and make your selection." A grid of character types and descriptions floated into view – there appeared to be over fifty distinct possibilities, and included was the option of having two simultaneous occupations. Yuugi did some quick mental calculating. That means there's over two thousand possibilities here!

"You need only select one, Yuugi," his darker half reminded him.

Well, fine, then. What would you pick? I don't think King, Pharaoh, or Emperor is anywhere on the list...

"Amusing." The Pharaoh looked through the list alongside Yuugi, and with a metaphorical finger he pointed to one. "Regional judge. A character of objectivity who dispenses impartial justice."

That doesn't sound at all like you, mou hitori no boku, was Yuugi's sarcastic reply. Nevertheless, he made the selection, because he also liked it. The role was a reasonably important one, but not so much so that he would garner unwanted attention right off the bat.

"Please select starting location."

This made Yuugi blink in surprise. A map appeared before his eyes and showed him a large island-continent, with a satellite island off its northwestern coast. Looks like the big population center is to the south of the mainland, he noted, so I guess if I want to avoid a lot of controversy to start off with, I should stay away from it.

"Isn't the purpose of a game such as this to confront a conflict, Yuugi? You seem quite determined to steer clear of conflict, without which there can be no story of any interest."

Well, I want to see how this world works first, before jumping right into the action, you know? I want experience before battle, not the other way around. Yuugi scrolled the map up and selected "Jakhud", apparently a thriving port city in the island's western province.

"Please select three Duel Monsters."

Another list was presented to Yuugi. It didn't take him long to figure out what the monsters presented to him had in common – all were Level 4 or lower, had no special effects to their credit, and had an attack power of 1500 or less. Well. I guess I'd better choose an even spread. Given what I have to work with – or what I don't have to work with – that should be pretty easy. Nevertheless, Yuugi gave his selection careful consideration. I want monsters that are familiar. I want excellent defense ability... so Mystical Elf's at the top of the list. I also want something that can both attack decently, and is mobile... Gazelle? Nah, not right now, anyway, and he can't fly... oh! Winged Dragon, Guardian of the Fortress #1! Perfect. And something to back them both up. Doesn't have to be phenomenal, necessarily, but something I can work with – aha, Flame Manipulator. That could be interesting. There. No opposing types or classes.

The screen went blank, then faded back in with a wide-pan view of the continental map, and an upward-scrolling script from which the female voice began to read.

"After three hundred years of ruling the Rondeval continent, the Sygh-Varths Empire is faced with a crisis. Since the ascension of the 12th Emperor, Heishin, to the throne, corruption and brutality have begun to spread across the empire. Heishin and a select group of his underlings have been accused of living in the lap of luxury by strictly enforcing heavy taxation on the people they rule – but these complaints have fallen on deaf ears. Many have expressed anti-Imperial sentiments, only to be arrested soon after on charges of sedition.

"On the fringes of the empire, people have begun to whisper of open revolt and rebellion against such oppressive taxes. Silent support of an uprising has taken root among the residents of the remote northwestern island of Vaxi..."

Suddenly, the screen went blank again. The sounds of crackling and snapping echoed painfully in Yuugi's ears, and he felt a distinct – and thoroughly unpleasant tingle – on his neck, where the neural circuitry was touching his skin. He winced. Hey, what's going on?

"I have a very bad feeling about this..." said the Pharaoh.

Just as Yuugi was about to reach up and try to tamper with the straps that held the helmet to his head, the screens buzzed back to life.

KINGDOM SIMULATOR OVERLOAD

A glitch...? he wondered.

SAFETY LOCKS ENGAGED

BEGINNING TRANSITION TO MODE-2

Yuugi frowned. What's Mode-2...?

TRANSITION TO MODE-2 COMPLETE

KINGDOM SIMULATOR LOCK-IN MODE ENGAGED

His eyes went wide. Lock-in mode?! His hands leapt to his helmet; the last thing he wanted was to be trapped in yet another virtual simulation.

But before he could even locate the first strap, the neural circuitry buzzed the back of his neck. He arched his neck back and cried out. What's... happening?!

And then all was darkness.

–
August 10, 9:24 a.m.
SIC Private Aircraft 1993
Pacific Ocean - In Transit
–

He chuckled, then removed his monitor goggles.

"Gotcha."