Yuya's Treat

by Fenghuang0296

It's the perfect storm as forces converge on Fusion Dimension. The Lancers are backed up by powers and allies new and old alike, but will it be enough to take down Leo Akaba once and for all? And is he even the biggest threat? AU from episode 63 onwards. Rated T for occasional profanity and mature (violent) themes.

44. The Deadly Wind! Rise, Eyes of Bravery!

Chapter 43: The Deadly Wind! Rise, Eyes of Bravery!

Eventually, Shun figured out how to drive the Airship, and carefully piloted across the ruins of Heartland. He docked at the top of the stairs that lead to the Duel Sanctuary, carefully lining up the door with the plateau outside the Sanctuary.

"It's quiet," Yuya noticed, looking around.

"There should be more activity. Where is everyone?" Allen agreed with a frown.

"This is wrong," Kite frowned. He swung the door open and leapt out, charging towards the Sanctuary.

In a burst of pressurised air, the double doors were blown open. Kaze's slim, cloaked form stood in the doorway, staring outwards. The wind blew Kite backwards, and he skidded on the polished stone floor. Squinting, the blonde noticed something horrific.

Bodies. Every single refugee in the Duel Sanctuary was laid on top of one another, unmoving. "What the hell did you do?" Kite demanded.

From the Airship, Katie frowned. "Hey. That's the guy who saved us yesterday. Hey guy!" she shouted, waving through the window, but Yuke held her back. "I don't think he's our friend right now," he shook his head.

"They aren't dead," Kaze informed him. "Just unconscious,"

"They'd better be!" the blonde shouted, arming his Duel Disk. "What the hell are you playing at?"

"I've been dancing around this city-sized pile of ash for two days looking for the one She chose, and nothing," Kaze growled. "I got sick of it. So I decided to make him come to me,"

"What the hell are you going on about?" Kite demanded.

"Yuya Sakaki!" Kaze shouted. The entertainer, who had been watching through the window of the Airship, flinched in surprise. "If you wish to ensure the lives of these people shan't end today, you will Duel me! At once!"

"Screw that, I'll crush you here and now!" Kite barked.

"If you try that, they all die at once," Kaze snorted.

"How do I know you aren't bluffing?" the blonde demanded.

In response, Kaze snapped his fingers and clenched them into a fist - and suddenly Kite couldn't breathe. He clutched at his throat, desperately trying to inhale oxygen. His face slowly turned purple, black spots dancing in his vision, and he fell to his knees, shuddering and gasping. The Lancers watched in horror as the boy collapsed, his eyes sliding shut.

Kaze released the fist. "He's not dead either, just so you all know. But if I'd withheld air from him for a few seconds longer, he would be. So unless you all like that idea, Yuya Sakaki will Duel me right now," he demanded.

Yuya emerged from the Airship and armed his Duel Disk. "I'll Duel," he nodded, frowning at his opponent.

"Excellent," Kaze coolly smiled, arming his own Duel Disk, which flashed into the lime green splodge shape of a Crashlands Duel Disk. Yuya's own disk activated, and he started the Duel. "Field Spell; Cross Over, activate,"

"I'll take the first move," Kaze hissed, his cloak billowing around him. He drew his hand and scanned it. "By discarding Skypent Tlaloc, I can add Skypent Xipe from my Deck to my hand," he declared, discarding and drawing. "Now, by discarding Xipe from my hand I can add my Spell, Skypent Sacrifice from my Deck to my hand," he declared, repeating the procedure.

"I activate my Spell, Skypent Sacrifice!" Kaze declared. "By banishing Tlaloc and Xipe from my Grave, I can perform a Fusion Summon, but the summoned monster is destroyed at the end of my second turn! Mother snake of brilliant bronze, come forth now with power untold! Fusion Summon! Level 6! Rise as the serpent that brings life from death! Descend, Skypent Maya!" His 2400-ATK bronze ace serpent appeared. "I end my turn,"

"Then it's my turn," Yuya nodded, taking his own hand. "Junior," he smiled, seeing Odd-Eyes Baby Dragonet in his hand. The other cards fell together, and he had his strategy. "Using the Scale 1 Odd-Eyes Baby Dragonet and the Scale 3 Performapal La Panda I Set the Pendulum Scale!" Junior rose into the air, accompanied by a crystalline '1', and the other Scale carried a plump panda with a large '3'. "I'll first activate Junior's Pendulum Effect, which lets me change La Panda's Pendulum Scale to 8 until the end of the turn!" Yuya declared, and the numbers changed as Junior squeaked adorably. "Now, I'll activate La Panda's effect, which allows me to increase her Scale from 8 to 9, and in the process make the Scale change permanent!" The panda clapped her hands in glee.

Kaze looked at Junior with a frown. "You will be mine," he muttered.

"And now, it's time for the amazing, astonishing, Pendulum Summon! Swing far, pendulum! Carve the arc of victory!" Yuya commanded, his pendulum drawing a portal in midair.

"Come, my friends! Performapal Laughmaker! And Performapal Radish Horse!" Yuya commanded, twin streaks of light shooting out of the portal. Laughmaker materialised, a tall, yellow-clad warrior, with 2500 ATK, and Radish Horse cheered, shaking her leafy mane, with 500 ATK. "I activate Radish Horse's effect! I target a monster on either side of the field, and your monster loses ATK equal to Radish Horse's, while Laughmaker gains that ATK!" Yuya commanded. Radish Horse fired vegetables from its forehead and hit both of the other monsters, adjusting their ATK accordingly. Laughmaker now had an 1100-point advantage over Maya.

"Battle Phase! Laughmaker, attack Skypent Maya!" Yuya commanded, and his monster giggled, springing into action. "Now, when Laughmaker battles, he gains 1000 ATK for every monster on the field whose ATK is greater than their original ATK!" the boy grinned, his monster's points rocketing up to 4000.

Kaze chuckled. "I activate Skypent Chalchi's effect in my hand! By discarding him to the Graveyard, Maya is indestructible, I take no battle damage, and your monster is destroyed at the end of the Damage Step!" he declared, sending one of the four cards in his hand to the Grave. A cyan serpent appeared from the Graveyard portal, and wrapped around Laughmaker, crushing it, before vanishing. The Pendulum was sent to the Extra Deck, and Yuya inhaled in surprise. He frowned, scanning his field for options. "I end my turn," he decided. The only card in his hand was Performapal Dramatic Theatre, which wouldn't be much use defending. The boy cast around the field for an Action Card, and spotted one on the fringe of the forest around the Sanctuary. He dashed towards it.

Kaze, not understanding his action, drew. "My turn," He scanned his hand and snorted in disappointment. "I activate Skypent Maya's effect, which allows me to revive Skypent Chalchi from my Grave," The cyan snake returned, with 1100 ATK. "And now, using the Scale 5 Skypent Quetzal and anotherScale 5 Skypent Xipe, I Set my own Pendulum Scale!" the man declared. Another pair of Pendulum pillars rose into the air, each carrying a Skypent. "Quetzal's Pendulum Effect; if there's another Skypent in the other Pendulum Zone, I can change her Scale from 5 to 1!"

Yuya's eyes widened as he grabbed the card, and he paused, staring up. "Pendulum?"

"Now, bloodstained pendulum! Slice through reality and allow my monsters passage!" Kaze declared, and a portal was torn open. "Come, Skypent Tonat!" Reducing his hand to two cards, a new monster appeared, coloured navy blue. Tonat roared, showing 1300 ATK.

"And now, I activate my Spell, Skypent Fusion!" the man commanded, and he was left with a single card. "Come, golden serpent, bring forth all that you have! Fusion Summon! With the blood of your foes on your stained fangs, destroy all that stands in your gold-paved path! Now, Level 10! Rise, Skypent Huitzil!"

With a mighty roar, the great golden serpent that was Kaze's ultimate monster appeared on the field. Yuya gasped at it's splendour and 3500 ATK. "By banishing a Skypent from my Graveyard, I can destroy a card on the field. So I'll say goodbye to Skypent Tonat and get rid of Radish Horse!" Kaze commanded, and with an earthshaking crack Radish Horse was swallowed up by the ground. "Huitzil! Direct attack!"

Yuya looked at the card he had picked up. Not bad, but not helpful. He narrowly dodged the snake's attack, which reduced him to 500 LP in a single blow. "I end my turn," Kaze grinned in satisfaction. "I will claim your power for my own!"

"What are you talking about?" The boy demanded. "You know what? It doesn't matter. My turn, draw," Yuya declared, looking at the card he drew. "I Normal Summon Performapal Secondonkey," he declared. With a bray, the cheerful 1000-ATK monster appeared. "When Secondonkey is Summoned while I have two cards in my Pendulum Zone, I can add a Performapal from my Deck to my hand," His plan fell together in an instant, and he smiled. "I add Performapal Trump Witch,"

Kaze frowned, sensing that something was coming.

"Now, Ladies and gentlemen! It's time for the climax of our performance!" the entertainer declared. "We'll start off by setting the stage of the performance! I activate my Field Spell, Performapal Dramatic Theatre!"

A stage erupted at the side of the courtyard, where Yuya stood, and his Pendulum Scale moved to match it. Kaze looked on in confusion. "Now, it's time for an aide! My Action Spell, Downsize Summon, allows me to Summon a Level 4 or lower monster from my hand with its ATK reduced to 0! But that doesn't matter to my Performapal Trump Witch, because her ATK is zero anyway!" With a cheer, his Fusion witch appeared next to Secondonkey on the Stage. "It's here that Dramatic Theatre's effect starts to come into play. For every Performapal that I control with a different Type, all my monsters gain ATK based on the number of Types I control times 200!" Trump Witch's ATK became 400, and Secondonkey grew to 1400.

"And now, it's time for the amazing, awe-inspiring, Pendulum Summon!" A portal opened in the centre of the stage. "As the pendulum swings, our previous stars will make an encore! Return, Performapals Laughmaker and Radish Horse! And since there are now two more Types on my field, ATK increases again!" With four monsters, each gained 800 ATK.

"And now, it's time for Dramatic Theatre's final effect! While I control four Performapals with different Types, I can Summon an Odd-Eyes monster from y Deck! So lay waste to all that you see with your beautiful heterochromatic eyes, Odd-Eyes Pendulum Dragon!"

With a roar, the curtains pulled back to reveal Yuya's ace. Odd-Eyes roared as it entered the scene.

Yuya's Pendulum flashed. He looked over at the Different Dimension Airship, and saw all of his friends watching. His eyes caught Flare's, and he grinned in response to her encouraging smile.

His Pendulum glinted, and he felt a by-now-familiar pulse from his Extra Deck. Above him, Junior yelped encouragingly.

"Alright! I activate Trump Witch's monster effect! By Tributing her, I can add a 'Polymerization' from my Deck to my hand!" he declared, and his monster vanished as he pulled a card from his Deck. "And I activate my Spell, Polymerization, and fuse Odd-Eyes Pendulum Dragon with Performapal Laughmaker!"

A Fusion vortex opened on the stage, as a new card emerged from Yuya's Extra Deck. "Brilliant laughing clown, and dragon with shining dual-colored eyes! Become one now, and awaken a new life! Fusion Summon! Appear, courageous dragon burning with sublime eyes! Brave-Eyes Pendulum Dragon!"

The monster resembled Odd-Eyes, but with massive, expanded horns and a long, armoured tail, and covered in gold and grey armour. It roared, showing 3000 ATK.

"A new one?" Gong blinked.

"I dunno, it looks kinda familiar," Flare shrugged, cocking her head. Suddenly, her eyes widened in realisation. "Hey. That thing's horns. It looks a lot like my Assault Flare!"

"And its armour resembles Yuto's Phantom Knights, and its tail is segmented like a Raidraptor," Shun added.

"It's the connections I've made in the Xyz Dimension that have given rise to this new power," Yuya muttered with a smile. "Yuto, Shun, Flare . . It's my connections with you that allowed me to create this monster,"

"I appreciate the sentiment," Yuto's voice sounded from next to him. Yuya gasped, looking at the spirit that had manifested next to him. "Hi," the boy smiled.

"Good to see you," Yuya nodded. "Now, where were we?" He pressed a button. "Brave-Eyes' effect! The ATK of all monsters on my opponent's field is reduced to 0, and all monsters with 0 ATK have their effects negated!"

"No dice!" Kaze retorted, shaking his head. "Huitzil is unaffected by my opponent's effects during the turn that they're activated!

"Aww, really?" Yuya sighed. "And without Laughmaker and Trump Witch, Dramatic Theatre doesn't give enough of a boost to overpower Huitzil,"

Sure enough, only Radish Horse and Secondonkey were boosting Brave-Eyes, meaning it only had 3400 ATK. 100 short of beating Huitzil. "I end my turn," Yuya sighed, the picture of defeat.

"All that for nothing. What a waste," Kaze shook his head. "My turn! Draw!" And the second he drew, Huitzil fell to the ground, reduced to 0 ATK. Kaze's jaw fell open, revealing serpentine fangs. "What,"

"Surprise!" Yuya shouted. "Your Skypent Huitzil is unaffected by my effects during the turn that I activate them! But it is now the turn after the turn that I activated Brave-Eyes' effect, which means that Huitzil's effect expires. And Brave-Eyes' is a permanent effect, which Huitzil is now under the power of!"

Kaze was stunned. He numbly looked at his card and shook his head, knowing that, no matter what he did, the entertainer had outplayed him. "I pass," he decided. "Well done,"

"My turn! Draw!" the green-haired boy declared, not even looking at his card. "Radish Horse! Secondonkey! Brave-Eyes! Attack!" One by one, his monsters charged, and Kaze's LP was wiped out.

"Well done," the man numbly responded, and Yuya jumped down from the vanishing Theatre and offered him a handshake, which he accepted. "You know, if you wanted to Duel me so badly, you should have just asked," the boy told him. "No need for all this," he shook his head, gesturing at the unconscious forms in the Sanctuary.

"You're right. I'm sorry," Kaze nodded, deep in thought. "You're a good Duelist, Yuya. But don't rely too much on the powers you have been given. That will inevitably lead to your downfall," he advised.

"What are you talking about?" Yuya asked.

"That pendulum," Kaze pointed at the crystal around his neck, "is important to you. It's a part of you. But it doesn't define you. Don't let it," he recommended, before pressing a button on his Duel Disk. Ribbons of rainbow light flickered around him, and the Crashlander vanished in a flash.

"That was weird," Yuya muttered.

With a cheerful chirp, Junior wriggled out of his Deck and landed on the floor, looking up at him. Yuya scooped up his pet and nestled him in his arms as the other Lancers emerged from the Airship.

"So, now what?" Gong asked.

"Now, we pack. Gather supplies, get your things, and load it all into the Airship," Shun commanded.

"Why?" Yuke questioned. "It's cool and all, but what's the point?"

"That Airship has the power to cross dimensions, I can sense it," the Xyzian explained. "It's gonna take us to Academia, and we're bringing the fight with us,"

"Sock it to them, I like it!" Sawatari cheered.

X

The refugees began waking up, and Sayaka regained consciousness shortly after. Cyril, though, remained completely unresponsive.

Ryuna gazed at him, still lying in a seat in the Airship.

Allen joined her. "You said he was your brother . . how does that work?"

She shrugged awkwardly. "Well, in terms of being Duel Spirits, as Red-Eyes Black Dragon and Cyber Dragon, we're not related at all. But our human forms were both created by my father, so in that sense we're siblings," she explained.

"Fair enough," her friend nodded. "Are you gonna tell Sayaka? Before we leave?" he asked.

"About what I am?" Ryuna frowned thoughtfully. "She deserves to know, but . . well, it's Sayaka. If she sees me change into my true form, she might just have a heart attack,"

"Well, we shouldn't leave her out of the loop," Allen shook his head.

"You're right," she nodded. The redhead turned to go and find her second-oldest friend.

X

"So, what do you want to talk to me about?" the grey-haired teenager asked as Flare led her into the forest.

She spared a thought for Sayaka's unusual hair colour. It wasn't as though there were colours that hair usually couldn't be; Yuya's hair was green with red streaks, and Shun's was navy blue with a tuft of lime green. But grey hair usually denoted age, which Sayaka, being in the same class as her and Allen and thus the same age, fifteen, did not have.

"What do you know about Duel Spirits?" she tentatively asked.

The girl frowned. "You mean the old superstition about the monsters on cards being real?"

"It's not a superstition, or a legend, or a fairytale," Ryuna started.

"What are you talking about?" Sayaka frowned. She slid open her Duel Disk and produced Fairy Cheer Girl, her ace card. "I love my monsters as much as any good Duelist, but I know that they aren't real,"

"Yeah, well," The girl groaned. "Oh, screw it," She unbuckled her Duel Disk and dropped it to the ground. "You might wanna sit down," she advised.

Sayaka obediently took a seat on the grassy ground, still confused.

As Ryuna transformed into the massive black dragoness that was her true form, her friend's mouth fell open. "Wha - what?" she demanded.

"I, am a Duel Spirit," she simply explained. She gently wrapped her tail around Sayaka, both as a gesture of comfort and in preparation to catch her if she tried to run. "Do you, like, need a minute to take this in?" the dragoness gently offered.

Her friend wordlessly nodded. Flare settled down, resting her underbelly against the cool grass, and experimentally reached out with her potential sense. She immediately sensed that Sayaka was capable of accepting the truth, and that she just needed a nudge in the right direction.

"How is that possible?" Sayaka finally managed to ask.

"Do you remember what my dad specialised in?" the dragon asked.

"Alternate energy sources," the gray-haired girl instantly recalled.

"Ten years ago, he tried to harness the energy given off during Duels. This eventually lead to him conducting research into the source, which led him to attempting to create a connection to the world of Duel Spirits, which exists outside and separate from all four dimensions," Ryuna explained. "It proved impossible for him to send anything to the Spirit world, but, after three years of experimentation, eventually he figured out how to bring a Spirit here,"

Sayaka instantly pieced it together. "And that was you?"

"To cut a long story short, yeah," she nodded.

The mousey girl immediately remembered when she had first met Flare, back in third grade, when they were both eight. "How did you get so young?"

"Blip with dad's machinery. Forced me to take on a human form, and I regressed, losing most of my memories in the process," Ryuna admitted, laying her head on her front claws. "This, though, is my real form,"

"Why didn't you tell us?" Sayaka gently asked.

"I didn't know how you'd react. 'Oh, hey, so I'm a magic alien dragon from another galaxy. Cool, right?'," Ryuna admitted. "But then we got attacked while trying to rescue you and I had no choice but to use my true form and then everyone saw it, and I figured you shouldn't be left out of the loop," She sighed. "You're taking this surprisingly well, I gotta say,"

"You did always have a weird vibe about you," Sayaka admitted, "so it's not a totally unexpected thing, if that makes sense," She stroked the scales on Ryuna's cheek, completely unhesitant about getting close to the being that could swallow her whole in an instant. Even when lying down, the dragoness' slim, cylindrical body was ten feet in diameter at its highest point, and her thick, muscled wings and legs were almost disproportionately large compared to her torso. "I can't help but wonder how you bathe in this form," she chuckled.

"The ocean usually works," Ryuna admitted with a chuckle. "Hey, uh, don't spread this around, okay? The other Lancers know, and so do Kite and Allen, but,"

"You'd rather the word wasn't spread. Sure," Sayaka agreed with a wink behind her glasses.

X

Meanwhile, Shun and Gong were loading supplies into the Different Dimension Airship.

"Hey, Shun?" Gong suddenly piped up.

"Yeah?" his friend responded.

"You know, those Raidraptors of yours, they use a lot of Rank-Up-Magic shenanigans, right?" the martial artist pointed out.

"Yeah, so?"

"Have you ever considered what might happen if you played a Rank-Up-Magic Spell on a Number?" Gong suggested.

Shun paused. That . . . was a good question.

X

Katie sighed to herself, lying on her bedroll in the little room she, Flare and Sayaka had stayed during their time in the Sanctuary. She rubbed at the silver bracelet on her wrist, stroking the blue gem in its centre.

The door swung open, and she turned, expecting to see her brother.

Instead, Kite's pale face looked down at her. "What's eating at you?" he asked.

"That Kaze guy . . when me, Yuke and Sawatari were Duelling that girl from Academia, he helped us. He saved us. I thought he was our friend," the girl sighed, looking down. "But after what he did here, just to get to Yuya,"

"Morality isn't black and white. People aren't simply good or evil," Kite coolly told her. "There's complications, situations. As living beings, we get overwhelmed by emotion, make mistakes. Sometimes we do good, sometimes we do bad,"

"What happened to you? Here, when the invasion started?" Katie asked, looking up at the blonde. "Why were you so angry?"

"I . . ." The Duelist sighed, thinking back to that day, such a short time ago. "The invasion, I could handle. I lost my father, my uncle, my grandfather, but I got through that. I took out my anger and fury on Obelisk Force, and," He chuckled darkly. "It was kind of therapeutic,"

"But then they did something that pushed you over the edge?" she questioned.

"That's one way of putting it," Kite's fists clenched.

X

His little sister clutched at his hand as they entered the highest remaining floor of Heartland Spire. Everything above it had been torn away, destroyed.

"Is there anything here?" Lucy asked, looking around.

"Maybe. I don't know. Let's start looking. Food, water, cards, anything," Kite told her, and she nodded, dashing away.

A few minutes later, Kite slid open a drawer in an office and found a Deck. He shuffled through the cards, instantly recognising several. "This was Mr. Heartland's spare Deck," he sighed, pocketing it. "It's a relic. I've gotta bring it back,"

"Kite?" Lucy's voice echoed from the next room over, and he immediately dashed out of the room, through the corridor and into the room, which was a waiting room that featured a wall-length glass window.

The unmistakeable sight of an Ancient Gear Chaos Giant was standing right outside, its back partially turned. Lucy was frozen, staring up at it. Kite took her wrist and pulled her around, crouching and gazing into her eyes. "Don't worry. It'll be okay. Me and Galaxy-Eyes take care of them,"

"I'm scared," she whispered, tears brimming in the corners of her eyes.

Kite gently guided her to the corner, where the window didn't quite reach, and sat her down in a spot where the Giant couldn't see her. "It'll be alright. You just stay here, where it's safe, and be quiet," he told her, and she silently nodded.

Her brother gently smiled at his younger sister, fishing one of his copies of Galaxy-Eyes Cipher Dragon out of his Duel Disk. "Here," he smiled, pressing the card into her hand. "Galaxy-Eyes will protect you while I'm gone," he told her.

"I can't use him," Lucy protested, showing him her own Duel Disk. Children's size. "My Paleozoic Deck is about Rank 2, not Rank 8,"

"So?" Kite shrugged. "It'll be fine. He'll protect you, regardless of whether you can Summon him or not,"

Lucy hugged him. "Come back soon," she begged.

"It'll only take a minute. I promise," Kite told her.

He ducked out of the room and made for the staircase. But by the time he had reached the threshold, his sister's scream echoed from the waiting room.

His eyes shot open, and in a flash he was dashing towards the corridor.

The window was gone, half of the room torn away - including the spot his sister had been sheltering in. Kite rushed to the edge, hoping that somehow, miraculously, she had survived.

The Ancient Gear Chaos Giant was clutching a pile of rubble in its hand, and it's controller was scanning it, perched on his monster's wrist. There was a flash, from within the rubble, and the soldier reached in. His hand emerged, clutching a card.

Kite never forgot the satisfied smirk he saw on the man's face as he pocketed his sister. Not even when his body was lying, crushed and lifeless, beneath his feet.

X

Instead of recounting the painful memory, Kite asked the fox girl a question. "What do you think Yuke would do if something happened to you?" he asked.

"Get payback, at any cost," she immediately responded. "And probably level several buildings in the process," Katie mused. "Why?" she asked.

Kite cast an irritated glare at her. "Oh," she finally realised.

"Well, now you know," he shook his head, turning away. "That's why I'm going to Academia with you,"

"What?" Katie blinked.

"The Resistance is tough, and as long as they have Castel, the Skyblaster Musketeer, they can handle the remaining pockets of Obelisk Force in the city and beyond," the boy reasoned. "By the time I caught up with the bastard who carded my sister, he's passed her on to his superiors. She's probably at Academia with all the other victims. If I'm going to rescue her, I can't do it from here," he growled.

Sawatari rushed up and paused, directly behind him. "Guys, come on. We're leaving," he told them. Katie rapidly grabbed her bags, and, pushing past Kite, ran towards the front door.

X

Sayaka, along with several other members of the Resistance, had gathered to see the Lancers off.

Shun looked at Cyril's unconscious body, draped across a bench in the Airship. "Are we sure we should be bringing him?" he asked.

"He can't stay here," Yuke pointed out.

"He's right," Gong nodded.

Katie entered and took her seat, carefully shifting her tail. "Everyone here?" she asked as Kite docked behind her.

"Wait for me!" Sawatari shrieked, shoving his way through the crowd and grabbing for the door. As soon as Shun was convinced that he was safely aboard, he revved the controls and the Airship began to rise, lifting away from the Duel Sanctuary to a chorus of cheers from the crowd.

"Thank you, thank you! We will return soon!" Sawatari shouted from the door. "You haven't heard the last of -"

Shun momentarily vacated the controls to pull his blonde teammate away from the door and swing it closed. "Keep the door shut, idiot. If you leave it open, the Airship's protective seal won't work and we'll all burn up in the dimensional boundaries,"

"Okay, jeez," Sawatari huffed, taking a seat next to Yuya, who was protectively clutching at his little dragons in luau of a seatbelt.

"Everyone have their seatbelts fastened?" Shun asked, and, after a series of affirmative responses, he smiled. "Next stop, Fusion Dimension,"

X

Edo Phoenix groaned as he woke up, clutching his head. He staggered out of the alleyway Yuya had left him in, and looked around.

It didn't take long for him to notice that the camp, his base of operations, and the entirety of Obelisk Force's troops had anished like a bad dream. "What the hell happened while I was out?" he drowsily muttered to himself.

High above him, a massive, golden airship soared overhead, and he stared up at it. "Am I dreaming?" he finally asked.

He watched as the craft punched through the omnipresent layer of clouds that obscured Heartland City, and, for the first time since the invasion began, the clear blue sky and warm light of the sun shone down on the ruined metropolis through the hole that the Airship had left in the city's gloom.

Far away, Sayaka basked in the warmth that her friends had left for her to enjoy, staring up at the clear blue sky that the Airship had returned to Heartland City. "Isn't it lovely, Allen?" she smiled, looking around for her friend.

The boy was nowhere to be found. Sayaka snorted, shaking her head. "It's one thing for Ryuna to run off, but Allen? Ooh, that boy is in for such a beating when they come back,"

A/N

A/N

Just if you want a size reference in regards to Ryuna's dragon form, her body's about 1.7 times the size of Odd-Eyes Pendulum Dragon relative to Yuya, not counting the fact that her tail is a lot longer or her massive wings.

And with that, the Xyz arc is over and wrapped up with a neat little bow. XD BUT . . .

IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT:

Since I know lots of people skip Author's Notes, but you really do want to know this, I'm hopeful that the text above will catch all attention. After this chapter, I'm going to be turning the fiction's attention to what's been going on in Fusion Dimension while all this has been happening. Which will probably only take a couple of chapters. The GOOD NEWS is, I'm confident enough in my current plan that I feel I can write these next two(ish) chapters before reinstigating the hiatus.

Now then, new cards from Kaze:

Skypent Chalchi

Level 3/WIND/Sea Serpent/ATK:1100/DEF:900/Pendulum/Effect

Pendulum:

5

Once per turn, if you have a 'Skypent' card in your other Pendulum Zone; You can make this card's Pendulum Scale become 1. This change lasts until the end of the turn.

Monster:

You can discard this card, then target one 'Skypent' monster you control; if it battles an opponent's monster this turn; it cannot be destroyed by that battle, you take no battle damage from that battle, and if you do, destroy that opponent's monster at the end of the Battle Phase.

Skypent Sacrifice

Normal Spell Card

Banish 2 'Skypent' monsters from your Graveyard; Special Summon a Level 6 'Skypent' Fusion monster from your Extra Deck. Destroy it during your second End Phase after this card's activation.

Now then, peace!