"I suppose this is the last of my stuff," I said, grabbing my winter coat from the Hiiragi household's guest room. I'd finally managed to get an apartment of my own with the money Leo Corporation (read: Reiji) had sent me, as Maiami city had very lax laws concerning minors.
"We'll miss you," Shuzo said, tears forming in his eyes. "You've truly become a great hot-blooded duelist!"
"Dad!" Yuzu admonished as her father broke down into ridiculously over-the-top tears. "It's not like Joshua is leaving town, he's just getting his own place!"
"You'll come around for dinner sometime, right?" Shuzo said. "Don't hesitate to call us if you need anything! You're a friend of the Hiiragi family and a friend of You Show!"
"Of course," I said. "I just don't want to impose on you guys any longer." I threw my coat over my shoulder and pulled my backpack over the other shoulder.
"It wasn't an issue!" Shuzo protested. "I'll never forget how you helped save my school!"
Oh, right. The best-of-three against LDS. I'd nearly forgotten about that. "It was nothing," I said, rubbing the back of my head awkwardly.
"It wasn't," Yuzu said. "You saved our school and preserved Yuya's dream, and on top of that, you taught us all so much."
"Sheesh, you act like I'm going to disappear," I joked. "Besides, you also taught me a ton. I never would've understood the dueling culture here if not for you guys."
"Just remember to come around from time to time!" Shuzo reminded me. I nodded in response.
"Well, see you guys at You Show tomorrow," I said, waving to them as I walked down the hall and out of the house.
My new apartment was almost completely bare, with white walls and no furniture from previous owners. It was quite different from my cozy little place back in New Haven that I shared with a friend. That place seemed to be full of energy and personal touches, whereas this place seemed sterile. That could be fixed, however, and this apartment was spacious, clean, and quiet. Boxes of unassembled IKEA furniture were neatly stacked near the doorway. Apparently the Swedish company was still kicking, even in the futuristic world of Arc-V. I explored the four rooms of the apartment briefly, and found that the simple futon that I'd ordered a couple of days ago lay in the middle of the floor of one of the bedrooms, with a desk on one of the walls. I tossed my stuff on the desk and lay back on the futon.
Was I becoming too comfortable? Why was I relaxing and establishing myself like this when everything was going to get upended soon? The championship was coming, and with it, the Battle Royale and Obelisk Force invasion. In other words, everything would be going to shit soon. I would soon be leaving Standard behind, and with it, this apartment. Why did I go to so much trouble for this? It was going to be useless to me!
On some level, I knew the answer. I needed something to fight for, something to tie me down. Without it, what might keep me from becoming lost in bloodlust or giving up? Without a concrete idea of what I was protecting, why would I care if everything was destroyed? Thus, the bonds I had formed, both with the people here and the places. I was going to build a new life here, so that after the craziness of the war, I'd have something to come back to.
Wait. Why was I so okay with staying in this place, in a body that wasn't exactly mine, in a world where I didn't belong? I'd had a life going for myself as a grad student. There were friends back there waiting for me to return. My younger brother would miss me greatly. Or perhaps in my old world, I was dead, and returning there was impossible. The last few seconds before I'd ended up here replayed themselves in my mind. As far as I could tell, I'd gotten hit by a truck or something in that snowstorm. How cliché.
My duel disk buzzed, and I rolled off the futon and grabbed it out of the pocket of my backpack. Reiji was calling me.
"Joshua Cohen speaking," I said as I accepted the call. "What's up?"
"I hope your new apartment is to your liking," Reiji said.
"It is, though I still need to put together my furniture," I answered. I didn't really want to think about how he knew that I'd gotten this place. "I presume that's not the only reason you called me."
"Indeed," Reiji said. "I need you to tutor Yuto and Shun in dueling and teach them your methods."
I nodded and started to pace around the bedroom. "I can do that. What time?"
"As soon as you can," Reiji said. "The receptionist at the Leo Corporation tower will know who you are."
"Glad to know I'm famous," I joked. "I'll be there in half an hour."
"I'll hold you to that," Reiji said, before hanging up. I swiftly packed a couple of decks and exited the apartment that I had entered just minutes prior. If I was being honest, I was quite excited to talk to Yuto. He was a criminally underused character in the original, and I wanted to avert the events that would lead to his 'death' by any means possible.
Twenty-five minutes later, I was riding the elevator up to the seventh floor of the tower where I would meet Yuto and Shun in one of the place's many duel training rooms. Why a business building needed duel training rooms was beyond me, but given that everything here revolved around dueling, I wouldn't be surprised if even the hospital in this town had a place to duel, in case you couldn't pay for your appointment.
After an annoyingly long wait, the elevator pinged and the doors open. I strode quickly down the hall, past a cluster of small offices, and then past large rooms with floor-to-ceiling windows and racks of duel disks lining the walls. Those were most likely the duel training rooms. Counting the room numbers, I reached the room I was supposed to meet the Xyz Dimension duo in near the end of the hall. Yuto and Shun were already inside, and moved to face me as I swung open the door and walked into the room. Shun's face was still full of suspicion and distrust, while Yuto's was a bit harder for me to read.
"Who's ready to learn about interaction?!" I said happily, a wide grin plastered upon my face. What can I say? I was in a fun mood today.
My enthusiastic greeting was met with crickets.
"Of course Reiji would sent you teach us," Shun growled, lifting his duel disk.
"Shun, try to be nice," Yuto chided. "He's going to help us save Ruri."
"Anyway," I said, trying to steer the conversation back on topic, "I'm here to help you boost the power of your decks. Yuto, what do you usually do for your first turn?"
"Depends on my opening hand—" Yuto started before I cut him off.
"And there's the first problem. Consistency. Pack your deck with as many searchers as you can so you can always execute the same combos."
"But wouldn't that make us predictable?" Yuto questioned. "If I do the same thing every time, enemies will be able to counter it eventually!"
"From the moment I see a Phantom Knights card, I know exactly what you're able to achieve in your turn," I said. "All a consistency boost will do is help you find that top end easier. Playing random garbage doesn't make you less predictable, it just makes your deck weaker. You want to be able to access your ceiling as much as possible. For you, that would be Dark Requiem and some Fog Blades, maybe a copy of Wing if you're worried about sweepers."
Yuto stepped back, shocked. "How did you—Dark Requiem—how?"
"As I said, I know what your decks are capable of. I'm here to help you reach their full potential. Now, you'll want to identify which cards to keep, which to cut, and which to run more of. When you read a card, ask yourself—'What does this card help my deck do turn one? Is there a card I would rather see?'"
"If we show our full strength on our first turn, what do we do when our opponent breaks through?" Shun asked.
"Second lesson! Your first-turn board should be as close to unbreakable as you can get! Bring out your negates, your unaffected boss monsters, everything! If your opponent can't play a card without it getting negated, you can't lose!"
"That's..." Shun started, before shaking his head. "I can't argue with that, actually. I want to see those Academia bastards as helpless as we were!"
This was actually kind of disturbing. "Well, it's good that you're... motivated," I said. "We should go over combos now. These are going to be the bread and butter of your dueling style, and they're probably more complex than the combos you're used to."
"More complex?" Shun scoffed. "You're awfully full of yourself, you know?"
"How do you make Cyber Dragon Infinity on your first turn?" I countered. Shun thought for a minute, before shaking his head.
"Exactly," I concluded. "By the way, the answer is that you want to set up Soul Shave Force with Force Strix in your graveyard."
"Fine," Shun said angrily, activating his duel disk. "Show me these combos!"
I placed my hand on his duel-disk-holding arm. "Put that thing down. We'll be doing this analogue style."
Thankfully, my teaching methods weren't questioned too much after that. We got nearly one and a half hours in before we were kicked out, something about the room reservation being up. Regardless, both Yuto and Shun's decks were now far better tuned and consistent, and while Shun still wasn't able to do the full Kali Yuga lock line, he was significantly better at piloting Raidraptors than before the meeting.
Soon, the day of the championship was upon us. I'd heard through Yuya that Gongenzaka had learned both Pendulum and Synchro on his own and was now using the Superheavy Samurai pendulums. Funnily enough, despite Gongenzaka being one of Yuya's closest friends, he and I had never interacted much beyond greetings in passing. Heck, we hadn't even dueled once, while I'd had a number of unofficial duels with both Yuya and Yuzu.
Anyway, I hadn't thought much of the steadfast duelist's newly acquired abilities until I'd heard of his duel against Yuya, where he scaled Prodigy Wakazushi and performed a powerful Superheavy Samurai combo, ending on an impressive board of Warlord Susanowo, General Shanao, and Overlord Masurao. When had Reiji printed the CYAC stuff I'd given him? Questions for later, I suppose. Perhaps he wanted to shake up the meta before the tournament so it wouldn't be nothing but Dracoslayer Performapal decks. I would describe the duel here, but Nico Smiley decided I wasn't allowed to watch, citing something about Yuya's personal growth, thus this account was secondhand.
Regardless, Yuya still managed to win the duel with skillful play and a bit of luck, as Gongenzaka's draw three off of Masurao did not grant him any handtraps. The lack of interruptions meant that Yuya had little difficulty with successfully dismantling the board and performing a one-turn-kill. From what I'd heard, he'd managed his lines quite well, activated Monkeyboard three times in a single turn, and used the Dracoslayer engine to its fullest. I was quite proud of him, and he would need that level of skill for what was to come. He'd soon be facing more interactive and dangerous boards.
Right, where was I? The championship. Due to the unexpected number of qualifiers, the structure had been changed to allow the tournament to be completed in a timely manner. The Action Duel fields were partitioned into multiple smaller ones and the commentator, Nico Smiley, would commentate only one or two games during each round. In addition, the tournament would be three rounds of Swiss, cutting to a top thirty-two, instead of the typically-favored single elimination bracket. Thus it was somewhat similar to a YCS, apart from the oddly low number of Swiss rounds. Apparently even with the extra people, only one hundred and twenty-two qualified in Junior Youth, while Youth and Junior had only forty-five and fifty-seven qualifiers, respectively. Was it really that hard to get over a sixty percent winrate or win six duels in a row? Apparently when you were playing stupid inconsistent do-nothing highlander piles, the answer was 'yes'.
My first round pairing was someone whose name I didn't recognize, which meant it was probably a free win. I made my way to the section of the Action Field I had been assigned (section three of Western Showdown), and found myself facing across a guy with orange hair and reddish bangs whose eyes seemed to be shut or very close to it. Oh, right, Michio was the cook guy that Yuya had dueled. Well, this should be easy. Michio won the coinflip (one of my suggestions I'd sent to Reiji in an e-mail, explaining that being able to just choose to go first granted way too much advantage), and chose to go first. His turn one board was rather unimpressive, consisting of three low-level "Cookpal" monsters and a singular backrow.
I drew for turn and grinned at my hand. This was what I liked to call a 'wake-up duel'. It was something that I'd done against a number of new students to my study group to show them that their old ways wouldn't work anymore. Dark Hole and Cosmic Cyclone to clear the board and full combo granting a protected OTK in hand. Now, to be competitive, you needed to produce a strong board or be really dedicated to blinding second.
"Pay 1000 LP to Cosmic Cyclone the backrow, response?" I said, placing the spell onto the duel disk. I then recalled that asking if your opponent had interaction wasn't a thing people did here. Old habits die hard, I suppose. The facedown was sucked into a miniature black hole and revealed to be Food Cemetery, which I vaguely remembered as being the centerpiece of Michio's deck.
[Joshua: 4000 - 3000]
"Activate Dark Hole," I declared. Before the aftermath of the vortex left the field, I immediately started on my combo. "Normal Mo Ye. Mo Ye effect, reveal Longyuan, make token. Synchro for eight, make Chixiao, Chixiao search Blackout. Activate Longyuan pitching Taia. Synchro for ten, make Baronne. Longyuan burn for 1200."
[Michio: 4000 - 2800]
In almost no time, I had assembled my full board of a guy with a glowing sword and a woman on a horse with a sword and shield. "Battle phase. Chixiao attacks you for game."
[Michio: 2800 - 0]
And just like that, my first game of the day was over in no time. I checked my watch and yep, it hadn't even been five minutes.
"Want to go watch the other matches?" I asked Michio. "Pretty sure everyone else is still dueling."
"No need to rub it in," Michio said, slightly annoyed. "Where'd you learn to duel like that? You don't duel like a stuck-up from LDS and you're not brutal enough to be from Ryozanpaku. It reminds me of something, but I can't quite place it"
I shrugged and glanced up at the broadcast screen. "Eh, mostly self-study. Hey, Yuya's match is the featured one! That's neat!"
"That's it! Yuya dueled a lot like you do, but not quite as quickly."
"Oh, I taught him," I said lightly as we walked towards the stands. "It's impressive that you see dueling styles. Most people just get tripped up on the type of summoning method. Xyz Summon, Fusion Summon, Pendulum Summon... any summoning method can be used for any style." Perhaps there was some potential within him, though there wasn't much time to unlock it.
"Thank you," Michio said. "But I doubt self-study is enough to make you stronger than all of LDS's top students."
I grabbed an empty seat. "You'd be surprised what a fresh perspective can get you."
We watched in relative silence for some time as Nico Smiley attempted (and failed) to commentate a Performapal Dracoslayer Odd-Eyes combo. I made comments of my own at points, noting choke points in the lines and explaining what Yuya was going for. Eventually, Yuya ended on Pendulumgraph Dragon, Vortex Dragon, Cyber Dragon Infinity, and Baronne, a formidable board of four negates that almost any deck not playing Dark Ruler No More would struggle to beat.
"This is how strong Yuya is now?" Michio questioned. "He wasn't even that good when he dueled me!"
"He's gotten a lot better in a short span of time. It just takes a bit of a different perspective. When you duel, do you try to go all out on the first turn?"
"Well, no," Michio said. "You have to ramp things up over the course of the duel as you get a feel for your opponent's strength."
I shook my head. "The way I duel, you combo off on your first turn. You're not trying to get a feel of what your opponent can do, you're trying to prevent them from doing anything. For a control deck such as yours, the early turn is the most important, as you need to restrict your opponent's moves as much as possible to survive and get your engine running before you can kill them with card advantage."
"My perfect recipe was flawed because I let my opponent enjoy it?" Michio said. "That can't be right. That goes against everything I've learned!"
"A fresh perspective can do wonders," I said. "If you want me to teach you, see if you can make it to top cut. There's still three more rounds to go."
Michio nodded. "I need to go fix my deck."
I nodded to him as he walked off. Yuya defeated his opponent quickly with an easy OTK after negating every card his opponent tried to play, and the feature match switched over to Shun vs Sora. Speaking of Sora, I hadn't interacted with him much; while I did teach him occasionally, we'd drifted apart after I attempted to force him to learn Xyz summoning. While he still attended You Show, he claimed that he was starting to see Pendulum as 'boring' after everyone started playing it. Sora was currently struggling quite a bit with Shun's Raidraptor board. While he didn't manage to make the Kali Yuga lock (as he wouldn't give me the time to teach him how, his loss), he'd taken my brief piece of advice and turboed out Ultimate Falcon and Cyber Dragon Infinity on his first turn.
"And it looks like Cyber Dragon Infinity is as strong as ever! While a very niche card before this tournament, it has proven itself both in Yuya's match earlier and even now, cutting Sora off of a potentially powerful play with Frightfur Tiger's destruction effect! Sora is forced to pass with no way to get rid of Raidraptor - Ultimate Falcon! But it gets worse! Ultimate Falcon's effect causes Sora to take 1000 damage in the end phase, and all of Sora's monsters will lose 1000 attack points!"
Buildings collapsed in the wake of Ultimate Falcon's bombing raid, though due to the barriers established within the Action Field, there was far less destruction than there could've been.
"How does it feel to be the hunted one?" Shun questioned rhetorically. "Unable to do anything, unable to strike back. Imagine what your victims felt... though I'll give you little chance to feel remorse. Remember how—"
The feed was suddenly cut off to switch to a duel between two random NPCs playing what looked like highlander durdle decks. Smooth one, Reiji.
Yuya joined me shortly afterward. Despite his easy win, he seemed to be conflicted.
"What's up? You should be celebrating your victory," I said.
Yuya stared downwards. "No, I shouldn't. It was empty. I did my thing, my opponent couldn't do anything, and then I won. It had no substance to it! It wasn't a duel, it was solitaire! And somehow... the audience still loved it! I could hear them cheering for me, like I was doing something cool, not destroying some other guy's hopes!"
"You were doing something cool," I pointed out. "When I combo, it's boring! But when you do it, it's like a show. You're drawing the audience into the duel, making them root for you. You're creating your own path of entertainment."
"Still... it's unsatisfying. I want a good back-and-forth duel, not something so one-sided."
"There's still three more rounds until top cut," I pointed out. "In the next few rounds, you'll dueling against stronger opponents, and eventually that'll sort itself out."
Yuya nodded. "Is this how you felt when you first came here? Like dueling was suddenly empty?"
Finally, he'd realized it! "Exactly. Where I come from, I'm only a bit above average. That's part of why I teach people here—so I can find a challenging opponent. I'd say you're approaching that level yourself."
"Thanks." Yuya smiled at my praise. "If I can ask you something... why do you duel?"
"I duel to have fun," I responded. "Of course, that means different things to different people, but at the end of the day people only really duel for three reasons: they find it fun, they have something to gain, or they want to prove their ideals. Me? I just want a good duel."
I was partially lying here, but if I said something like "I want to make sure that everyone here is ready to fend off the Fusion dimension with ease," I'd get one of Yuya's lectures on how "a duel is not a tool for fighting".
"That makes sense," Yuya said. "I duel to bring smiles to people so... I guess that would be ideals."
"That's a noble goal," I said. "Just remember—you can't make other people smile if you can't get yourself to smile first."
"I'll keep that in mind."
The next two rounds progressed without much incident. In round two I went first against PePe and easily won off of Rivalry of Warlords, while in round three I was going second against PePe and won off of Droll. Round four, on the other hand, was a different matter. I'd been matched up with Sawatari, and we were competing for the top of Swiss. Regardless of who won at this point, we would both make top cut, but it was about the principle of the thing.
"Joshua!" Sawatari called as we faced off on the duel field. "Today is the day that I will surprass your teachings! The last time we met, I was but your student, but now, I will prove my mastery!"
"I can't tell if you're butchering the quote intentionally or it's just coincidence," I said.
"What?"
"Never mind. I'm excited to see how far you've come, Sawatari! Good luck!"
Sawatari closed his eyes and nodded. "Likewise."
"This is the final match of the first part of the Junior Youth section!" Nico Smiley announced. "One one side, we have the rising star Shingo Sawatari, an LDS student whose Monarch deck has performed exceptionally well against the large number of Performapal decks in the tournament! On the other, there's Joshua Cohen, the influience cited by those very Performapal users! His Swordsoul deck has performed extraordinarily well today, taking down the fearsome Pendulum threat with ease!"
You mean silver bullet floodgates, I mentally corrected.
"Who will triumph today? Student or master? Let the duel... begin!"
Sawatari won the coinflip and chose to go first. My opening five was not spectacular, consisting of Droll, Imperm, Mo Ye, Taia, and Anti-Spell Fragrance. It was full combo, but it was also extremely easy to interrupt.
"I activate Reinforcement of the Army!" Sawatari began. "This card allows me to add one level four or lower Warrior monster from my deck to my hand! I'll add Edea the Heavenly Squire."
"ROTA is fine," I said. "Droll on resolution. Since you added a card from your deck to your hand, I can send this card from my hand to the graveyard to apply the following effect: for the rest of this turn, neither of us can add cards from the deck to the hand!" A lock formed around Sawatari's deck, sealing it off. Hopefully this would prevent the domain-lock.
"Dammit!" Sawatari cursed. "I normal summon Edea and activate its effect! It allows me to—"
"Imperm it," I said, then realized I was being televised and should probably clarify it. "Since I control no cards, I can activate this trap card from my hand! By targeting your monster, I can negate its effects until the end of the turn!" A bolt from the heavens struck Edea, freezing it in place as it was about to lift its sword. The knight slumped back.
"I end my turn," Sawatari said. Okay, good. I had one turn to pull this off.
"What a stunning display!" Nico Smiley yelled. "Even though it's only the first turn, this duel is already a fierce battle! With negations tossed around at blinding speed, this is truly a high-level match!"
"Draw for turn, standby, main. I normal summon Swordsoul of Mo Ye and activate her effect, reavealing Swordsoul of Taia in order to special summon a Swordsoul Token!"
"In response, I activate the effect of Effect Veiler in hand!" Sawatari proclaimed. "By sending this card from my hand to the graveyard, I can target one monster you control and negate its effects until the end of the turn! Mo Ye is negated!" The ghostly image off Veiler appeared in front of the swordswoman, causing the glow within her sword to fade.
"Battle phase," I said. "Mo Ye attacks Edea!"
[Sawatari: 4000 - 3100]
"Second main, set one, pass."
"Another shocking turn of events! Neither player is able to access their powerful combos because of the other's well-placed negation effects! It'll be a matter of time to see who can force something through first!"
"My turn, draw!" Sawatari declared. "I—"
"—activate Anti-Spell Fragrance in draw phase," I said. "Spells must be set before activation, and cannot be activated until your next turn after they are set!"
"Amazing! Joshua has just disabled Sawatari's use of Action Cards, as well as any other spells he might be running! But this only buys him another turn to find his combo."
"I set three cards and end my turn," Sawatari said.
"Draw," I said. Ecclesia was an amazing topdeck. "I summon the tuner monster Incredible Ecclesia, the Virtuous!" The blonde girl twirled her hammer as she was summoned to the field.
"Tuner monster? Is Joshua finally going to be able to access his potent pool of Synchro monsters?!" Nico Smiley yelled. Okay, he was starting to get on my nerves a bit.
"Battle phase," I declared. No reason to play into a Strike or something like that. "Ecclesia attacks you directly!"
[Sawatari: 3100 - 1600]
"Finish this! Swordsoul of Mo Ye!"
[Sawatari: 1600 - 0]
[Joshua: WIN]
"Well played, Sawatari," I said, walking over to shake his hand. "I assume you had a Solemn back there?"
Sawatari nodded. "My hand was pretty bad, especially with the Droll preventing me from fixing it, and the Anti-Spell was the nail in the coffin." I took a look at the cards he showed me and nodded. Kuraz, March, ROTA, and Stormforth would be decent but not great, but Anti-Spell completely ruined his chances. "I'd run that card more myself, but I need to activate quite a few spells," he continued.
"Eh, don't worry about it. Your standing at the end of Swiss doesn't really matter as long as you make the cut. Perhaps we'll meet in the finals!"
"I'll see you there, Joshua," Sawatari declared. "And then, that's when I'll truly surprass you!"
"I look forward to seeing it," I said truthfully. This game had been fun, and I really wished the duels were best-of-three.
"Why were you teaching Sawatari?" Yuzu confronted me. "He's a jerk who stole your cards!"
"It was one time," I said. "Besides, he's gotten better since then. Kids do stupid things, they learn from it, and that's the end of it. I teach anyone who's willing to learn."
"Why?" Yuzu said. "If some jerk picks up your teachings and decides to go around stealing cards, then—"
"Society tends to operate on the principle that most people aren't jerks," I explained. "If one of my students were to do that, then another five would be ready to stop him. And besides, anyone who actually went around stealing cards after I taught them would be kicked out of my study group."
"I guess... but still! You shouldn't be putting power like that in the hands of random people! And wait a minute, you can't be more than a year older than I am!"
I chuckled. If only you knew... "Eh, most people where I'm from are at around as good at dueling as I am. By the way, I saw you switched over to Rikka for this tournament."
Yuzu nodded. "Yeah, something about the deck clicked with me, and it has all the properties of a good deck."
I smiled. "Yep, it's a strong control deck, and you've improved a lot. Your second round win in particular was really good." She'd managed to grind out a victory against Performapal by baiting their one negation and then using Konkon with Glamour to break their board. In the following turns, she'd maintained control of the board despite not dealing with her opponent's scales, before drawing into Rivalry of Warlords to seal up the game.
"Thanks," Yuzu said, a faint tinge of red on her cheeks. I really hoped she only saw me as a mentor and a friend, and not... anything else. That would be... well, given my mental age, definitely immoral and predatory.
The sun was slowly setting over the bay of Maiami city. As the sky changed from a brilliant gold and orange to a duller red color, Yuzu spoke.
"Sora is in the hospital, isn't he? We should go visit him now. He's one of us, and we should make sure he's okay."
And there was the thread to the plot. "Sounds good," I said.
By the time we got there, Yuya and Gongenzaka were panicking. By the looks of it, we had just missed Sora's dramatic exit.
"Did we miss something?" I asked.
Gongenzaka nodded. "This man Gongenzaka just saw Sora and another man with purple hair and a black cloak run out of the building!"
"We need to find them!" Yuya said, as if it wasn't obvious. "I'll search towards the park."
"I'll take the docks," Gongenzaka said.
"Then I'll go over there," Yuzu said, pointing off to the north.
"Then I suppose that leaves me with this direction," I concluded as I took off.
As soon as I was out of sight of the others, I took a sharp turn, heading directly towards the park. This was a gamble, as there was no guarantee that Sora would run the same way he did in canon, but I needed to ensure that Yuto didn't die here. As I was starting to near it, my path was blocked by a shadowy figure. Attempting to go around them was futile, as they swiftly moved to block me with their body.
"Okay, would you mind letting me through?" I said, exasparated. "I'm in a bit of a hurry."
"The Supreme King's awakening will not be stopped by insects," the figure said in a voice that wasn't as deep as I expected. I now had a chance to take in their features. They were male, by the tone of their voice and physique, dressed in dark hooded robes that covered the face in shadow. To me, it looked kind of like a hooded bathrobe.
"Oy vey," I groaned. "Look, I don't have time for this. Would you mind stepping aside, Mister Bathrobe?"
"Your insolence will not be tolerated. I am the Herald of the Holy King, and I will see that my Lord's resurrection takes place. I—"
"I'm really not in the mood for a crazy monologue by some random creep right now. If I duel you, will you go away?"
The herald nodded. "Indeed. It will be fun to feed your soul to the shadows, interloper."
As my duel disk activated, I put Yuzu and Gongenzaka on call. "They're in the park," I said. "Run there as fast as you can. Do not allow Yuya or anyone with the same face as him to duel. Don't question this, we don't have time."
"What's happening?" Yuzu asked.
"Get running! There's no time!" I yelled back.
"Of course you would call upon your pathetic friends. I shall deal with them after your defeat."
"Sure, sure. Bring it on, Herald of the Bathrobe!"
"Tch. Such insolence. I shall take the first move. I normal summon Floowandreeze and Robina," the herald declared.
Shit. Shit shit shit. This was not good. This guy was a serious duelist, and without Barrier Statue of the Stormwinds banned, he could set up some extremely oppressive boards. This wasn't going to be as easy to deal with as I expected.
"Its effect now activates. I add one level four or lower winged-beast monster from my deck to my hand, then I can normal summon a monster once more. I add Floowandreeze and Eglen and summon it! Now, Eglen's effect activates."
Several groups of birds appeared on the field, the second drawn by the songs of the first. Guess it was time to Ash this and hope they don't have a way to Map.
"Ash on Eglen to negate the search," I said.
"I activate Crossout Designator! By declaring one card name—"
"Yep, Crossout call Ash, I get it. Just finish your damn combo already, will you?"
"Very well," the herald said. "Why waste my breath on you when you shall become one with the shadows soon enough? I shall also chain Dimension Shifter to my Crossout Designator! Now, the chain resolves, and I add Floowandreeze and Empen and normal summon it!"
From there, he set up a board of Empen, Barrier Statue, and a set Dreaming Town, in other words, the standard Floo end board pre-Barrier Statue ban. I'd need a really good draw to get out of this one.
"I end my turn," the herald declared. "Come then, interloper! Face your doom!"
"Okay, your trash-talk is pathetic," I said as I drew my card. Book of Eclipse was absolutely perfect here. "Seriously, you sound like generic doomsday villain! At least do something original, like a breaking speech! Good villains love breaking speeches!"
"There is no point in wasting my thoughts on you, insolent one," Mister Bathrobe sneered.
"And yet you're dueling me right now... not that Floo requires much thinking. I activate Book of Eclipse at the start of main one." The dark book glowed with lunar power, forcing all of the herald's monsters into face-down defence position. I then fired off a couple of Upstart Goblins, a new tech I'd been experimenting with, before finding my starter. "Since you control more monsters than I do, I can special Ecclesia from my hand. Ecclesia effect, special Mo Ye. Mo Ye effect, reveal Emergence, make token. Activate Emergence, add Longyuan."
[Herald: 8000 - 10000]
"Reverse card, open! Floowandreeze and the Dreaming Town! I can normal summon one Floowandreeze monster from my hand! I—"
"I know what your cards do!" I yelled, exasparated. "Just do your brain-dead Floo combo already!"
"I normal summon Floowandreeze and Eglen and activate its effect!" the herald roared as the bird emerged from the mists of the Dreaming Town. "Do not interrupt me once more, interloper! Once you lose this duel, I shall subject you to agonies beyond your comprehension!"
"Wow, that's only been said by... basically every guy who did a shadow duel ever, I think," I said, scratching my chin in mock consideration. This guy wanted to be taken seriously. He wanted to be seen as a fearsome foe, and I wasn't going to give that to him. The more pissed he got, the more likely he was to make mistakes.
I watched with a grin as the robed guy went for Raiza, grabbing Toccan off Eglen along the way. Raiza bounced the token and stacked Mo Ye and Ash to the top of my deck. This was his first misplay—not using Toccan to recycle the banished Dreaming Town. Of course, I didn't point this out to his face. There was a difference between being irreverent and being downright suicidal.
"I activate Pot of Desires! By banishing the top ten cards of my deck face-down, I can draw two cards!" Both heads of the pot laughed as I drew my cards. Ashuna and Blackout were perfect here. "Special Ashuna, activate Longyuan pitching Blackout. Special Longyuan and token. Since Blackout was banished, I can make another token. Synchro for ten into Chengying and synchro for eleven into Psychic End Punisher!"
Psychic End Punisher roared as it hit the field, while Chengying's wild hair billowed out behind him, blowing with wind from some unknown source. "Since a card was banished, I can activate Chengying's effect! I banish the set Empen from your field and Dimension Shifter from your graveyard!" Chengying's sword now glowed with an otherworldly light that enveloped the set penguin. When the light faded, Empen was gone, leaving the herald with only a single set monster.
"Since you activated a monster effect during the main phase of this turn, I activate Triple Tactics Talents on Pot of Greed mode!" I took my two cards as the spell resolved. Blaze Awakening and the second Ecclesia? This was amazing.
"I activate Swordsoul of Blaze Awakening to banish your set Barrier Statue," I declared. This was a new CYAC card that I hadn't gotten a chance to use in real life, but since Reiji had printed it, I figured it might be a good idea to give it a spin. It was certainly coming in handy here.
I glanced at my duel disk and checked my opponent's LP before I attacked, noting the abnormal value Why was the starting LP 8000? What had caused this change? I shook my head. It didn't matter, all I had to do was win this duel. I wasn't sure if I had enough power on board to win, but math is for blockers. "Chengying gains 100 attack and defense points for each banished card, and your monsters lose the same amount! Currently, there are twenty-five banished cards, so he has 5500 attack points. Now, Psychic End Punisher attacks Mega Raiza!"
The draconic abomination blasted Razia apart with a beam of energy from one if its 'fists'. One more card banished, which meant that Chengying was now up to 5600.
[Herald: 10000 - 6800]
"Chenyging attacks you directly!"
Chengying's blade, glowing with the power of the banished cards, rushed forward and cut through a portion of the herald's cloak, sending him flying back into the wall of a building.
[Herald: 6800 - 1200]
"I end my turn," I declared. Dammit, not quite enough, and now End Punisher was no longer unaffected. Still, he was within Longyuan range.
The herald pulled himself to his feet, and it was only now that I noticed that a large portion of his body was gone. To confirm my hypothesis, I glanced at my arm holding the duel disk, and saw a that a large chunk of it was also gone.
"Finally realized it, have you?" the herald taunted. "Every time you take damage, the shadows shall consume part of your body! Soon, you shall be sent to the Shadow Realm!"
"Old school, huh?" I quipped. I didn't think they did this kind of shadow duel past GX. "It's only a scratch."
"Only a scratch? Well then. Soon you shall experience much greater pain."
"Whatever you say, Dollar Store Marik," I said.
"Tch. I activate Ultimate Slayer! I send Wind Pegasus Ignister from my Extra Deck to the graveyard in order to return your Chengying to the Extra Deck!" Okay, that was kind of bad. I watched, unable to use any card effects, as Apollousa (yes, that's the monster in Ultimate Slayer's art) loaded Wind Pegasus into her bow and shot Chengying off the field in the blink of an eye. The Herald then proceeded to go through the motions of playing Floo, going Robina for Harpie Harpist, Toccan recycling Empen, and Stri into Eglen into Empen for Map into a second Mega Raiza to out my End Punisher. That Harpie Harpist, which had the potential to be problematic, as it would allow him to recycle Raiza and bounce a card I played. However, he still didn't have Dreaming Town back in rotation, as he'd opted for the Raiza line to push damage. With all four small birds back in his hand and recycled from the banished pile, the herald proceeded to bring on the pain.
"Battle Phase!" the herald declared. "Empen attacks you directly!"
[Joshua: 7000 - 4300]
I gritted my teeth in pain as I felt my other arm disintegrate, as well as part of my right leg.
"Raiza the Mega Monarch attacks you directly as well!"
[Joshua: 4300 - 1500]
This time, I screamed as I was knocked off my feet and onto the cold concrete ground, my legs disappearing as the attack connected.
"I end my turn," the herald said. "Draw your last pathetic card, interloper! Soon, the shadows will consume what's left of your body!"
"It's just a flesh wound," I responded through gritted teeth as I pulled myself off the ground. Dammit, it really did hurt, but I wasn't going to let knockoff Marik get the satisfaction of knowing it. Annoyingly, he didn't continue the Monty Python reference, so I decided to taunt him further as I drew for turn. "And will you stop taking Kaiba's best lines? You're nowhere near as interesting as he is."
"Shut up!" the hooded man roared. "Shut up and duel!"
"That's more like it," I said, grinning through the pain. I could see the winning line now. I knew every card he had in hand, and as long as I didn't normal summon, I would be fine. "I'll special Ecclesia in defense and activate her effect to bring out Longyuan from deck! Now, I'll pay 1000 LP to activate Instant Fusion and bring out Elder Entity Norden!"
[Joshua: 1500 - 500]
I watched the elder god climb out of the instant ramen cup as a good portion of my torso disintegrated, leaving me as a pair floating hands, a floating head, and my feet. It would be quite comical if it didn't hurt so much. In the corner of my eye, I could see the shadows of the street creeping towards me. Looks like this wannabe doomsday villain wasn't just bluffing.
"Norden effect," I gasped. "Special Ecclesia. Synchro for ten into Baronne. Longyuan burn... for game..."
I collapsed as I saw a spectral version of Longyuan release a blast of fire at the Herald's face. Before the blast of fire reached, the shadows dissipated and I had all my limbs once more. Apparently that was a thing that he could do.
[Herald: 1200 - 0]
[Joshua: WIN]
"I lost... I lost to Longyuan burn?!" the herald yelled. "What the hell? I... goddammit!"
"Looks like I hit a nerve," I said, pulling myself off the ground for the second time that night. The pain was fading, and I could feel new energy coursing through me. Instead of rising to the taunt, the mysterious guy composed himself.
"Interesting... Joshua Cohen," the robed figure said. "I shall take my leave... but this is not the last time we will meet." With that, he vanished into the shadows, leaving only a fragment of his cloak that Chengying had cut off. I pocketed the piece of fabric, being careful not to touch it with my hands. There was a possibility that it would be useful later. I then resumed my run towards the park. As the park came into view, my duel disk buzzed twice.
"Joshua! I don't see Sora, but there are two Yuyas there!" Gongenzaka said.
"Whatever you do, don't let Yuya duel another copy of himself!" I reiterated. "If they're already dueling, try to step in and end it."
"This man Gongenzaka will not allow Yuya to come to harm!" Gongenzaka said firmly, before hanging up.
Okay, good. Gongenzaka's there, the fact that Yuya and Yuto are also there means that Yuzu isn't there yet, therefore... I quickly punched Yuzu's number into my duel disk. "Yuzu. Where are you right now?"
"I just passed the Leo Corporation tower," she responded.
"Change of plans," I said. "Find Reiji if you can. I'll update you a few minutes from now."
"Why?" Yuzu asked.
"No time to explain." I hated using this cliche, but the explanation would sound utterly absurd and take quite a bit of time. "Just trust me on this one, okay?"
"You owe me an explanation later," Yuzu said, before hanging up. Okay, good. Things were falling into place.
"Sora was an invader from the fusion dimension," I heard a voice say as I ran through the park. "He has returned back to his home." As I turned a corner, I saw Yuto, Yuya, and Gongenzaka. Yuto was explaining the plot, while Gongenzaka stood slightly in front and to the side of of Yuya, duel disk readied.
"There are four dimensions," Yuto continued. "Fusion, Xyz, Synchro, and Standard. I fear that Fusion may be planning to invade Standard next."
Before Yuto could continue his lecture, a bright flash of light blinded us. As the glare subsided, I saw a motorcycle crashed into a broken lamppost.
"Who put this thing here?" the rider complained as he removed his helmet. His face was the same as Yuya's, while his hair looked like a blueberry with a bunch of bananas in front. "Seriously, this is really annoying!"
"Pawn of fusion!" Yuto roared.
"Huh?" Yugo said. "My name is Yugo!"
"Three Yuyas?" Gongenzaka said. "And one of them is fusion?"
"This is Academia's ally from the Synchro Dimension," Yuto explained. "He calls himself Fusion."
"I keep telling you, it's Yugo, not Fusion! Dammit, you're annoying! Duel me, you bastard!"
I stepped in front of the motorcycle, which in retrospect was a very stupid move. "Nobody is dueling anyone right now," I stated firmly. "Yugo. How do you spell your name?"
"Why are you asking me this question? It's Y-U-G-O. Not 'Fusion', dammit!"
I turned to face Yuto and the rest. "Don't tell me that you were planning to kill this guy over a goddamn homophone," I groaned. "Oy vey."
"I—he's with fusion!" Yuto yelled, raising his duel disk. "Why else would he end up in the Xyz dimension?"
"And your explanation, Yugo?" I asked, turning back to the motorcyclist.
Yugo pulled his deck out of the motorcycle-mounted duel disk and looked through it for a few second before pulling out a card and holding it up for everyone to see. "Whenever this card glows, I end up somewhere else," he explained. "Last time, it brought me to a war-torn city, where some people kept insisting I was an enemy for some reason!"
"How can we trust him?" Yuto countered. "He could just be lying through his teeth!"
Okay, that was a good point if you didn't know the plot. "First off, don't start killing each other just because Yugo might be an Academia agent. Second, there should be a way to verify this. All Academia duel disks have the ability to seal people into cards, right?"
Yuto nodded. "Academia soldiers would be useless otherwise."
"Therefore, it stands to reason that if Yugo's duel disk didn't have that carding technology, he wouldn't be an Academia agent?"
"That makes sense," Yuto said. "Yugo, could I take a look at your duel disk?"
"What? I'm not letting you take my deck!" Yugo yelled. "If you want that, you'll have to duel me first!"
I sighed. It felt like I was surround with overly confrontational children, which... I kind of was. "We're not taking your deck, we're just going to be inspecting your duel disk," I explained. "You can hold onto your deck until we're done."
"And leave myself defenseless?" Yugo complained. "No way in hell I'm doing that!"
Goddammit, why did Yugo have to be so bloody headstrong? "I suppose there's only one way to resolve this," I sighed. "However! Yuto, Yuya, you two will not be dueling Yugo under any circumstances. I'll explain later why, but I'll need you to trust me now."
"Why?" Yuto asked. This was starting to get infuriating.
"I just said I'd explain later." I readied my duel disk and walked over to face Yugo. "Would dueling me suffice?"
Yugo nodded. "I'll beat you, and then I'll beat that annoying guy who gets my name wrong!"
"Sure, sure. You want to go first or should I?"
"I'll take the first move!" Yugo declared, revving his motorcycle. "Since I control no monsters, I can Special Summon Speedroid Terrortop from my hand! Now, I normal summon the tuner monster Speedroid Tri-Eyed Dice! Magical Sword with the form of a cross! Use your power to rend your enemies! Synchro Summon! Arise, level six Hi-Speedroid Kendama!"
The sword floated menacingly in the air as Yugo jumped over a nearby fountain on his motorcycle. "Hi-Speedroid Kendama's effect! Once per turn, by banishing a Speedroid monster from my graveyard, I can inflict 500 points of damage to you!"
The ghostly image of Terrortop flickered in front of Kendama as it gathered energy in its tip before blasting me in the chest. I stumbled back, wincing at the pain.
[Joshua: 4000 - 3500]
"Joshua already took a hit!" Yuto commented. "He's... wait, why are you guys not reacting?"
"It's just some burn damage," Yuya said dismissively. "If Yugo just passes with Kendama, Joshua will win?"
"You think I'm that weak?" Yugo said angrily. "I set one card and end my turn!" He did the 'Akira Slide' as he passed, sliding his motorcycle across the ground with the motorcycle pointing in a right angle to the direction of motion.
"Draw for turn, standby, main," I said. "Special Ecclesia, Ecclesia effect. I'll special Swordsoul of Mo Ye from deck." From there, I performed the standard Swordsoul combo, going into Chixia and Baronne and burning Yugo for 1200.
[Yugo: 4000 - 2800].
Of course, since I hadn't committed to my normal summon yet, I could extend a bit farther. "Normal summon Taia, Taia effect, banishing Longyuan to make a token."
Taia's sword glowed as Longyuan exited my grave, and a token sword formed next to the swordsman. "Synchro for eight, make Baxia. Baxia effect, spin Kendama and the backrow." Baxia roared as it entered the field, and the images of Taia and the token orbited it as it released a blast of light at Kendama and Yugo's set card.
"Battle phase. Chixiao attacks for game."
"When you declare an attack, I can banish Speedroid Tri-Eyed Dice from my graveyard to negate that attack!" the Synchro duelist yelled as a spectral version of Tri-Eyed Dice interposed itself between Chixiao's blade and Yugo.
"Fine. Baronne attacks for game," I declared.
"When you declare a direct attack, I can special summon Speedroid Menko from my hand!"
"Baronne effect, negate and destroy!" Baronne's sword sliced through the toy as it attempted to enter the battlefield, and the knight's charge continued. Yugo found himself smacked off his bike by Baronne's shield, and he landed on the ground some distance away.
[Yugo: 2800 - 0]
[Joshua: WIN]
"Fine. Now can we resolve this damn misunderstanding?" I asked. "Yuto, if you would?"
Yuto walked over to Yugo's motorcycle and fiddled with the duel disk apparatus for a bit, checking the various buttons and popping open a component that allowed him to see the circuitry. Yuya was looking over his shoulder most of the time. After a few minutes, Yuto shook his head. "You were right. It's an ordinary duel disk with no carding features," he said. "There isn't even a dimension-travel component. As skeptical I am about his story, it seems that he may have been telling the truth after all."
"Finally!" Yugo said. I shared his sentiment. "Well, what now?"
I was almost certain Yugo had ADHD or something similar. "Need a place to stay?" I asked.
Yugo nodded. "Yeah. I'm not sure where this place is, but it seems far from the City."
"You can crash at my apartment," I offered, extending my hand. Yugo clasped it vigorously.
"Deal!" he said triumphantly.
I gave him a wide grin. "Great! I needed someone to help assemble my furniture!"
Yugo's eyes widened. "Is it too late to back out?"
"Yep."
Author's Note: This chapter was not sponsored by IKEA. I just like their furniture, though it can be frustrating sometimes.
We've got a new mysterious villain with their own motivations and a powerful deck making moves in the shadows! Since Academia is kind of a non-issue right now, I needed to put in someone to pose an actual threat to the heroes.
I've been experimenting with my writing style a bit in this chapter, trying to slow the pacing slightly and give the characters room to breathe. Let me know what you think of this in the reviews!
In other news, I've started drafting another Arc-V fanfic, which should hopefully avoid most of the powercreep problems this fic is having. I don't want to say too much about it, as it's still in the very early stages, but if you have any characters or ships you want to be focused on, do let me know.
Author's Note 3/16/2023: Special thanks to Kisaraizthebestwaifu for doing almost all of the work scripting the gameplay of the Swordsoul vs Floo duel! I've updated the chapter to make the Herald of the Supreme King more of a threat and have the duel be a bit more back-and-forth. Swordsoul's ability to put easy damage on board and Floo's general oppressiveness made it super difficult, so mega props to them.