Turn 14: Dark Ruler's Domain vs. Royal Magical Library
Bakura Twilight
4000 4000
“Since I’m the last of my team,” Twilight said, “I believe I get to go first. I’ll start by summoning the Ancient Haunted Library in defense mode.”
Dusty bookcases burst up from the ground, surrounding the duelist on all sides, but there was a noticeable difference from her last library. The shelves were more worn, darker, and seemed to sag a little under the weight of the tomes resting upon them. Half seen shapes could almost be glimpsed here and there behind the books as if specters were peeking out at the players.
Twilight breathed in the scent of old books with obvious enjoyment and returned to the game with a renewed glint in her eye. “And I’ll throw down a face down for good measure. That’ll end my turn.”
“What, no spell cards?” Bakura mocked as he drew, “I do hope you are not going easy on me; you were the one who wanted this duel, after all. I summon Malice Doll of Demise!”
An extremely creepy wooden mannequin appeared on his side of the field in a clatter of popping joints. Its dead eyes stared across the field at the girl and it hefted a wicked-looking axe nearly the size of its own body in its tiny hands.
“Appropriate,” Twilight said with a smirk, “But it appears to be a few points shy of being able to attack the Haunted Library.”
“Is that so?” Bakura said, as he picked a new card from his hand, “Let us see how you feel after I lay this card face down and end my turn with the spell card Ectoplasmer!”
His spell appeared on his field and immediately lit up with a green aura. The doll trembled as if it were having a seizure before collapsing into a heap on the ground. From out of the pile of wood it had become rose a wispy specter vaguely resembling the mannequin. The ghost let out a forlorn moan as it shot across the field and slamming itself into Twilight’s chest, knocking her back a few steps and chilling her to the bone.
Twilight
3200
“At the end of each of our turns, we are forced to select a type of monster,” Bakura explained as she tried to catch her breath. “Ectoplasmer then rips the soul out a monster of that type and hits the opponent with half that monster’s attack points. So I have nothing to fear from your defensive strategy at all. I can just sit back and watch you destroy your own monsters for me!”
“Keep it together, Twi,” Applejack offered from the sidelines, “He’s left himself wide open!”
Not completely, Twilight thought to herself, eyeing Bakura’s face down, I somehow doubt that he’d sacrifice his only monster if that trap couldn’t protect him somehow. But I can’t allow that spell to cut through my field…
She grimaced as she drew and selected a card. “I summon Breaker, the Magical Warrior! This knight comes into play with his own spell counter, but I will be spending it immediately to destroy your spell!”
A brilliant light engulfed her field and faded to reveal a man wearing bright red and gold armor. A purple gem in the knight’s shield lost its glow as the monster raised its sword high and slashed violently down with it. A shining arc of power was released from the tip of the sword and shot across the field, bisecting Bakura’s spell cleanly in half, which then exploded.
“Not bad,” Bakura grunted, slipping quickly back into his calm veneer, “So I assume your next move is to attack?”
Twilight hesitated. He seemed to be almost inviting her to attack and every instinct in her was telling her that this was a trap of some kind. She looked through her hand one more time, but none of her cards offered a solution to the face down. But early on is a much better time to fall into a trap, when I haven’t built up very much to lose…
Confident in her reasoning, she pointed dramatically at her opponent. “Nothing ventured, nothing gained. Breaker, let’s see what he’s hiding!”
Her swordsman shouted its agreement and dashed forward, sword raised high. Bakura made as if to activate his trap… but then laughed and held his arms out to the sides, accepting the blow without complaint.
Bakura
2400
“Oh, the look on your face before you decided to attack!” he laughed, still struck by her expression. “I’ve gotten pretty far into your mind if you are second guessing yourself this badly already!”
“Sh-shut up!” Twilight said, going a little pink in the cheeks. Her eyes flicked back to the trap once more before she crossed her arms defensively. “I end my turn there.”
“Don’t let that creep psyche you out, Twilight!” Pinkie called out encouragingly, and Twilight offered her a quick smile.
Bakura smirked as he drew. “Touching, but you should be more concerned with the field. You see, my Malice Doll rises from the grave at the start of my turn, just in time for me to offer it once more as a sacrifice. Behold the Magical Marionette!”
There was a clattering as the Malice Doll reassembled itself from the pieces it had left strewn across the floor. It had barely hefted its axe when it vanished in a burst of light and a new monster had taken its place. It wore a dark red cloak that hid most of its body from sight as it floated in the air above the two duelists, the bits uncovered hidden behind violet colored armor.
“First demons, then ghosts, and now puppets.” Joey said with a groan, “Why does every monster Bakura plays have ta be that unnecessarily creepy?”
“Go, Marionette, slaughter Breaker the Magical Warrior!” Bakura shouted. The creature thrust forward its armored arms and golden lines of light trailed off from its fingertips. From out from beneath its cloak a plain doll was pulled out by the glowing lines, each of the dolls’ hand clutching a wicked sharp dagger. The puppet flew through the air and stabbed the knight through its chest as if its armor were paper-mâché, and it exploded.
Twilight
2800
“And that trap you were so afraid of is called Robbin’ Zombie!” Bakura declared, activating it with a flick of his wrist, “Now that my monster has damaged you, you have to send the top card of your deck to the graveyard!”
Twilight picked up her top card and couldn’t stop a moan from escaping as she saw what it was. “No…”
The card was Solis Tia, the Heliosphere.
Bakura threw back his head and roared with laughter. “What unfortunate luck! And just like that your best card is out of the game! You might as well just throw in the towel now!”
“I’ve only just started!” Twilight shouted, starting her turn with a bit more of a savage draw than normal. “I summon the Secret Alchemical Library!”
More shelves burst up from the ground, which combined with her first library almost completely blocked her out of view from those watched the duel. These new structures were easy to pick out from the ancient ones of her first monster, as they were much cleaner and well-kept. Candles cast soft light on the books and completed the illusion that Twilight had somehow set up a cozy room to read in.
Twilight pointed out a green orb that was floating, ghostlike, through the shelves. “My libraries have the same ability as the one I played in my first duel, creating a spell counter each time a spell is played by either of us. So they will each create a counter when I use Pot of Greed!”
She drew and gave a huge grin at when she had. “Just what I was hoping for, Spell Power Grasp! This not only causes my two libraries to make counters, it creates a third one of its own! Not to mention it allows me to add a second copy of it to my hand immediately. And I’ll end my turn with two more face downs.”
Mai gave a slow whistle, impressed despite herself. “So she’s got six counters now, impressive. But what’s she going to do with them?”
“You’ll see,” Applejack said knowingly, “Solis Tia isn’t the only trick in her saddlebag. She’s pickin’ up steam now!”
Bakura smirked as he drew his card and moved to play it right away. “Not bad at all, but as I recall each library can only have three counters apiece. Seems you should have spent a few on your turn, or else you could have garnered a few from this spell here!”
“I’ve accounted for that as well!” Twilight shouted, activating one of her traps, “Endless Shelves removes the restriction on my monsters, allowing them to have as many spell counters as I want!”
Bakura shrugged as if this were no big deal. “As you wish, but you still have a Painful Choice to make! Now which of these five monsters from my deck would you like to add to my hand? Do not worry, the others are all going to the graveyard.”
A quintet of cards appeared in a row on his field. Twilight looked back and forth between them, but none of them jumped out at her. None of these are very powerful monsters, so what’s he driving at?
Shrugging, she pointed at the card in the middle. “I choose that one, the Earl of Demise. You have to sacrifice to summon it, and it isn’t strong enough to challenge either of my libraries even if you do. It’s clearly the weakest of the group.”
“Really?” Bakura mused as he discarded the other four and gestured to his monster. “Tell you what; I will let you in on another secret. You see, I know all about spell counters. This monster here also uses them, and has been gathering them with the same speed as your libraries. The difference is, my monster gains two hundred points for each one it has collected, making it more than powerful enough to smash through your defenses!”
The floating puppeteer threw its arms out again, but Twilight only laughed as the doll it commanded flew closer. “Did you really think I wouldn’t recognize the Magical Marionette? I had one in my deck for a while, before I grew out of it. I know all of its weaknesses, such as the fact that it’s a spellcaster instead of a fiend. Which means I can use this trap, Magician’s Circle!”
A shimmering swirl of magical lines spread out across the field in the shape of a gigantic circle, and a figure rose out from the center of it. It looked like another knight in over-elaborate armor, but this one handled a shield nearly the size of it body on one arm. As the puppet flew past it raised the stubbly sword in its other hand and jabbed at the wooden doll. One of the eight green orbs floating around Twilight’s field shot forward and intercepted the puppet, exploding out into an emerald dome that halted it in its tracks.
“Magician’s Circle lets me summon any spellcaster from my deck, so long as it has less than two thousand attack points,” Twilight explained smugly, “And this mighty warrior is Defender, the Magical Knight! He allows me to save any of my monsters from death with the simple cost of a single spell counter!”
“Hrmph,” Bakura grunted, “Well, your trap grants me the same ability. I summon Jowgen the Spiritualist.”
A man wearing the robes of an eastern priest rose up from the ground on Bakura’s side. It tapped its oak staff lightly on the ground before it and adopted a serene expression.
“I am also aware of that monster, and how you can only use its effect once per round. So what will you do when I remove two of the counters my Marionette has collected to destroy that overgrown piece of furniture?”
“I’ll just use this!” Twilight declared, flipping up her other trap, “Pitch-Black Bauble lets me use Defender’s ability once more!”
Twin green orbs shot out from under the Marionette’s cloak and traveled down the wire, where they fused with the puppet’s daggers. The puppet somersaulted over the glowing dome that had stopped it and shot on towards the bookcases once more, but the knight thrust its sword at it again with a yell. Another orb flew out of the stacks and transformed into a barrier scant inches before the puppet could make contact, its magically enhanced blades unable to cut through to the vulnerable books beyond.
“Not bad, but can you escape death a third time,” Bakura growled, “I discard the Earl to activate Jowden’s special ability. Now all monsters that have been special summoned on our fields will be sent to the afterlife!”
The priest spun its staff in a grand sweeping arc over its head and brought it down pointed at the knight. A stream of nearly invisible air-like energy rushed out from between the staff’s pines and washed over Defender, who dissolved away. The energy whirled around the field for a little while before converging on the priest itself, who also faded away under its waves.
“So they’re right back where they started!” Joey said, putting his hands on his hips in annoyance, “What was tha point of all that?”
“The point?” Bakura said with a grin, “Why, the point was to draw out her resources early. Remember my first spell this turn? What if I said my aim was just to send the others cards it selected to the grave? After all, I need to sacrifice the souls of three fallen fiends to summon Dark Necrofear!”
“No!” Twilight gasped, realizing too late what his plan was.
The ghosts of three of the monsters he discarded rose out from the slot of his duel disk and swirled around the field of a moment before meshing together. The spirits grew blacker as they merged and expanded to the form of the monster that had defeated both Fluttershy and Applejack on its own. The country girl grunted as she saw the demon again, bending the brim of her hat down a bit as if she didn’t want to look at it.
“And I will end my turn with a face down card,” Bakura said, doing just that, “So now the ball is in your court, little girl. Do you think you can succeed against the monster where none of your precious friends could?”
Twilight swallowed and looked up at the thing’s dead eyes. It’s so powerful it’s unfair. If it dies in battle, it possesses the monster who killed it. And if it dies via a card effect, it activates that Dark Sanctuary spell and possesses my monsters anyway! There’s no safe way to get rid of that thing… except for…
Twilight looked down at her hand and sighed. “I was hoping to save this card to stop Ataxia, but I have to use it now. I’ll draw and start my turn with the spell Field Barrier!”
A spark of light burst into being high above the duel and a shimmering veil spread out from it, forming a softly glowing dome that encased the two of them and their cards. Bakura looked around wildly, but there was no way out from beneath the spell.
“What is this supposed to be?” he demanded.
Twilight smiled and gestured around her. “This spell preserves the field just as it is, denying either of us the ability to play any new field spells. That means no Ataxia, and no Dark Sanctuary either. I can destroy your Necrofear with impunity now!”
“Yes!” Joey, Pinkie, Applejack, Mai, and Pegasus said in unison.
“You still have to accomplish that feat!” Bakura challenged.
“I intend to!” Twilight countered, playing another card from her hand, “First I need to use Spell Power Grasp once again, adding my third copy to my hand and bringing my spell counter total to eleven. And that’s finally enough to use one of the most powerful spells in my deck. At the cost of ten counters, I’ll obliterate your whole field with Mega Ton Magical Cannon!”
Her spell card appeared next to her and began to glow with an inner light. Immediately nearly all of the glowing orbs floating around her flew one by one into the card face, each one causing the energy contained within it to glow brighter. When the tenth one was absorbed the card shone with such light than no one could look directly at it. Bakura stepped back as if the light along were pushing him back.
“This is the end of your field!” Twilight shouted. She thrust her fist forward and the magic held in her spell was unleashed, pouring out from the hovering rectangle in an endless stream. Bakura’s fiend, his puppeteer, his two active traps, everything disappeared in the overwhelming light. It took nearly thirty seconds for the blast to finally taper off and leave everyone blinking their eyes rapidly to restore their sight.
Twilight passed a hand over her eyes roughly to clear them quicker. “Had enough? Now that you’re wide open, I can… wait, where did that come from?!”
A ghostly card was floating on the field at Bakura’s side. A weak aura surrounded the trap, which still had a trail of ectoplasm connecting it to his graveyard slot.
“I activated this when you played your card,” Bakura said calmly, the angry glare in his eyes betraying the true emotion he was feeling, “A Deal with Dark Ruler can only be used when I lose a level eight monster. And now, for half my remaining life points, I can summon an even stronger beast from my deck!”
Bakura
1200
The ground rumbled and cracked open as a skeletal arm forced its way up out of the floor. The corpse of a jet black dragon dragged itself out from the spreading fissure and gave a sickening roar that rattled all the books on their shelves. Twilight clapped her hands over her ears as the nauseating sound washed over her, and sneaked a peak up at it when the thing paused for breath.
“Th-three thousand, five hundred attack points!” she breathed, hardly daring to believe how badly her trump card had backfired.
Bakura grinned and spread his arms wide. “Indeed, little whelp. All you’ve accomplished is making me stronger! Now are there any other pathetic moves you wish to try?”
Twilight looked down at the two cards left in her hand. I’ve already used Spell Power Grasp this turn, so I can’t use this one yet. And Reliable Guardian isn’t going to save my monsters from a dragon that powerful…
She shook her head and glared at him. “No… I end my turn.”
“Don’t stop there!” Applejack cried, “Ya gotta have somethin’ to stop that thing!”
Bakura chuckled as he drew. “It is worse than your friend believes, but before I can reveal how I must first summon the Goblin Zombie!”
A gangly creature materialized next to his dragon and let out some kind of hissing shriek from its misshapen head. But Twilight barely paid the new arrival any attention, as something was happening to the dragon. An acidic sludge-like substance was starting to pour out from between the dragon’s black plates and its toxic breath seemed to be a little more labored.
Confused, Twilight regarded her duel disk and her eyes widened. “Your dragon just lost five hundred attack points!”
Bakura shrugged as if this news was of middling concern. “The Berserk Dragon does not last long once it has been summoned, but fortunately I don’t need it to last forever. You see, it’s being eaten alive by the incredible power it possesses. The power to attack all monsters at the same time!”
“What?!” Twilight exclaimed, looking up sharply.
The dragon reared back and its jaws yawned wide, unleashing a dark miasma that quickly obscured everything contained within Twilight’s field barrier. Twilight hacked on the smog and looked around, realizing she was experiencing a bookworm’s worst nightmare. All around her books were rotting and falling apart and the shelves holding them collapsed with sickening pops, their insides putrefying. Her libraries collapsed with less of a crash and more of a splat, and it was with almost relief that her precious monsters exploded into duel shards. The sight of them suffering like that was almost as unbearable as losing them in the first place.
But she didn’t have time to mourn their loss. With her field empty, the remaining zombie had a clear line to her life points. It lunged forward and drew a scimitar cruelly across the girl’s midsection, driving her back a step.
Twilight
1700
“Did that hurt?” Bakura asked mockingly, “I am afraid the pain is not over. My zombie forces you to send to top card of your deck to the graveyard.”
Twilight frowned and proceeded to do so, wincing a little as the Pitch-Black Power Stone disappeared into the slot. She drew to start her turn and looked in surprise at what she’d been given, then turned a triumphant smile on her opponent.
“It’s a shame your monster has such an exploitable weakness,” she informed her opponent, “So first I’ll play one card face down and activate the secondary effect of Endless Shelves. By sending it to the graveyard, I can summon the Royal Magical Library from my deck!”
Fresh bookcases rose up all around Twilight, but she barely let then settle before moving on. “Don’t blink or you might miss them, as I offer them as sacrifice to summon out Imperial Spellbinding Library!”
Her shelves, which had topped out at about twice the height of either duelist, suddenly expanded to much greater heights. Ornate metal plating grew out of the edges and the mantles as the tops ended their growth spurt nearly forty feet up. There was nothing homey or worn about them now; the sleek metal design and towering straight rows bore the impression of pure professionalism.
“This library has three thousand defense points, more than enough to hold back your monster even if it wasn’t dissolving before our eyes!” Twilight declared, throwing a challenging look into Bakura’s face, “Let’s see you break through this one as easily!”
Bakura grimaced as he drew, while his dragon fell apart a little more. “You have a good point, girl. This beast’s use seems to have passed. It is time to trade it in with this, The Puppet Magic of Dark Ruler!”
The spell card appeared on his field and sickly green light burst out from its face. The dragon bent back over itself, unable to resist the pull of the spell as it was dragged back into the card itself with cruel slowness. As soon as the dragon was swallowed completely the card pulsed and vanished, revealing a new monster crouched behind it. As the monster stood up, Twilight couldn’t help but gasp.
“Dark Necrofear!” she breathed, as the familiar menace towered over her, “You can bring it back so easily…!”
“With puppet magic, I merely have to discard one monster to revive any one with the same level as I wish,” Bakura said mockingly, placing his hands on his hips, “But why so glum? Dark Necrofear does not have enough attack points to destroy your Library, so your defense remains intact. I will even switch the Goblin Zombie to defense, just in case.”
Twilight grimaced as she drew her card. As if destroying that monster once wasn’t hard enough… She looked at her new card and sighed. “I set this face down and activate Spell Power Grasp to add counters to my Library, bringing it to a total of five! Then… I’ll end my turn.”
“As I thought!” Bakura shouted, drawing his card with a snap, “You have to build back up to pose any threat to me. But if you think I am going to give you the time to do so, you are sadly mistaken! I activate Card of Demise, which lets me refill my hand!”
He consulted his new cards before pulling one out. “And I think I have had enough of this showy circle you have us trapped in. I will use the spell Spiritualism to send Field Barrier back to your hand!”
“No, her only defense…” Joey moaned as the field was suddenly filled with a swirling mass of wailing ghosts. The spirits spun around the field, pressing up against the barrier holding them in until it gave away and vanished with a burst of released power.
Twilight picked up the card as her disk ejected it. “But if you’re doing that… no, you mustn’t!”
“I do whatever I wish!” Bakura screamed in joy as the field spell slot opened on his duel disk, “I activate Ataxia, Zone of Bedlam!”
“I activate the Spellbook of Wisdom!” Twilight shouted, flipping up one of her face downs.
The checker board pattern of Ataxia spread out over the ground from Bakura’s feet, and as it passed under his monsters the color bled out from them, leaving them darker and somehow more powerful-looking than before. But as the pattern met her library it met a shimmering green barrier that it couldn’t overcome. The field broke around it like water, leaving the shelves the vibrant color they were to start with.
Bakura frowned, his greyed out features hardly seeming to bother him. “Strange, this spell should have switched your attack and defense points, leaving your monster helpless like a lamb. What precisely did that spell card do?”
Twilight gasped a little for breath, finding the pressure of the field spell hard to overcome even with the protection cast by her cards. “Spellbook of Wisdom makes the Imperial Library immune to all spell cards for one turn, so its defense points remain untouched. But you have to listen to me! No one can resist that cards’ corrupting influence for long. It’ll erode your mind and reduce you to a puppet of your former self!”
“This?” Bakura asked, holding up one trembling grey fist and regarding it with undisguised greed, “Yes, I can feel the dark power that flows though the card directly into my veins. But it is uncontrolled, directionless, simply waiting for the appropriate master to give its malevolence direction!”
“Aren’t you listening? It’s pure chaos; not even you can command it!” Twilight shouted, trying to scream sense into him, but clearly her words were just bouncing off without making the least impression.
A kind of maniac glee entered his eyes as her leered across the field. “Perhaps you need a demonstration of my willpower. Challenge accepted! I sacrifice the Goblin Zombie for Puppet Master and I will use his special ability to drill despair directly into your heart!”
Bakura
200
His zombie faded away to be replaced by an evil looking clown, hovering over the field due to its lack of legs. The clown stretched its arms wide and trails of magical strings shot down from each finger and burrowed into the ground. The floor split and cracked as Malice Doll, Jowgen, and the Earl of Demise were dragged up onto the field. All four of his monsters bled dry of color as the power of his spell washed over them.
“That’s five…” Pinkie said in a small voice, for the first time speaking without a trace of giddiness in her tone.
“Twi, stop him!” Applejack shouted.
“Too late,” Bakura screamed in joy, spreading his hands, “I offer my five monsters to Ataxia to summon Discord Incarnate!”
Twilight grit her teeth and pointed to her trap. “Then I will use Pitch-Black Bauble to-”
The rest of her move was completely lost on Bakura, however, as a surge of darkness exploded in his mind and all but blacked him out to the world around him. He became aware of a terrible presence that was pressing in on him from all sides. He cast his will against it and it pushed back a bit as if surprised, but instantly rushed back in all the tighter. And then the force spoke in his mind.
well WElL wELl, AnD WHo dO YoU THinK yOU ARE, tO SuMmON me?
Bakura’s shock over the card apparently speaking to him lasted only an instant, and then he returned the voice with all the mental force he could muster. I am your new MASTER! He pressed the force with all the anger and pride and magical might he could muster and felt it reel back in surprise once more. Through sheer willpower along, Bakura fought his way clear of the force and found himself suddenly back to his senses.
Discord floated above him, flexing its claws as if eager to use them on something or someone. A dark swirl of energy that Bakura recognized as a visual representation of his own power swirled around the monster’s eyes, and he paused to wonder about that voice he had heard. But he stopped immediately when he saw what was waiting for him on the other side of the field.
“What did you do?” he demanded.
“Need a refresher already?” Twilight asked, forcing confidence around the lump of fear in her throat, “Pitch-Black Bauble lets me activate Imperial Spellbinding Library on your turn, so I spent nine spell counters to revive all three of my other Libraries.”
Indeed, her field was filled with more bookshelves than Bakura would have thought possible. There were so many that the spectators were only faint outlines glimpsed through the holograms. The few spell counters the girl had left floated around her, ghost-like, casting shifting shadows of light as if they were underwater.
Bakura stumbled as his control over the beast wavered for a moment, but he caught himself by hunching over and planting his hands on his knees. “So… so what? Those things are not protected from Discord, who is using all of Atazia’s effects. Yes, that is right… it is a monster effect now, so your Imperial Library is not protected either! Your defense points are all zero!”
“Bakura,” Twilight said cautiously, as the boy lurched again, “Are you alright?”
“I am more than fine!” he spat, now with one hand pressed to the side of his head. He saw out of the corner of his eye that the hand had as much color as an old black-and-white photograph, but that hardly seemed to matter anymore. “This power is indescribable! But maybe you would like a taste? Discord, blow apart her Imperial Library!”
Discord’s jaws opened wide and swirling violet flames gathered within. It launched the fires like a bullet that slammed their way through the tallest shelves, setting them randomly aflame. The attack burst out the other side and temporarily banished the feeling that they were dueling in a contained area. And through the newly created hole the two duelists had a clear view of the bridge leading back into Pegasus’s castle and the lone figure standing on it.
“… Discord…?”
“FLUTTERSHY!!!!” her friends cried. Applejack and Pinkie rushed over to her and threw their arms around her. She was hunched over, with Rainbow’s jacket held tight over her shoulders like a shawl, and she gave her friends almost no mind. She seemed hypnotized by the sight of Discord floating on the field in front of her.
“Fluttershy, are you all right?” Twilight called out to her, unable to leave the field without forfeiting but wishing she could. Fluttershy seemed to snap out of her haze and gave her a weak smile and a nod, and Twilight sighed with relief. Relief that turned to stabs of anger as mocking laughter rose up behind her.
“So you woke up?” Bakura laughed, swaying slightly in an intoxicated way, “Come to see how much better I am at wielding this card? Perhaps you should have stayed asleep, saved yourself the trouble…”
“How could you?” Twilight demanded angrily, “I will make you eat those words!”
Bakura cackled again, but cut it short when a strange feeling rushed through him. For a moment, it had felt like his monster had been pulled towards the new arrival.
“No,” he muttered, not sure if he was saying that to Twilight or Fluttershy, “Discord is mine! I activate The Dark Door, which forces us to only attack with one monster a turn, and Gravekeeper’s Servant, which will cost you the top card of your deck if you do attack. And I will place this last card face down!”
“Then it’s my turn!” Twilight said. She looked over her shoulder and met Fluttershy’s eye. Something unspoken passed between the two of them and she turned back to the duel. “Alright, it’s time to end this. I activate my face down card, Reliable Guardian!”
“What is that for? Have you completely forgotten Discord’s ability?” Bakura snarled. He raised his hand and Discord lifted its claw obediently, preparing to snap its fingers and shatter the card…
“Discord, do you really want to listen to him?”
Fluttershy’s voice was so soft that it barely carried over the field, but it seemed to be enough to freeze Discord’s claw in place. Unbelievably, Bakura felt his control over the dark power of the card weaken and he redoubled his efforts. Do not listen to that stupid girl, you are MINE and you will do as I SAY!
But Discord dropped its arm without doing anything and Twilight grinned in triumph as the floating demon glowed green. “It seems you don’t understand his ability entirely. You see, half the time Discord doesn’t destroy his opponent’s cards but steals them for himself instead. And in addition, both of us draw a new card when that happens.”
She drew and then pointed to her left. “That spell put a third counter on each of my monsters, and I’ll spend the three on Secret Alchemical Library to search my deck for a card and put it on top. Unless Discord stops the ability, of course.”
The monster lifted its claw but paused again as it gazed in Fluttershy’s direction through dark magic clouded eyes, then dropped its claw to the side.
“Then we both draw, and since the effect doesn’t target a card on the field, Discord doesn’t redirect my target,” Twilight explained, looking briefly though her deck before putting one card on top. “Next I activate Field Barrier again.”
“Discord, stop her!” Bakura demanded in a scream, but his monster wasn’t paying him the slightest attention. It continued to do nothing as it stared blindly at where Fluttershy, now walked to the edge of the field and still hugged tight by her friends, was standing.
“Ah’ve never seen Discord let that many cards go by unopposed.” Applejack said in a low voice. Next to her Fluttershy smiled softly and continued to stare unblinkingly back at the hovering monster.
Twilight drew for the fourth time this turn as the shimmering spell appeared. “Looks like Discord doesn’t want to be under your control after all, Bakura. If he did, he never would have allowed this card to come to my hand. Now watch the card that will put an end to your twisted plans! I sacrifice all three of my Libraries to summon Yunae, the Crescent!”
At once every shelf around them lit up with a brilliant light and shot up into the sky. For a moment nothing happened and then a figure slowly descended from between the clouds. A soft, cool light radiated from the figure, like the moon breaking through an overcast night. Its long flowing hair, softly furling dress, and long wings twinkled with tiny stars. As its light played over the active spells and traps on the field, they each slowly folded back face down as if they were bowing to the monster.
“Yunae resets every card on our fields other than monsters,” Twilight explained, setting the last two cards in her hand, “And her mere presence doesn’t allow them to be activated again for another two turns. In addition, she gains an extra one hundred attack points for each card we have face down on the field.”
“But that only makes tha two monsters equal!” Joey groaned, clenching his fist in frustration, “If only she had one card more!”
Bakura broke out in a manic grin. “Haha, exactly! And thanks to all of your spells, Discord has filled up my hand again! Even if you destroy this useless monster this turn, the game will be mine on the next!”
“There is no next turn,” Twilight said sadly, “Unfortunately for you, Discord Incarnate isn’t the only evil force we’ve defeated before. And you’re about to meet another one now!”
At the exact moment she said that, Yunae feet finally touched down upon the checkerboard ground. But instead of losing color her colors darkened, growing deeper and deeper by the second. Its serene expression faded away in a silent scream that contorted into a roar of rage. Its dress contracted and grew plates of armor and from seemingly out of thin air it grasped a pair of sharply curved blades that crackled with pent-up lightning. It swished the blades and the cruel light one sometimes glimpses around a solar eclipse before going blind radiated off it, not really banishing the growing gloom as much as strengthening it.
Twilight pointed directly at Bakura’s heart. “Yunae also has a dark side; Nightmare, the Broken Crescent! Nightmare is automatically summoned the instant Yunae becomes a dark type, and she gains one thousand attack and defense points for every face down card on the field!”
“IMPOSSIBLE!!!!” Bakura screamed, craning his neck up to stare at his monster with confusion and hate. “How can power like yours lose?! Are you listening to me?! Do something!”
“It’s too late!” Twilight yelled, “Your spells and traps are sealed, and your monster has betrayed you! Nightmare, end it with Night Fall!”
Twilight’s monster leaped up into the air and turned a somersault, both blades glinting like the edges of a mostly hidden moon. Bakura turned one last look up at Discord and felt that voice echo in his mind for a second time.
SorRy, bUT You OnLy HavE dARKNEsS iN YoUR SouL. Fluttershy HAs bOTH LiGHt anD DarKNEsS. nOTHiNg BuT DarK Is BORinG, YOu KNoW.
i ThINk I’Ll stAy WItH mY fRIEnD foR NoW.
With a scream of effort, Nightmare slashed down with its blades and produced a great crescent of blue lightning that cleaved Discord in two and slammed into the duelist below. Bakura bellowed in pain as his world became lightning.
Bakura
0
“Now, Gatling Dragon!” Bandit Keith shouted, his tongue flapping wildly out of his mouth, “Unleash bullet hell on them!”
His dragon reared back and flailed about, raining bullets in every direction. Rarity’s Diva was the first to fall, with the bullets tearing holes in her precious clothing, closely followed by Spike’s Champion. Rainbow’s Flint Lock flitted about, avoiding most of the missiles, but it too fell in the end.
“And now I’ll sacrifice it to Destruct Potion!” Keith cried, and his beast erupted with a deafening explosion.
Keith
7200
“Not again…” Rarity huffed, straining for breath, but Bandit Keith wasn’t finished with them.
“Call of the Haunted!” he shouted with a bark of laughter, and his Gatling Dragon resurrected, “It looks like these worms still have a few cards left, not to mention way too many life points! Gatling Dragon, go wild!”
Yet again his dragon whipped itself into a frenzy and explosions rocked the field. All three of his opponents were thrown off their feet and landed in separate heaps, nearly all their remaining cards exploding into fragments.
Rainbow, Rarity, and Spike
100
Rainbow Dash coughed and tried to roll over onto her hands and knees. “That… card… is… so… broken…”
“How does it keep working?” Rarity gasped, “How do his cards activate just the way he wants them to every single time?”
“I’m… not done…” Rainbow Dash growled, struggling onto her feet, “I refuse… to let it end… like this…”
Bandit Keith roared with laughter and waves of force pulsed off him, pushing the girl back to her knees. “You can’t stand up to the full, concentrated power of my Master! I’m his last servant and his most faithful! Now prepare yourselves to become his slaves!”
“Never, you brute!” Rarity spat. Keith narrowed his eyes at her in irritation and another blast of power blew off him and slammed into Rarity. She was pushed roughly across the ground and bounced off the railing, crying out and clutching her shoulder in pain.
The sound galvanized Spike to rise unsteadily to his feet and take a step forward. “Rarity, Rainbow… I’m sorry, but I don’t think we can win this…”
“That’s right!” Keith laughed, drunk with power, “Know your place! Especially after I summon Cannon Soldier to finish you off!”
“I didn’t want to do this,” Spike said as the mechanical monster appeared on Keith’s field. He glanced at his last trap, the only card of theirs that had survived, and hesitated. But after looking back at where Rarity still lay the determination returned to his eyes and he thrust his hand out to the card.
“I will not let you win, no matter what! I activate the Self-Destruct Button!”
“No! Why would you ever have that card?!” Keith shouted, but his denial was useless to change reality.
The trap flipped up and exploded, the ensuing ball of flames engulfing everything in an instant. The Gatling Dragon and Cannon Soldier crumbled under Keith’s unbelieving eyes and he thrust his arms out before him. Energy focused on his palms and for a few seconds the explosion was held off, the force of it causing his arms to tremble and shake with effort. His feet slid along the floor, unable to find enough traction to stop the force, and Keith struggled with all his might to maintain the magic as he was pushed back. His cloak ripped, his sunglasses cracked, and his bandana was blown off, revealing the crystal embedded in his forehead was glowing red hot.
Then the back of his feet hit something and he unbalanced over it, his arms losing their tenuous ability to hold off the flames. In the last second Keith looked down to see what had tripped him up. It was Celestia, still lying where his Master had abandoned her. Then the explosion was upon him and a fierce pain wracked his whole being.
Rainbow, Rarity, Spike, and Keith
0
It took a while for the smoke to clear, but when it did Spike realized that the phantom pain he had been experiencing from Keith’s attacks was gone. He felt refreshed and looked around eagerly to see the two girls also sitting up with relieved expression.
“Rarity!” he said, rushing over to her, “Are you alright?”
She nodded and smiled at him indulgently. “I am, all thanks to you. You saved us, Spike.”
“Aw, it was nothing,” Spike muttered, suddenly embarrassed. He blinked and looked down at his hands. “Even though we lost, I don’t feel any different. I guess that since he lost as well, that means we aren’t going to be brainwashed?”
“Guuhhnnn…” a voice said, and the three of them looked over to see Celestia sitting up slowly, pressing a hand to her head. “What happened… it feels like I’ve been out for some time…?”
Rainbow rushed over and helped Celestia to her feet, allowing her to lean on her shoulder for support. “Don’t worry, we kicked that guy’s butt! Come on, I want to get back to the others and see how the tournament’s going!”
“Ussssee… lleessssss…”
The hoarse growling voice caused them all to freeze and turn sharply around. Against the wall further down the corridor, a black mass of energy was pulling Bandit Keith’s body to his feet. It was clear that the man wasn’t conscious, but the black smog was forcing him to move about like a broken doll. His eyes leaked a glowing green mist, from which a pair of sharp red eyes suddenly opened and stared at the people before him.
“Need… better… hossst…” the thing rasped, and it raised Keith’s arm. Black smog poured out of his palm and engulfed the four of them before they could move, and they realized that they couldn’t move at all. Still moving lifelessly, Keith started walking over to his captives.
A burst of brilliant white light suddenly appeared from behind everyone, forcing Keith to halt in his tracks. The smog dissolved under that light and the four of them collapsed to their knees in surprise. Keith’s body held up its arms to protect his strange eyes, and black energies swirled around him to shield him from the light. The light disappeared as quickly as it had appeared and in the half second when everyone lay gathering their wits a figure walked forward and placed himself between Keith and the others.
“So you are the source of the dark power I’ve been sensing,” Yugi said, pointing threateningly at the dark shadow coalescing over Keith, “I will not allow you free reign anymore! I will stop you here and now!”
“Yessss…” Keith said in that same hissing voice, “A suitable ssservant…”
Yugi snapped out his arm and activated his duel disk. “Prepare yourself, shadow! It’s time to duel!”
Next time on Yugioh: It's Time to Duel
Dark Magic React vs. Crystal Clear
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Took you long enough to update this great story. I hope the next update comes within a month at least.
7909159 considering that the updates are slow to begin with, this was fast
7909190 I was talking to the author, not you dude.
Luna!
And that was a really cool deck you got for Twilight! 
Awesome to see an update for this. Last chapter was such a horrible cliffhanger. I hope the next one will not take as long. Keep up the good work.
When did Yunae turn DARK?
7910501
The field spell Ataxia has a side ability that turns all Monsters in the field, hand, and graveyard into DARK types. Ataxia was sacrificed to summon Discord, but Discord gains all abilities of all field spells cards in the graveyard, so its type-changing effect was still in play. I probably should have described it better in the chapter, my bad.
7910530 Sorry for some reason I missed that detail the first time I looked at the card.
Hey Daga are you on Yu-gi-oh! Duel Links for smartphones?!
7946802
Unfortunately, I'm one of those dinosaurs who still doesn't have a smartphone.
7947842 That's too bad. It's a blast and a half!
I spotted quite a few grammar errors in this chapter. If you want me to let you know where there are, please send me a message.