#but here Yuma is screaming all at this to Astral | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

scattered-irises · 2 years ago

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Tale XI: The Slumbering Prince (Yuma)

Apologies to @Devilchiara...I could not keep my promise and hurt Yuma.

Rating: Teen

Word Count: 10k

Characters: Yuma Tsukumo, Kotori Mizuki, Astral, Vector

Relationships: Past Yuma/Kotori (like from 1000 years ago), Yuma/Astral

Warnings: Angst, dystopic themes

Summary: Awakening from his slumber of one thousand years, a young prince finds that so much, yet so little has changed.

Once upon a time, a young queen bore a son. The kingdom rejoiced at the birth of the new heir, for the pregnancy had been long and difficult for the queen. Relieved that both his wife and son were delivered safely, the king invited all of the subjects in the land for a feast to celebrate the birth of the crown prince. Gathered around the young prince, the king, the queen and his older sister presented him to the adoring subjects.

As was tradition for the royal family, the seven fairies of the stars were invited to bless the child. On a bridge of starlight they ascended, stars woven in their colorful hair and jewelry jingling from their wrists. Their crystalline wings glimmered beneath the sun, aweing all that saw them. They cooed and laughed over the smiling child, allowing him to grasp their various crystalline baubles.

Mizar, the guardian of the rising sun, adorned in topaz and amber, blessed the child with generosity so that he could serve his people with their best interests in mind.

Alioth, the guardian of the sunset, energetically bounded towards the royal bassinet, ruby earrings jingling with excitement. He beamed at the infant and waved his wand over him. With a voice bright with joy, he blessed the child with boundless energy.

Merak followed after his companion. The guardian of the blazing day, the burly fairy leaned down towards the young prince and allowed him to wrap his hands around his gargantuan finger. With a voice as gentle as the summer breeze, he blessed the prince with endless compassion. The young prince beamed and released his grip from Merak.

Following Merak was Phecda, guardian of the harvest and merchants. Wearing a wreath of sunflowers and crystals, the fairy cartwheeled over to the young prince as he laughed. With a mischievous grin, he granted the child the gift of wiliness, allowing him to navigate the fraught waters of politics with relative ease.

The only female fairy of the seven, Megrez, glided over to the infant and placed her lips on his forehead. The guardian of the waters and travelers blessed the prince with curiosity, which would allow him to always listen eagerly to his subjects’ concerns.

The second-in-command of the fairies, Dubhe, the guardian of beasts and hunters, blessed the child with the name of Yuma. With this name, the young prince was imbued with the strength and endurance of the noblest of steeds.

In a dazzling array, the fairies reveled and danced after their blessings, only to be stopped just as the seventh fairy was about to bless the child. A cold wind filled the palace courtyard and the sun disappeared behind stormy clouds.

“It seems thoust forgotten about me,” boomed a voice as clear and cold as glass.

Thunder struck the midst of the courtyard. In its wake, a figure dressed in black and red robes stood, glaring at the royal family. Yuma began to cry as the figure approached the bassinet, red crystals jingling in his long and golden hair.

“Don Thousand! Get away from my son! A beast such as you is not welcome here!” bellowed the king, brandishing his sword.

With a wave of his hand, the eighth fairy threw the king against the wall, eliciting a series of screams. Impervious to the chaos that he had caused, Don Thousand peered into the bassinet and sneered at the crying infant. The wind howled as the eighth fairy prepared his curse. As the guardian of the night and the spurned, he was rarely revered by the people of the land. Centuries and centuries of neglect had caused jealousy to grow in his heart.

“Get away from my baby brother!” snapped the young princess, tugging at Don Thousand’s robes.

She glared at the ghastly figure, unperturbed by his previous actions. The fairy paused, glancing at the young girl and her fiery red hair. He bent down towards her and clutched her face in his hand amidst the queen’s wails.

“Akari, no!” screamed the queen.

Defiantly, Akari continued to glare at Don Thousand and his mismatched eyes. The courtyard held its breath at what the fairy would do to the young princess. After a few moments, Don Thousand laughed, his laughter sounding like crackling thunder.

“And thee have refrained from blessing this princess with my fellow fairies’ blessings?! Such silly patriarchal notions thou possesseth! Had she been blessed, she would have become a fearsome ruler like none had ever seen before! Such a warmonger! Such a wonderful, ruthless tyrant she would be!”

He looked into the young girl’s eyes and beamed.

“Run along, mine dear. Thou wast born far too soon in a world that will never recognize thy greatness.”

Letting go of Akari’s face, he then cups his chin with his hand.

“Perhaps it never will.”

In a fluid motion, Don Thousand stood up and faced the injured king and his cowed subjects. He raised his hands, a wicked smile on his lips.

“It is true, thy prince shall grow to become one of the greatest of his time. A prince among princes, a jewel among chaffs of grain. But at the age of sixteen, he shall prick his finger on a spindle and perish!” cackled the fairy.

The queen began to sob in despair while the young princess held her mother close. Joined by her subjects, men and women alike began to weep for the king that would never be. With a final gust, Don Thousand vanished. As the sun dawned through the dark clouds, the king weakly tugged on the sleeve of the final fairy, yet to grant his own blessing.

“Save my child, please,” he begged.

Benetnasch, the leader of the seven fairies, gazed down at the sorrowful king and his crying queen.

“It is not our duty to interfere in the threads of fate…,” murmured the fairy, his deep blue eyes filled with sorrow. “I cannot undo what has been done.”

A lone breeze blew through his violet curls, the crystals in his headdress jingling merrily amidst the gloomy moment. The queen ran to his side and bowed to him, her pale hands grasping his silken robes.

“I beg you, try. I cannot bear a child again,” sobbed the queen. “He is all I have.”

“You are the guardian of the home and family. Please save mine,” continued the king.

Benetnasch gazed at the wailing infant and slowly peeled himself away from the royal couple. He procured his wand and positioned it over the child. His wings briefly fluttered as silence fell over the courtyard. The opaline colors of his wings cast a pale rainbow over Yuma and the child hushed.

“He shall not die,” declared Benetnasch, trying to keep the shaking out of his voice.

The courtyard continued to hold its breath. The leader of the fairies closed his eyes and gritted his teeth.

“But shall fall into a deep slumber, lasting a thousand years.”

The wail of the queen punctuated his benediction, sending a bolt of pain through Benetnasch’s heart. As the spell was cast, the child beamed and soon fell into a peaceful sleep, as if the blessing had already taken effect. Sorrowfully, Benetnasch pulled himself away from the bassinet and avoided the king and queen’s eyes.

“We cannot intervene in the Fates’ design for your child,” repeated Benetnasch gravely as the rainbow bridge reappeared. “To prevent any further strife, we shall take our leave.”

In a solemn row, the seven fairies of the stars ascended the rainbow bridge and returned to their perches in the skies, where they watched over their humans yet were powerless to help them.

🥀

“Alright! Sixteen pancakes for this morning’s breakfast!” crows Yuma as he rushes into the dining hall.

“But my lord—”

“Sixteen pancakes for sixteen years of being alive!” demands Yuma as he excitedly bangs his fists on the table. “And don’t forget the syrup!”

His parents exchange helpless glances while his sister massages her brows and sighs. The pancakes are soon brought in by the chefs. Eagerly, Yuma begins to slather them with syrup.

“Are you sure you need that much sweetness?” mutters Akari.

Yuma scarfs down his pancakes, two at a time. Syrup stains his cheeks and he gives his sister a slimy smile.

“‘Coursh!” he says with a full mouth.

Akari winces and forces herself to resume her breakfast.

“Yuma, dear,” his mother begins. “There’s something we have to tell you today—”

“No time, ma! I’ve got a hunting trip with Tetsuo!” says Yuma.

Right afterwards, he licks his plate clean and dashes off. Queen Mirai sighs. King Kazuma pats her shoulder.

“We can talk to him later.”

“There won’t be a later if you’re not careful!” exclaims Mirai.

She stiffens and then sinks back into her seat.

“I’m sorry, my love. It’s just…”

Tears fill her eyes and she quickly wipes them away. Pain fills Kazuma’s expression and he returns to his breakfast. In silence, the family eat. Akari is the second to finish and she piles her plate on top of her brother’s.

“Akari,” begins her mother.

Akari lets out a growl.

“I know. The tailors are waiting.”

As her younger brother would never be king, she would eventually be queen. The only caveat was that she had to be married to a man of great power to ensure that her crown could be kept. Her father’s old friend, Duke Charles, had willingly offered himself to her. Just thinking about the man made Akari shiver in distaste. Beloved by the older courtiers for his wit and charm, all Akari could see was a spoiled playboy who would plunge the kingdom into debt. Behind his suave features and carefully combed hair was an idiot.

Although, she has read of queens that cleverly disposed of their incompetent consorts. She’s still slightly appalled by such underhanded tactics, but the closer the wedding date approaches, the more she is willing to take the risk.

🥀

“Ma! Look! Tetsuo and I got a whole boar!” declares Yuma as he runs into the throneroom with muddied boots.

The huntsman’s son, Tetsuo, carries a large boar over his shoulder and then slams it before the courtiers to astonished gasps. Yuma swipes his nose and hops over to the boar.

“It wasn’t easy! We had to follow it through muddy trails and through forests of thorn to get him!” says Yuma as he plants a foot on the boar’s stomach.

He pauses for a few moments as the boar stirs. A gasp ripples through the crowd. Yuma withdraws his sword as the boar opens its mouth. Weakly, the boar coughs up a long spike. As the light fades from its eyes, the boar’s eyes turn to the young prince. Its mouth stretches into a grin.

“Out of the way!” shouts Kazuma as he pushes his son to the floor.

Picking up the spike, his expression pales.

“What is it?” asks Yuma, peering over his father’s shoulder.

Kazuma meets the eyes of the terrified courtiers. For the last sixteen years, all had been forbidden to speak of the prince’s curse under the threat of death. The spindle gleams beneath the sun, winking as if the two shared a terrible secret. In disgust, Kazuma tosses it aside.

“A wooden stake,” he replies. “It must have eaten a vampire hunter.”

Uneasy laughter fills the room. All of Yuma’s further attempts at looking at the spike were obscured by busy attendants gathering the boar. He glances at his mother, who has turned inexplicably pale, fussed over by her ladies-in-waiting. By Duke Charles’ side, Akari smacks his hand away and glares at the place where the spike had been. Her attendant, Duchess Dorowa, sighs and puts a hand on her shoulder.

“We can still eat it, right?” offers Yuma after a few moments.

He forces an awkward grin.

“Yes, yes of course,” says his father absentmindedly.

The king turns back and rests his hand on Yuma’s head.

“For the rest of today, you must stay within the palace,” he says.

Yuma’s expression falls.

“But Kotori and Takashi…”

He’s interrupted by a stern headshake. Then, his father gives him a smile.

“We haven’t been seeing you much. On a day as important as your birthday, we’d prefer to spend time with you.”

Yuma glances at his mother and sister. Then he turns back to his father. He scratches the back of his head and forces a grin.

“Alright,” he says.

As he grew older, he began to notice the forced grins of the courtiers. They had always been exceedingly kind to him. While other princes complained of harsh tutors and boring lessons, Yuma had only informal lessons taught by a scribe. He often spent his days hunting, sparring and fishing with his friends. Sometimes, when he entered a room, a brief silence would follow. Then he would suddenly be surrounded by uneasy smiles and stilted conversation.

The whispers in the halls, about Akari being queen and the royal family being doomed, occasionally reached his ears. He didn’t know what to make of it. Surely, he would be king someday? Perhaps his sister was plotting to marry a prince behind their parents’ backs. He wouldn’t put it above her to do so. Still, he’d miss her when the time came for her to go to the prince’s kingdom.

Yuma scans the faces of the courtiers around them. Uneasiness fills their eyes and they avoid his gaze. In the crowd, he meets Kotori’s eyes. She offers him a small smile and he bounds over to her.

“So, what did I miss?” he asks.

“Not much. The Asterellen ambassador is coming soon.”

The young man rolls his eyes and blows a stray lock of hair from his bangs.

“Please…there’s more interesting things happening in the magician’s closet than that.”

Kotori stifles a giggle and takes Yuma’s hand in hers.

“Do you still want to go to the forest?”

Yuma grins.

“We’ll do it right when the ambassador arrives.”

🥀

“Stop it!” laughs Kotori as Yuma splashes her with water.

Kotori splashes Yuma with water in return. Yuma runs off and Kotori chases after him. They wind through the small streams that they had run through as children. Past trees that they had watched turn gold and then bare countless of times. Fields that they had snuck out to and helped the farmers harvest. They are surrounded by green mountains and blue skies, as if the heavens themselves were celebrating with the young couple.

Making their way into a clearing, the two collapse onto the grass, laughing. Yuma picks a long blade of grass from nearby and sticks it in his mouth. He looks up at the sky, arms behind his head. The clouds move by in a procession of odd shapes and the prince smiles.

“What do you see?” he asks.

“Fairies,” replies Kotori.

“I wonder what they’re doing now,” he muses.

Kotori shrugs.

“Listening to our prayers.”

Yuma frowns.

“That’s all they do though. They don’t come down to help us, so there isn’t really a point, is there?”

Kotori puts her hands over her ears.

“I’m not hearing any of this. They came to your birth, for crying out loud!”

“They haven’t been seen since!”

“Because they’re busy!”

Yuma spits the blade of grass out. He goes back to looking up at the sky. Only out here does no one treat him like glass. The peasants greet him with familiar handshakes and backslaps. In the palace, it seemed like only his friends treated him as if he were like the others. Their parents, on the other hand, gave him the same pitying smiles and false praises as the other courtiers.

“What do you see now?” he asks Kotori.

His friend blushes.

“A mother walking her child.”

“And how many do you want?”

Kotori shrugs.

“Three, I suppose.”

Yuma smirks.

“That’s not enough to form secure alliances! I’ll give you nine!”

Kotori’s cheeks turn bright red and she pushes Yuma away.

“You can’t possibly marry me! I’m only the daughter of a count!” protests Kotori.

“A king once married a merchant’s son,” offers Yuma with a shrug.

“That’s because he was a beast!”

“That’s what my sister calls me!”

Yuma places a kiss on Kotori’s cheek and runs off. She lets out a huff and chases after him, her body feeling as if it was on fire. Through the woods they run, the trees growing thicker and thicker the deeper they go. The wind whistles through the trees, joined by the leaves’ incessant rustling. The path begins to grow muddy, the shade only allowing in small amounts of sun. Kotori frowns as Yuma draws further and further away from her.

“Yuma, come back!” she calls.

“Catch me if you can!” he replies, letting out a laugh.

Kotori looks around her. Everything has become unfamiliar, the trees too large and old and the streams enlarged into creeks. Reluctantly, she runs after Yuma, praying that he knew the way back. They wind and twist deeper into the woods. Now the wind is cold and biting, no longer the playful breeze they were accustomed to.

“Yuma?” she calls as she stops beside him.

“There’s a cottage there!” says Yuma as he points to a dilapidated building. “Let’s explore it!”

Before Kotori can stop him, Yuma has slipped through the creaky door. She squeezes herself in after him and sneezes at the dust surrounding them. Bits of sunlight filter in through the collapsed straw roof. Clearing bits of straw from the floor, Yuma wanders into the cottage.

“I really don’t like the look of this,” whispers Kotori.

“It’s fine. It looks like no one has been here in years!” reassures Yuma, his voice echoing off the empty walls.

Empty bottles and barrels lay scattered across the floor. Yuma kicks them aside and walks into an area shadowed by the ruins of a large dresser.

“Look at this!” he exclaims.

“What?” hisses Kotori.

“This…thing!” says Yuma as he spins the wheel.

The wooden contraption spins with surprising speed, despite how long it has been in disuse. Cobwebs cover its feet. Yuma hops around the contraption, playing with the wheel and then stopping as he regards the empty spike at the end.

“What do you think this is?” he asks as he taps his finger up and down on the spike.

“Careful! That’s still sharp!” exclaims Kotori.

Yuma jumps, his finger landing back onto the spike. He lets out a small cry and bounds back into the light, sucking on the finger.

“It’s a weird thing, whatever it is,” he says, his finger dripping with beads of blood.

Kotori lets out a sigh of frustration and offers Yuma her handkerchief. Yuma grabs the silk cloth and wraps it around his finger.

“Thanks! I’ll give it back to you after I wash it.”

Kotori crosses her arms, thankful that the shadows concealed her blush.

“Keep it,” she mumbles.

“Oh, alright then! I’ll use it to wipe my nose later,” Yuma says with a chuckle.

His friend grumbles.

“There’s nothing else in this place so let’s go back.”

When there’s no response, she turns back to Yuma. He leans against the wall, a hand on his head. His brows are knit in a rare show of concern as he looks down at his wound. The blood on her handkerchief has bloomed into the shape of a diamond, red as a ruby.

“Yuma?” she asks, her heart leaping to her throat.

The prince forces a smile.

“Yeah…I’m just feeling a bit tired all of a sudden,” he murmurs.

Kotori rushes to support him as Yuma’s body sinks to the floor. Yuma looks at her with half-lidded eyes, a smile still on his lips.

“There’s a marionberry cake waiting for me. Save me a piece, won’t you?”

When his eyes close, his breathing immediately slows. No matter how much Kotori shakes him, he refuses to awaken. Panic fills the young woman’s chest. The only witness to her screams are the trees, the shadows and the spinning wheel.

🥀

They had found her in the middle of the woods, the prince’s body slung over her shoulders. Mud clung to her skirts and her face had been scratched by the brambles she had wandered through. She collapsed at the guards’ feet with tears in her eyes, begging for them to wake the prince. Although the trumpet player blew his horn and the men bellowed at the top of their lungs, the prince’s eyes remained closed.

Upon seeing the slumped form of her son, the queen began to weep. King Kazuma seized the young maid and questioned her until the sun set and the moon rose high into the sky. Across the kingdom, the people mourned. What had been a joyous day had turned into a funeral. The colorful banners were replaced with white. All of the flowers in the palace garden had their blooms cut. The birthday banquet was left uneaten.

Oblivious to all, the young prince slept in his room, surrounded by the heads of flowers and guarded at all times by a kingsguard armored in black. As long as his chest rose and fell, he remained alive.

Far and wide the king and queen searched for healers. As the years passed, their hopes diminished and their hair grayed. Charlatans and honest doctors paraded themselves before the unhappy couple, their promised potions and poultices yielding to nothing. The prince continued to remain young in his slumber, his curved lips always on the verge of breaking into his trademark grin. The princess was eventually crowned queen, surprising all with her decision to marry a duchess’ daughter over the king’s trusted friend.

Together the two ruled, ushering in a rule of enlightenment. Fighting against plots against her life, arguing against backward laws and vying for the elevation of women, Queen Akari soon became a symbol of progress. Literati and artists flocked to her kingdom, impressed by the tales they had heard. Reviled by the older members of the court for her headstrong nature and harsh punishments against corrupt aristocrats, Akari and her consort were constantly slandered in the shadows. Elegantly, she glided through the rumors and held fast to her crown.

Meanwhile, the young maid was accused of witchcraft and murder, despite the king declaring her innocent. The rumors hung upon her like a cloud until one night, she was discovered missing from her chambers. A small, golden dahlia was left behind in her place, the sign of Merak’s knights. Leaving all she had known behind, Kotori sailed away to distant lands that had never heard of the slumbering prince. She cut her hair, trained alongside the Knights of Day and dedicated herself to protecting the downtrodden.

At times, she would journey alone, the memories of her sun-filled childhood keeping her warm throughout the cold nights. Although she would live for many years, never again did she fall in love. Retiring to a convent to teach the next generation of knights, Kotori would be known among the trainees as Greenheart. Despite her rheumy eyes and gray hair, the stories she would tell of her childhood remained bright and vivid.

As Queen Akari’s reign reached its third decade, war brewed on the horizon. Aristocrats who had disagreed with her reign betrayed her with foreign armies. In a furious battle, they surrounded the castle and demanded her surrender. Refusing until the final soldier had fallen, Akari was brought to the opposition in chains. Before her executioner, she had spat curses that had made even the hardiest of warriors blush. As the blade fell before her, it was said that a black shadow fell before the queen and whisked her away. The morning after, her consort had also been discovered missing from her cell.

As kingdoms rose and fell, the slumbering prince soon became nothing but a legend. Only his tower remained of the razed castle, overgrown by thorns and wildflowers. Where lush fields of wheat grew, trees began to take their place. Over hundreds of years, a forest grew to conceal the ruins away from prying eyes. Surrounded by the husks of flowers and empty suits of armor, the prince continued to sleep, as youthful as the day he had fallen.

Eventually, the people began to turn away from the fairies of old. They began to worship at altars made of gears and steel. Black smoke from factories began to fill the air. The fairies began to fade from memory, their shining faces obscured by smoke. Now they could only watch from above as their worshippers moved beyond them.

Like kingdoms, factories rose and fell. Kings and queens were reduced to relics of the past. The gods of Logic and Reason took the places of the fairies. As the fairies slowly faded from existence, they lamented that not a single soul upon the earth would mourn for them, as the black smoke had obscured the heavens for good.

Even more centuries passed. The skies were cleared of the black smog. A weary sun shone upon a world of blue. Sand covered the lands as far as the eye could see. Thin buildings shyly rose into the sky, as if hesitant to touch the face of the sun. Alongside ashen men, blue beings roamed the lands. Devoid of the traditions and superstitions of old, the inhabitants were devoid of hearts and ruled from their towers.

In this world, so foreign and lifeless compared to the world that he had known, the slumbering prince awakened.

🥀

“It’s a formality, really. This tower has nothing in it,” says the construction overseer as he clears away bits of dried vines.

“Regardless, I would still like to see what is inside,” says Chancellor Astral.

“Of course,” says the overseer, opening the door to the tower.

The door collapses behind the chancellor, the wind jingling their earrings.

“And that’s why it’s no longer a stable structure,” grunts the overseer.

They make their way up the winding staircase, lit only by the overseer’s lamp. The overseer shows the chancellor the multitude of empty rooms. As they reach the top of the tower, the heavyset Astralian pauses. He puts a hand on his chin as he stands before a door overgrown with vines.

“Never seen this one before,” he grunts as he opens the door.

It gives way easily. Dust motes fill the room. The overseer and the chancellor both shield their eyes at the colors of the room. Multitudes of faded greens, reds, golds, purples and oranges fill their eyes. Rarely had a place ever contained this much color.

“Stars above…,” grunts the overseer.

Astral walks past the overseer and towards an area curtained off by thick curtains. They yank them away and stiffens upon seeing the being beneath the covers. Usually, the humans they saw were ashen-skinned and gray-eyed. Their hair came in similar shades of gray. Loud and disorderly, Astral preferred to interact with them via their representatives.

“What is that?” asks the overseer from behind.

“A human, I believe…,” murmurs Astral.

The human twitches. His mouth twists and he stretches. Astral and the overseer jump in unison. When he opens his eyes, Astral’s eyes widen to see bright red pupils. The young man shouts upon seeing the blue beings. He throws off his covers and looks around in bewilderment. A stream of unintelligible panic escapes from the young man, the language archaic and long disused.

“Translation?” asks the overseer.

“Just a moment,” says Astral as they close their eyes and comb through their collection of ancient languages.

The files run through Astral’s mind at a rapid pace, stopping at one far in the back.

“...mother and father and sister and…”

Astral opens their eyes.

“Sperian,” they respond to the overseer.

The overseer grunts.

“Tell me your name,” says Astral.

“Wait, you can understand me?!” exclaims the boy.

“Via an internal translator, yes,” replies Astral.

“You ate a translator?!”

Now it was the Astral being’s turn to be confused. Astral beings never needed to eat. They relied on the light of the sun to function. The chancellor shakes their head.

“No. Every citizen of Astra has access to a digital library implanted in their mind.”

Even more confusion fills the human’s eyes.

“What sort of witchcraft is this?” he sputters.

“Please tell me your name,” repeats Astral.

“Yuma! Prince Yuma of the great Kingdom of Hope!” he shouts, causing Astral to wince.

Astral and the overseer exchange glances. Never had they heard of such a person.

“Yuma, I am Chancellor Astral and this is Overseer 349,” introduces the Chancellor.

Yuma made a face.

“That’s a weird name,” he remarks.

“We are named for our functions. I am meant to serve Astra. Overseer 349 is meant to oversee construction projects.”

“Wait, where am I?” asks Yuma as he looks out the window to see a world of blue sand.

“You are in Astra, Block 39944G,” says the overseer.

Yuma’s brows knit. He looks out the window again. Flecks of blue crystals have begun to fall from the sky, dissolving once they touched the sand.

“What year is it?” he asks in a quiet voice.

“We are in XC9023,” replies Astral.

“I must still be dreaming,” says Yuma as he crawls back into bed.

“My vitality scanner says you are fully awake,” says Astral.

“Well, you see, on the day I fell asleep, it was the month of the Regent, year of the Sword and my sixteenth birthday,” says Yuma as he pulls the covers back over himself.

“That’s impossible,” says the Overseer after he looks up the date. “That was one thousand rotations ago.”

“Rotations?” asks Yuma, a brow quirked.

“In your term, ‘years,’” explains Astral.

Yuma pales. The color change sends prickles up Astral’s spine. The prince stares down at his hands, still imprinted with the prickle of the spindle.

“No,” he utters.

“No?” echoes Astral. “But that is what has transpired.”

This is why they despise dealing with humans. There was no point in denying what had happened. Even more discomfort fills Astral as moisture begins to fill Yuma’s eyes. His lips begin to tremble.

Crying. It was something unique to humans. A file on crying fills Astral’s mind and they brush it away.

“That would mean they’re all dead,” chokes Yuma. “Kotori, ma, sis and dad…”

“Well, yes. The average human only lives to about 120 rotations,” muses Astral. “You are an illogical existence.”

“What happened?” whispers Yuma, looking out at the barren wasteland before him. “It’s all…blue.”

“Owing to the centuries of pollution, floods, chemical reactions and decomposition, most living entities have lost their ability to reflect all waves of light save for shades of blue,” explains Astral.

“You’re not making sense.”

“Correction: I am making the most logical sense.”

Yuma turns towards the Astral being and scans them up and down. Pain fills his expression. He holds his sheets closer to his body. Giving a small headshake, he gazes down at the comforting shades of red and gold.

“There are still kings, correct?” he asks after a few moments.

“Kingdoms are illogical inventions of the past,” replies Astral tersely.

“That’s…that’s treason!” exclaims Yuma.

“You have no authority to accuse me of such crimes.”

“But I’m a prince!”

“As part of an archaic and illogical structure of power, your title is null and void.”

In the silence that follows, Yuma holds the cold gaze of the being before him, his heart hammering in his chest. Astral lets out a sigh and offers Yuma their hand.

“However, as it is my duty to serve all entities in my sphere, I will help rehabilitate you.”

Yuma smacks away Astral’s hand and glares at them. Upon contact with the human, Astral flinches. Briefly, it felt as if all of their neurons were activated, setting their body aflame. They weren’t sure if the sensation was normal or not.

“What’s wrong with you?!” Yuma exclaims. “Aren’t you going to offer me any sort of understanding? An apology, maybe? Something comforting? It’s been order after order, confusing story after confusing story!”

And this is why they despise humans. Astral lets out a sigh.

“Permission to demolish this unsound structure?” asks the overseer.

“Demolish?!” exclaims Yuma.

“Permission granted. The individual can be temporarily housed in my tower,” replies Astral.

Yuma jumps up and stands before his bed, arms outstretched.

“There’s no way I’m stepping into this wasteland!” he snaps.

Astral glances down at Yuma’s bare feet.

“Agreement. Before demolishment, send for proper footwear.”

Yuma lets out another growl. He lets out a stream of curses that rings in Astral’s ears. Quickly, they switch their translator off. Truly, this would be a difficult individual to integrate into society. However, they couldn’t stop thinking about the jolt that had occurred when Yuma had first touched them. For a moment, the colors in this archaic room hadn’t felt too overwhelming. They could feel Yuma’s fear and confusion, their heart racing. They glance back at Yuma, who was now on his knees, hands clasped together, desperately motioning at the room around him.

“Please schedule the demolition for the next moon cycle,” orders Astral.

The overseer raises a brow at the inefficiency. Despite that, he holds his tongue and nods his assent. Astral turns the translator back on and looks down at Yuma. He was quiet now, face buried in the covers. Hesitantly, they approach him.

“Please stand. I will reintegrate you myself,” they say, surprising even themself.

Yuma looks up at Astral and stares at their offered hand.

“Why?”

Yes, why? They could have ordered their Mentors and Integrators to do this. For once, they didn’t have an answer. Astral continues to hold their hand out.

“It is because I am made to serve my constituents. You are one of them.”

Serve. They guess it could also equate to teaching.

🥀

“Wait, humans live here?!” exclaims Yuma as Astral shows him a photograph.

The young prince leaps up from his seat and begins to scroll through the images of the ashen buildings. Astral had to admit. They didn’t expect the young prince to pick up on the new technology so quickly. Perhaps humans weren’t as set in their ways as they thought.

“Yes. Each living area contains a sleeping, sanitary and consumption area.”

“Where are the plants? The animals? The fountains and pools?!” asks Yuma in a scandalized tone. “There’s absolutely nothing for them to do!”

“Why, isn’t working enough for them?” asks Astral.

Yuma makes a sputtering noise and gives the living quarters a dismissive wave.

“Not at all! Humans need places to make music, sing and dance! If they’re bored, they get restless!”

“Music…?” muses Astral.

Yuma’s eyes widen and his nostrils flare. He takes two pencils and begins to tap out a rhythm.

“Music! You know…when sounds are put together,” explains Yuma. “For example, singing!”

In an offkey voice, he begins to sing.

A beastly king one night decreed

A fair maid was to be his bride

He roared and thrashed, burning down villages in his rage

A greedy merchant then said,

“I have a child fair, with blue eyes and lovely limbs, see!

In exchange for gold, I will give my child to thee!”

The beastly king reared his head and said,

“Bring her unto me!”

A rose was not he who had arrived,

Freckled and plain, he had come expecting a simple task

Yet when the beastly king bent down to devour him, the youth laughed and said—

“Enough,” says Astral, removing their hands from their ears.

Yuma’s face is red with joy from tapping together the pencils and singing. He breathes heavily and he smiles.

“See? Isn’t it fun?”

“Fun..?” mutters Astral.

Chaos. It was pure, disorderly, nonsensical chaos. Yuma grabs Astral’s hand and places a pencil in their hand. Once again, for the briefest moment, Astral can feel Yuma’s rapidly beating heart and passion for this…music. Heat fills their face as they hold the pencil.

“Like this!” says Yuma as he taps out a new beat.

“This isn’t the function of a pencil, though!” protests Astral.

“An object’s function can be whatever you like, as long as you use your imagination!” says Yuma with a grin.

“Imagination…?”

After a few moments, Astral begins to mimic Yuma’s beats. If possible, the youth’s smile brightened.

“You can try your own rhythms as well!”

Yuma begins to tap a new beat, much to Astral’s surprise.

“How do you know which rhythms to use?” asks the Chancellor.

The prince shrugs.

“Just do what feels right!”

Feels right , huh? Astral tries a ¾ rhythm. They twist their lips and switch to a 3/2. Then a 2/4. They suppose that it could be…entertaining…

“What is the purpose of this?” asks Astral as Yuma begins to hum.

“It’s just fun!”

“Fun?”

Yuma twists his lip, tapping the pencil against his chin.

“Enrichment, in your terms,” he says after a few moments. “We humans always need enrichment.”

“From the settlements I’ve seen, the humans seem to be doing fine…,” muses Astral.

“You should take me to one. I’ll tell you how they really feel!” says Yuma.

Astral cocks their head. They run through their schedule for the moon cycle. In a few suns, there should be some time allotted.

“Alright. It can be an experience for you and I,” agrees the chancellor.

“We should bring instruments, just in case. I can show you how to make some!”

Perhaps they still had much to learn from this human.

🥀

“Hello!”says Yuma in the common tongue.

He bounds into the human settlements, the structures whitewashed and identical. Confused ashen figures stare at him, their eyes dull and their expressions unmoving. The prince approaches a small child and bends down.

“My name’s Yuma! What’s yours?”

“Moon,” replies the child.

Yuma fishes a horse from his pocket, made of various interlocking branches.

“Have you ever had a toy before?” he asks.

With wide, gray eyes, the child shakes her head. Yuma places the horse in the child’s hand. He smiles and pats Moon’s hand.

“Now you do!”

“What is it?” asks Moon, observing the toy from all angles.

A small crowd of onlookers have gathered, their eyes glued to the vibrant human before them.

“A horse. It’s an animal humans used to ride to travel far.”

Gently, he takes the horse from Moon and makes it gallop across the air.

“This is how they moved,” he says, placing the horse back in Moon’s hand.

Fascinated, the child imitates Yuma’s motions.

“What is the purpose of this smaller…horse?”

“It’s for you to play with.”

“Play?”

“You know. Having fun. Making you feel all calm and warm inside.”

Astral watches the exchange with fascination. More human children have gathered around Yuma. One by one, he offers them a unique toy from his bag. The children begin to gather together with their presents, imitating Yuma’s motions and making a game of imitating him. When an older man approaches Yuma, the prince smiles and greets him warmly. Without a moment of hesitation, he hands the man his own horse. A small smile fills the man’s face and he shows off the horse to a group of his own friends.

From the crowd, Yuma meets Astral’s gaze and smiles. Astral feels their own lips curve without knowing why. A hint of warmth has filled their chest.

When the prince pulls out drumsticks carved from wood, a raptured silence fills the square as he begins to tap out a rhythm and sing offkey.

“You can join me, if you’d like,” invites Yuma. “If you put your hands together hard enough, you can make sounds too!”

It begins with a young child. Then another child. Astral watches in fascination as the humans join the prince. Some even begin to hum alongside him. Handing off the drumsticks to a child in the back of the crowd, Yuma begins to dance. His movements are absurd and nonsensical, yet a smile fills his face and he occasionally laughs, his laugh bouncing off of the alabaster words. Once again, the warm sensation fills Astral’s heart.

The prince laughs and dances until the moon has risen. When Astral signals that it’s time for them to return, Yuma bids the children farewell. A child tugs at his jacket, asking for him to stay. Yuma shakes his head and then motions to the child’s parents.

“I’ll be back,” he promises as he walks back to Astral.

He waves and the humans imitate his gesture. Once they’ve gone far enough, Yuma looks back at the young child and her parents. As they get into their vehicle, Yuma gives the settlement one final look and leans his head back against the headrest.

“Humans become more productive if they’re allowed to have fun,” says the prince. “After a holiday, the kitchen always seems to create better meals.”

“We shall test your theory then,” muses Astral. “Quarterly reports will be coming in about a lunar cycle.”

The prince swipes his nose and lets out a laugh.

“If I’m right, you must build enrichment areas in all settlements!”

“After a few lunar cycles of increased productivity, perhaps we will.”

🥀

Astral wanders down the sleeping corridors. Although they were created with the inability to feel tiredness, they could not help but feel slightly weary after today’s outing. After all of the sensations they had felt with Yuma, it felt as if the absence of these sensations had left a vacuum. As they pass by Yuma’s room, they hear sniffling. They pause before the door.

He must have been “crying” again. Gently, they open the door. Wrapped around blue sheets, Yuma buries his face in his knees and sobs. Astral stands in the doorway, unsure of what to do.

“Yuma?” they call after a few moments.

Yuma stops his sobs and looks up at Astral with reddened eyes.

“You don’t sleep,” he says. “So what are you doing here?”

Astral takes a step forward.

“I do not, however, I feel like I must sit down.”

Yuma pulls the sheets away, allowing a small space for Astral to rest.

“Thank you,” says the Chancellor as they sit down. “What is the cause of your crying?”

The prince sniffles, wiping away a few tears.

“I just miss my family, that’s all,” murmurs Yuma.

Family units were incredibly important to maintaining the physical health of a human, from what Astral had researched. In ancient days, they were essential to a human’s development. This was why the Astral beings kept humans together in units. Looking at Yuma’s hunched over body and high levels of stress, perhaps this was why separation from the family unit was considered a negative.

“Miss?” echoes Astral.

“I want to be with them, even though they’re gone,” explains Yuma.

“But that’s illogical.”

“Humans are an illogical species,” replies Yuma with a sniffly chuckle.

“Why do you want to be with them?”

Yuma pauses, holding Astral’s mismatched eyes. Even in the darkness they faintly glowed.

“There’s many reasons why. For one, I want to hear my sister arguing with ma again. They always fought over the silliest things. Then, I want to see my father again so we can go on a hunt. Even the court jester, Tokunosuke, would be a welcome sight. They were the people that helped raise me to be the person I am today.”

So this confirms the theory of ancient family units contributing to an individual’s overall wellbeing. Astral places a hand on their chin.

“Do you need…a hug?” asks Astral, pulling up a term from one of their old readings.

Immediately, the prince’s brows spring up.

“Yes,” he says. “You have hugs?”

“No,” says Astral. “They’re an archaic custom that I read about.”

“It looks like you need one too then.”

Taken aback, the Chancellor tilts their head.

“I do?”

“You’re lonely,” says Yuma. “You always seem to be alone, even when you’re surrounded by people. You don’t seem to do anything but observe.”

Astral’s brows knit. According to their constituents’ reports, they were doing an excellent job at fulfilling their duties. Why did Yuma’s observation contrast with theirs? They did more than observe situations…most definitely. And they are certainly not alone.

“I object. You are with me,” they reply.

“Do you want to know how a hug feels?” offers Yuma.

The Chancellor gazes at the human boy for a few moments. They slowly blink.

“Permission granted,” they say.

They gasp as Yuma pulls them into an embrace, his skin warm and wet with tears. They can hear Yuma’s heart beat in a slow rhythm, a constant thump, thump similar to a drum beat. He is so… alive in a sense that it takes Astral’s breath away. His organs are constantly working away to maintain homeostasis. This imperfect yet perfect system of tissue was ensuring that Yuma could smile, play, run and cry. The world fills with color and sorrow as Astral feels themself…ascending with this human in their arms.

And then Yuma pulls away and Astral is cold. Colder than the night. Colder than space. They stare at Yuma with widened eyes.

Thump. Thump. Thump. Their hand rises to their chest and they look down at it in surprise. Something burns in their eyes and they wipe it away. Concern fills Yuma’s expression.

“Are you alright?” he asks.

Astral stares down at the sheets, now dotted with dark spots. Were they…crying? They look up at Yuma and grabs his wrists, staring down at his hands. His index finger is still marked by the red dot that they had found him with. The heat in Yuma’s skin once again transfers to Astral and once again, warmth envelops them.

“I cannot cry. I was not made to cry,” utters Astral.

Yuma offers them his own teary smile.

“You can function however you’d like. We weren’t born with any purpose but to live.”

“Living…,” breathes Astral.

Their heart beating. Warmth filling their body. Tears streaming from their eyes. Was this living, then?

🥀

Another diversion. Vector scratches his head at the text before him. A prince was supposed to come and kiss Yuma awake or something. Peeking into the Astra Chancellor’s chambers with his spyglass, Vector frowns. Well, they definitely didn’t seem like a creep. He supposes he should be glad for that. There were other versions of Sleeping Beauty that put the original version of Rapunzel to shame.

Checking his watch, he sees that the arrow was drawing quite close to the end.

“What kind of happy ending is this…?” mutters Vector as he watches Astral dry Yuma’s tears.

“Scale?” offers his hat.

“Yeah, sure, why not?”

His hat spits up the scale and Vector catches it.

“Sleeping Beauty,” says Vector, snorting at the name.

The scale remains still. The sniper purses his lips. Perhaps the universe agreed that Yuma wasn’t so pretty as well. If Vector had been that shallow, he wouldn’t have accepted Yuma’s marriage proposal in the first place. To see him in this other life, bursting with the same boundless energy and kindness, makes him want to scream. Now others would get to hold his hand. Now others could whisper secrets in his ear that he would easily forget. They will make him laugh and cry, his mind entirely wiped of the previous lives he has had. He will never ever think of Vector again. And Vector would be condemned to watch, bound to the shadows.

“The Sleeping Prince,” repeats Vector.

Once again, nothing.

“Oh come on, he’s been through enough…,” mumbles Vector.

He expected the scale to have slightly favored the white jade. Sunlight fills the land as a new day passes. To fairytale characters, time passed by regularly. To Vector, hundreds of years could pass in the blink of an eye. In the branches of a bare and white tree, Vector leans back and watches as Yuma stands by Astral’s side, discussing the importance of enrichment in human settlements. Passion fills every motion he makes, from the impatient toe taps to every point he made on the map. The duo work tirelessly for days, meeting humans and Astral beings alike.

As the days pass, the tenseness in Astral’s shoulders loosen. They smile more. Sometimes, they even laugh. It usually occurred when they were in Yuma’s presence. Vector’s stomach begins to twist itself in knots as he sees the two grow closer and closer. With their growing relationship comes more ambitious projects. The humans begin to develop more emotions. Music soon becomes a regular occurrence in Astral’s sphere of governance.

Yuma and Astral kiss. Vector looks down at his watch with bloodshot eyes. For some reason, the needle was agonizingly close to the end but refused to budge. Perhaps this was a part of his punishment. To watch his loved one fall in love with others that are not him, over and over again. And with each incarnation he has, he will grow further from the prince that Vector remembered, laughing beneath the delonix trees.

Blue crystals begin to fall from the sky, this world’s version of rain. Vector’s hat spits out an umbrella. Ignoring it, Vector allows the crystals to pelt him. It was the closest thing he had to feeling alive these days.

🥀

“The Will of Astra has arrived!” declares Astral’s notification system.

A pang fills Astral’s chest. It must have been fear. They look up from Yuma’s most recent proposal just as the doors to the governmental office open. An imposing silhouette with large shoulders and long hair enters through the door.

“Eliphas,” greets Astral.

“Chancellor Astral,” greets their leader. “News of your projects have reached me. They are not part of Astra’s program.”

“Our productivity levels have reached record highs due to these projects,” says Astral, trying to keep their voice even.

Eliphas scans Yuma’s notes, the prince’s handwriting scrawled and disorderly. He frowns.

“Are these the notes of your temporally displaced human?”

“They are.”

“Permission to read them?”

“Permission granted.”

Astral steps aside, their heart hammering in their chest. Eliphas picks up the notes, scanning through them.

“Your human’s notes are displeasing to me. I cannot follow their logic.”

“Humans rely on their intuition on an equal level to their reason,” explains Astral.

Eliphas grunts and sets the notes down. His gaze stops on Astral, sending a chill down their spine.

“I sense irregularities in you as well.”

Astral’s mouth is dry. They shrink under Eliphas’ gaze.

“It is the result of interacting with humans. We have much to learn from them. Music, for example. They possess the ability to synthesize waveforms to create pleasing arrangements! Their emotions are what fuel them to work so hard for our country. Family, friendship, creativity…”

Astral trails off as Eliphas silences them with a glare.

“Our species have surpassed the need for emotions due to their illogical nature. Are you proposing to erase our progress and return us to a state equal to that of humans?”

“We are equal,” snaps Astral.

His leader’s eyes widen. Astral freezes, the weight of their words sinking into their stomach.

“Subversion. That is a crime,” breathes Eliphas.

Astral’s mouth is dry but they force themself to continue on, clinging onto the image of Yuma’s determined expression.

“We are not born with set purposes. We can serve any function we wish, as long as we are aware of our free will,” presses Astral. “I thought that I was born to serve my constituents, but I can also teach, process and feel emotions on my own.”

“Another subversion. You must be reprogrammed.”

“I object,” growls Astral. “How can you fight against progress and success? Look at the data. The health of humans and Astral beings have improved in my sphere due to integration. Not only that, our productivity levels have risen far above predicted levels. We now have time for recreation and exploration. This will only yield to new inventions and schools of thought.”

Eliphas grits his teeth. It was the truth. He had seen the impressive reports from the chancellor’s sphere. The high numbers had irked him. In a world where equality and uniformity were valued, these numbers constantly fought against Astra’s ideals.

“You and your human must be reprogrammed,” breathes Eliphas. “I have issued the order via the Astranet.”

“If you reprogram us, you must reprogram our entire sphere,” says Astral. “You will be met with violence, chaos and resistance.”

Chaos. The word makes Eliphas feel something akin to rage. He grabs Yuma’s notes.

“I will be destroying this. Where is your human?”

“His name is Yuma,” corrects Astral. “And he is currently working on a project.”

“He must cease his efforts. They will be destroyed.”

“You can’t!” protests Astral. “He’s speaking to the people!”

“Come with me,” orders Eliphas. “You will stop him by your own hands and then both of you will be brought in for reprogramming.”

“Reprogram? Don’t you mean eliminate him?!” snaps Astral.

Eliphas gazes at them with cool eyes, his expression as placid as before.

“If he cannot serve Astra’s will, then he is unessential,” he replies. “Now come, follow me.”

Despite all of their efforts, Astral feels themself following Eliphas. It had been part of their programming—part of every Astral being’s programming—to obey Eliphas without fail. Despite their deviations, their core programming remained. A pang fills Astral’s chest. As the doors to the governmental office close behind them, they send a prayer to the stars above.

🥀

“Doesn’t it feel good to see color and create?” asks Yuma, his voice ringing across the city’s square.

Thousands of faces look up at him and cheer. The prince smiles, his heart soaring upon seeing smiles on Astral beings and humans alike. As of late, more color has filled the city. In the crowd, he sees shirts of green, red and orange. Children happily bang on their drums and blow on their whistles. Citygoers clap in agreement.

“You can be anything! There is no need to follow your title or name. As long as you know that you are your own individual—”

“Cease,” calls a resounding voice.

The Astral beings immediately silence. The humans look at their counterparts in confusion until a large shadow engulfs Yuma. Turning around, Yuma gasps upon seeing the Astral being that towered over him. Eliphas. He had seen him in pictures detailing the lands of Astra. Displeasure fills the being’s face as he looks down at Yuma.

“I accuse you and Chancellor Astral of subversion and sentence you to reprogramming,” declares Eliphas.

Behind him, Astral helplessly stands. Below Yuma, worried murmurs fill the crowd.

“What have I done?” asks Yuma, his voice echoing across the silent square.

“You have promoted a culture of chaos and have gone against Astra’s values of equality and uniformity,” booms Eliphas.

“None of us are the same!” protests Yuma. “From the youngest Astral being to the oldest human, all of us are capable of free will!”

“Subversion!” declares Eliphas.

Yuma winces at his loud voice. He grits his teeth and forces himself to carry on.

“They weren’t living, when you put them in empty homes and silent cities. They weren’t living, just surviving day to day without purpose.”

“All individuals have purpose in the functions that they are assigned!” booms Eliphas.

“They were no better than unfeeling automations!” argues Yuma.

Although Eliphas’ glare chilled him to the bone and his words shook his very soul, Yuma remained where he was and continued to speak. He could feel the gaze of thousands on his back, their hope floating to the sky like countless stars.

“Listen…!” gasps Yuma. “This is living.”

Eliphas pauses. Silence fills the air until Yuma begins to clap. It begins with a child’s high and lonely voice. Joined by other claps and voices, the song soon flows into a familiar tune Yuma had taught Astral’s citizens.

The sky is blue so where are you?

Lovely and twittering bluejay?

I’ve climbed mountains high, I’ve traversed deserts low

I’ve swum through seas and climbed up trees

In search of you

No matter where you fly, I will find you

For your cackling brings me such joy

Together we will laugh and play ‘til the sun sleeps and the moon sings

The oceans will dry and the skies will cry

But my love for you will never die

Illogical. Silly. Absurd. Yuma sings the song with all of his might, holding Eliphas’ gaze the entire time. His eyes fill with tears upon seeing Astral join along after the second time around. Eliphas remains unmoved by the procession and raises a hand for silence. Despite that, the song repeats itself, the voices louder than before.

Taking a deep breath, Yuma grabs Eliphas’ large hands. He continues to sing, picturing the lonely bluejay in his mind. In Eliphas, he sees his father’s stern features. In Eliphas’ desire to protect his people, he sees his mother. In Eliphas’ stern voice that could split the skies, he sees his headstrong sister. And in Eliphas’ strength, he sees Kotori. Although he would never be able to see them again, they would live on in everyone that he would meet.

The Astral being tries to pull himself away from Yuma’s grasp, but the prince refuses to release his grasp. As the song begins for a third time, he can feel Eliphas’ hold slackening.

“We’re the same, you and I,” says Yuma over the din. “We’re the same because of how different we are.”

“I-illogical,” protests Eliphas, warmth filling his body.

He can feel the tiny human’s heart beat in his chest as if it were his own. Yuma’s passion crashes against him like ocean waves, nearly overpowering him with their strength. Joys, sorrows and pain flood Eliphas’ chest as he gazes out at the united humans and Astral beings. Gazing down at the human who refused to release his grip, Eliphas took a deep breath and began to mouth the words to the song.

🥀

Ding! Vector gazes down at his watch. The arrow had finally hit the end. He looks out at the colorful square. Even from his perch at the top of the tower, the singing fills his ears. Eliphas’ shoulders lower. He slowly lowers himself into a kneeling position.

“Scale,” orders Vector.

His hat immediately spits it up.

“Sleeping Beauty,” says Vector.

The scale tips toward the white jade. A deserving hero.

Vector wets his lips as Yuma pulls Astral into an embrace. The two passionately kiss, color filling Astral’s body. His fingers itch for the trigger regardless. After watching Cinderella get his deserved happy ending, he had been raring for a new undeserving hero. It was cruel of fate to place him in his former prince’s fairytale. If he lets Yuma go, he will be freed from the cycle of samsara. Then, Yuma would be allowed to choose if he wished to reincarnate or move on into the heavens.

If he ascends to heaven, he will be given all the memories of his former lives. Then, he will remember Vector and all the joys and sorrows that they had shared. Yet they will never be able to meet in person again, for their two existences were on different planes. They would live apart for the rest of eternity. Perhaps Yuma wouldn’t even think about him, too taken by the other individuals he had met.

But if Vector pulls the trigger, Yuma will continue to be reborn into other stories, oblivious of Vector’s existence as he skulked through the shadows and executed undeserving heroes.

Suffer without him or suffer with him.

Vector already knows what he wants.

Before he can regret it, Vector takes his aim and fires.

#Zexal #Yuma Tsukumo #astral #astral zexal #keyshipping #skyshipping #Kotori Mizuki #vector zexal #H☆H☆S #writing from iris

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starlightshadowsworld · 3 years ago

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Someone took Jaden, maybe they work for the Light of Destruction maybe they wish to gain access to the Gentle Darkness, Seto don't know and frankly he doesn't care. He just know whoever it was they were smart about it, sending millions if not all of their pawns in attempt to stop Seto and others from reaching where they kept Jaden. Yugi might be the kings of games and Seto is deadly with Blue Eyes Dragon, not to mention Jaden’s friends and husband are all formidable on their own. Still even when all of their allies were gathered they lack the numbers to deal with this obstacle quickly.

Good thing they don’t have to.

Whoever planed this failed to taken to account about Jaden’s children (Seto’s grandbabies!). The place was a mess when they got there. There are duel runner tracks all over the stone floor, peeking out of the rubbles on the west side is Astral’s Different Dimension Airship, and even from the courtyard he could hear Zarc’s roar.

Racing through the wrecked hall with sharp vines protruding from them, Seto quietly hoped that the younger ones (Yuga and the newly adopted Leo and Luna) weren’t caught up in this mess but knew that it was unlikely. They all took after Jaden in terms of finding trouble after all. Zane and Echo slammed through the last door to revealed the form of Leo Akaba hooked up to some sort of machine, his body glowing white.

“That asshole again?” Mokuba hiss beside him.

Against him is Zarc, half dragon and growling. Fortunately Yugo and Yuto and Yuya, shield by Crow and Akiza, appear to fine if a little bit bruised. Astral take to the air as he summoned another Number monster while Jack rain down hell fire on their opponent. Seto’s eyes trailed up and he could feel his heart stop.

His body move before his mind could comprehend and before he knew it he was on top of the balcony. Jaden is stuck in some sort of pod, withering and letting out noiseless scream. Yubel, although outside of the dreaded machine, did not fare any better. White strings curled around Yubel causing them to let out painful howl. They barely held still enough for Yuma to free them with a glowing knife. Yusaku and Yusei are typing furiously on the nearby computer while from behind the machine Yuga and Leo are trying just at hard to disable it. Yuri and Luna stood guard with their dragons, shaken but deflecting any incoming debris. Even Pharaoh the cat was valiantly scratching at the metal

It was Yuma who notice Seto running toward them. “Grampa!”

“What's progress on getting your dad out of there?” Seto ask as he began running through a computer next to Yusaku.

“Nothing.” Yusei answered him. “Ai found a dozen lead within the system but none of it shuts the machine down.”

“Same here on this end.” Yuga called out. “ No matter what we do the thing just rearranged itself.”

Seto frown at the information. Magic, god he hated magic.

“Leo Akaba is using the Light of Destruction.” Yubel whispered once they were free from their bindings, flickering in and out of sight. “ I have enough strength left in me to temporary stop its influence but after that I’ll need a few days to recover.”

“ We’ll take what chances we can.” Moving Yuga and Leo away from the machine, Seto accepted a ZW from Yuma and he and Yusei stood by for Yubel. They disappeared into thin air after letting out a blast energy and wasting no time Seto worked with grandson to pry open the pods. Jaden slumped into Seto arms once he got hold of him. Jaden sobbed as he buried his face into his father’s shoulder and Seto tried his best to ease his son from the pain.

Giving Jaden over to Yusei, Seto placed a hand on Luna and Yuri telling them that he’ll take it from here. “ Go take you dad out of here, okay? Take Yuga and Leo with you. Roland is waiting on thejet outside with medical help.”

Nodding, Yuri guide his sister to join Yusei’s group. Together they made their way off the balcony but of course Leo (Seto was going to make sure to eradicate any traces of the scum in the universe once his kids are safe) refuse to let Jaden go. Yuma blocked the attack with his Utopic monster as Yusaku prepared to retaliate with his own to open the path for his siblings to get their dad out.

Leo Akaba screams as a stream of destruction rained down on him. Looking up he could see the three Blue Eyes White Dragon snapping their fangs at him but Leo isn’t afraid of them. No the true monster was behind them. Shadows spread like dragons wings on the wall as Seto Kaiba stared down at him with cold blue eyes and promise of unending wrath.

#submission

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lazella · 4 years ago

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Infinity Stones AU: Face your Fears, Part 1

I apologize for nothing. Enjoy.

Yusaku took a sharp breath in, coughing as he tried to make his lungs work again. For a moment it felt like he was back in that white room, alone and only a voice for company. Looking around, he tried to piece together the events of the past few minutes. Yusaku did recall that they had joined the Avengers on a retrieval mission and had infiltrated the warehouse but then he was drawing a blank.

“Ai...can you tell me what just happened...Ai?”

Yusaku was puzzled when he didn’t hear Ai respond right away and looked down at his Duel Disk, and spotted the Ignis with tears running down his face.

“AI?!” Now Yusaku was worried, Ai had never cried before.

“Yusaku….” Ai’s voice was quiet, and he had also not used any of his nicknames for Yusaku, “I hope that was all fake....”

“Fake?”

“Nevermind…” Ai shook his head, “That stone of yours seemed to break whatever that lady did to you.”

Yusaku raised an eyebrow, “Lady?

Ai took the opportunity to explain, “Some lady came in and hit you with this red stuff then everyone started screaming. You just kind of froze but after that I’m not sure as I started seeing stuff as well…”

Yusaku quickly put his theory together. First, they had been ambushed by an unknown enemy. Second, it seemed like she had the ability to cause hallucinations most likely based on fears. Third, it seemed that the Mind Stone could reverse the effects which is why he felt fine now even with how brief his vision was.

“We need to locate everyone else…” Yusaku got up and surveyed the room, “They must still be under the effects of that attack.”

“Good luck with that…” Ai muttered, “They all ran off in different directions attacking anything in sight…”

“Then we’ll just have to be careful……” Yusaku stated as he ran off in his chosen direction.

…………………………

The first person he found was Yugi. Thankfully he didn’t seem to be lashing out at anything and was just leaning against the wall but judging by the red haze over his eyes, he was still under the effects of the hallucination.

“Yugi!” Yusaku grabbed the smaller boy’s shoulder and gave it a good shake, “Yugi snap out of it!”

Yugi just continued to stare blankly ahead.

“Might have to do this the hard way…” Ai pointed to the Mind Stone.

“Afraid so…let’s just hope Yugi makes it easy….” Yusaku said as he placed the Mind Stone against Yugi’s forehead letting its power do its thing. Reality around Yusaku and Ai but Yusaku knew he was just now entering Yugi’s mind, and hopefully to find out just what he was seeing.

What he did see did not make any sense. Everything around them was dark and foggy obscuring anything that could be approaching. Yugi was no longer on the ground but suspended in the air by an invisible force gripping onto his wrist and ankles. But the most shocking part was that Yugi’s knee and elbow were missing and other parts of his body were slowly dissolving away.

“Th-this is bad!!!!” Ai cried out, “What kind of madman thinks of doing messed up stuff like this!?!”

“A sick one fore sure….”

Yusaku spun around and he was quite sure if it was relief or worry when he spotted Yugi’s other self, Yami, slowly pulling himself along the ground. He wasn’t looking good judging by the blood dripping from his mouth.

“Yugi’s had nightmares about this duel….” Yami panted trying to catch his breath, “I’ve tried to snap him out of it but…” Yami seemed to cough up more blood, “I’m not doing too good either…”

“I’ll warn you, it’s going to be a shock to the system….” Yusaku clenched the Mind Stone tighter, “I don’t think we have the time to ease him out of it…” Yellow light blinded everyone as Yusaku just focused on making the vision end quickly. Within the blink of an eye, they were back in the warehouse. The red haze was gone from Yugi’s eyes and he was checking himself over as if to see if his body was whole again.

“Doing okay?” Yusaku found himself asking.

“I-I think so...,” Yugi said with shaky breath, “What was that?”

“My guess is that we were hit with something that makes us hallucinate our worst fears. The Mind Stone snapped me out of it rather quickly and you were the first one I found still under the effects.”

“What about the others?” Yugi asked.

“Not sure but we better stay on our guard…” Yusaku said, “Who knows if anyone can tell friend from foe right now….”

………………………………..

They found Yusei next who thankfully was also not lashing out. Yusaku found him in a vision of a destroyed city but it ended on its own the moment Yusei spotted Yusaku. The hacker wished he could be grateful for the quick conclusion but Yusei had spent at least five minutes hugging Yusaku and Yugi tightly as he could.

“Sorry about that…” Yusei explained as he composed himself, “I know that future will never happen but still...I just needed reassurance that you were alright.”

Yuya was the next one they found. He seemed to have snapped out of it on his own but the room he was in was completely trashed. Yuya was hugging his knees in the center of the room but his dull stare made it hard to figure out exactly who was in the driver seat.

Yugi carefully knelt down next to Yuya and began trying to talk to him, “Yuya...can you tell us what happened here?”

“Yuto actually…” So it seemed that Yuya wasn’t the one in control right now. “Yuya is still processing his panic attack. Yuri buried himself somewhere in our subconsciousness and Yugo is giving all of us a headache by yelling at our bad memories.”

“Sheesh...what’s gotten all four of you worked up?” Ai asked.

“Our past….” That’s all Yuto was going to say on it as he just sat in silence until Yuya came back to the surface.

“I think I hurt Yuma earlier…” Yuya said when he finally came back out, “I’m not sure but I think I heard him crying in pain…”

“What ever happened was not your fault…” Yusei said as he squeezed Yuya’s hand, “It’s not any of our faults.”

“The real fault lies with that woman who attacked us…” Yusaku said with renewed determination, “Let’s find the others.”

……………………………………

Things started to get complicated when they finally found Yuma. The young boy had one of his swords in hand which was strange to the others as they thought he had to be fused with Astral to summon them. Yuma was swinging the weapon around in a panic while crying out…

“Give Astral back!!!! Just leave us alone!!”

Yusaku wasted no time in using the Mind Stone to bring the group into Yuma’s vision. They found Yuma surrounded by creatures made out of crystals and rock or some sort of black sludge. Laying on the ground was Astral unconscious with what appeared to be a large crack spreading across his chest.

Yusei sprang into action, charging in and punching the creatures away in an attempt to reach Yuma. Yugi and Yuya hung back behind Yusaku not out of fear, but at the shock of seeing Ai emerging from Yusaku’s duel disk and changing form into that of a mass of tentacles. Yusaku didn’t object to Ai’s actions, and let the Ignis do his thing protecting Yusei’s back and tearing the creatures to shreds.

With Ai watching his back, Yusei reached Yuma in no time, the younger boy crying tears of relief at the sight of rescue. Yusei quickly scooped him up with one arm and grabbed Astral with the other. Ai used his large mass to create a protective dome over them while he worked on getting a secured grip on them.

“Hold on tight…” Ai warned as he launched himself back towards Yusaku.

Now that he was back in the safety of the group, the red haze faded away from Yuma’s eyes as everything returned to reality.

“Wh-what...happened?” Yuma asked as he blinked clarity into his eyes.

“You just got hit with some trippy stuff no worries…” Ai grinned...forgetting that he was rather frightening in his larger form.

Yuma obviously panicked, “AH!!! Monster!”

“Now that hurts...it’s just lovely old me Ai…” The Ignis pouted.

“Has he always been able to turn into the embodiment of nightmares?” Yuya asked Yusaku.

“Since I first met him but he’s still an idiot…” Yusaku sighed.

“At least this version of me is great for hugs!” Ai demonstrated this fact by giving Yusei, Yuma, and Astral who were still tangled up in his limbs, a tight squeeze. “Just ask Yusaku, he quite enjoys them.”

Yusaku turned his face away to hide the fact he was now blushing out of embarrassment.

“We still need to find Judai...and the Avengers team as well…” Yugi said, trying to refocus the group, “But where are they?”

His inquiry was answered when Thor was launched through the wall by some sort of strong force.

“Hey boys….” Thor grunted through the pain, “We could use some assistance....”

Before Thor could elaborate anymore, a shadowy tendril shot through the hole in the wall and dragged him back through. Once everyone got over their shock, they followed Thor through the hole.

On the other side was the very definition of a nightmare. Every Avenger member was pinned to the walls by shadows and in the very center, was a tall imposing figure dressed in black and gold armor, the helmet obscuring the figure’s identity.

“Who’s this guy?” Yuya found himself asking.

Tony flipped his visor open and cried out, “It’s Judai! Judai is in that armor!”

This came as a shock to the newcomers, just what had happened to Judai?

Everyone had to scatter when another wave of shadows swept through the room. Yusei held onto Ai tightly as the Ignis refused to let go of anyone and had even grabbed Yusaku to keep him out of the line of fire.

“Ai...do you think you can get close to Judai?” Yusei asked.

“Not without letting you guys go which I am not going to do.” Ai protested as he scooped up Yugi and Yua next. The Avengers were still pinned, unable to move.

“Throw me Ai….”

Everyone turned to Yusaku in shock. “What did you just say?” Ai asked.

“Throw me at Judai…” Yusaku’s gaze was firm and determined, “Throw me and I will break through to him with the Mind Stone.”

“I am not going to…”

“DO IT!” Yusaku cut Ai off, clearly not in the mood for arguing.

Rather reluctantly, Ai took careful aim and shot Yusaku forward, a tendril still wrapped around him as Ai clearly didn’t want to let him go. Yusaku gripped onto Judai’s cape and began trying to wrestle the helmet off. It took some doing but Yusaku managed to slide the visor up revealing that Judai’s eyes were completely blinded by the red haze.Yusaku didn’t even dare try to view Judai’s vision, instead he slapped the Mind Stone on Judai’s forehead and yelled,

“WAKE UP ALREADY!!!!!!”

Yellow light began cracking through Judai’s armor, then down the shadows that were blanketing the room. With a quick flash, everyone dropped to the ground exhausted, Judai included now freed from the dark armor.

Tony groaned as he got to his feet, “That’s it….extra therapy sessions for everyone.”

Steve rubbed his head in frustration, “I still have no idea what Wanda was up to…”

This caught Yugi’s attention, “You know the woman who did this?”

“Her name is Wanda Maximoff, she’s actually an ally to us…” Natasha explained, “But the fact that she attacked us today indicates that something outside her control is going on.”

“So an outside force?” Yusei asked.

“Mostly likely…” Clint said, “Which means we’ve got another conspiracy to break down.”

“Does this happen often?” Yusaku asked.

“More often than we like,” Tony said as he hefted Judai over his shoulder, “Come on...let’s head home. And get that nightmare fuel to shrink down already…” Tony said pointing to Ai, “We already have enough trauma to deal with.

Ai huffed as he finally shrunk back down to his smaller form. He really didn’t care about this Wanda character or any supposed conspiracy theory. The vision he got was still on his mind. After all...the sight of Yusaku’s bullet ridden body was forever burned into his memories.

#yugioh #avengers #infinity stones au #gx #5ds #arc v #vrains #zexal #yugi mouto #Judai Yuki #yusei fudo #Yuma Tsukumo #yuya sakaki #yusaku fujiki #trama #hallucinations #hints at vrains ending

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galaxwrites · 4 years ago

Text

That time Kaito (accidentally) seduced a dragon

Yugioh writing, this time.

crossposted on my AO3

A mix of Zexal and Arc-V

Ship: ...what's the ship name for Kaito x Shun? that's the one

Dungeons and Dragons AU!

Please, enjoy~

-------

The very way Yuto Sakaki was sitting on the throne radiated power, but... His face looked sorrowful. Kaito had seen plenty of sorrowful kings, but never one this...gloomy. Almost as if in mourning.

He did find it weird how there was no advisor or queen that sat besides him. The last time the pirate was in front of the king, he had the Kurosaki siblings at his side. But now...He was alone.

Yuma's voice snapped the pirate out of his thoughts, as the paladin spoke to the dark-robed king. "Your majesty, I am Yuma Tsukumo, Paladin of Ellipas. And me and my gang have a proposition for you."

The king raised an eyebrow. "What kind of proposition, and what is in it for my people?"

"Well, you may already know about your brothers and their kingdoms. And...The threat that Yuri's kingdom poses." Yuma stated. "We believe it'd be best to reunite the kingdoms into one. We've got King Yuya of the Kingdom of Flames on board. We want to continue with you."

Yuto rose from his throne, and walked up to the party of four. Kaito noted that his cape was...well, pretty long. "Reuniting the kingdoms would be vital to our survival, but if I am to get on board with this plan...I need something in return." He stopped right in front of Kaito. The pirate gulped. "My advisor and my queen, Kurosaki Shun and Ruri.. They've gone missing and I am assuming it has to do with the two dragons that have shown up at the edge of my territory. I wish for you to find them, and get rid of my little dragon problem."

Ryouga nodded. "Piece of cake."

The king only narrowed his eyes, at Kaito in particular. "You've been in my kingdom before, and caused quite a stir.. I don't trust you, Tenjou."

"I assure you, your highness, I won't cause that sort of trouble again." Kaito replied, having to physically stop himself from shaking by gripping his arm.

---------------

Yuto had lead the group to a dark forest he called "Raptor's Hollow". It was thick and twisty and Kaito wondered how any creature could live here.

A distant roar, that steadily grew closer as the group pressed forward, was heard. One of the dragons, maybe.

It took about an hour of walking before the group had reached it-a large, dragon-made clearing. Stumps of wood and full trees were scattered around it. Two dragons sat in the middle, one roaring in pain and the other whimpering while trying to help the other.

The roaring one was much bigger than the other. Its scales a dark green, with a lighter teal underbelly and wings. Its gold eyes shimmered with a sort of familiarity.

The other was a deep purple, with hot pink eyes and pastel purple wings. A small ribbon was tied around its tail.

The bigger one lifted its snout, sniffed the air, and roared, heading straight towards the gang. Yuto and Kaito simply jumped out of the way, with Ryouga and Astral simply running.

But like always, Yuma was an idiot and froze up, getting rammed into a tree. He cried out in pain. "OW-"

"YUMA!!" Astral yelled, obviously concerned. The paladin flashed a thumbs up.

"I'm okay! I think I broke a few ribs but I'm okay!"

Kaito sighed. That's gonna be a Cure Wounds later. For now, he had a plan. A risky one, but when were his plans ever risk free?

He took his lute, and strummed a small tune, letting the spell he had prepared be cast on the dragon. The dragon tilted its head and looked at the bard, listening to the tune. Kaito continued to just...play. Not just for his spell, to to calm himself down as well. Playing music always seemed to help.

As his tune ended, the bard put his lute back, and held a hand out to the dragon. "Hello, there." He said. "Are you hurt?"

The dragon nodded, holding up its tail. A rather large bear trap was secured on it, and dark blood still steeped out of it. Kaito winced. The thing looked painful to even look at. But he nodded and walked over to the dragon's tail. He wasn't a formal healer, but he knew a thing or two about traps and how to get unstuck from them.

He barely even touched the trap when the dragon roared. He held out his hand again. "Easy, there." He said, softly. The dragon layed his head down next to Kaito, softly whimpering. Kaito placed his hand on his head. "Try and stay still."

The smaller dragon tilted its head in confusion as Kaito got to work. With all the strength he could muster, he opened up the bear trap. The dragon roared again and raised its tail, only for Kaito to push it back down. "Let me patch you up, first." He reached into his pack and took out two large rolls of gauze, and started wrapping it around the dragon's tail.

Meanwhile, Yuto turned to Ryouga. "Are your party members always like this?"

Ryouga nodded. "Sadly, yes."

"...I am deeply sorry for you."

The siren shrugged. "Eh, I'm used to it. Though Yuma's idiocy can be a bit much."

"I figured." Yuto said.

As that went on, Kaito finished wrapping the dragon's tail. "There. You should be good for now."

The dragon bowed his head in thanks, and made a sort of friendly growl.

"...I can't understand you, you know." Kaito stated, but he got an idea. "Hang on." With a snap of his fingers, he casted a spell; Speak With Animals. "Try now."

Thank you, kind stranger. The dragon said, in its growly voice. Who are you?

"My name is Kaito Tenjo, I'm the captain of the Starry-Eyed serpent." Kaito replied. "Part time bard. And your name?"

Kurosaki Shun. I was cursed to stay in this form until someone breaks the spell placed on me and my Sister.

Kaito raised an eyebrow. "And how do I do that?"

Shun shrugged. I've no idea myself..

The bard thought for a moment. What breaks curses?

....A kiss? That might work!

"...I have an idea, but I have to ask if it's alright for me to kiss you."

In the background, Ryouga mumbled "Of course he's suggesting that." Yuto facepalmed, and Yuma just weakly cheered Kaito on.

Shun tilted his head. ...Why?

"In some of the old fairy tales I've read, the curse is broken with a kiss." Kaito explained. "It might be the case here."

...Just do it then. I can't take this form any longer,

Kaito nodded, and pressed a kiss to Shun's snout. In a flash of dark magic, the dragon-just the one, the other who Kaito guessed was Ruri was just hugging Yuto at this point-seemed to shift into a young man who was just Kaito's type. Dark hair of green and turquoise, yellow eyes, and dressed almost like a classy vampire.

Needless to say, it was pretty much love at first sight.

"Thank you, Kaito." Shun said, with a smile. His voice was smooth and deep.

Kaito took a bow. "You're welcome, Sir Shun."

---------------

After the incident, Yuto joined the alliance, and Shun joined the group. Turns out having a shapeshifting sorcerer as a teammate is a good idea. As night fell, the Starry-Eyed Serpent set sail once more, towards the Kingdom Of Winds. Kaito stood out on the main deck, the wind blowing in his coat. Most of the crew-minus Droite and Gauche- had gone to sleep. But, Kaito never slept. Not like he needed it, anyways.

As the moon and stars rose, Kaito held a hand up to one of the constellations. Gemini.

"Hang on, Gem." He whispered. "I'll find you.."

"What's all this about?" Shun asked, walking up behind Kaito.

The bard turned around, and smiled. "Shun. You need anything?"

The shapeshifter shrugged. "No, just...Couldn't sleep. Why you up?"

"I don't exactly need to sleep." Kaito stated, pointing at his pointy ears. "Just meditation every once in a while. Comes with being a half elf."

"Ah." Shun said. "...May I ask who Gem is?"

"...Gemini is one of my siblings." The bard stated. "Hart isn't my only one. We have ten others, and Gemini's one of them." Kaito explained. "...They'd be 15, today."

"...Did they die?" Shun asked.

Kaito shook his head. "No. Just...Father mistreated them and Virgo. So all of us ran away from him and...we somehow got separated. I'm still searching for them."

"What were they like?"

"Well, Gem's really bright and fun. They loved it when I sang. And Virgo was just really shy, but she got along well with basically everyone." Kaito said. "I miss them..."

"I know the feeling, dude." Shun said. "One time I lost Ruri, and I almost went insane trying to find her."

Kaito chuckled. "I can see it, I suppose."

"Yeah..." Shun gave a small laugh of his own. "One more question?"

"Yeah?"

"...Your siblings seemed to be named after the zodiacs, but you and Haruto aren't?"

"Oh, that. We chose these names to distance ourselves from our father." Kaito explained. "My real name is Sagittarius."

Shun smiled. "..Kaito fits you a bit better."

"I know, it does. Now I've got two questions of my own." Kaito stated. "One, mind calling me Kite? We're friends, now. You don't need to be so formal."

Shun nodded. "Sure, Kite. ..What's the second?"

Kaito-Kite-smiled. "....Is there anyone out there whom you like?"

The shapeshifter blushed. "..T-there's someone. Not s-sure if he reciprocates."

The pirate raised an eyebrow. "Who?"

"...W-well, it's you.." Shun confessed.

Though Kite kept his cool, he was screaming on the inside. This hottie liked him? WHAT THE HELL?

He took a deep breath, and calmed himself. "What if I said I liked you back?"

Shun's face gained a dusting of red. "...Wait, seriously?"

Kite nodded. "Why wouldn't I? You seem like a nice fellow, and it helps that you look positively handsome."

"I.. I m-mean... Oh fuck it." Shun grabbed Kite by the coat, and pulled him in for a kiss.

Kite blushed heavily, but...well, he kissed back. His arms wrapped around Shun's waist and pulled him close.

It wasn't anything big, it was just a kiss, but Kite, in that moment, felt utterly elated.

When the two had to pull away for air, he smiled. "Look at that. I seduced the dragon."

Shun huffed. "Yeah, yeah. Guess you did.."

#yu gi oh #yu gi oh arc v #yu gi oh zexal #kaito tenjo #yuma tsukumo #astral #ygo zexal #ygo arc v #shun kurosaki #yuto (arc v)#ryoga kamishiro #dungeons and dragons #dnd #dnd au #shun x kaito #please tell me the ship name someone #this is so cute i caaaaaaaaant

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kuriboo · 4 years ago

Text

Hugsaku 2021

Crossover | Skipping Dimensions

This year I figured I’d take part in the hugsaku week. In the past with events like these, I’ve seen people take the prompts and turn them into one continuous story, and I ended up wanting to give that a try. I used a combination of prompts from the 2021 list and the 2019 list to write this out, so I hope you enjoy it!

This isn’t any of the day 1 prompts, I know... I ended up taking this prompt and using it to sort of set up the story, so this ended up being slightly out of order. The rest of the prompts should be in order, though. I do have an actual day 1 that will post later today, so there’s that to look forward to.

I’ll be posting this up on ao3 where the whole fic will be titled Dimension Gate. I’ll link the ao3 in the notes of this post. I hope you enjoy!

"Where am I? What is this?”

There was not an area like this anywhere in Link Vrains. Den City definitely looked nothing like this. Yusaku glanced down at himself briefly; okay, he was in the real world. So where was he?

He had another question: how did he get here? The last thing he could remember was...actually, he couldn't remember the last thing that happened. It wasn't a complete amnesia, he had most of his memories intact, but there was a definite blank before he got to wherever this was. Which left him with no ideas of how to get home. Great.

While he'd been checking his outfit to check if he was in the real world or Vrains, Yusaku noticed a card on the ground. It wasn't terribly uncommon for someone to accidentally drop a card in Den City. This was a completely blank card, however. Cards usually weren’t completely blank, and people didn’t tend to carry around blank cards, let alone lose them. Curious, he bent down to get a close look.

“Ai, do you know of any cards that are completely blank being used in Vrains, or why anyone would have one?”

He waited a few moments for Ai to respond, but the next few seconds were filled with nothing but silence.

That meant something was wrong. Ai loved to talk, especially when he knew something Yusaku didn't.

"Ai?” Yusaku tapped the top of his duel disk, but got no reaction. Either something was wrong with Ai, or Ai wasn't here. That worried Yusaku more than he'd like to admit.

His attention was drawn back to the blank card. Maybe his brain was just trying to distract itself from bigger, more terrifying problems with something smaller and more manageable. What was this thing? Maybe if he picked it up and got a closer look...

“Hey, buddy! you really shouldn't pick up that card!" Whatever the complete stranger who Yusaku couldn't even see was yelling about, it was too late for that. The card was already in Yusaku’s hand. He heard footsteps running behind him and assumed they probably belonged to the person that was yelling.

Yusaku turned around and, sure enough, someone was running directly at him. He glared at them." I am not your buddy, We are not friends.”

“Okay I get it, we don't know each other. But you shouldn’t keep that card . It's dangerous.”

Yusaku snorted. “Why should I give up this card, especially to a little kid?." He looked down at the card, and saw it was no longer blank. It was an actual card now, and XYZ Monster, and now it was his. There was a dull ache in the back of his head, but he ignored it. "This is exactly what I need to get my revenge, and I’ll never let anyone take that from me." He hadn't been thinking about truly putting it in his deck until he picked it up, but now he felt the strong urge to use it, like the card wanted to be with him.

“Well, if you're going to be like that, I’m gonna have to duel you for it!" The stranger held a duel disk in front of him and put some sort of eyepiece on his face.

Yusaku heard the word ‘duel’, stared at the eyepiece, and felt something between fear and confusion fill him. What was he doing ? He glanced at the XYZ card. It was like the second be picked it up, he'd been filled with this anger. The same kind of anger that drove his revenge, like the card was Ai and this stranger was a Knight of Hanoi. He hadn’t realized the anger was there until it was gone. Could a card do that outside of Vrains?

He looked at the stranger. "No duel. I changed my mind, I don't want it."

That caught the strange off guard." Are you sure?"

He looked the stranger over this time. This was clearly a kid still in middle school. Was it safe to give them this card if they said it was dangerous? Well this middle schooler knew more about this card than Yusaku did, clearly. He held it out to the kid. “Take it.”

("Yuma, why are you hesitating? Take the card before he charges his mind.”)

The stranger stared at Yusaku as he slowly took it, as if waiting for Yusaku to change his mind, but he took the card easily.

The stranger blinked up at Yusaku. “How did you resist the Number's control?"

"Control?" Now that the card was out of Yusaku’s possession, it felt like a weight had been lifted from his shoulders, but he still didn't understand what that meant.

"These Numbers belong to my friend Astral. He lost them and they're all over the place, and when most people pick them up, they take control of them. People

start doing bad stuff. I'm trying to get them back for Astral, but I usually have to duel whoever has them to get them back. But I challenged you to a duel, and you just gave it to me?"

Yusaku shrugged." I don't know about this cards controlling people business. I don’t know why I wanted to keep the card at all. You wanted to duel, I don't like dueling.

The stranger pointed at Yogaki's arm, " You have a duel disk?"

Yusaku shifted his weight. "Appearances can be deceiving. You don't know anything about me.

"That's true. I've never seen you before. I don't even know your name. Oops! I'm Yuma.”

“Yusaku."

(“Fascinating. Yusaku doesn't seem to know how he did it, but he resisted. I would like to observe him and try to figure out how.”)

"Come on, Astral, don't be creepy," Yuma whispered to the empty air beside him, loud enough for Yusaku to be able to hear easily.

"Uh…”

“Oh. Astral, the friend I mentioned before, he's here, too. But for some reason I'm the only person that can see him. Weird, huh?"

“So you have an imaginary friend.” If it was really Yuma who owned and lost these cards and Astral was made up to blame someone else for it, Yusaku wouldn't be surprised. Middle schoolers were young enough for imaginary friends, right? He couldn't remember.

("Yuma, ask him if I can learn more about him.”

“He's not imaginary, I swear -- Astral, stop being weird!" Yuma protested. "Besides, I'm sure Yusaku wants to go home, it's getting dark out!”

Yusaku looked up to the sky. Yuma was right, twilight was hitting the city and he was no closer to figuring out his own predicament. As a night owl, the time and darkness usually didn't bother Yusaku, but in an unfamiliar area like this he was only going to get more lost. "I suppose I should.” The two of them stood in silence, Yuma staring at Yusaku while Yusaku stood in place.

“So, are you going home, then? Or…” Yuma spoke eventually.

“Oh right,” Yusaku blinked. "I don't know where I am or how I got here. So I have no idea how to do that."

"I can at least tell you where you are! This is Heartland City!"

Yusaku shook his head. "Never heard of it." Knowing that didn’t help him at all. He’d have to figure it out from there, somehow.

“I can try to help you figure out how to get back," Yuma offered. "But - oh, my sister's going to be so mad at me if I'm not home soon. You know, there's no school tomorrow, I could help you then. You want to spend the night at my place?"

Everything about following some kid he barely knew to his house set off extremely loud danger signals in Yusaku’s head. He tried to remind himself he was older now, definitely older than Yuma was, and was more able to take care of himself.

"It'll be a lot easier for us in the morning," Yuma offered when Yusaku gave no response.

“...I get bad nightmares. I wake up screaming.”

"That's okay.” Yuma did not waver in his determination to help.

“Fine." Yusaku definitely had no friends around here, so he didn't have much of a better choice.

"Awesome, it’ll be a sleepover! I can't wait!”

Yuma pulled Yusaku into a surprisingly strong hug for someone shorter than him. Yusaku froze, felt every muscle in his body freeze up. This was about the most uncomfortable thing that could’ve happened.

Once Yuma realized, he released Yusaku and apologized, but his spirits did not seem dampened at all.

"So,Yusaku, do you go to the same school as me?"

(“Yuma, if he's never heard of this city, I highly doubt he goes to school here.”)

“Astral, I didn't ask you."

#hugsaku #hugsaku2021 #yugioh zexal #yugioh vrains #tater writes #when i first started writing this i hadn't committed to using all these prompts to write a whole story #so originally this was going to be the entire fic...but then i kept looking at the prompt list and kept getting inspired to continue #and then this became extremely long...#this takes place before episode 20 of zexal and at.......some undefined point before season 3. up to your interpretation

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dualumina · 4 years ago

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Let me just ramble about my thought process regarding my fic for a bit combined with some observations from what we've seen in the show:

- As much as Yuma's all about that Kattobingu™ motto, my memory seems to indicate that he only ever used screamed the phrase when doing something that could be perceived as dangerous or against the odds put against him.

- With that in mind, I've seen a few fics use it as a reasoning behind why Yuma has the guts to [insert cute fluff action here] Astral. Now, the show obviously doesn't show how Yuma might act in a relationship, but I get the feeling that he would not actually feel the need to use his motto that much, if at all.

- Don't get me wrong, I'm not condemning anyone for headcanoning that he would, but part of the reason why his motto is so powerful is because he doesn't use it for literally everything.

- Taking Astral as the main example, (I don't care if you ship them or not, that bastard has tried sacrificing himself so many times it's a hobby of his now, he's the best example to work with) whenever Yuma has said Kattobingu regarding Astral, it was usually because Yuma was in the process of doing something that fell into the above category. Like duelling against someone who was currently winning, not because his tsundereness was fuckin' him over.

- In fact, the most keyshippy moments in the show, whereby it directly shows Yuma and Astral having a meaningful interaction, don't have Yuma say his motto. It's almost like *gasp* he doesn't consider his interactions with Astral to be against the odds, let alone dangerous.

- Yuma is 100% a tsundere though, and like most tsuderes, breaking out of that habit is hard. Not impossible, but hard. And I'm not using the term lightly here. This article does a fantastic job of going into the psychology of tsunderes, but to highlight the important things:

"I recently came across an interesting term that may be used to describe the reason behind a tsundere's actions: Avoidant attachment: people with this see tenderness, closeness, emotional investment as always dangerous and to be shunned. But they may in truth be desperate for a cuddle or for reassurance, but such things look far too treacherous. [...] Avoidant Attachment is generally caused by the lack of communication with one's parents, relatives, or friends."

"Lack of communication with parents"

You know, like if they've been presumed dead for several years???

- If you're still not convinced Yuma is a tsundere, just take a look at the conversation that follows after Yuma risked so fuckin' much just to save Astral

- Like by this point, even though Yuma has pretty much flat out admitted his feelings for Astral to everyone (Eliphas, the audience, Astral who could hear everything from inside the crystal, the entire Astral World) he still feels the need to act distant.

Also can we appreciate that knowing smile Astral gives in this scene?

Ah, warms me heart.

- But it's okay because Yuma gets over his instinctual tsundereness in ✨💖 MY FAVORITE SCENE 💖✨

Bless that character growth

- Okay, but assuming Yuma gets into a relationship, this is still unfamiliar territory for him, and a whole 'nother level of "how safe is it to show this person I care about them?" I highly suspect that, even if he won't necessarily be like "It's not like I hugged you, kissed you, and started living with you because I like you or anything, b-baka!" it would still take some time for him to no longer be uber shy with every little display of affection he gives and receives.

So here's my answer to a question nobody asked;

Why did I choose to write such a long keyshipping fic?

Because writing a fic that starts from the beginning of Yuma and Astral's intimate relationship, and getting to the point of a satisfying ending that respects the characters as much as possible, takes A LOT of time and words.

Doesn't matter if they've known each other for years, they are, as weird as this may sound (but it's pretty much the backbone of good romance plots), their own worst enemies. Yuma has his own hiccups that he has to work through if a relationship between them is to work out, and Astral has his. Some of them are more obvious than others, while some I've only barely hinted at in the writing.

If you're caught up with the current chapter, you'll notice that not one of those 14'039 words is Kattobingu. This is very intentionally done. When, or better yet if I use it at some point, it will carry some significant weight to it.

#I'm kind of responding to the last review i got but also not really #keyshipping #honestly what more do you expect from this blog?#yuma tsukumo #astral #ygo zexal #fanfic #fan fiction #theories with dual

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baddyzarc · 5 years ago

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1/6 Ruins: Legend of the Ancient Hero

x 2 3 4a 4b 5 6 7

So awhile back I wrote a small, incomplete piece over Vector and his guardian, Minotarous, and how it connects to his legend and mythyrian number. Since then, I've been wanting to do it for all of the Emperors since there's enough details and Easter eggs to do that and nows a good time. I'm gonna be taking text mainly from the original subs since the dub did things to them that I do not agree with.

Since its gonna cover 6 different ruins, I decided to split this up into multiple parts.

So let’s begin with the ruins of everyone's favorite blind, book-loving, memelord supreme barian, Dubhe

Being the first to kick off the arc, Durbe’s ruin is probably the easiest of the ruins to understand.

Aside from the theme of trusting in others, one of the other major themes of his ruins revolves around the self-sacrifice motif.

This is clearly seen at the very start of the arc. It started with the scene where Yuma jumped in front of a bear in order to protect Durbe, who is a stranger and a very likely candidate of the Barian Emperor that crashed into their ship. Yuma was willing to sacrifice himself to (or fistfight) a bear to protect a complete stranger.

The next example is a little more obscure, but I say it happens when Durbe pushed Ryouga out from under the falling rocks and trapped himself with the fish boy. This one is a bit tough to grasp what Durbe “sacrificed” by doing this, but I argue that Ryouga was immediately held distrust towards Durbe from the beginning. Durbe has no reason to save him, and it would’ve benefited him greatly if Ryouga is out of the picture. Instead, Durbe saves him, and in the process he sacrifices his safety for a person who really hates Barians.

This whole concept continues throughout the Durbe's ruins. “Numbers 44: White Winged Horse - Sky Pegasus“ has the ability to destroy a monster unless the owner pays 500 lifepoints, and due to additional effects, Yuma has to pay 1000 lifepoints (which is a quarter of his life) each time this happens. Yuma chooses to sacrifice his lifepoints to keep Durbe and Ryouga as well as his “Numbers 39: King of Wishes, Hope” alive. In the Legend, Mach sacrifices himself for Durbe, and Durbe sacrifices himself for Mach in the past. There’s also something to be said when Yuma places his trust in the Barian Emperor, Durbe, after recounting his disaster with my boy Vector too. Even near the end of the episode, Ryouga is willing to die in order for Yuma to win the duel. The whole mini-arc is lathered in this theme.

What I found interesting about the "self-sacrificing" theme is what Mach says at the beginning of the duel. He says that in order for Yuma to win (and in turn save Ryouga and Durbe), he has to surrender the duel, or "victory can only be achieved through surrender." In essence, Yuma has to sacrifice, or surrender, the Mythyrian Number if he wants to save everyone. This is usual villain banter, but in the context of this episode, it is almost knee-jerking and tragic.

Recall back to Durbe’s legend. The Legend of the Ancient Hero (recounted through the scriptures on the ruins, Durbe, and Mach) tells the story of a group of four brave knights with one of them being Durbe and his Pegasus, Mach. Together they protected a distant land. Durbe returned to his homeland for some time (presumably to aid Nasch in his quest). Corrupted with the aspiration for power, the remaining knights overthrew the king and took over the country. When Durbe returned, he tried to appeal to them by saying “their hearts [are] filled with justice.” Unfortunately, he failed to open their hearts, and the three knights attacked Durbe.

Despite the assault, Durbe refused to harm or kill the attackers because he saw them as his cherished companions. Instead of fighting back, he surrendered, and he was stricken down by their relentless attacks.

Mach intervened in these attacks in order to protect his master, and he became fatally injured as a result. Durbe refused to retreat or abandon his dying steed, so he stayed by Mach’s side so they could perish together.

The final line of the legend said that the knights saw how noble the two of them were in their self-sacrifice to each other. They committed their lives to prove the bond between friends, the knights included. To honor Durbe, the knights ceased their rebellion, and they laid Mach and Durbe to rest as heroes.

In the case of the legend, even with their tragic demise, victory was achieved through surrender.

Yuma does a similar thing. In order to win, he has to play Mach’s game. He has to accept sacrificing himself over and over again. Only by taking those hits, by surrendering his life, is he able to win the duel and save his friends.

Okay, so enough about the theme of the ruins, let’s talk about physical ruins.

Noteworthy imagery used in the ruins is the use of colors.

When the characters got separated, they ended up in two chambers. One is lit by blue flames and the other by red flames.

And the thing about Zexal is that blue and red have strong associations to Astral World and Barian World respectively. Not all of the time, but the usage of these colored hallways and flames disappear shortly afterwards. So if the writers didn’t want you to notice the difference, they would’ve omitted it entirely. These colors are included for some reason.

Now you're probably wondering why I bring this up. Ryouga, Durbe, and Rio are Barians, Astral is, well, an Astral, this separation doesn’t make sense. But consider where the characters wind up. The “blue light” leads to the legend of the hero while the “red light” leads to the Number.

With the "red light" path, their intention is to free “Number 44: White Winged Horse - Sky Pegasus”.

Okay, slight deviation since this is important, but the Mythyrian Numbers are a special set of Numbers that Astral used to seal Don Thousand’s powers away. With Numbers, they do not belong to the Astral as a whole. If that’s the case, the existence of “Number 100: Numeron Dragon” implies that Astral created God, which is a little problematic (or a plot hole, take your pick). This is also why the Barians have their own set of Numbers. Astral is called the Original Number, so I take this as he is conglomerate of a bunch of strong Numbers, and Astral’s whole identity and powers is tied to the Numbers. This is why his memory shatters in the form of Numbers, or how other beings can absorb Astral’s Numbers. The Astrals simply used the powers of the Numbers to create Astral and lock Don Thousand away. I’ll explain this more later when we get to Mizael’s ruins and the whole smitck with the Numeron Dragon because it gets complicated.

BUT if anyone took the Mythyrian Number, whether it was carried out by Astral World, or Barian World, or an Earthling, Don Thousand’s strength will be restored. No matter what, Don Thousand's strengthening is inevitable as long as the characters choose to act on the red path.

For during the path of the “blue light”, or the one that Durbe and Ryouga took, the show hints that the evil Barians maybe aren’t evil. They have another secret to them that we don’t know of. In fact, the legend concludes by mentioning that the heroic Durbe and Mach ascended into Heaven, or into Astral World. This did not happen, of course, since we know of Durbe’s true fate. With Ryouga, his presence with Durbe allows for a crucial scene to play out later in the episodes. This also steadily connects him to his Barian heritage.

I can’t say much for Rio, but I feel as though the writers were incredibly inept about handling her Barianhood in comparison to Ryouga. They had no idea what to do with her (aside from being a handy-dandy translator and expositioner) and her character suffers for it, but ill get to her later.

Like, I may have an slight explanation for why Rio stays with the “red light” group. It’s kinda weak, but here we go.

Out of all of the legends, only Nasch and Durbe were not seen to be touched by Don Thousand's direct actions:

All of the other Emperors had a scene where an Over-Hundred goes into their heart or are possessed by Don Thousand. It is highly implied that Durbe also had the Over-Hundred Number monster enter his heart, but this was not shown since the scene cut away before we find out. Far as I know, Durbe was influenced to become a Barian when Donny made the knights turn on him, and the betrayal of his friends was so heart-breaking that Durbe descended into Barian World. Nasch was… well, ill get to him later too, but Durbe and Nasch could be the only ones who aren’t embedded with the curse. At least, on-screen.

Whether it happened or not is up for your interpretation, but them staying on the “blue light”, in the path of true heroes, makes sense in this concept.

Weak, yeah, but if there’s anyone that can explain why Rio is on the “blue light” side, let me know, aside from plot convenience. It’s obvious that the writers wanted Ryouga and Durbe to be together in the death rooms for plot reasons though.

Moving on, more plays on colors could be seen with the drawings in the Ruins.

This handsome, colorful fellow is meant to be Durbe. This depiction of him is much different than the one that is shown in (hopefully accurate) flashback.

It isn’t known who is responsible for scriptures and drawing in all of the ruins.

But the person who did this has the right idea of dressing Durbe in this multicolored garb. The story is called the “Legend of the Ancient Hero” and heroes are often associated with the three primary colors: blue is seen his shirt, pants, and helmet; red is seen in his cape; and yellow is seen in his undergarment. Meanwhile, white is a color often associated with purity, peace, and sincerity. All of these colors represent Durbe his legend—as a pure hero.

Being as he is the first Ruins we visit, using all this imagery to scream to the audience that “the barians are actually fallen heroes! theyre not evil!” is quite a nice, fun touch.

As well, out of the Seven Emperors, Durbe is the one who tends to be the most pure and heroic. From his deck being based on “holy” objects and his... questionable leadership, Durbe isn’t like Vector. He isn’t cruel or evil; everything he does is “for sake of Barian World” and that’s about it.

He knows that if Barian World does not attack Astral World, they will die (and vice-versa with Astral World). His motivations are solely to protect his home and his people. Also, I like Durbe I really do, but he is pathetic as a villain. Literally the worst plans and a bad leader who does not know how to use any of his pieces, but I appreciate his noble goals. He’s funny, Durbe is really funny. He just doesn’t have the heart to be the bad guy; but as a character who acts heroic (his duel with Merag for example), he does it pretty well.

And to rub my grubby little barian-eatin hands all over Durbe’s heroness, I want to talk about his ace monsters—his Mythyrian, his Over-Hundred, and his Chaos Over-Hundred.

Durbe’s Mythyrian Number also serves as his beloved Guardian of the ruins, Mach. This holds true for most of the Emperors due to the Guardians connection to their Emperors during their past life.

Now, Durbe isn’t shown with the card like some of the other Emperors, but we likely can infer that he was in posession of the Mythyrian Number, thus being a target of Don Thousand.

The role of the Mythyrian Number for the Emperors isn’t crystal clear, but what is known is that their being used to seal Don Thousand away. During the original fight between Don Thousand and Astral, Astral won the battle but lost fifty of his Numbers. Among these were the Mythyrian Numbers, which had the power to suppress Don Thousand. I don’t know if it was random chance that the Numbers glided towards the Emperors or it was divine intervention, but what I do know is that anyone who got the Mythyrian original had a good, strong heart and were destined for Astral World.

My personal theory is that the Barians and Astrals are like Newton’s Third Law, “every action has an equal and opposite reaction”. They complement each other and balance each other out.

In order to seal Don Thousand’s Chaos away, the Astrals had to counteract with equal forces of Cosmos. In their true life, the Emperors provided the necessary Cosmos to suppress Don Thousand. The Emperors were supposed to be Astrals anyways; the Astrals just harnessing their powers while they were humans to fight Don Thousand.

Since the Mythyrian Numbers are drenched with the power of Cosmos due to their relationship with the human Emperors, they are the antitheisis to the Over-Hundred Numbers whose powers come from Chaos.

Mythyrian Numbers being based more on Astral World could also be seen in how the Pegasus on the coat of arms is often associated with Heaven, or a messenger from God. And as Mach recounted the ending of Durbe’s legend, he does that color thing. That iconic blue, Astral-like glow.

With his Over-Hundred Numbers, I think the most interesting thing about it is that the full Japanese name is “Numbers 102: Holy Lightning - Glorious Halo”. These Number monsters represent the Barian Emperors in some way (despite some of them being weird like the giant handy one). The most direct statement to this is when Vector uses the Over-Hundreds to mock Nasch by summoning Durbe and Merag’s monsters (as in “I ate your sister and best friend and these are mine now”), and the entirety of Nasch’s tragic display during his final duel with Yuma.

So even in death, even as a Barian, even as one of the villains, Durbe is still sainted as holy and adorned with a halo. None of the other Over-Hundred are dressed in such a positive light (if at all).

When he turns “Glorious Halo” into a Chaos monster, technically putting extra barian sauce on a plate of fried barian, the name changes into “Number C102: Unholy Lightning - Noble Daemon”. Durbe still has the “Noble Demon” attached to him, even with extra evil on him.

Durbe’s nobility as a Barian makes since if you see that he isn't deeply infused with Don Thousand's curse in comparison to someone like Vector. Or his strong affiliation to keep Barian World safe from harm.

Plus, as a little extra snippet that I noticed in the episode, I wanna focus on this scene in the ruins.

This scene is great. It doesn't have much to do with Durbe, but it's an amazing foreshadow. I think by this point, the audience suspects that Ryouga is a Barian. He acts weird sometimes, his past is unknown, he can summon Chaos monsters, the Emperors are missing two and the Kamishiros slide in like a puzzle piece. BUT, I think the most damning evidence is this specific piece.

Before entering the ruins, Durbe broke his Baria crystal. He is unable to use his Barian powers nor does he have the ability to fix it. But the moment he saves Ryouga from falling to his death, Ryouga begins to glow that iconic red Barian color.

Not Durbe, but Ryouga. Ryouga’s energy flows into Durbe, which restores his crystal to full power and allows him to reveal his true form. Since Ryouga is the King of the Barians, Nasch, it makes complete sense that his body has remnants of his Barian life. (why this didnt activate before, idk, maybe shark wasnt in the mood)

Watching Ryouga heal a fellow Barian is conclusive evidence that Ryouga, as well as Rio probably, must be Barians, or at least connected to the Barians.

Even parts of the duel includes Nasch’s legend in it.

“Labyrinth of Decisions”, “Unfair Treaty”, and “Shield of Conspiracy” are cards used by Mach that fit into Durbe’s story. The labyrinth could be attributed to him leaving the country to aid Nasch in tracking Vector into the Labyrinth of Screams, and the unfair treaty/ or conspiracy is attributed to his own story, where the three knights betrayed the king.

In the end, the first of these ruins reveals two major plot points about the Emperors with one being much more obvious than the other. First is that there are more to the Emperors than being “plain evil” for the sake of it. Second, the events seen in the ruins hints that this shark-shaped shadow is Ryouga, and he is likely to be the final and missing Barian Emperor(s).

Of course this isn’t everything. I don’t know why his ruins are in South America (Ecuador, i think, go here if you want to know more about geography) when they say his homeland is somewhere else.

The Pegasus came from Greek mythology which spawns an interesting connection to the legend of Nasch and Vector. Pegasus was borne from the death of a gorgon (Medusa) and reared by Poseidon (who is attributed to being the god of the seas in most pop culture iterations). Gorgons and oceans is basically the story of Vector and Nasch, and as you know, Durbe and Mach participated in that legend too.

I’m just so fascination by Emperors and their everything, their monsters, their past lives, their ruins, their planet, their composition. Theyre entertaining to explore bc it feels like the writers put something in them for the audience to discover. They're simply fun, and I'll see you in the next ruins

#long post #zexal #barians #durbe #dumon #dyzarc diet #dyzarc writes #barian biology #my boy durbe and his horse #i have a video conference tommorow at noon and my internet cut off at 2am #i was like 'ah! my durbe essay cant save' instead of 'ah! how an i suposed to stream in the morning'#so my priorities are pretty much straight #not a fan of getting a critque over skype thats what

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seven-spirits-of-light · 4 years ago

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The Barian Invasion - Avina

Avina cheered as Yuma delivered the finishing blow to Heartland. God, she could watch that asshole eat shit over and over again! Except… his sudden and spontaneous combustion put an abrupt end to that. She stood in shock with everyone else, her jaw dropped in horrified awe. She then realized that Kite was still down, and Yuma was definitely hurtin’ and she went to them.

“Are you guys okay? God, fucking Barians blatantly cheating by putting you in a field that does actual, physical damage to you.” She spat, causing Yuma to chuckle.

“Ah, it’s nothin I can’t handle. I just gotta feel the flow!” He grinned, making the pop star giggle. Before she could say anything more, the huge pillar of light over the ocean caused the world to rumble, and 7 different sparks of light burst from it, flying directly at the group. Avina screamed, pulling Yuma down and covering Kite’s head with her body as best she could. The flying lights slammed into the towering cranes and walls, throwing dust and rock everywhere before gathering together on the wall above the cowering group. She looked up, her eyes fiery with rage, her brain immediately recognizing Vector, Dumon, Mizar, Alito and Girag.

“HEY! DO YOU ASSLORDS HAVE NO DECENCY? YOU COULDA KILLED US!! WHAT’S THE BIG ID-“ she barked, but stopped. It had taken a second… but her mind was finally registering that there were 2 more in the group of Barians.

Two she recognized.

“O-oh… god.” Vance breathed, his eyes wide too.

“Sh-… Shark?” Avina finally spoke. She couldn’t comprehend what she was seeing. There he was. Her Shark. Her boyfriend. The man who held her heart, who made her laugh, who made her smile, who held her when she cried and who could calm her when she raged. There he was, his sister right beside him. The girl her own brother loved more than anything in this world and the next. They stood up with the enemy, glaring down at everyone they had called ‘friend.’

“'Shark?' Feels like ages since anyone called me that…” he finally spoke. Avina gave a breathless laugh, slowly rising to her feet.

“Aha… Ages? Babe I… it’s only been like a day. C’mon, quit fooling around. Like… we’ve got kind of a serious situation here. Do you, uh… wanna explain what’s up with… them? I-I mean… are they on our side now or… something like that?” She asked nervously, her eyes flicking between the other 6 before returning to Shark.

“Hardly, love. You see… Shark was my old name. I am Nasch, Leader of the Seven Barian Emperors, and this world is now ours! You all should surrender now, it would be in your best interest.” He spoke, his voice carrying that unwavering tone she was all too familiar with. As he said this, her eyes welled with tears, and her jaw dropped before clenching shut. She lowered her head, trying to hide her tears.

“You… y-you… you rotten, lying, BACKSTABBING, TWO-FACED SON OF A BITCH!! YOU BASTARD!! YOU SERIOUSLY CHOOSE THEM OVER US!? OVER ME!? FUCK YOU, JUDAS!!” she cried out, her face twisted with rage but eyes pouring with tears.

“I promise you, love, I haven’t chosen them over you. In fact, I intend to have you join us. I promise you, we will be together forever. Nothing will ever be able to part us again.” He said, though his words did little to soothe her. Quite the opposite in fact. Avina made like she was going to charge at him, but Vance luckily caught her, holding her back. He too was crying, unable to remove his eyes from his beloved Rio… the girl who had betrayed him and come to see his destruction. Yuma then rose, trying to reason with Shark, but he took it one step further, revealing to everyone present the undeniable proof of his new alliance. Shark Barian-phosed, along with Rio and the other 5. Not long after he did this, Sha- Nasch and Yuma seemed to share some sort of memory with one another, and Yuma was unable to handle the shock, passing out on the dock. When the pop star saw this, she was agitated further, fighting hard against Vance’s hold to get to the man who had betrayed her love, her trust. Vance held fast though, trying to pull her back toward the Arclight’s vehicle.

“Avina… Avina that’s not gonna help anything. Let’s get out of here, it’s not safe.” Vance urged, pulling his heartbroken sister with him. As they finally drove off, Avina curled into her brother’s chest, the adopted siblings both grieving the loss and betrayal of the ones they loved so dearly.

If only the knew just how much worse things were going to get…

————————————————————

Avina’s chest shuddered with her silent sobs while her brother sat and held her, tears rolling down his cheeks too, too numb to do much else. The pop start could physically feel her heart breaking in her chest, and for a moment… she feared that she would actually die from heartbreak. For a while, the car was silent. No one really knew what to say… everyone was in shock. Shark. Ryouga Kamishiro. Their good friend, Avina’s boyfriend… he had betrayed them. Left them to fight alongside the ones who had been harassing them for months and had been actively trying to kill Astral. Avina was definitely in the worst shape of all. After everything she and Shark had been through… he chose those stone faced assholes over her, over his friends! The people who had stood by his side when no one else would! Not only that… but he planned to turn her into some stone faced monster, too. She wanted nothing more than for this nightmare to end. She wanted to go back home, lay in her bed with her boyfriend and listen to music.

But that wasn’t possible… not anymore. He’d made his choice. He had chose them over her.

Avina’s sorrow turned quickly back to rage and resolve. Nasch wasn’t going to win. No matter what.

Avina glanced out the window, a terrified gasp leaving her as she saw who was pursuing them. Nasch! Nasch and Merag!! Oh fuck, ALL SEVEN were there! They were chasing their vehicle and she could see Nasch and Merag looking right at them! Avina couldn’t stop the look of horror on her face. She turned away, frantically thinking of what she could do when she quickly realized what she had to do.

“V! Stop the car!” She called, causing the white-haired man to jump.

“What! No! Why!?” He asked, glancing back at her as if she were mad.

“They’re chasing us, and if they catch up to this car, they’re gonna get their hands on ALL of us. You have to stop and let me out! I can draw him away. Please! We can’t let Nasch get his hands on either Yuma or Astral, and god forbid he gets them BOTH. So don’t fucking argue with me, and stop the goddamn car.” Avina explained, her franticness making her hiss out the last bit. V looked hesitant, looking to his little brother, but neither III nor anyone else in the vehicle offered any objections.

With a resolute nod, Avina scooted over to the door, taking the handle and preparing to launch herself out of the car once it had stopped, not noticing as Vance prepared to jump from the car too. V hit the breaks, turning just so that she had quick access to an alleyway, and came to a stop. Avina jerked the door open, throwing herself out and onto the street, yelping when Vance followed. She opened her mouth to protest, but when she spotted the seven eerily glowing figures quickly approaching, she huffed, closing the door and grabbing Vance’s wrist.

The adopted siblings took off in a direction adjacent to the vehicle, running into the shows of the alley. Sure enough, the Emperors seemed to pause, and three broke off from the group, following Avina and Vance while the other four continued chasing the vehicle. Fuck. Ok, well, four is better than all seven… and it looked like Nasch and Merag along with one other had decided to follow her and Vance, so the Barians didn’t have their powerhouse leader. Avina prayed that her friends would all be safe as she continued to run. The pop star could see them swooping down closer, and so she began to dip and weave in and out of alleys and behind the many towering buildings of Heartland City. She was gasping for breath, and her sides screamed at her, but she refused to stop. Not yet.

It seemed like an eternity until, finally, she glanced behind them and didn’t see any of the Emperors. Avina pulled Vance with her, hiding in an alley and crouching down in the darkest corners so they could catch their breath. She motioned to Vance to be quiet, creeping forward slightly. Avina could hear footsteps, and out in the street she spotted just who had accompanied Nasch and Merag. It was Dumon, Nasch’s little fanboy. He was looking around, but luckily seemed to have lost them. She couldn’t help the cocky little smirk on her face.

For a moment, she thought she’d won…

That was until she heard the terrifyingly familiar sound of a portal ripping open behind her, and a pair of large, purple stony hands wrapped around her waist.

Avina shrieked, turning to see a similar pair of white stone hands latching around Vance’s chest. She screamed bloody murder, reaching out for her brother and fighting hard against the grip around her.

”NO!! VAAAANCE!!!”

And then gravity was gone. She felt like she couldn’t breathe. She was so scared. She had no choice but to cling desperately to her kidnapper.

————————————————————

The Barian King stepped out of the portal carrying the trembling human in his arms, looking around his room. It was elegant yet simply decorated, and in any other situation, he thought Avina might have liked it. He hoped she would still… this was to be her new home after all. Nasch looked down at her, a gorgeous wine-colored gown now draped over her slim figure, a silver metal bust encircling her abdomen. She truly looked like the queen she was meant to be.

“You can open your eyes, love. We’re home now.” He murmured, nuzzling her with his mouthless muzzle. Avina’s eyes flew open and she gasped, looking around before shoving away from him.

“How dare you!? HOW FUCKING DARE YOU!?! YOU- YOU-- YOU BASTARD!! You terrorized all of our friends, you betrayed Yuma, you betrayed me! God, don’t you love me at all!? Am I just- am I just a fucking object to you!? A prize to be won! An item to possess!?” She spat, her furious amethyst eyes boring into him.

“No… you’re… you’re my bride.” Nasch replied.

“Your bride. You seriously think that I would ever WILLINGLY associate with you at all after everything you’ve done, let alone marry you!?” Avina retorted, crossing her arms over her chest. She then paused, glancing down at herself, going silent for a beat too long. Finally, she spoke, her words dripping with seething anger.

”Where… the fuck… are my clothes? What the FUCK is this!?” She growled, her hands clenched into fists.

“You don’t need those rags anymore. You’re going to be a queen, Avina. You deserve the finery befitting a queen. You should see yourself… you look stunning.” Nasch answered evenly. He was trying desperately to keep up the heartless Barian façade, but it was so much harder with her here. She looked so hurt, so upset, so uncomfortable. While she did look beautiful… it was also unnatural.

“Jesus… you really don’t fucking care at all, do you?” She breathed, her heart squeezing painfully in her chest. “God… god I had hoped so desperately that some how, some way, you… the you I know was still in there. But… but he’s gone. My Shark… he’d never try to turn me into something I’m not. He’d never betray his friends. He’d never stoop as low as you.” She wrapped her arms around her torso, hugging herself tightly. In the red glowing light, Nasch could see the trails of tears streaking down her cheeks, and he could no longer maintain the mask. Not in front of her.

“Avina… I… I do care. I know in your anger, you see me and Ryouga as two different people and… while that is true in a way, I promise you I am the same man that you fell in love with. The truth is I really… don’t want to do this. ANY of this. I never wanted to betray my friends, or Yuma… or especially you. But I can’t deny what I am. There are so many souls here that need me, souls that can’t rest until I defeat all threats to our world. Did your Ryouga not share that same dedication?” He asked.

Avina turned away, not seeing the pain in his mismatched eyes.

“It doesn’t have to be like this… I still love you. I love you so deeply. I know you still love me… I can see it in your eyes.” The Emperor continued, approaching her. The hand that was placed on her shoulder wasn’t one of stone… it was flesh. Avina jumped slightly.

“You know I want you

It’s not a secret I try to hide

I know you want me

So don't keep sayin' our hands are tied.” his voice came drifting to her ear, warm and inviting and distinctly human.

“You claim it's not in the cards

And fate is pullin' you miles away

And out of reach from me

But you're here in my heart

So who can stop me if I decide

That you're my destiny?”

Avina turned to him, looking up into his beautiful deep blue eyes, his face once more human and no longer the strange featureless muzzle he had revealed to them all. Nasch took her into his arms, dancing slowly with her as he continued to sing those sweet and loving words to her.

“What if we rewrite the stars?

Say you were made to be mine

Nothing could keep us apart

You’d be the one I was meant to find

It’s up to you, and it's up to me

No one can say what we get to be

So why don't we rewrite the stars?

Maybe the world could be ours

Tonight.” He spun her once before pulling her close again, leaning down to kiss her. Avina felt herself leaning forward, wanting to accept his kiss. She suddenly realized where she was and what was happening, and in an instant, she ducked, sliding out of his arms. The pop star walked away, desperately trying to catch her breath and stop her head from spinning.

"You think it's easy

You think I don't wanna run to you?” she sang, slowly looking over her shoulder.

”But there are mountains

And there are doors that we can't walk through” Avina turned back to him fully.

”I know you're wondering why because we're able to be

Just you and me within these walls

But when we go outside, you're gonna wake up and see

That it was hopeless after all…” She turned to the large double door to Nasch’s room, her hands resting on the handles for a moment before shoving with all her might, pushing them open. Avina wasn’t entirely sure where she was going, but the huge staircase at the end of the hallway seemed to be a good bet. Where it lead, she didn’t know, but it was certainly better than just staying stuck in this room. She knew she couldn’t actually run… but even moving around a little helped alleviate some of her anxiety.

The words continued to pour from her heart as she walked out of the room, knowing Nasch would follow.

”No one can rewrite the stars

How can you say you'll be mine?

Everything keeps us apart

And I'm not the one you were meant to find” She began ascending the stairs, her skirt lifted so she wouldn’t trip. Avina looked up, noticing some of the other Barians standing in what must be the main throne room, her sadness switching to irritation. She stopped, whipping around to motion between herself and Nasch.

”It’s not up to you

It’s not up to me

When everyone tells us what we can be!” She spat, shooting a glare at Dumon and Girag. The two Barians looked back at her with open wariness and confusion, the Barian Knight looking back at his king. Avina huffed, turning away from them all and walking further into the throne room. This is probably where it would end. Nasch wouldn’t sacrifice his dignity to sing with her, especially in front of the other Barians. Her shoulders dropped, head lowering.

“How can we rewrite the stars?

Say that the world can be ours

Tonight?” she sang. When she continued… she was shocked to hear another voice join hers. Avina turned, seeing Nasch coming towards her, still singing! Their voices harmonized beautifully, and for a moment, she was able to forget where she was entirely.

”All I want is to fly with you

All I want is to fall with you

So just give me all of you!”

”It feels impossible…” She sang.

”It’s not impossible!” He replied, reaching out to her.

”Is it impossible?” She asked, her eyes turning hopeful.

”Say that it's possible!” Their voices joined again as he finally reached her, taking her hand and holding her close. Ryouga smiled, pulling her up the stairs leading to his throne.

”How do we rewrite the stars?

Say you were made to be mine?

Nothing can keep us apart

'Cause you are the one I was meant to find!” They reached the top, and he danced with her, spinning her and holding her close.

”It's up to you

And it's up to me

No one can say what we get to be

And why don't we rewrite the stars?

Changing the world to be ours!” Their voices rang out, uncaring of who heard or who saw, standing close to one another, relishing in one another’s warmth and comfort. Ryouga leaned down to kiss her, and Avina smiled, ready to kiss him in return. This time she was stopped by the feeling of a pendant lying on his chest. The Barian pendant. That’s right… This was Nasch. She stopped him, pushing him back slightly. He looked down at her in confusion, and Avina couldn’t help the bitter smile that made it’s way onto her face.

”You know I want you…

It’s not a secret I try to hide

But I can't have you…” Avina sang softly, her thumb running over the red gem in the center. The sensation startled Nasch so much, he found himself suddenly Barian-phosed, changed back into the towering stone creature he had chosen to be instead of the human man that could be with her.

”We’re bound to break and my hands… are tied.” She finished sadly, pulling away from him and walking back down the stairs, looking out one of the huge archways overlooking the Great Barian Sea.

————————————————————

Avina looked out at the deep red landscape below, her heart aching, trying desperately not to cry. God… for a moment, for just a moment, she felt connected to him again. She felt like she was singing with Ryouga and not the heartless Barian King. She began to wonder if… if maybe they really weren’t so different after all. God, she didn’t want to think about this madness anymore. She just wanted it to end! She wanted to go back home, with her human boyfriend. But the longer she was on this strange planet, the stronger this feeling of dread grew.

Something terrible was about to happen.

Nasch approached her from behind, reaching out to lay a hand on her shoulder. Before he could touch her, though, she finally spoke up.

“Nasch… I’d like to see my brother. Please. If your intention is still to turn me into a Barian, then I… I’d like to see my brother first.” Avina asked, not wanting to look at him. She knew her heart couldn’t take it. The Emperor was silent for a moment before answering.

“Yes… I’ll send for him and Merag.” His deep and alien voice came, turning to nod at Dumon. He then turned back to Avina, unsure of what to say. He stood beside her, looking out at the garish landscape of his world. There was silence for a few moments before Avina spoke, her voice soft and hesitant.

“Will it hurt?” She asked, not looking at him. The Emperor was quiet, considering how to answer her question.

“It… It shouldn’t. I will do everything in my power to ensure it doesn’t but… I’m afraid I don’t know for certain. All of us became Barians after our deaths on Earth so… I can’t say for sure. But I promise you, I will do everything I can to make sure it doesn’t hurt.” He answered.

“Do you have to? Do you have do turn me? Do you have to do any of this? Ryouga, please… we… we can still go back. We can go back to Earth, we can help Yuma fight and we can return to our normal lives! It… it doesn’t have to be this way.” Avina pleaded softly, tears rolling down her cheeks. Nasch felt tears prick his own eyes too, but he refused to let them fall.

“I must, Avina. I’ve been shown my past. There are hundreds of souls here counting on me. They all had their lives cut short on Earth due to choices I made, they are my responsibility. They were brought here for a second chance, and it’s my job to lead them and protect them from all threats. They… they deserve to be happy and safe. I failed them in my first life, but I won’t in this life. Believe me, I wish it didn’t have to be this way, but Barian World can’t exist in peace when Astral World does. Our worlds are polar opposites, and as such we are bound to fight. We have to destroy them before they destroy us.” Nasch explained, and Avina turned to look at him.

Even though his face was the featureless mask of a Barian, she could see that strong resolve and dedication that her Ryouga had shining in his eyes. God… it really was him. That realization only broke the singer even more. She desperately wanted to stay with him, to help him and see him succeed, but she also didn’t want innocent people to die. Avina lowered her head and closed her eyes, her tears falling steadily. There was no way to win this… not really. She couldn’t convince him to trust Yuma, and she couldn’t stand by his side and let him beat Yuma. She wanted to scream. This was impossible! A gentle breeze stirred her hair, making her open her eyes… and look down.

There… there was only one option.

“Avina!”

The magenta haired girl turned, seeing her brother enter with Ri- with Merag, his attire similarly changed like hers. She ran to him, hugging him tightly and trying not to burst into tears.

“Vance! Thank God, are you okay? Are you hurt at all?” She asked, pulling back and looking him over. He chuckled sadly, shaking his head.

“Not physically but…” he trailed off, the pain evident in his eyes. He was suffering the same dilemma she was. Avina could only assume that whatever conversation he’d had with Merag, he’d come to the same revelation she had… that Merag and Rio really were one and the same… but there was no way that he could stay by her side.

“Vance… Vance I… I’ve been thinking. We can’t let this happen. We can’t become Barians, otherwise we’ll just become part of the problem. We can’t get in Yuma’s way. I know he and Astral have a plan, but if we let them turn us into Barians, all we’re gonna do is throw a giant wrench in those plans.” She murmured, making sure her voice was low enough that none of the Barians present would hear them. “I’ve… already made my choice. I’m gonna fly…” Avina whispered, glancing back toward the large archway

The open archway that overlooked a fatal drop down to the beach.

“I’m… I’m really sorry. I don’t want you to- I-I don’t know what else to do… you don’t have to follow-“ Avina started, her tears falling once more, but Vance stopped her.

“Hey… you… you don’t have to be sorry. Truthfully, I had made the same decision.” He whispered in reply, the pain agonizingly evident in his eyes. Avina hiccuped, hugging him again, holding on tightly. God… god, she didn’t want this. Not for Vance, not for her. She didn’t want to do this to Nasch or Merag. She wanted this whole stupid nightmare to end!

But it wouldn’t… not yet.

Avina extracted herself from her brother, sniffling. “I need to… say goodbye.” She murmured, Vance nodding in agreement. The two siblings went toward their significant other, reluctance in their every step. The pop star looked up at the purple visage of her beloved, reaching up to caress his stone cheek.

“Okay… I-I’ve made my choice. But first… can you please turn back into a human? Just for a moment s-so I can… say goodbye?” She asked. Nasch didn’t hesitate at all, shifting back into the human body of Ryouga Kamishiro. She hugged him tightly, kissing him with all the passion and desperation she had felt for him ever since they’d first met. In her heart and her mind, she said goodbye to the future she had always imagined for them. She said goodbye to her band, she said goodbye to their wedding, their children, their blissfully-wedded future. None of that would happen now… So she savored this moment. The safety of his embrace, the warmth of his lips. After what felt like both an eternity and less than a second, she pulled back, her forehead resting against his and her hands resting on his chest, feeling the pulse of his heart.

“Ryouga… Nasch… I know now that you are one and the same. You are both a champion duelist with many friends who care deeply for you, and a great leader who will protect those who follow him. You’re a man of dedication and passion… and that is what I fell in love with.” She murmured to him, looking up into his brilliant blue eyes.

“I love you. I will always love you.” Avina declared.

Then, she shoved him back with all of her might, catching him by surprise and managing to push him off his feet and away from her. In an instant, she turned, making a mad dash for the open archway, spotting Vance having done the same to Merag before running the same direction as her. She reached out her hand to him, the two siblings grasping at one another and bolting for the edge. Avina faintly heard Nasch roaring for someone to stop them while Merag screamed after Vance, though the sound was muffled by the pounding of blood in her ears.

The edge grew closer

And closer

And then the ground was gone.

And she was falling.

And she was screaming.

The wind whipped around them, but even over that plus her own screams and the blood still rushing in her ears, Avina heard one single word being cried by two voices.

”NOOOOO!!!!”

It seemed like she fell forever. Had the ground vanished? Was there a bottomless pit that she hadn’t seen? She could faintly see the heads of the Emperors watching in horror as the two humans plummeted down.

“N-Nas—“

And then… darkness.

When Avina opened her eyes again, she was on the beach of Barian World. She looked over, seeing her brother standing beside her, his figure startlingly transparent, almost like Astral looked except not blue. She looked down at her own hands to find them equally transparent. An agonized cry drew her attention up, and not far ahead of them, she saw Merag pounding on the chest of a slightly burned body.

Vance’s body.

The sound of a pained grunt followed by sorrowful weeping attracted her attention next, and she spotted Nasch coming up out of the bloody red waters of the Great Barian Sea, a body in his arms with skin reddened from the acidic water.

Her body.

They hadn’t hit the ground, they’d fallen right into the Barian Sea, thankfully dying on impact so they didn’t have to suffer the agony of the acid. But… but now they had to watch as the two people who they loved more than anything in the world mourned over their broken bodies.

Avina wept openly, and she heard Vance doing the same. She reached over, taking his hand, the two siblings weeping at the tragic scene.

”Fellow Lights… I am so sorry it came to this.” a strange, feminine voice said. Avina gasped and turned, spotting a group of five women approaching them. ”There is much that needs to be explained, and we will do so. Please… come with us. Things will make sense soon.” a lady with blond hair dressed in blue said, offering her hand to them. The siblings hesitated, looking at one another and glancing back at their Barian lovers.

”I understand your desire to stay… and I promise you, you won’t be parted from them for long… but right now, there is nothing you can do. Truths have been hidden from you, and you deserve to know about your past, as well as theirs. Let us help you… Together, we can free them from this agony, but in order to do so, you must understand the whole story.” The girl in a flowing purple skirt said, her lavender eyes imploring. Avina let out a shuddering sigh, looking back one more time at the sorrowful scene behind her.

“Nasch… I’m so sorry. I love you.”

Then, she and Vance turned, following the group of women into a glowing white light.

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3w-writer-with-wings · 6 years ago

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1, 5, 6, 10, 17, 19, 22, 23, and 34 for the yugioh meme?

1) Favourite Yu-Gi-Oh! series

This is like asking me which out of my six children should survive while the other five die XD. I love all the series since they all have both pros and cons, and they all have interesting characters and stories, but I guess ARC V will always have a special place in my heart since it got me back in Yugioh fandom (I stopped after 5Ds for a while several years ago). VRAINS is currently my favourite series plotwise since it continues to surprise me and keeps me hyped every single week.

5) Favourite opening/ending

For the opening, it’s a tie between second and fifth ARC V opening. “Burn” has an incredibly upbeat melody that makes me smile every time I listen to it. “Light of Hope” on the other hand tells a story of how there is despair but smiles will be there to make it go away. I’m rather torn between choosing either of them since they are both really nice endings. As for ending - “Close to You”, 4th ending from 5Ds. I first started watching 5Ds in English dub but once I caught up with it, I was too curious what is going to happen next so I started watching Japanese dub from that point on and that was probably the smartest decision ever. I got to see “Close to You” not only as the first Yugioh Japanese ending but the very first anime ending ever. I loved every single moment of it, of all the characters just chilling around the city, then meeting up, watching the sunrise and then riding D-Wheels with their dragons! It is an ending that is beyond perfect and really emphasises the bonds and friendship between all Signers.

6) Favourite character

If you had asked me this question before Takeru showed up, I would’ve probably blurted out the names of several characters and say how I love them all, but Takeru is a special case. You see, he is a character that I loved before he even officially appeared XD. I’m following the news, cast lists and summaries, so when Takeru showed up for the first time in an anime magazine (like a month before his official anime appearance), I fell in love with everything about him. Both his human self and avatar had all the right colours and designs that fit his personality well, his backstory was intriguing, I was already looking forward to seeing another Lost Child and out of all possible voices, he got to be voiced by one and only Kaji Yuuki (who is among my Top 3 anime voice actors!). Then he showed up in the new opening and ending and him being friendly and cosy with Yusaku was just plain adorable! I had no idea what his role was going to be but from that point it was clear - Yusaku is getting a new friend! And was his entrance perfect - lightning, fire tornado and then him! 10/10 Burner of Souls! Not only was he righteously hyped up, but he also continues to be amazing and I have a feeling his character will get even more development!

10) Favourite Duel Monster

It’s hard to pick a single monster, but I love every single card in Johan’s deck aka. Crystal/Gem Beast archetype. The designs are simple but so well executed and out of all of them, it’s hard to pick just one. I love their story, the legend and just the fact how much they all care about Johan, trying to reach out to him when Yubel possessed him. A big plus is also the fact how much personality they all have and they are always there to help up Johan.

17) Have you ever cried over YGO and why?

You should’ve rather ask me when I didn’t lol. But yeah in every spinoff there was a moment that I actually cried. In original series there were two moments, when Yugi duelled Atem in the fourth season, letting him defeat him and then fading away in his arms and the Ceremonial duel when Yugi stumbled on his knees and cried, I cried with him cuz I also didn’t want Atem to go. Then in GX, it was basically whenever Judai would show vulnerability, cuz really, I hated his guts and his goofy overpowered persona. But then when he lost Johan, when he was afraid of Yubel, when he succumbed to the power of Supreme King and the entire season 4 when he was battling with depression - to see someone so cheerful becoming a mere shell of himself was so darn sad. 5Ds started darker but nothing could prepare me for two scenes, Yusei nearly dying, being afraid to duel and then watching his friend die in his arms and then losing another friend for real (Bruno! :’( ). Zexal made me cry a weird mixture of happy and sad tears whenever Yuma and Astral did something. When Astral sacrificed himself for Yuma I don’t know when I cried more - when Yuma watched Astral die or Yuma suffering from major depression for the next few episodes. But that scene when he got reunited with Astral was that more powerful because of it and their relationship is truly the purest of them all. ARC V, spinoff all about smiles was probably one of the saddest series, not just because of many sad moments throughout the whole thing aka. Yuto dying in Yuya’s arms for real, Yugo losing Rin, Yuya losing Yuzu, the fate of other Bracelet Girls and Yu-Boys and the overall ending, but also how inconclusive the ending felt. I kinda get the point was to show the realism of war, how not everyone can get a happy ending but it could still be executed better. Then there’s VRAINS…. *sighs* where do I even start with this….

VRAINS truly took the plotline seriously and doesn’t seem like it’s going to back down. It is like the writing staff put together a medley of the saddest moments in Yu-Gi-Oh! and were like, “Let’s make it sadder!”. From the fact that mere six-year-old children were tortured so badly, that Ryoken was so messed up by his father, that all Lost Children are still suffering in one way or another, that SOL practically killed a living being and all the drama that it’s going on between Yusaku and Kusanagi right now. Last week’s episode had me nearly tear up and for tomorrow I will most definitely cry. It’s just so painful to see someone so desperate to save their own family, to attack someone they were all set to protect just a few episodes ago… And VRAINS isn’t even over yet. I thought nothing could top Earth’s death scene, but from the looks of it, tomorrow will be getting a dose of the most painful feels.

19) Least favourite series

It’s a tie between GX and the first series if I had to choose one. GX has a rather monotone first half when there is some stuff going on, but it’s really episodic and easily forgotten. While there were some interesting episodes, the rest was just one giant filler that tried to deliver too much nostalgia from the first series instead of developing on its own. And speaking of the first series - I know the card game wasn’t as developed at the time so tons of duels made absolutely no sense. Then it was only Yugi, Kaiba and Joey having the development and extremely long duels that were starting to feel off and annoying to watch. But overall - I know that was the very first series and the spinoff, so it was obvious it wouldn’t be perfect. What I truly love about Yu-Gi-Oh! is that it’s a franchise that continues to grow with every single spin-off, even if they’re becoming less relevant they are still getting stronger storywise.

22) Least favourite character

This little brat is a perfect representation of how to create the most annoying character. Everything about him screams “annoying, useless and awful”. It would be completely fine if he was an episodic villain, but noooo for some reason writing staff was like, “hey let’s make this dude into Yuma’s friend”. I get it, Yuma can make friends easily, but for the love of God, why him?! Yuma has enough friends already, why bring this brat into his group? Tokunosuke has literally no purpose to be here but to cause trouble or be a plot device to bring Yuma trouble. Okay, I was fine with that one time that he got Yuma into trouble and Yuma still forgave him, but why the hell did they have a need to repeat that three more times? I feel the same way about Kotori - she has no basic purpose but to be moral support or act as a damsel in distress.ZEXAL had way too many characters and out of them all, they picked the most useless ones for major roles.

23) NOTP

Canon datastormshipping. I think I made it clear why I dislike it in two posts already, but I guess I could sum it up for the third time. In canon verse they are two unstable people who bring out the worst of each other. They rarely interact, their ideologies are vastly different and they are in a way obsessed with each other in a very unhealthy way. If the two of them dated it would most likely result in a very toxic relationship which would only worsen up their already broken mental states. Again, I greatly dislike this ship in canon verse (in anime up to episode 92) and my opinion could change by the end of VRAINS. I still like the fanfics and fanarts that depict “what if” scenarios where their relationship could work (I’m actually writing one at the moment and I have plans to write one where I focus on their relationship in detail), but canon shipping just feels off and dysfunctional.

34) If you met Kazuki Takahashi, what would you say to him?

First of all, I would thank him for coming up with those amazing characters and plotlines. I still love the original manga and season 0 the most since it had so much creativity with different games, but I can see it keep getting included more with new summoning methods and unique stories. Then I would most likely present him my idea for the 7th series and its protagonist. From the start of the series, there wasn’t much about card game production or who designs them. We got some info on how Pegasus discovered Millenium Items and the tablet with Egyptian Gods and in GX it showed Hayato working as a card game designer. I would love to see a protagonist who loves games just like Yugi and wishes to create more, so he strives to become the best card game designer. He is not that keen on playing the game since he prefers to make the cards more, but when he creates a particular card(kinda like how Takato created Guilmon in Digimon Tamers) he is pulled into an adventure where he must find other cards that contain powerful Duel Monsters spirits and he has to lock them back into their cards. I would also love to have a protagonist that can talk with spirits again since while Judai had adorable interactions with Winged Kuriboh and Neo Spacians, it was still largely brushed aside and not that much explored. So yeah please make the next protagonist into a card game designer, it will be unique and open to so many interesting plotlines and potentials.

#yugioh series #vrains #homura takeru #Soulburner #ygo #yugioh zexal #yugioh gx #yugioh 5ds #yugioh arc v #datastormshipping

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darkzorua100 · 6 years ago

Text

My thoughts to episode 70 of Vrains.

Before watching the episode: Soulburner better do his fire tornado thing to save Playmaker or else I’m going to be very disappointed with this episode.

After watching the episode: Well...uh...that escalated quickly. Yeah never mind about the whole fire tornado thing, what the actual f*ck just happened here?!

I walk into this episode expecting the basics. Revolver to Synchro Summon Borreload Savage Dragon, Soulburner and Flame rescuing Playmaker and Ai, Windy getting out right murdered. I did not expect us to get two more Lost Children/Ignis pairings, that gorgeous freaking Synchro Summoning being so technology heavy, and Windy getting out right murdered like that. Yeah, have fun censoring that one, dub.

Just like episode 68, where do I even begin with this? Again, I guess at the beginning where it is revealed that Windy is actually an out right psychopath. He literally tried to murder his kid in a car accident. Of course, we don’t know his actual condition now because of this. His kid could very well be dead but I highly doubt that. The Lost Children are to important to the story for the writers to just have killed any of them off like that before we even had a chance to meet them all, similar to the whole Aqua situation where some people thought she was dead after episode 66 airing with the way Earth was speaking about her. At the very least, he’s in a coma, physically disabled, life support if we want to get that dark, or heck his whole body could have been replaced with an artificial one. Geez, and we talk about how Jin couldn’t catch a break after the Hanoi Project. The Wind Child probably has mental and physical problems to boot because of his little sh*t of an Ignis. Also, what is this? The third car accident now? God, I knew I was onto something about this being sabotage. Of course, this could all be different car accidents, and the writers really have no creative ideas when it comes to terrible backstories (yeah there are boundaries they can’t cross because this still is a kid show after all) but this has cross the line of just being just a coincidence.

First time is an accident (Aoi and Akira’s parents) Second time is a coincidence (Blood Shepherd and his mom) Third time is a pattern (Windy’s Lost Child)

And this isn’t even factoring in Takeru’s parents, who we still don’t know how they dead. If it was also a car accident, we definitely have something more then just a pattern. We saw in Blood Shepherd’s backstory that his car started to glitch out which to me looked like something was interfering with the signal but if it was Windy taking over it to hit his kid’s car, that would explain a lot. Blood Shepherd really was just at the wrong place at the wrong time and his vehicle was just a means to a end for Windy. The Zaizens, and Takeru’s parents, if they were also involved in this, might have just been caught in the cross fires. Also keep in mind, if this all happened in the same accident, the Wind Lost Child would have only just been freed from the Hanoi Project when Windy decided to kill him based on the fact that Aoi and Takeru were both little kids when they lost their parents. Heck, the Wind Lost Child might have been on his way to the hospital, like Takeru was after he was freed, when Windy decided to play some Grand Theft Auto with him. Windy claims that he did this because he didn’t need his partner but at this point, I’m pretty sure that Kogami might have put in a Fail-Safe program in the Ignises that can only be activated by their respective kids that can destroy the Ignises for good. After all, it can’t just be a one way relationship between the two. All of the Ignises know who they were based on and have shown the ability to be able to find them instantly. If Windy knew about this Fail-Safe, he might have went after his kid to make sure that he never would have had the chance to use it. Same could probably be said with Lightning.

Oh and then there’s Lightning to talk about here who I think just became my favorite Ignis at the end of this episode because he’s a literal sociopath. At the end of this episode, Revolver actually tries to murder Windy and it is brutal. Like holy crap, Windy is screaming his head off and Lightning is just standing there, watching the whole thing so emotionlessly, as Windy is begging him to save him. He does, but only at the last second, and when he does, Windy is almost completely destroyed. Like we know he can repair himself, but geez, Lightning is just...wow. I mean, we all knew Jin was messed up because of the Hanoi Project but how messed up do you have to be to create that? Oh and yeah, Jin was confirmed to be the one Lightning was based off of and sh*t, I was kinda right about him being who the silhouette character was. Maybe not the actual character, because it was Lightning, but as for the silhouette itself, yeah I was right. Lightning actually stole Jin’s consciousness to use him as a weapon. It is even creeper when you remember that Lightning already had the silhouette of Jin created before he got his consciousness's data. Yeah...uh...crap...well...we might have to put Yusaku, Takeru, and Spectre into Witness Protection now because if Lightning could do that to Jin, if he can hivemind Ai, Flame, and Earth (because yeah, Earth is basically confirmed to be Spectre’s now if there was any doubt before between him and Windy), then we are going to lose them to the Light Side (I seriously love how they are making Darkness (Ai) good and Light (Lightning) evil again for this series). Spectre who knows with him, since Earth doesn’t seem to want anything to do with him (not that anyone could blame him), Yusaku possibly since Yu-Gi-Oh isn’t afraid to make their protagonist evil for some time (looking at you Judai and Yuya (though if they do do this to Yusaku, I see it more like what happened to Yuma and Astral with the whole Dark Zexal moment), and as for Takeru, oh he’s definitely going to get brainwashed for sure because we can’t have a Yu-Gi-Oh series where the best friend character doesn’t get brainwashed, possessed, or turns out to be evil all along sometime later during the season.

Oh and we haven’t talked about Kusanagi’s reaction to this reveal. My god, the opening foreshadowing is coming soon. He is so going to flip when Yusaku and Takeru return. Lightning is going to manipulate him so hard through his brother to get what he wants. Or Kusanagi might just try and murder Ai and Flame instead, blaming them for what has happened to Jin. Either way, Kusanagi is definitely not going to be in a good place in the upcoming episodes.

As for the conclusion to Revolver vs Windy, yeah Revolver out right destroyed him with his new Synchro Monster and my god, the animation for the Synchro Summon was freaking amazing. They went all out on this one like damn. The Knights also got to show up the end too, after out right destroying all of the Echos, watching as Revolver proves to everyone again why he is the leader. Spectre stayed behind and we got the meeting between him and Soulburner (hell yes to this! Though I have to wonder if Soulburner actually does know if Spectre is a Lost Child just like him) and the dialogue was just amazing between them. I loved how Spectre just flips on a dime like that like one second he is being friendly to Soulburner and asking him to view for himself if the Ignises can be trusted or not and if he still wants to work with Flame after all of this, he would destroy him personally himself. Soulburner vs Spectre foreshadowing? I hope so because my god, that would be amazing.

Soulburner and Flame save Playmaker and Ai from their spheres but not before Revolver has the best reaction to Soulburner and Flame’s appearance.

“Oh? Four Ignis in the same room.” Just the way he said it got me hyped because yeah, as long as Takeru has Flame, we are getting Soulburner vs Revolver and I want this match up so badly. I need these two to fight to the death. It would be fantastic.

A few last things I like to note about this episode on the top of my head is that Windy used Storm Access during this duel and I seriously wish this wasn’t a thing. Having the people in Lightning’s group have Storm Access as a Skill would be one thing, even though that would be annoying to begin with because that is Yusaku and Ryoken’s thing (they are called Datastormshipping for a reason) but for them to just continue to screw the rules and use it during a Master Duel just will continue to irritate me since they shouldn’t be able to do that. Sure, they are advanced A.Is that can break the system but the system should still be able to say “no, you can’t do that” and automatically give the opposing player the win, or at the very least give the people in Lightning’s group a penalty, such as in ARC-V where we had the intrusion penalty whenever someone should join in on a already ongoing duel. Like if they can just break the rules like that, why not just screw the rules entirely and play with Duelist Kingdom logical? Seems kinda stupid to just break the rules and not take full advantage of it. And they are supposed to be the smart ones here.

Also, during the duel, Windy does what I wanted him to do since the beginning of the duel and out right taunt Revolver, using his father against him, saying stuff like he’s a failure and that if his father believed in him, why didn’t he use him as a test subject for the Hanoi Project, and that Ryoken’s true reason why he wants to kill the Ignises is because he is jealous of them for being the “chosen ones” in his father’s eyes. Revolver has a flashback to when his father died, saying how he never wanted to involve him in this, which Revolver fully believes, and honestly, I think at this point we can all agree that Kogami is full of crap. Never wanted to involve Ryoken in this is out right bullsh*t. Windy does bring up some good points with this though. Ryoken has ever right to hate the Ignises, not just because of his father’s goal, but because like Windy said, they were the chosen ones in Kogami’s eyes, not his own flesh and body. Kogami said it himself, he viewed the Ignises as his own children to his own son. Ryoken has ever right to hate them out of pure jealously. And since I fully believe that Kogami is full of himself when he said he didn’t want to involve Ryoken in any of this, why didn’t he use his own son for the Hanoi Project? I talked about how Ryoken is basically an unofficial 7th Lost Child of the Hanoi Project but he seriously might just be. He’s Dr. Kogami’s son after all. If the Lost Children are the keys to destroying their respective Ignis with some kind of Fail-Safe built into their program, Ryoken might just unknowingly hold the instructions to activating those Fail-Safes hidden somewhere deep inside his consciousness. Or if we are to believe the major plot twist done the line that Ryoken might actually be an A.I. himself like some people theorize he could be, Windy might just mean this literally. Ryoken might have actually been the chosen one, the first successor to humanity, or a simple prototype to the Ignises that wasn’t what Dr. Kogami wanted, a failure as Windy claims him to be, and was effectively replaced by the Ignises. That’s why he wasn’t used for the Hanoi Project. He had no free will to take to use to create the Ignises. If anyone has seen or played Detroit: Become Human, Ryoken’s case could be something like that. He was reprogrammed to be Dr. Kogami weapon but he started to gain a free will of his own after witnessing the torture of the Lost Children and speaking to Yusaku and especially after coming to his own decision to save them. Interesting thing to look back on if the “Ryoken is actually an A.I.” theory does actually turn out to be true.

But yeah, I think that about does it for episode 71. As for the preview for 72 and the cast list, Playmaker and Ai seem to be chasing after Jin and Lightning which is what I guess leads to the Playmaker vs Bohman rematch since I figure Bohman is trying to stall for time for them to get away and do whatever it is Lightning is trying to do in the preview at the end. Looks like he’s trying to rise someone from the dead or maybe this is a flashback to him giving Bohman new memories once more? He could also be creating more minions to shall for him as he prepares to attack the real world or also be trying to fix up Windy since in the preview, he has seen better days. SOL Technologies people are back (Akira, Blood Shepherd, Hayami, and Go’s goons) and here in this fake Cyberse World to destroy some Ignises from what we see of BS in the preview with him destroying copies of Bit and Boot. No Emma or Aoi (is anyone surprised at this point though?) so who knows if we actually are going to find out what happened with that stand off between BS and Ghost Girl. No Go either so I really want to know now what kind of special mission he is on if it is more important then this mess right now. Faust and Baira aren’t speaking so I wonder what happened to them? Kusanagi is more then likely going to be losing his mind in the real world over the whole Jin situation so that just leaves Soulburner, Flame, Revolver, Spectre, and Dr. Genome speaking. Revolver is probably going to send Spectre and Dr. Genome after Lightning, Jin, and Windy so I wonder if he’s actually going to try and take on Soulburner to try to destroy Flame? Soulburner has to do something during the Playmaker and Bohman duel, same with Revolver, and I don’t see the writers just having them destroying Bit and Boots during this time being. Honestly, I have no idea what’s going to happen at this point. We have a lot of characters in one area so a lot can happen in these upcoming episodes. This is going to get good for us as the viewers, and bad for the characters, is all I can say.

#vrains #vrains spoilers #Thoughts #theories

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skittymon · 7 years ago

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So after some encouragement from twitter, I’ve decided to write down my feelings about the Yusaku/Revolver rivalry, since their second duel is coming up, and I don’t have the highest exceptions in it, except that were bound to learn more about the Lost Incident, and Ignis.

Also to keep it fair I’ll be analyzing the past rivals only up to their second duel, with the exception of GX. That being said let’s dive in.

I’ll be basing rivals and their rivalries based off three points:

1. Their motivation to win.

2. Their effect on the protagonist, or vise versa.

3. Their threat as a rival.

Off the bat Revolver does hold for point three: he’s the leader of a terrorist group, however as a rival Revolver lost most of his treat, at least to me, after losing to Yusaku. Of course other rivals have as well, but I respect them more as a rival and character than Revolver. Let’s go over previous rivals.

To get the easy ones out of the way: Reiji and Kaito.

While both of their first duels against their protagonists ended inclusive, it’s very clear Reiji and Kaito would have both won their duel. Which is amazing considering protagonists is ygo are usually unbeatable. So their threat as a rival stands.

Not only that, their motivation which we learn well before their second duel against the protagonists is phenomenal: Reiji’s discover his father started an interdimensional war and wants to stop it, he’s a rival to Yuya to push him further to evolve him and his dueling so Yuya can become a powerful Lancer. Kaito wants to save his little brother who is suffering and gets off on pain now. He antagonizes Yuma and Astral because they hold the number cards that can save Haruto.

Finally, their effect on the protagonists. After Yuma and Astral’s duel the two are afraid, of losing and disappearing and I’m pretty sure after that Yuma goes to the Duel Temple, I may be mistaken. Yuya, learning other people can use Pendulum Summoning, shuts down once again and it takes a duel with Shuzo to pull out of it.

So both Kaito and Reiji are phenomenal rivals, the best if I might say.

And while both did win their duel against Yuma and Yuya the second time, those duels happen at later points (ep 72 (i think) and ep 51 of Zxl and A5 respectively) which is later than the presumably ep 34-36 range that the second duel of Yusaku and Revolver will take place, so these points were ignored will giving Kaito and Reiji their checks.

Next, Jack, since his first (on screen) duel with Yusei ended inclusive as well. However, according to Jack, Yusei would have won their duel had it continued.

So instead of effecting Yusei, the inclusive duel effects Jack and causes him to struggle and wonder if he is worthy of being King. So their rivalry passes the second check.

Now motivation, Jack’s motivation prior to their first is to find a better life than the shitty one he had in the satellite. He achieves this goal and vows to never look back. But when Yusei, his past, comes after him he strives to beat to prove that he’s better than Yusei, the satellite, that he’s better than garbage. So point one checks.

Point three for all the rivals from now one is gonna be iffy because they lose against the protagonist, and that to me, makes them not a threat. But for Jack, he didn’t technically lose, and as the final boss for the fortune cup and seeing his resolve to beat Yusei makes it hard to willingly want him to lose.

Next we have the interesting case of Manjoume, who sadly has never beaten Judai. Revolver has a good chance of being on this boat too considering than chances of Yusaku losing the duel with everything at stake is slim to none. But what makes Manjoume such a good rival in my book?

Let’s take a look at point two first: effect on protagonist or vise versa. Honestly, to me, Manjoume doesn’t make a difference on Judai, the only ones to do so are Ryou and Edo, but ho boy does Judai make an impact on him.

After losing his credibility from being defeated by a Osiris Red, Manjoume loses practically everything, favor from his teachers, his ‘friends’ and I’m pretty its at this point he loses respect from his brothers. So what does he do? He builds himself back up.

That episode where Manjoume is outside South Academy, looking for cards and climbing to the top has to be my favorite in season 1. Hell Judai was my favorite protag before Yuya came along and damn did I want him to lose so Manjoume’s efforts could pay off - point one checks out.

A well written ‘loser’ who may have never beaten his rival but damn do I want him to. 2/3 points to him, I understand why people would claim Ryou or Edo are Judai’s true rivals.

Finally we have Kaiba and Shark the two who lost their first duel against their rival, but won the rematch.

Now, only Shark actually won out of skill (granted season ones rules are bullshit), but I’m 80% sure Yuma was over confident in that match, I don’t remember. But lets look at the lead up to those duels since that’s where we are in Vr.

I’m gonna be honest and say I hated Kaiba for the longest time. He’s an asshole and at like six years old destroying someones property is the worst thing someone can do. But once Mokuba was introduced? I felt bad for the guy. HELL, he had to see Mokuba’s unmoving body - HIS ONLY FAMILY THAT LIKES AND HE GIVES A FLYING FUCK ABOUT.

Sadly I have to leave out the AMAZING second duel of their and what Kaiba does to be fair but I will say that point two checks out with Yugi after that duel.

But what about point three? Kaiba lost to Yugi before. HOWEVER, that won was practically bs as Yugi had managed to summon the one monster that legally causes automatic win, which was now lost. That win had nothing to do with either of their skills, just luck and what cards they happen to have. Without Exodia, Kaiba has a solid chance to defeat Yugi and with the title of World Champion (at least in the dub) Kaiba is very much a real threat. 2/3 points.

Now Shark. Shark is interesting in the fact he doesn’t have a point one at this moment in zxl, thats his entire arc. He doesn’t know what to do with himself so he turns to the thug life. This downward spiral started because he lost to Yuma. And Yuma was able to his journey to becoming a better duelist because of his first duel with Shark. Both influence each other greatly - just in opposite ways. Point two stays.

Now point three is very meh because with Astral’s help, Yuma can win probably easily but at this time in zxl Yuma and Astral relationship is...rocky with Yuma blatantly refusing Astral’s help. But seeing how Shark is even worse off than Yuma his threat as a rival doesn’t stick that well.

1/3 points however that’s intended in the story and Shark turns this around after their second duel.

Now how does Revolver stack up against the previous rivals?

I already stated he doesn’t have a threat as a rival and I mean it. ‘He has a powerful new card!’ Yea okay but....look what happens if Yusaku loses:

-Ema stays dead forever

-A bunch of other people will die

-Yusaku would have failed to protect the LINK VRAINS thus breaking his promise to that little boy and god forbid if a protag can’t keep a promise

-No more speed duels which is the series gimmick

-The actual end of the digital age thus no more duel besides table duels and no will watch episode of that

so I hardly doubt Yusaku will lose with all that’s at stake. At most Yusaku wins and Revolver somehow manages to take Ignis from his somehow.

So...no threat. In verse yes, but people watching? lmao hell no.

Point two, effects on the protagonist or vise versa.

....

I got nothing.

Besides getting information from one another (Yusaku learning more about the Lost Incident and Revolver discovering his one of the six kids) from their first duel to know they haven’t effected each other.

Yusaku didn’t stop the KoH, in fact more hooligans apparently joined based on the Another Incidents. No one in the KoH questioned Revolver’s authority despite losing to the guy who causing them the most problems.

The only thing that might pass is that Yusaku and Ignis’ relationship deepened but consider there’s a good chance Ignis is going to betray him I guess not. Oh and Firewall Dragon showed up, yea (not counting that as influencing since Yusaku could have potentially grab Firewall from any data storm).

So no point two.

Finally point one, what is Revolver’s reason for wanting to beat Yusaku?

Well that’s easy, he wants Ignis!

Why?

Because he’ll destroy the world as we know it!

How?

Uhhhh...

It is really worth putting society back to an era without technology?

Maybe...?

Yes, most likely we’ll learn the answers during the duel but that why I brought ulp the previous rivals. At this point, before any of the other rivals second duel against the protag we have learned:

Kaiba is dueling to save his little brother who’s soul was taken and has seen his lifeless body

Manjoume is dueling to get his respect back after we have seen him fall to the pits and valiantly brought himself back up

Jack is dueling to prove he is King, it’s his destiny, and that he’s more than satellite trash and he won’t go back there.

Shark doesn’t have purpose and Yuma has to throw himself out there to save Shark from ruining his own life.

Kaito is dueling to save his little brother who screams in terror and helps destroy an entire world.

Reiji is dueling to stop his father’s plan and to help bring peace back to the dimensions.

So while Revolver’s motives are noble, there’s not a lot of backbone to them. Does he feel guilty that his father’s project caused this? I know those professor people Faust and Ava did but does he?

I feel like I don’t know Revolver at all. I know about him, but I don’t know any of his emotions and that just makes him feel like a level boss for Yusaku to defeat, not his rival for the show.

So dude, for me of course, gets a soft 1/3.

So year here you go. I hope after this hyped up duel I’ll learn to like Revolver more cause haha he’s kinda disappointing to me atm.

#skitty rambles #vr damn it #sorry but had to get that off my chest #congrats if you read it all and I hope i made sense #and tell me if I made any grammar errors I'm very bad at everything

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entamewitchlulu · 7 years ago

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Final Code

Prompt: Alternate Death

Warnings: Major Character Death (i mean...of course)

Characters: Yuma Tsukumo, Nasch, Astral, Kotori Mizuki, Kaito Tenjo

Summary: canon divergence from episode 143, the final duel between Yuma v. Nasch, in an AU where the Numeron Code accidentally merged with Yuma, and the only way to get it out and use it without killing Yuma was to collect all of the Numbers.Only, they’re going to find out that the final cost of using the Numeron Code is a lot worse than they imagined.

((so this is late and i was gonna like, draw shit for it but i didn’t...this is spoilers for my Zexal longfic but in all honesty i think like three people read that one anyway and most likely everyone will have forgotten by the millennia that i finally go back to finishing it))

He couldn't. He couldn't hold it up anymore. Being one with Astral made it so hard...so hard...to hide things. He didn't want to hide things from Astral but he didn't want Astral to know—not yet. He couldn't....it would hurt...

Astral gasped as the two of them pulled apart, Zexal shattering around them. Yuma dropped lightly to one knee.

“Yuma—why did you undo Zexal??” Astral said, zir voice cracking slightly with uncertainty.

On the other side of the field, Yuma saw Nasch's eyes widen slightly. He was just as shocked as Astral. Kotori gasped from the sidelines, too. Yuma tried to swallow—it was hard around the lump of tears in his throat.

He was scared.

He knew, now, exactly what he had to do. He knew what he had to do—and he would do it. But...

He was so scared....

He forced a faint smile as he wobbled up to his feet.

“That door told me,” he said. “That...that if I accepted it's power, I would lose the thing most important to me.”

Yuma swallowed again—talking was hard, every sound that came out of his throat forced the tears in his eyes a little closer to the surface.

“For so long I thought it must mean one of you guys,” he mumbled. “But...but the thing that's most important to me is...is my self...it's who I am...my kattobing...”

He quickly rubbed a hand under his nose.

“Yuma, what's wrong? What are you talking about?” Astral said, sounding suddenly nervous.

“I think I lost something of myself along the way already,” Yuma said. He had to keep talking, or he wouldn't be able to talk again. “The me that I like—that's the me that never gives up on anyone, that never leaves anyone behind, and for a minute there, I think—I think I almost sacrificed you, Shark...I don't want to do that...I don't ever want to live in a future that had to be taken from the lives of my friends.”

Nasch's eyes narrowed, but it was more from confusion than ire.

“Yuma,” he said. “What are you on about?”

Yuma rubbed at his eyes with the back of his hand. Oh no, oh no, he really was going to cry...he wanted to keep his eyes closed, so he wouldn't have to see the three of them all looking at him. Astral with zir wide, worried golden eyes, Nasch's deep blue confusion, Kotori's hazel uncertainty.

“I guess at the end I just want to make sure I say...uh...thank you...Shark.”

Nasch blinked with surprise, his duel disk arm drooping slightly.

“For what?” he said.

“For taking me seriously. For telling me that you understood. Even though we're on different sides, and even though you've known me as that stupid kid who can't stop trusting everyone, you took me seriously as an opponent and faced me head on....and thank you.”

He shook his head quickly.

“And thank you, Kotori, for—for following me all the way out here, so far away from our home.”

Kotori clutched at her breast—the look in her eyes made him think that maybe somehow she already knew what he was about to do, even though there was no way she could.

Then Yuma slowly, slowly swung his eyes up to Astral, met zir eyes, and remembered the tingly feeling of their minds melding together in Zexal, the rightness of it, the wonderful, chilling feeling of meshing together for a few brief moments at a time.

“And thank you, Astral...for...for fighting alongside me, all this time, even when I was really, really dumb.”

Actual fear sparked in Astral's expression, and Yuma felt his head break. He...he didn't want to make Astral look like that.

“Yuma, what are you talking about? Why are you talking like this?” ze asked, voice trembling.

Yuma licked his suddenly dry lips. The world around them was so...cold, and distant. These floating ruins in the vast depths of space felt so alien. He didn't feel at home. He...he missed Heartland, with all its gaudy colors and glowing lights and its warm homes...

He lifted his hand to his chest, touching softly over his heart.

“The Code is almost done,” he said. “We...we all knew it was gonna come down to this, right...? It wasn't just me?”

Astral jolted. Ze zipped forward, trying to grab for Yuma's shoulder.

“Yuma, no,” ze said frantically. “Once we win—once we obtain all the Numbers—their power should be enough to extract the Code from your soul safely. That's what we're doing. You don't have to—you don't have to act like you're about to die—”

Yuma smiled, but even he could tell it was strained and trembling.

“That's not what the Numbers are for,” he said. “It's not what they were ever for—you know that, right, Astral? Shark? The Numbers aren't just power...they're...”

“They're a blueprint,” Nasch said suddenly, his voice cracking. “Oh—oh gods. Yuma, you're not—”

“I have half of them right now,” Yuma said quickly. “And once I have the other half of the Numbers, the blueprint will be finished, and I'll know—I'll know how the universe is actually supposed to fit together, and I can fix it, and everything will be okay again—”

“Yuma, no,” Nasch said, his voice actually leaping with fear. “Yuma, you're—you're planning on using it, you're planning on—if you do that, if you fix the entire universe like that, you won't even be you, anymore, you can't do this—”

“The Astral and Barian Worlds were never supposed to be separate,” Yuma said. “Maybe that's why I became friends with both of you—isn't that kinda funny? I started on the road to being friends with the both of you on the same day...”

He sucked in a breath.

“I activate the effect of Sylphid Wing—I can change it into one of Utopia's overlay units, and then I use it to negate my Double Up Chance attack.”

“Astral, stop him,” Nasch was shouting. “I can't—if he does that he'll—”

Utopia's attack stopped in midswing, and Nasch might have sworn. Yuma couldn't tell due to the sudden ringing in his ears. He knew before Nasch or Astral made a sound that it was over—he had won. Nasch's card that he had drawn from Draw Reset had to be played, or he would automatically lose...and from the scream in Nasch's voice, whatever he had drawn couldn't react to Yuma's move.

Nasch let out a faint choking sound that might have been a muffled scream.

“I have to activate Glorious Seven,” he said in a choked, angry voice. “I attach the rest of my banished Chaos XYZ Monsters to Barian Hope as overlay units, and increase Barian Hope's attack to 7000—but when the battle phase ends, my life points becomes the change in your life points.”

“My life points didn't change,” Yuma choked.

Nasch's pained eyes looked helplessly at Yuma.

“And mine become zero.”

Yuma closed his eyes.

He felt the Numbers surging towards him before they hit—the pain was intense for a moment, as the cards sank into his skin and melded into the Code trapped in his heart, and he almost screamed. His head was so heavy and thick and dizzy, he could see galaxies swirling in the space behind his eyelids, the entire world vibrated as the Numbers integrated into the Code in his heart, sending him wobbling to his knees.

He heard someone screaming his name. He wasn't sure who—it could have been any of them.

“I'll miss you guys,” he mumbled. “B-bye.”

The Code was completing itself, weaving itself back together—it was fixing the hole left by the tearing apart of Barian and Astral worlds, figuring out how to fix it. Yuma wasn't in the right place, he realized suddenly. He had to...he had to go. He had to follow the map that the Numbers were putting together, so that he could...oh god, it hurt, why did it hurt so much?? He couldn't think, he was being ripped apart—

“Hey...sh...it's okay. I'm here.”

Yuma cracked open his eyes.

There was a hand in front of him—a gentle light surrounded him, and all at once, the pain faded. He felt...calm, and safe...it was kind of like the feeling he remembered from when his mother held him as he fell asleep.

He looked up to find the other end of the hand stretched out to him.

Tenjo Kaito sent Yuma a half smile.

“Hey,” he said. “Long time no see.”

“Kaito,” Yuma breathed. “You're...”

“Dead? Yeah. I might have gotten a little carried away back there.”

He looked different. It was Kaito, but it also...wasn't. He was glowing—or maybe it was the world around him that made it look like he was. Both of them were entirely enveloped in a soft, golden light, that somehow wasn't blinding. But if Yuma looked a little too hard at Kaito, or not hard enough, he thought...maybe it wasn't a person standing in front of him...but something with the hint of wings, the faint swish of a tail, the glint of fangs, the swirling of galaxies for pupils...

He took Kaito's hand, and let him help him up.

“Looks like you did it, though,” Kaito said. “I knew you'd make it.”

Yuma tried to hide the fact that he was sniffling.

“Were you waiting?”

Kaito nodded.

“I'm the dragon of light and time,” he said. “That's why I had to go to the moon. Not just to get Numeron Dragon...but to figure out exactly what I was. So I could lead the Code to the end of the universe.”

Yuma looked down.

“I'm sorry,” he mumbled.

Kaito tilted his head.

“What for?”

“You...you died because of me...so that you could do this...”

Kaito actually chuckled softly. There was something so much lighter about this Kaito than the one that Yuma had known as a human. Dragon Kaito was...he didn't have any weight on his shoulders, Yuma thought. He was free and glowing and full of light.

“I didn't really have to die to become the dragon...I just might have...gotten a bit overzealous.”

He smirked at Yuma, nudging him with his elbow.

“Maybe a certain someone was rubbing off on me.”

Yuma covered his mouth against the unbidden snort. But the brief spurt of mirth faded quickly, and he looked down at his feet again.

“Kaito?”

“Yeah?”

“Is it okay...that I'm...scared....?”

For a moment, Kaito did not respond. Then Yuma felt his hands grip Yuma's shoulders lightly, squeezing.

“Of course it is,” he said. “But that's why I'm here. I'm here to guide you to the point where the world can be fixed. And I'll be there every step of the way.”

“Do you think I can do it?”

“Yuma, you are literally the most ridiculous fucking person I have ever met—if anyone can do it, it's you.”

Yuma looked up quickly, and found that Kaito was actually smiling at him. He found himself smiling faintly back. He wiped at his eyes quickly.

“Okay,” he whispered. “I'm ready to go.”

Kaito clapped him lightly on both shoulders, and then extended hand to him. Yuma took his hand, and then, all at once, they were nowhere. Yuma felt the Code in his chest shifting, clicking together, finding the last stray lines of its program while Kaito dragged them between space and time. Light bent around them, and the part of Yuma that was still human and not Code could not comprehend it, could not understand it enough to put any semblance of words to it.

He could feel the tingle of every single star in the universe—he could sense the space between every galaxy, the whisper of every space between dimensions. He could feel the horrible, torn edges of Astral and Barian worlds like an open wound in his own chest.

It was never supposed to be separate.

For just the briefest moment, he remembered everything. The faces of his friends flashed across his mind—everyone he had lost, everyone who had fought and died to make sure that he made it, made it to the point where he could do this—where he could fix the world. They had no idea...they had never known that he would do this.

Shark and Astral's faces lingered the longest before vanishing. Yuma closed his human eyes, and let the Code take over.

Shark....Astral....Kotori....everyone....thank you so much.

I love you all so much...

I hope...I hope this new world is one where all of you can smile and be happy again.

I'll miss you.

Yuma let out one final gasp, felt Kaito's hand slip away, and then the Code began to turn.

And then Tsukumo Yuma ceased existing.

* * *

Nasch of Barian woke up, not on the warm red ground of Barian World, but on the cool clay stones of....Heartland Park.

He shot straight up—and immediately regretted it when his head spun. He gasped at the sudden rush of bile in his throat. That...that wasn't normal for a Barian...h-hang on...

His vision blurred slightly in and out as he stared at his hand. Pale, soft flesh looked back at him. He tried to put on his Barian armor—it was easy, as easy as breathing.

It didn't happen.

W-what? What was happening? And where was he—

The first thing he saw was Heartland Tower, standing tall and untouched. No hint of the Barian World fusion remained. He...he was on the edge of the park. He could see kids running around with Duel Disks, families walking with strollers, businesspeople in suits rushing past without looking. It...it was too normal for a world that had just recently died...

“Nasch—Shark.”

Nasch jerked his head up to find wide, golden eyes staring down at him. Astral hovered above him looking for all the world like ze had just seen a ghost. Was...was ze crying?

“He's gone,” Astral said, zir voice breaking. “Shark—he's gone.”

For a moment, Nasch had no idea what ze was talking about.

And then he remembered. The light, enveloping Yuma. The world breaking apart around them as the entire universe briefly disintegrated, pulled apart before snapping back together.

“I can feel it, the Astral and Barian Worlds—they reformed,” Astral was saying as Nasch's head spun. “There's only one world now, they came back together. H-he fixed it. H-he actually fixed it but he's...he's...”

Astral couldn't finish the sentence, wobbling in midair as zir voice broke into a faint, moaning keen.

Nasch felt tears bubbling into his own eyes. He pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes. It wasn't real, right? He was going to open his eyes, and Yuma was going to be grinning down at him. He wouldn't have rebuilt a world where he didn't exist, would he have?

Did he have a choice?

It shouldn't hurt this badly...oh gods, it shouldn't hurt this badly.

He broke down anyway.

Tsukumo Yuma was gone.

#zexalmonth #yuma tsukumo #ryoga kamishiro #nasch #kaito tenjo #astral #kotori mizuki #yugioh zexal #lulu writes

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