Ya know, sometimes the best offense is a solid defense. Monsters that have trap effects are worth their weight in gold. However, these cards are difficult to come by and are only seen in the hands of high-level duelists. I knew a lad who mortgaged his house to buy one. Sadly, he was stabbed to death in the parking lot during the transaction. Duelists are a wild lot.

  -Friedrich Fischer Chancellor of the Duelist Academy

  Cyrus

  Cyrus sat at a booth in his father’s game shop shuffling a deck of cards while doing a few card tricks in between shuffles. The shop had a large amount of common and uncommon cards. While the rare cards were stored behind glass, the few epic cards remained stored in a vault hidden inside the back room. One of the epic cards would pay rent for half a year if sold at a fair price. However, buyers for physical cards were hard to come by. As for legendary cards—Cyrus never saw any. He only heard about them from others but even world champion duelists couldn’t get ahold of legendary cards. Like a deity, most didn’t believe they existed. And the ones that did believe wouldn’t give any proof. Cyrus was agnostic about whether these legendary cards were real. He believed that if they did it would most likely be in The Grid.

  Bowie organized various games and merchandise on the shelves of the barely surviving store.

  “Late customer again? Remember they are on your time right now Cyrus,” Bowie always knew best.

  “I guess. You know we have room in the shop to set up a few VR booths to get more customers in here,” Cyrus always tried to talk business with his father. VR booths were a cheap option for people who traveled a lot and wanted access to good internet and privacy for Grid activities. Every business had them, except for Bowies Game Shop.

  Bowie sighed ignoring his son’s comment and continued to meticulously organize cards by rarity first, then by alphabetical order. Cyrus never understood his father’s resistance to VR technology—after all his father was a five-time world champion duelist. He thought his dad was a hypocrite because his father dueled in the early iterations of the VR movement.

  Cyrus never got his father to talk about it, but he saw the live feeds from all the old championships. Watching his father win his first championship made Cyrus both proud and angry. Proud of his father’s talent and angry because Cyrus knew he was in The Grid. Cyrus was in a perpetual state of not knowing what could have happened if his father would simply just let him duel in the Grid—the chance to climb the ladder was all Cyrus ever wanted.

  For Cyrus, the only answer was the Dueling Academy. He needed to get accepted into the school—It was his dream—his only chance to be a professional duelist. Harlow got accepted and he didn’t even play the game nearly as much as Cyrus. He thought it was unfair and the world was cruel, at least it would be if he wasn’t accepted into the academy.

  Cyrus looked at his reflection in the window. He was young and had masculine features. With bright red spiky medium length hair, passed down from his mother. Cyrus stared back at himself. Some days he didn’t even recognize the person who looked back at him. He had bright blue eyes and was scrawny for a sixteen-year-old.

  This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  The doorbell rang as the door flew open chaotically.

  “Welcome to Bowies, we have cards and more how may I help you?” Bowie sounded off in a robotic tone.

  “I’m sorry, I’m so late. Am I too late?” A panicked voice blurted out.

  “It’s alright, you’re Tera, right?” Cyrus did not care he was giving a dueling lesson or that Tera was late for her lesson.

  “Yup, that’s me!” Tera held her deck up proudly in excitement.

  “We can begin if you are ready. Have you ever played?” Cyrus questioned.

  “Nope, I am here to learn,” Tera had a fun sense of excitement about her. Cyrus thought it was crazy that someone who was his age never played Emblem Duel before. Then again, people that looked like Tera didn’t play Emblem Duel. He stared back at the beautiful blonde girl who had emerald eyes. Cyrus thought he could stay lost in them forever.

  “Hey you alright?” Tera asked.

  “Oh yeah, right the dueling lesson,” Cyrus nervously laughed. Tera smiled back at him cheerfully.

  “So, let’s look at a card composition first.” Cyrus launched into his beginner speech.

  [Time Mage]

  [Class: Wizard]

  [Level 8 Epic Guardian]

  [Power Rating: 0]

  [Defense Rating: 2500]

  [Intellect: 8]

  [Conditional Summon: Must perform a Rite on three monsters equal to or greater than level 8.]

  [Card Effect: When Time Mage is summoned into any battle zone flip a coin. If heads all monsters on the field of play reduce their power and defense rating to 0. If tails the user is forced to give their opponent an emblem from the lane the Time Mage occupies, then move Time Mage to another lane with an active Emblem.]

  “This is my guardian the Time Mage. Every deck has a unique guardian. They are powerful cards that, when summoned at the right time, can change the course of a duel. Guardians stay in your Sideboard and can be summoned at any time you meet the Conditional Summon. Does that make sense?”

  “Um, I think so. I will let you talk and ask any questions if I have them.”

  “The level of the monster is the cost it takes to get a monster summoned on the battle zone. A level one monster does not have any cost to summon but level two and above requires a cost. The card also tells you the rarity and card type which is important. Next, we have the power rating, this is how powerful an attack is on another monster. The defense rating is how tough the monster is. Now, the intellect does a few things. It represents how smart the monster is. It determines your hand size if the card is a Guardian and determines how many equipment cards can be played on monster cards. My Time Mage gives me eight cards in my hand, and it can have eight different equipment cards that can be played onto it. Now, remember that Conditional Summons trump the Level Summon cards have; however, only high-powered cards have Conditional Summons with a few exceptions, remember to always read your cards.”

  “Woah that’s a lot,” Tera was processing all the information presented to her.

  “The last thing is the card effect. Some monsters have them while others don’t. Always read them because they affect the game in various ways. My Time Mage forces me to flip a coin. The effect is powerful but risky.”

  “Monsters level two and above have a cost to summon, what is it? Also, I read your Time Mage and what is a Rite? Tera asked.

  “Oh, sorry about that. Yes, the cost is the levels from other monsters out on the field. For example, you have a level-four monster in your hand you want to summon; However, you have two level-two monsters on the field. You can pay the level cost of both monsters to summon the level-four monster onto the field, and both monsters you sacrificed go back to the bottom of your main deck. This is what a Rite is called. It’s a ritual that involves sacrificing your monsters to get more powerful ones onto the field.”

  “Ok, I think I am ready to set the game up,” Tera wanted to be a true duelist.

  Trevor S Wells