The silver gates opened and gave off a scent of raging heat. Iron chains dangled above the ceiling and dripped oil to the floor. In every corner of the room were statues that emitted flames into the air. They came in various forms, from dragons to witches to robots. However, it could all be just his perception. Ever since his feet stepped into the Trial Chamber, a creepy sensation had already poisoned his head.
Even so, Rei strode forward until his feet climbed the steps that led him to a field the size of futsal. The field wasn’t dotted with grass, but barren soil. Even his nostrils could feel how dry it was. He looked this way and that, yet he couldn't find anyone who would be his opponent.
"Where's my opponent?” he asked, “and where's the table? At least, can you give me a chair?"
“Calm down, Rei,” the small robot who couldn't climb the stairs, replied. “You have no need for a table or chair. Anyway, why don't you use this opportunity to learn your own deck first?”
“Well … you’re right,” Rei tapped his bracelet. “There is something that I couldn’t understand with the deck anyway.”
What he meant were three types of decks that have separate panels. The Main Deck, Coalition Deck, and Extra Deck.
His main deck only contains 20 out of 60, while the Coalition Deck and Extra Deck remained empty. Is it possible that only one-third of the maximum capacity of Main Deck can be used to play?
He scratched his chin and asked. The robot immediately gave him a reply.
"Take it easy. The early game doesn't need more cards than that."
He nodded. It was quite reasonable for a tutorial play with a low amount of cards. It should be an easy play for any first timer, shouldn't it?
He reviewed his deck again. The Units, the Spells, and lastly, the Protocol Card.
“Do I have a guide to play the game?” He asked again. It should be the first question he asks before anything else. What a dummy.
A noise sounded, with a little shrill, and then a question mark appeared on its monitor. “Weird. I thought you already knew about the rules?”
Huh? Hello? This is my first time here, why should I know about the rules? I have quite experience with a few card game rules, but not this one, metal brain. Rei didn’t speak it out loud, but it was painted on his face.
"Alright. I will provide you with the instructions."
He stepped down until he stood in front of the robot. It pulled out the cable from its body and plugged into Rei’s bracelet. His vision glitched for a few seconds then a new window displayed.
He was still not used to his vision, though.
“You can read all the rules now,” The robot explained while moving to the sidelines. “Because you have no time to spare, just read the important part about Deploy Limit, Deploy Method, and how you need to use spell and protocol cards. Anyway, use your time wisely."
He headed back. “Let's see what I got here.…”
Rei read the manual from the cover. Jumping around the chapters until he arrived at the point which the robot suggested reading. Of course, he didn’t read all those lousy explanations. Just the important part.
Firstly, the Deploy Limit: A rule to limit the player's ability to summon units in one turn. Any player who got the first turn was able to deploy 3 units. At the next turn, the other player was allowed to deploy 5 units at max. The count increased by 2 for each turn that passed and the final limit was 10/10.
1st turn: 3/3
2nd turn: 5/5
3rd turn: 7/7
4th turn: 9/9
5th turn or more: 10/10
Secondly, the unit classes. Each unit had its own class. Guardian, Attacker, Battler, Leader, Neutral, and Support. Each class had an effect that the other classes didn’t have.
For example: A guardian class: This class had two different effects and each guardian unit only had one of them.
- No damage received or dealt during the battle phase while involving this unit. Or,
- Discard this card, negate any battle damage from opponent units.
He read all the other class effects, and then went to the next part.
Thirdly, the Deploy Method. It was what they called a summoning method. A way to play a unit. In most cases, you couldn’t win the game without any unit on your field.
There were 4 types of Deployment.
- Deploy, when a player plays a unit from hand.
- Call, when a player plays a unit from the Main Deck.
- Revive, when a player plays a unit from Grave Zone.
- And lastly–
“Hei! Are you done? HEI! HEI! DON’T IGNORE ME PLEASE!!!”
A loud shout echoed through the air, distracting his attention. At the far end of the opposite side was a man who kept shouting while posing like a world-class coach. A young man with a mohawk, black skin and dressed like someone from a cyberpunk city.
“Hoi! Are you done whispering to yourself? Let’s duel, Handsome Boy!” He continued, somehow that guy’s body was emitting positive vibes through the air. So dazzling.
From his height and behavior, Rei was sure that he was a boy around his age. But, it was rude to judge a person's age just from their appearance.
“How old are you?” He asked spontaneously.
“...Huh? What does my age have to do with this trial?” The new guy frowned. “You should ask my name first before asking my age! What a rude guy!”
He was right.
“Ah, sorry,” Rei lowered his head, just like how his Mom taught him since childhood. “My name is Rei. What is your name?”
The black boy folded his hand for a moment and exhaled a long breath. “Morgan. The Great Morgan!” And raised his voice for no reason. “You should remember my name because I will top the world!”
Does this guy have some kind of delusion? I hope not.
Wait … I think this is a good chance. This is the first time I met a human that actually speaks to me here. If I really want to make sure that I was in a virtual game or not, maybe the Great Morgan is the key I need.
“Before we play this game, may I know where you come from?” Rei asked.
“Huh? Why are you asking another unnecessary question?” He touched his chin for a moment and leaked a ‘hmmm’ sound from his mouth, “I forgot.”
“Huh?”
“What? Do you think I lied to you or something? Hell no! I always speak the truth here!”
Rei scratched his cheek softly. “Don't tell me … you got amnesia?”
Sweat beaded on Morgan’s forehead. “Kinda. It’s not like I forget my own name or something.” Then, he stared off into the distance and whistled.
Rei’s eyes widened, his jaw almost dropped. He and Morgan apparently had the same problem. They had amnesia for unknown reasons. It couldn't have been a coincidence.
“Can I ask you another question?”
“Hell no.”
“Okay … do you ever know a continent named Africa?”
“Just like I said, I will not answer your question. Just get ready to duel, please!”
“If you don’t want to answer it, I will surrender this duel.” Rei took a u-turn and descended to the first step.
“W-wait! What the hell are you thinking? Surrendering without a fight isn’t cool, mate!”
He turned his head and showed a sneaky smile, “You know, I don't really care about this game after all.”
Morgan leaned forward, swinging his hand like a fist while raising his voice. “Stop joking around, mate! You cannot get out of this floor without winning this duel!”
That shout stopped his legs immediately. Actually, Not the shout, it was the content. He said the same thing as his little robot had told him earlier.
Why is the duel a requirement to be able to leave this place?
Still, that wasn't enough to stop Rei. “I can wait for another duel,” he said.
Morgan clenched his fist, ready to shout again. Then he stopped.
“Okay, you win the bet. I will answer any damn question after we finish our duel. How about it?”
Rei beamed, “Deal.”
His objective was achieved--to prove Morgan was a real human or just a random NPC in this game. From the response, he became convinced that Morgan was a real person just like him.
While he was so happy with the result, suddenly a new window appeared. To be precise, it was shown to both of them.
[Both Duelists agreed to duel.]
[Preparing the duel field…completed]
[Registering Morgan’s Deck…completed]
[Registering Rei’s Deck…completed]
………
[Transforming the field … in progress]
The barren field in front of them glowed immediately. The blue-colored light formed a border, traveling across until it formed a pattern of separate zones. The inner half of the zone became the Unit Zone and the other half became the Spell Zone. To the left of the Spell Zone, the Protocol Zone was formed.
Each Duelist possessed half of the field.
The Unit Zone was divided into a Combat Zone and Support Zone. The Combat Zone had three unit slots and the support had only two. While the Spell Zone had three slots and Protocol Zone had one expandable slot.
In a matter of seconds, the barren field was transformed into a high-end card game board. With various effects of light, fire, water and wind that seemed to come to life.
Rei took a step forward and touched the ground. There was no more soil left, and now it was filled with lush grass. He could feel the moisture of the grass swaying in the breeze. The same goes for the fire burning at the edge of the duel field, he felt the heat.
This experience made his initial speculation where he existed inside a gaming ecosystem, now falter.
[Transforming The Duel Field … completed]
Rei took a step back into his initial position, facing Morgan with a calm expression. A blue light emanated from the bracelet and penetrated into his vein. He could feel the light moving like a worm but he didn't feel any pain. Instead, he felt great.
As the light disappeared, a new bracelet materialized around his left wrist. It was shaped like a duel disk with a deck of cards already perched on it. How this happened, Rei didn’t fully understand. If he sought a similar example, then Iron Man’s nano suit technology came to his mind. Like magic, creating something instantly.
Another screen appeared along with the basic instructions.
[LP 5000 AEGIS 2]
[First turn given to Rei]
[First Player needs to say "DUEL"]
[The Second player needs to say "ENGAGE"]
In the left side of the instruction notice, a new, blank screen popped up with the hand symbol on its background. It was then filled with five cards which came up in sequence. These must be the cards in my hand, he guessed.
The instructions were simple and clear, but he felt quite embarrassed if he had to say something like that outright.
"Say it quickly! I'm going to win this duel," Morgan wiped his nose. "And I'll answer all the questions you have."
If I may, I want to give up. But that was an impossible scenario right now. There are things I couldn't understand, but one thing is certain. Losing here would lead me down to the wrong track. In the worst outcome, I would lose my chance to know everything.
Rei took a deep breath and said in a tiny voice, “Duel–”
“ENGAGE!!” And Morgan followed with a shout. "Hurry up and end your turn!"
Rei’s face dulled when he witnessed Morgan’s excessive self-confidence. He decided to ignore it and focus on himself.
Just like the most trading card game rules, the first player couldn’t draw a card in their Draw Phase. Instead, they went into the Standby Phase and to the Main Phase.
In the Main Phase, players were able to deploy or play units depending on their Deploy Limit. As the first turn, Rei’s deploy limit was 3. So he was able to play 3 units during his turn.
However, there was something different with these rules.
As the system displayed his starting hand, he got himself three unknown cards. He was sure it wasn't in his deck before.
Then, it must be the Master Spell, he thought.
He read about it, but only a little. Because when he looked for it, he didn't find it in either the Main Deck, Coalition Deck, or Extra Deck.
After all, the Master Spell(s) wasn’t included in any deck; it was part of the system itself.
Here, as the first move, Rei decided to use a Master Spell Card from the list.
“I activated Master Spell - Plazma Burst!” At once, Bluish light particles appeared in his palm and formed a small gun. Not the regular handgun you found in the gun shop, it was shaped like a gun made of Lego, a square-shaped gun with a metallic black color.
The moment he gripped the gun, he dropped it. “Wait wait wait wait! Is this a real gun?” He was startled, it weighed more than any airsoft gun he had ever held before.
“Yes,” the robot answered without a beat, “But, don't worry. No one can actually die with that gun in the trial duel.”
“Wait? So it is a real gun but it can’t kill people?”
“Yes.”
Rei kneaded his head and sighed. “Okay. You really know how to make a joke and I should never take yours seriously.”
He picked his ‘Plazma Gun’ and pointed its muzzle at Morgan. His index finger trembled when touched the trigger. He knew. Nothing would begin if he stepped down now.
Rei caught his breath and pulled the trigger.
A distinct charging sound was heard. The muzzle opened and emitted a bright, intense glow, and a loud sound. The next moment, a burst of superheated plasma pierced the air. Its recoil kicked his hand back, dislocated his shoulder joint. Before he could wink his eyes or groan about his shoulder, a blazing destruction took place where Morgan stood, leaving no trace behind except a trail of long burning crater and a thick layer of smoke.
Rei’s eyes throbbed, his face turned pale.
