#probably doing Duel Monster next

[wisyhana]

I was thinking on a way to share my thoughts on 5ds without ranting too much about it, but also thinking on a way to use the prompts for other yugioh shows, so here's my attempt number 1:

1. Favorite character over all.

Carly Nagisa. Want me a girlfriend like her.

2. Favorite male character.

Jack Atlas and Bruno. I really wanted to see them interacting more, they're pretty funny.

3. Favorite female character.

CARLY NAGISA OF COURSE.

4. The character you dislike the most.

Crow, but his deck is pretty I guess.

5. A character that looked annoying at first but turned out to be likeable.

Jaeger lol! I like the monkey sounds he makes.

6. Which character looked promising but didn't make it through?

Izayoi Aki 😢 she was the shit and they should have appreciated her more.

7. In your opinion, does the protagonist hold the show?

Objectively he does, Yusei is decent as character himself but it's a little too much on how he has to handle EVERYTHING. But that's the curse of the shonen protagonist I guess.

8. Favorite ship.

Scoopshipping, Omenshipping and Toolshipping.

9. Duelist/deck you felt more interesting.

Aki's and Carly's. Aki's strategy were so fun and interesting to watch.

10. The duel you had more fun watching.

Jack vs Carly for sure, the Fortune Ladies ready to kick Jack's ass and Jack confession were brilliant.

11. Favorite monster card.

Silly boi Dark Resonator.

12. Favorite dragon card.

My ass to Red Nova Dragon.

13. 5ds only. Favorite D-Wheel design.

Wheel of Fortune baby.

14. Favorite arc.

Dark Signer FOR SURE.

15. Least favorite arc.

Grand Prix can kiss my ass.

16. Favorite scene.

sobs profusely

17. Favorite character arc.

I'll say Jack but only to the Dark Signer arc.

18. A character that definitely needed their own arc.

Despite being the protagonist you don't see a lot of development on Yusei. He has a deep burden and there is absolute zero work on that.

19. A character that didn't need an episode about themselves.

Did we really need to see the backstory of Jaeger, the team Taiyou and Ragnarok?

20. From 1 to 10, what score do you give to the show over all?

siiiighh a 6.

[shanastoryteller]

Happy Holidays! I hope yours are peaceful and joyous.

I would do dastardly things for more identity/porn/gender-is-a-side-dish WWX like the Lady MO story (omg or time travel!!!), but I also love love love your story about Zag and the Prince's court and him helping people 😍 (living blood?). And I also want to read more of FMA Ed in the desert evacuating people (?) and Roy expecting him to be a monster. Ugh and I was just going back through your masterlist and forgot about the series about Godric, but I can't find the name and don't want to run out of time!!! If the untamed still sparks joy, I would love to read a continuation of one of those stories!! If not... dealers choice? Thank you so much for sharing your writing with us!

a continuation of 1 2 3 4

Salazar hasn't had much interaction with the Ravenclaws. His father considers them to be old fashioned, which is the nicest way he's ever called someone poor. Salazar doesn't think the family is particularly poor, even for their status, except perhaps in relation to the level of wealth that marrying his mother gave his father access to.

Or it could be the way certain members of that family never seem to quite manage to give his mother the respect she deserves. Salazar isn't particularly inclined to judge the lot of them based on the actions of a few, but that's not a trait that he got from either of his parents.

Rowena could go either way, considering she's burst down their door and is looking to curse his best friend inside out for the great sin of giving in to his mother's desire to arrange his marriage.

As if he could have stopped her. Salazar wouldn't cross Lady Gryffindor for all the gold in his vault. Godric does it occasionally, as he is the favored son, but certainly not over something like his marriage.

He can tell by Helga's grin that she's far less wary of Rowena, but that's probably because she's delighted when someone manages to take Godric down in a fight. She's disinclined to do it herself unless he really irritates her - beating respect into him is apparently not sustainable.

Personally, Salazar has found it the quickest way to get Godric's head of his ass, but playing mediator between Godric and Helga just ends up with the both of them pissed at him. He's learned to leave them to it.

"Slytherin," Rowena says slowly and Salazar tenses, readying himself for a comment about his father and his choices, then she says, "You've been traveling with him. You know where he is then?"

If anything, Godric's been traveling with him. There are idiots looking to die on his friend's sword everywhere and the books he and Helga are hunting down are significantly harder to find.

"He's at the tournament now," Helga says. Salazar rolls his eyes. "You can probably petition to swap in for his next opponent if you have a personal grievance."

Rowena's eyes narrow. At him, for some reason, even though he hasn't even said anything. "I thought you were his second?"

"I am," he says, then waits for the comment about his scholarly reputation and lack of public duels.

"He's at the tournament," she says slowly, "and you're here."

Salazar tries to think of a way to put this delicately.

"Have you seen the idiots that live around here?" Helga scoffs. "He's not going to need a second. Frankly, he could win with only using his wand or his sword. Subjecting them to both almost seems cruel."

Ah, Helga. A lack of growing up among nobility has left her with all the subtlety of a curse between the eyes.

He wishes he didn't find it endearing, but he wouldn't get along so well with Godric or Helga otherwise.

[thezoraprince]

Little Accidents - Link (BotW/TotK) x reader

“Hi! I was wondering if I could request Link (and Sidon too if you get the chance, separately) x reader where he accidentally hurts them. Like they’re fighting a monster and reader gets too close and he accidentally hits them with his sword or something. The boys would feel Sooo bad and probably be crying their poor eyes out more than the reader😭” - anon

both of these boys would be a mess, for SURE!!! Link would be so overwhelmed with guilt, and Sidon would be sobbing for well over a year.

i amy work on Sidon at a later date, but i HAD to write one for Link!! i don't get enough Link requests, so i was so excited to for this one!

i hope you enjoy!! <3

it’s a training day

you find yourselves just outside the home in Hateno

Link has taken it upon himself to help you master your sword skills

I mean, would he really let anyone else do it?

you both pick your swords

and then it’s time 

he wants to go easy on you, but he knows you’re more skilled than you let on

he’s watched you fight before, and let’s just say you always impress him

the duel goes on

you block his every move with ease

it’s almost like you know his next move, as if you yourself choreographed this graceful dance

but in a twist of events, you step back and lose your balance, dropping your weapon… just as Link lunges forward

his sword slices your palm, and you gasp involuntarily

blood pours from your hand and onto your clothes

Link sword falls to the ground with a thud as he rushes to you 

he quickly takes you to inside and sits you down at the table, not caring if blood stains the freshly washed tablecloth

it’s odd to see him this frantic, running around the home grabbing bandages and other medical supplies

he cleans your wound and begins to wrap it tightly

his eyes won’t meet yours

he’s scared; ashamed

“Link, it’s okay. It was an accident.”

after he’s finished wrapping your hand, he pulls you close

and once he has you in his arms, his emotions come in like a tidal wave

his grip is tight around you, scared to let you go

you try to reassure him that it’s okay

but he hurt you

and that hurt him

even if it was an accident

he manages to pull you closer, tears welling in his eyes as he nuzzles his face into the crook of your neck

you can feel his heart racing as he sobs

after a bit, you both walk up the stairs and lay down on the bed

he’s still holding you as close as he can

and he never wants to let you go 

[linkspooky]

DUEL VS. DUEL: Yubel and Judai vs Ai and Playmaker

If you haven't noticed YGO! often recycles different characters and plot ideas throughout its various spinoffs. There's usually a rival whose ace monster is a dragon, a best friend character to support the main character, there's almost always a guy like Bakura who has several things wrong with him. This isn't a criticism, I actually love the way that each spinoff builds off of all the other series while also remaining its own thing. There's a lot of meaning you can decipher from analyzing the intentional callbacks the authors put in to previous series so that's what we're going to do today.

Both GX and Vrains feature a third season where the protagonist's partner character becomes the main antagonist for the entire season, and manages to pick off the protagonist's friends one by one until they're all alone with the protag for the final duel. Both of these characters, Yubel and Ai aren't motivated by hate but rather a twisted form of love and the parallels between these two duels don't stop there.

Yubel and Yusaku: Love vs. Ai

The partner character appears in almost every YGO! series with the exception of 5DS and Sevens. It began with Yami Yugi, a second personality created inside Yugi who played took over and played games in Yugi's place and cursed everyone who offended him only to eventually build a partnership with Yugi that lasted for most of the series until Atem reclaimed his name and memories and became his own person again.

These partner characters usually assist in duels, and are either another personality existing inside the protagonist, or if they're external like Astral or Ai they still share a special link with the protagonist.

Yubel and Ai are unique because they are both partner characters who turn into major antagonists. They don't just share the role of antagonists there's also several similarities between the two of them, from motivation, their connection to the protagonist, and both characters being built around the concept of love. This is probably intentional because the scenario writer for all of Vrains also worked on large parts of GX and was the main scenario writer for Season 4.

To introduce both characters, Yubel is a Duel Spirit. They were originally a human child named Yubel who was the closest friend of the boy who would eventually grow up to be the Supreme King and reincarnate in the modern day as Judai Yuki. Yubel gave up their humanity and in a painful surgery became a hideous dragon with an impenetrable body in order to protect Judai.

Afterwards the boy who would eventually become the Supreme King swore eternal love to Yubel. Yubel's devotion followed Judai into the next life, where because Yubel gave up their humanity they reincarnated as a card spirit instead that only Judai could see. They used their considerable power to protect Judai from anyone they considered a threat, including other neighborhood kids who beat him in card games. Judai as a result became completely isolated. Which Yubel didn't mind because Judai was their entire world and they believed they should have been enough for Judai.

Judai decided to send Yubel's card away into space in the hopes that the space rays would calm Yubel's troubled soul, but instead Yubel became corrupted by a cosmic force known as THE LIGHT OF DESTRUCTION. Yubel endured ten years of torture and agony all along. At first they called out to Judai in his dreams, but his parents eventually forced Judai to go through a procedure that made him forget all memories of Yubel.

Alone and forgotten Yubel crashes down to earth and is torn to pieces. As an arm they parasitize several people until they gain enough power to reconstitute their body, and then dragon Judai and all his friends into another dimmension all as a part of their grand scheme to finally reunite with Judai and awaken his memories of the Supreme King.

Even though they were hurt by Judai, Yubel isn't motivated by revenge, but by love and a desire to be together with Judai and secure all of Judai's love for themselves. Yubel's twisted definition of love was formed when after crying for help one final time, they snapped and told themselves a lie in order to keep going. That ignoring Yubel, making them suffer, leaving them all alone it was just the way that Judai expressed his love. Yubel then becomes dedicated to showing that love in return and effectively dragging Judai down to their level.

Yubel: I was suffering as you came to forget about me… Yubel: It burns… It hurts…It’s killing me. But why? I love him so much. Why is Judai treating me like this? Yubel: And then it hit me. This is just a form of Judai’s love. Judai is hurting me and making me suffer because of his love for me. But you see, I couldn’t possibly forget about you in the time i’ve suffered. Yubel: So when I solved the riddle that you posed to me, I was delighted. And that fueled my decision. I would try to fill the entire twelve dimmensions with my love for you. Yubel: And once I did you would have to recognize my love for you, wouldn’t you?

Ai is also a character that's connected to Yusaku's childhood. Ai is an ignis, and artificial intelligence that was created by basically torturing six children by forcing them to duel over and over again and then scanning their brains and modeling six different AI off of the data.

The shadow ignis or AI quite literally came from Yusaku's brain, even though they don't meet until much later on in life. From the onset there's a lot of differences between Ai and Yubel's role as partners. Ai is Yusaku's partner for most of the series, and is effectively introduced as a stranger and has to build a bond fo trust with Yusaku over the first two seasons.

Whereas Yubel was Judai's best friend and favorite monster in childhood, but Judai has forgotten about Yubel in the first two seasons and when Yubel finally does appear again it's as an enemy. The bond between Yusaku and Ai forms and then falls apart, whereas both Yubel and Judai start out with their bond completely broken and over the course of season three they reunite and come back together.

Ai is motivated by first his own survival, and second the survival of all the other ignis who are currently being hunted by several human corporations, a group of hackers known as the knights of Hanoi, and one Ignis themselves known as Lightning who turned traitor to the other Ignis. Yusaki and Ai's shared goal is to find a way for the Ignis and Humans to co-exist without one of them trying to pre-emptively wipe out the other because of the danger both of them pose to each other.

Over the course of the story though, as one by one Ai loses his friends in the fellow Ignis who either die or are absorbed, he comes to obsess over Yusaku as his one remaining friend. Yubel and Judai's feelings for one another are a holdover from a previous lifetime they become estranged and reunite again, whereas Ai comes to love and obsess over Yusaku similiarly to Yubel does and it's precisely because of those obsessive and overprotective feelings he decides to terminate their relationship permanently.

Ai enacts a plan similiar to Yubel's to destroy Yusaku's friends one by one all while threatening the entire world. Yubel sought to fuse the dimmensions together, while AI wants to start the inevitable fight between the Ignis and Humanity on his terms.

While their role in the story and characters are similar, they're also contrasting opposites in many ways. Yubel started out as a human and gave up their humanity to become a duel spirit. Ai started out as an artificial intelligence, he thinks as an artificial intelligence who has trouble understanding humans, and while he becomes more humanlike all the time he's eventually hampered by his inability to think like a human. Yubel is also much older than Ai having lived two lifetimes with memories of both, whereas Ai is essentially a child, a fledgling sentient being who still doesn't understand many things about the world.

Their different levels of maturity really show in their understanding of the world around them, or rather Ai's naivete and lack of understanding. Both characters are built around the concept of love, with love for the protagonist as their main motivation but Yubel while twisted demonstrates a deep understanding of love.

Yubel is able to see inside the hearts of people and uses their intimate knowledge of their inner darkness in order to twist people according to their own desires. Yubel's actually a deeply empathic character able to understand people's feelings sometimes better than they understand themselves, they just use that empathic understanding for evil.

While their understanding of love sounds insane at times they're also able to make deep observations about not only people's relationships to each other but the darker nature of love. As much as we shy away from the idea of hurting the ones we love on purpose, there's a seed of truth in the fact that whether intentionally or unintentionally being close to someone means you will hurt them. That pain is a natural part of love. She's also able to suss out the unhealthy love and devotion shared between Amon and Echo quickly.

Yubel: I get it now… You weren’t in love with Echo. Yubel: No. You may have loved her just enough to clear the conditions in place for you to control Exodia. Yubel: But then, you didn’t truly love each other. Yubel: You were only unfairly hurting her, while you would stay unharmed. Yubel: You wouldn’t suffer. You wouldn’t be in pain.

Yubel also ultimately seeks a love between equals. As much as they frame themselves as Judai's protector, what they want is for Judai to be dragged down to their level so Judai will finally understand them.

Their entire plan revolved around isolating Judai until Judai understood the pain of suffering ten years alone in space that Yubel went through. When Judai snaps and becomes the Supreme King taking a similiar dark turn to Yubel, Yubel turns out to be right in the end. By the time they've reunited both Judai and Yubel have done terrible things and hurt the people they loved.

Yubel: So when I solved the riddle that you posed to me, I was delighted. And that fueled my decision. I would try to fill the entire twelve dimmensions with my love for you. Yubel: And once I did you would have to recognize my love for you, wouldn’t you? Yubel: That is why I sought to fill all those linked to you - your world - with both sadness and anguish. Yubel: ANd my line of thinking wasn’t wrong. Yubel: I mean you are right before my eyes, Judai.

Yubel operates on a principle of empathy and understanding through shared suffering. Whereas, I would argue while Ai cares about Yusaku they are not particularly empathic nor do they understand Yusaku. This is because Ai is practically a newborn existence naive to the world, and also as a computer with a computer brain fundamentally thinks differently.

However, I'd also argue that Ai also doesn't really want to try to change their thinking to bridge the gap between humans an AI. In despair they've completely given up on trying to understand humans. They also on some level don't want to change, because they arrogantly assume they know what's best for both them and Yusaku.

Ai has given into despair from losing their loved ones and suffering isolation just like Yubel, but I think a key difference is that everything Yubel does no matter how twisted is a desperate attempt to reunite with Judai, to understand Judai and be understood by them. Whereas, Ai doesn't want to try anymore.

Ai: Back then I would have done anything to save my friends. Yusaku: There's nothing you could have done there was no other way. AI: I know that. [...] Yusaku: Ai, you have the power to change this. Yusaku: As a special ignis you have the power to live with humans. Find a way to backtrack from this. AI: You trying to pull me back? AI: Thank you Playmaker, but you don't understand. I learned when everyone was gone that when you lose friends your heart breaks. AI: My heart was broken back then and I lost all self control. Yusaku: If losing a friend makes your heart break then are you trying to break my heart?

Not only does Ai not want to understand, but they also deliberately ignore Yusaku's feelings and personal autonomy. Yusaku is a kidnapped child who had a lot of their life robbed from them and manipulated they hate anyone who disrespects their free will but Ai walks all over it and disregards all of Yusaku's opinions. They do the one thing Yusaku asks them not to do, because Ai incorrectly assumes they know best.

They also don't really understand Yusaku on a fundamental level and as I said, they don't want to make the effort to bridge the gap either.

It seems kind of silly saying which one is worse, because both Yubel and Ai violate Judai and Yusaku's personal autonomy multiple times. They both act selfish and entitled towards the person they love. They both also intentionally hurt that person and then turn back around and claim it's protecting them. They both act incredibly possessive and try to manipulate their partner into doing what they want.

They both have the gall afterwards to claim they're doing so out of selfless devotion, downplaying any feelings of selfishness on their end. Both consider Yusaku and Judai's other friends to be targets in order to get at their partners. Both will inflict pain on the person they love and are so devoted to in service of getting what they want.

The only real difference is motivation because as I said, as controlling as Yubel is it's out of a desire to reunite and be equals. They're both in too much pain to express their love in any kind of healthy way, but Yubel at least wants things to be better whereas Ai has just given up. The fact that Yubel's themed around sharing pain too also makes them and Judai equals, whereas Ai is trying to have power over Yusaku and take Yusaku's decisions away in order to force Yusaku to do what he assumes is best.

That might be the most important difference between them. Whereas Yubel wanted to live together with Judai, Ai wanted to force Yusaku to kill him in order to avert a potential future where Yusaku dies trying to protect Ai. It's a motivation that turns one story into a love story, and the other into a tragedy.

Judai and Yusaku: Hero vs Anti-Hero

Judai and Yusaku are two characters who could not look to be any more different at first glance. Though they're both themed around heroism Judai starts as the fun loving kid who admires heroes and is always dueling to save others when his friends are in a fix. Yusaku is the loner anti-hero who is on a revenge quest all alone against the Knights of Hanoi.

Yusaku starts out unwilling to make friends and refusing help from others. Judai on the other hand is constantly surrounded by people. Though both of them are forced into the role of always dueling to protect others and carrying the responsibilies of other people on their shoulder. Often times it's forced upon them unwillingly and they have to take on too much responsibility.

Judai forms unhealthy relationships with people that are based on him always needing to clean up their messes and those same friendships eventually unravel. Whereas Yusaku spends three seasons learning to form healthier relationships with people, and the climax of the first season is even Yusaku developing from dueling for revenge to dueling to save his very first friend in Kogami.

Judai loves dueling and even duels exclusively for the fun of it, often in the first two seasons protecting others and facing the villains as an afterthought. Yusaku on the other hand hates dueling because of the trauma he was forced to undergo as a child and despite being the strongest duelist simply views dueling as a means to an end.

Perhaps the most interesting way to compare them is their opposite journeys. They're both commentaries on heroism. They both eventually gain alter egos that are really just emphasizing different traits of their personalities. The Supreme King is the embodiment of Judai's selfishness and his fixation on always winning and dueling for power. Yusaku is a socially withdrawn kid, and Playmaker his internet identity is the way he fights back against his abusers. He's also a strong willed, determined and active where Yusaku is almost entierly passive. They're both ultimately the same guy though, Supreme King is a part of Judai, Playmaker is Yusaku with more freedom to be himself online.

However, Judai starts out as a straightforward hero and goes on to be a dark deconstruction of the pure hearted hero. All of Judai's flaws that go unaddressed because people constantly put him on a pedestal eventually lead to his ruin. The pressure Judai is always under to win turns into an obsession with power.

Judai: Why? What did I do that was so wrong? I… I did the right thing! And yet… everyone keeps leaving me! What… What is wrong with me? Supreme King: Yuki Judai. To be willing to be evil to defeat evil. This world exemplfiies survival of the fittest. It must be ruled with power. Judai: Power? I don’t have that much power… Supreme King: You hold the Super Polymerization card in your hand. Defeat the spirits that stand against you. Breathe their lives into it and complete that card.

Judai also exists in a narrative that won't allow him to be a hero. GX deconstructs all kinds of heroism and self-sacrifice. Edo Phoenix's quest for revenge is called out as him being childish, and unwilling to grow up from the trauma he suffered as a child. Johan is the most straightforward hero, but his decision to sacrifice himself to protect Judai and everyone else is what starts Judai's breakdown. When Jim duels against the supreme king he declares he's not sacrificing him to save the world but rather trying to help a friend.

Judai's eventual character growth in choosing to fuse with Yubel isn't a sacrifice, but rather Judai finally growing up and taking responsibility for the way he hurt Yubel.

Yusaku on the other hand is on the journey from going from an anti-hero who fights for himself and his own personal revenge to becoming a more straightforward hero. I wouldn't say Yusaku's arc is more shallow in comparison just because it's not a dark deconstruction, rather it's exploring a different topic the responsibilities of being a hero.

His greatest moment of character growth in the first season is going from caring only about revenge, to dueling the pesron who saved him as a child because he wants to save his very first friend.

You could say Yusaku because he's not allowed to crumble is actually under more pressure than Judai is. He's almost forced into the role of a hero and not allowed to be selfish, while Judai from start to finish is a selfish character even if he grows up quite a bit over the course of the story.

Yusaku is also someone who from start to finish follows his own sense of unbending justice. Where, Judai doesn't have any consistent moral code. He's defined in the first two seasons of only dueling for the fun of it, and by Season 3 he's deeply troubled that he doesn't have a reason to duel like Johan does.

Following his own justice is actually deeply important to Yusaku, probably what he values the most actually. Since his life was thrown off by the Lost Incident he starts out deeply untrusting of others and even when he grows past that he hates people who try to influence him and insist they know what's best for him. It's what led him to not only be deeply offended by Zaizen telling Yusaku to back down and let him handle it, but also him refusing Zaizen's help.

This quality of Yusaku's also dovetails into my next point where we finally get to comparing the two duels.

A LOVE STORY vs. A TRAGEDY

The setup for the duel is identical in both cases. Yubel and Ai have eliminated almost all of Judai and Yusaku's friends and now they are on the endgame of their plans. Yusaku and Judai are both dueling against their former partners to stop them, and both partners refuse any attempts to work things out any other way and force a fight.

However, the motivations of each member going into these duels are so opposite that it makes a neat little foiling square.

Starting with Yubel their motivation for getting into the duel is simultaneously a desire to reunite and express their love for Judai, and a thinly veiled cry for help.

Judai: If you hated how I treated you, then you should have gotten revenge on me. Yubel: Hate? Revenge? What are you talking about? Didn't I tell you? I went to this trouble hoping it would make you happy, Judai. Judai: Make me happy? After my friends suffered by getting hurt and killed. Yubel: But that's love isn't it? Yubel: I wanted to torment you to share the depths of my love.

Yubel's plan is to both awaken Judai's memories of the supreme king by engineering his downfall, and also after taking his friends away one by one to fuse the dimmensions together so Judai and Yubel can be together forever with Yubel by his side protecting him. As Yubel defines their entire existence and worth by being Judai's protector and doesn't understand why Judai would ever reject their protection or need friends other than them.

Yubel: My every waking moment was for you. Yubel: I even got rid of everyone around you who tried to make you cry. Judai: Yubel. By doing that you hurt the friends I had around me. Judai: None of my close firends even wanted to duel with me. Yubel: You had me as a close friend, didn't you? All you had to do was focus only on me.

Yubel frames their actions as selfless while also acting out an entitlement that they're owed Judai's love for all of their devotion to him. They're also willing to hurt his closest friends, isolate him, and basically throw tantrums in order to get it.

When they come to the slow realization that Judai won't return their feelings, it leads to them breaking down slowly over the course of the duel. All of the lies they told themselves about the love between them and Judai slowly starts to unravel along with their mind.

The duel beings with Yubel actively enjoying all the pain Judai is inflicting upon them. When Judai activates the supreme king though, and starts dueling seriously to eliminate Yubel, it chips through Yubel's delusions and Yubel is no longer able to keep pretending that pain is love.

I couldn’t have lived with the heartache unless I felt that I was being loved…

Moving on to Ai, the primary difference between Yubel and Ai's motivation is that Yubel's plans are a thinly veiled cry for help while Ai refuses to accept any help.

Yusaku: Find a way to backtrack, Ai! Ai: I can't. Ai: Sorry, but there's no backtracking. Ai: Let's go, Playmaker!

Their desires are opposite too. Yubel's plan is to continue living with Judai, and Ai's plan amounts to forcing Yusaku to kill them.

Ai: If this attack gets through I lose. AI: Well, make up your mind already. AI: You came to get them back, right? AI: You're everyone's hope so you have to do it, even if I'm the opponent.

Yubel and Ai are both incredibly manipulative characters, and Ai in particular is holding all of Yusaku's friends hostage in order to make him do something he does not want to do and will hurt him beyond repair. He's also inflicting the same trauma the loss of all of his friends and the loss of an important friend the same way that Yubel wishes to make Judai suffer the same way they did by isolating them from all of their friends and pushing them off the edge to bring out their darkest emotions.

However, once again Yubel's manipulations are done with the intent of getting Judai to understand them whereas Ai no longer wants to try understanding Yusaku and presumes he knows best.

Ai: Back then I had to do whatever it takes to save my friends. Yusaku: There's nothing you could have done to save them. Ai: I know there wasn't. Yusaku: Ai, that simulation was lightning's trap. He knew if you saw it while in despair your heart would fall into darkness. So don't worry about it. Ai: I considered that possibility. Because he left it after he fought us. AI: So I redid my own simulation and ran it over and over. But the result wouldn't change.

Ai also chooses to trust simulations and the words of his enemy Lightning over the words of his own partner and the urging of Yusaku that they can try to take a third way out together. His basic inability to trust is what damns him, relying on controlling manipulation instead to coerce and eventually force Yusaku to do what he wants and what he has decided is best.

It shows in his plan to, Ai's conditions for the duel is that he'll either copy himself and spread the copies into all of the mass manufactured robots or Yusaku will have to stop him with his own hands at which point Ai's programming is terminated. Either way Ai dies. The only real way for Yusaku to save Ai is to convince him to stop the duel which Ai won't do.

Ai: Oh I didn't tell you. When my copies are created, as the final trigger my free will will be divided and given to them. Yusaku: What will happen to you? AI: My free will will be broken apart. AI: I'll be no more. If you win you'll retrieve everything I took and I'll be no more. Either way, I'll be no more. Yusaku: Ai, you're making me choose how you die?

He's stripped away all of Yusaku's choices. Yubel is stripping away Judai's choices to but once again it's out of a desire to be together with Judai while Ai is doing the opposite forcing Yusaku to be an enemy and end him with his own two hands.

Moving onto the process of the duel itself, the duel begins with both Yusaku and Judai trying to talk their partners down from dueling and finding some other way to settle this.

They fail but for opposite reasons. Judai because his pleas with Yubel are half hearted and done more in the spirit of lip-service. Judai fails because Yubel sees through his half hearted attempts. In their previous duel Yubel calls out the fact that Judai went to the ends of the earth to save Johan, but after subjecting Yubel to years of torture barely lifted a finger to reach out to them.

While Yusaku genuinely shows a desire to solve things with Ai with anything other than dueling, but Ai is the reason they have to fight. Ai is the one who forces Yusaku's hand. While Judai does not understand Yubel and does not empathize, Ai is the one who fails to understand Yusaku and how much pain forcing this conflict on him causes Yusaku. He also doesn't want to understand, while Yubel is at least self-aware of the fact that they are intentionally hurting Judai.

Yusaku's sincerity can be seen in how much he refuses to victim blame Ai, starting right away and continuing through the duel. Repeatedly over and over again Yusaku tries to reassure Ai that the guilt he's experiencing isn't his fault. Whereas, Judai victim blames Yubel continually. Yusaku is a character who values responsibility above all else, while Judai is avoiding personal responsibiltiy even though they're the ones who put Yubel in a situation where they were tortured.

Ai: As you know I got rid of my friends and ended up alone. There were only six of us but we foolishly hated each other. Yusaku: AI that's not your fault. AI: I know but it doesn't matter who's fault it is. I'm earth's last surviving human. And that fact won't change. Playmaker I sort of understand how you felt. Being alone is very painful. Yusaku: [...] I understand your sadness but don't let this fate sweep you away.

Whereas, Judai quickly resorts to victim blaming Yubel pretty quickly.

I made a lot of friends… And they all taught me something… real love is wide enough, large enough and deep enough to fill the universe. Your so-called love is only a conceited delusion.

There's also a distinct difference in both Yusaku and Judai's behavior throughout the duel. Most of the time it's Yubel iniating conversation with Judai because as I said by the time their second duel has started Judai has given up on understanding Yubel and dismisses them as crazy and beyond comprehension. Whereas Yusaku is the one who initiates most of the conversation with Ai.

Moving onto the duel part of duel it's interesting to note how different Yubel and Ai's dueling styles are. Yubel dominates almost any duel they're in. They toy with the likes of Ryo and Amon. Even when Judai duels them to a draw, the duel went exactly as Yubel planned because their true objective was to snatch away super polymerization from Judai's graveyard.

Yubel's boss monster is also unbeatable. It never takes damage, in fact most of the cards in Yubel's various decks don't take damage. Their ace monster for the sacred beast deck is a card that inflicts 10,000 damage once a turn. Advanced Darkness crystal beasts allows them to negate all damage done by sending a card to the graveyard. Even when judai manages to get Yubel off the field it simply upgrades into a stronger form.

Ai on the other hand duels on the ropes and duels very defensively, Yusaku at several points is about to go for game and end the duel in one hit and Ai only manages to barely avoid ending the duel early with a trap card or the like.

Yubel's main strategy is to prolong the duel until Judai is forced to pick Super Polymerization with spell chronicle. They want Judai to choose them and choose staying together with them by spell chronicle. Whereas at multiple points Ai continues to encourage Yusaku to crush them with everything they have.

Once again, one wants empathy, the other disregards Yusaku's will.

Yubel: My suffering becomes your suffering. Yubel: Such empathy... Yubel: Nightmare pain. It has us wrapped in the same anguish, and the same love.

Ai is forcing Yusaku's hand because once again, no matter the result Yusaku kills Ai. On the other hand, Yubel grows increasingly disturbed by Judai's lack of mercy.

Yubel: Oh my, you shouldn't be so heartless my dear judai. Judai: We can't protect what matters to us just by being kind. I'm prepared to fight for the friends I love to the end even if it becomes becoming a demon or the devil.

Judai also quickly abandons heroism for the power of the supreme king, whereas Ai practically forces Yusaku to choose being a hero and saving his friends. Judai prioritizes Johan and then the rest of his friends over Yubel, Yusaku doesn't want to choose and a horrible choice is forced upon him.

Yubel for their part is aware of Judai's hypocrisy, once again they demonstrate a deep understanding of Judai. Whereas, Ai doesn't understand Yusaku one bit, while at the same time claiming to know better.

AI: When it comes to memory and calculations we're far superior to humans. We can figure out humans' faults and contradictions. AI: That's why it's easy to become arrogant. With Ai's with free will it's in their nature. AI: Something awakened within me. They're not evil thoughts. But I wonder, in order for me to live why do I have to adapt to humans. AI: I feel differently from humans.

Ai continually urges Yusaku to choose his friends over him. He forces the choice where there should be done. On the other hand Yubel wants to be chosen over Judai's friends. Out of a sense of entitlement but also a fear of being abandoned again.

Yubel: The camraderie of yours with the neo-spacians will be of no use to you. And my love alone is much stronger. Yet even so you're saying that you'll choose friendships with the neo-spacians over my love. [...] Yubel: Judai so you want to drive me away at any cost. Do you and the neo-spacians find my love to be such a hindrance.

Once again, Ai remarks frequently that the loss of their friends made them give up all hope on continuing. Yubel on the other hand is capable of enduring almost anything. They're defined by their endurance and determination to hold on. When they burn up on re-entry they slowly piece themselves back together. When they're disintegrated after Johan's sacrifice, they take Johan's body and then slowly restore themselves once more. Judai duels them to a draw, that's yubel's plan all along and they take super poly. Judai destroys their boss monster, they just summon another one.

Ai on the other hand fundamentally believes free will in Ai's will lead to conflict and that future is inescapable, so they force Yusaku's hand in ending their existence.

AI: You said humans don't want sudden changes. AI: But I can't help my own changes. I may become someone like Bohman or Lightning so I want to vanish before that happens.

Ai has already reached their breaking point, whereas Yubel is slowly driven to their breaking point by Judai's lack of empathy throughout the duel. Yubel similiarly becomes suicidal like AI, but only after Judai continually insists that they're only dueling to destroy Yubel. Once again, while Ai's plan is to self-terminate for Yusaku's "sake" choosing to die while Judai lives on without them is something Yubel would never do.

At least, they might take a bullet for Judai, but they don't want to be alone and abandoned while Judai goes back to live on happily with all his other friends. Yubel wants to be chosen, Ai wants Yusaku to choose his friends. In fact, it's the idea that Yusaku wouldn't abandon him even if the war against Ai and Humans did happen that drives Ai's decision to die rather than let that happen.

AI: When I lived in the simulation I saw it. What my existence will lead to. You get dragged into it and perish. I can't choose that future.

Once again though, it's a decision Ai makes out of an inability to trust Yusaku. Also, if Yusaku wants to stay by Ai's side in spite of the danger it poses to him, that's Yusaku's choice. Ai may perceive himself as protecting Yusaku, but he's also disrespecting his autonomy.

It's also driven by a lack of understanding of what love and trust are. That's not entirely Ai's fault, he is in fact a newborn who recently lost every single one of his friends due to the conflict between humans and AI. It makes sense he'd have trouble trusting humans even the one that's been by his side all this time.

Whereas, Yubel wants Judai's understanding and breaks down when Judai continually denies it to them.

Yubel: Do you hate me that much? Yubel: I thought of this twelve-dimmension universe as a space for us together... so I tried to fill the universe with my love. But if you're calling on your friends and going to such lengths to get rid of me I no longer need to fill this universe with love. No, I no longer need this world. Let me put an end to this universe, to the void as well, and to our time together. Yubel: It was fun Judai, even those who helped lure you to me had dark, dark hearts. I feasted upon their hearts and waited for the reunion with you, my beloved. Yubel: I even invited you to that first dimmension. Well, I enjoyed that duel as well. Until he interfered. But I suppose you just weren't ready to accept my love back then. Yubel: I mean, the darkness in your heart, the supreme king was lying dormant. Yubel: Though I did have your friends help me. Which pulled out the darkness in your heart and ushered you this far. Yubel: I didn't think you were so hardheaded. You're the one at fault. If you can't grasp my love I don't need you. Or this universe. You can all just vanish into dust.

Judai needs to accept responsibility for both what he did to Yubel, and his own actions for the supreme king and how both him and Yubel can be pushed to do terrible things when they're alone and in pain. Part of the motivation for Judai's demonization of Yubel is he wants to keep playing the hero because the guilt of everything he did as the supreme king is crushing him and making him borderline suicidal.

On the other hand Ai is the one who's given up on trying to understand others. Yusaku is doing the best he can to both balance his feelings for Ai and desire to save him against his responsibility to save his other friends but he can't really be held personally responsible for Ai's actions. Whereas Judai on some level is responsible for Yubel's actions since he created the situation in the first place and continually chooses to abandon Yubel instead of trying to reach out to them.

Yubel is right to an extent that this situation is his fault and he never made any attempts to save them. Whereas, Ai is being manipulative when he forces Yusaku to make the choice to kill him putting all the responsibility on Yusaku's shoulders.

Which is why when the duels end in completely opposite fashions. Judai's way of taking responsibility is to fuse together with Yubel, whereas Yusaku refuses to fuse with Ai.

In Yusaku's case the refusal to fuse isn't turning down Ai's proposed third option, or a peaceful solution to the duel. After all, if Ai called off the duel right there Yusaku would accept it and work to forgive Ai for what he did to his friends. Even if they continue on as individuals it's not like Yusaku would leave Ai's side. In fact his reason for refusing Ai's offer to fuse is that he wants them to remain together as two individuals.

Fusion means two entirely different things in this context. Judai acknowledges there's a risk he may no longer exist after fusing with Yubel but like, they keep going on as two seperate individuals and consciousnesses even when they share the same body. Whereas in Ai's case, fusing with Yusaku would destroy both of them and give birth to a completely new being. Ai is using fusion as yet another method of self destruction, because he doesn't want to change himself and doesn't believe in the capacity to change himself.

Yusaku: Even if we become one, that's not the solution you're seeking. We only have one life. One consciousness. Yusaku: If I fuse, I won't be me and you won't be you.

Ai makes his choice out of his inability to face the future. He wants to self terminate, either by distributing his free will among copies or fusing with Yusaku to become someone else because he doesn't trust in his ability to grow and change. In fact he's avoiding having to change and grow up.

Yusaku: So living is a series of bonds! That's what life is. AI: So I have to do that forever? Yusaku: Yes. AI: That's a lot of work. And you can't do that unless you're strong. Yusaku: That's why people become stronger. And that occasionally leads to conflicts. But even if that happens we have to keep fighting. Keep searching for bonds even if there's no solution. AI: I was thinking too logically like an AI. Yusaku: You can't rush living. AI: But I don't want to keep fighting if there's no solution. Since I've lost the desire to fight I'll just vanish.

You could say that Yusaku's unbending nature and his responsibity as a hero made it so he couldn't fuse with Ai or throw the duel but like, there's only so much Yusaku could have done. He didn't give up trying to convince Ai at any point and it's not fair to put Ai's refusal to give up on their suicide plan on Yusaku.

It's also Ai's decision to activate TA.I. that made them lose the duel, so in the end Ai did self terminate. Even in the Yuma vs. Shark duel where Yuma is a character who will never sacrifice anyone even if the whole world is at stake, and kept throwing the duel and prolonging it to try to convince Shark, Yuma was unable to reach him in time. In both cases it's also Shark's decision to go all out for a final attack, and Yuma's decision to negate his own attack and not attack in the hopes fo reaching Shark that loses Shark the duel.

On the other hand, Judai's decision to fuse is him finally taking responsibility. Ai gave up on trying to change the future and himself whereas Judai's decision to fuse is him growing up from a child to an adult.

I also want to state I don't want to victim blame Ai for being suicidal, and not having the strength to go on. Not everyone does in that kind of situation, it's perfectly human (even though he's a robot).

Ai's story is also meant to be a tragedy. In tragedies characters succumb to their flaws instead of overcoming them. GX and VRAINS' third season are two entirely different genres of story, one is a love story where two traumatized people finally reunite and heal and Vrains is a tragedy where Yusaku can't save Ai.

Even then Vrains doesn't state that Ai doesn't deserve salvation, even if he chose to refuse help and didn't want to be saved. Yusaku's very last actions in the series are diving into the net to search for some remnant of Ai and it's implied after months of searching he's not stopping anytime soon. Even if Ai gave up on himself, Yusaku hasn't given up on Ai.

That's another thing even if Yusaku refused fusion with Ai, he still would have stayed by Ai's side. Ai literally simulated a thousand futures and Yusaku in every one of them stayed by Ai's side even if it led to his death. Yusaku still wishes to be with Ai and searches the net for Ai in the end of Vrains. He calls Ai the best partner even when Ai's in the process of breaking his heart.

So while both of these duels have very different endings, I'd say they both still advocate for forgiveness and love. Both duels are true to the message of YGO! that bonds are the most important thing and what give our life meaning - which I think is beautiful. People cannot live on their own and make bad choices when they're alone, but in the end it's bonds that save us.

"If there's no absolutes then what's left?"

"Bonds. Bonds between individuals. Bonds between one another. That's all there is. That also changes with time. A huge trigger can cause a huge change. Bonds may be severed but new bonds can also be formed. So living is a series of bonds. That's what life is."

Also as a final note on this post I'd like to thank @talaofthevalley their takes on Yusaku are all great and talking about Vrains meta with them really helped writing a lot of this post.

[gx-gameon]

Yugi raises Jaden part 9

Start - previous - next

Yugi and Seto took their places in the royal hall. Atem stood to the side close to where Yugi was. He wasn’t going to miss a moment of this duel.

People had started to gather, thinking Atem was dueling once more. They were excited to see their king and their gods fight once more. Yet when the crowd saw that it was Yugi dueling they started to murmur to each other.

Atem smirked. Soon his people will see the wonder that is his aibou.

They had determined that Yugi would start the duel. “Yugi!” Kaiba called. “Once I defeat you, I’ll beat the Pharaoh. You’ll both get to watch as I finally defeat your precious partner.” If Kaiba was anything it was dramatic.

“I’m not going to lose Kaiba. Not when I have a promise to keep.” Yugi had promise Mokuba and Jaden they would be home soon. And he intended to keep that promise.

“Duel!” They cried together in unison.

“I’ll start.” Yugi looked at the five cards in his hand. His eyes landed on one card in particular and knew exactly what he was going to do. “I set one monster face down, and I set one card face down. That will end my turn.”

“That’s your turn? You must have a pathetic hand.” Kaiba called. “Let me show you how it’s done! I’ll summon my Battle Ox in attack mode, and set two cards face down.” Yugi knew this combo. One of those cards was probably shrink and the other was Kaiba’s Crush Card trap card. He was trying to destroy Yugi’s deck. “Now go Battle Ox attack his face down monster.”

Battle Ox launched itself forward to attack and Yugi smirked as his face down revealed itself. Elemental Hero Clayman appeared, his 2000 defense easily blocking Axe Raiders 1700 attack.

Kaiba growled as he took the first damage of the duel, a mere 300 points. “That’s not one of your cards.” He observed narrowing his eyes at Yugi wondering what trickery this was. Did Yugi overhaul his deck in the time Kaiba was away?

Atem was also curious. He knew his aibou’s deck better than anyone. And while it wouldn’t surprise him if Yugi change up his deck in his absence, he was surprised by how different the card was.

Yugi smiled at Kaiba, “you’re right it’s not mine. This was a gift from Jaden. He wanted me to have a piece of his deck with me to protect me. And I intend to use it well.” He could see understanding flash across Kaiba’s face. He knew what it meant to receive such a card from a loved one.

Kaiba made a quick note of the monsters attack points. It was a mere 800 meaning the card would be spared from his Crush Cards effects. Good. Wait why was that good? Destroying that card would upset Yugi possibly leading him to make mistakes. He should be trying to destroy it at all cost. And yet…. No he needs to focus. He needs to beat Yugi and then he can defeat the Pharaoh.

“I end my turn.” Kaiba called already starting to plan his next move.

‘Alright’ Yugi thought. ‘If I attack and those face downs are his Crush Card combo then it will destroy my deck. So I need to bait him into attacking me.’ Yugi looked at his hand and knew what to do.

“I play Berry Magician Girl in attack mode.” Yugi played the baby magician as she fluttered on to the field. “Her special effect activates allowing me to add one Magician Girl from my deck to my hand.” Yugi added Kiwi Magician Girl to his hand. “I lay one card face down and end my turn.” Yugi says as he played mirror force face down.

“You’re not going to win this duel by playing cautiously.” Kaiba said as he drew his card. “I summon La Jinn the Mystical Genie of the Lamp, and I place one card face down. Now attack his Berry Magician Girl.” Kaiba waisted no time going to destroy Yugi’s weak monster.

“Now her special effect activates. When a monster attacks Berry Magician Girl she switches to defense mode and I can special summon a Magician Girl from my deck.” Yugi called as his Berry magician girl flew down to the field with her arms crossed over her chest. “Now come forth my Dark Magician Girl!” Yugi called as the blond spell caster appeared on his side of the field.

The crowd exploded in whispers and the Dark Magician Girl appeared shooting a wink to the crowed. They had never seen anyone besides Atem and Mana summon the spellcaster.

“Ya! That’s my ka Atem!” Mana cheered pumping her fist in the air before grabbing Atem’s arm and pointing at the Dark Magician Girl. “He still uses my Ka!” She was so excited her duel spirit was still helping Atem’s aibou. Atem smiled warmly at his childhood friend before turning his attention back to the duel.

“That’s not going to stop my attack!” Kaiba called as La Jinn attacked Berry Magician Girl. The small magician cried out as she was destroyed. “Now start your turn so I can end you.”

Yugi drew his card and thought of what to do next. Looking at his hand he had Apple Magician Girl and Lemon Magician Girl, he could get them both out on the field in the next move. But Kaiba was right. He wasn’t going to win if he kept playing cautiously. It was time to go on the attack.

“I summon Apple Magician Girl.” The dark haired magician appeared on the field. “Now go dark Magician Girl attack his La Jinn.” And with that the Dark Magician Girl launched her attack.

“Not so fast! I activate my Shrink Magic Card. This card cuts my monsters attack points by half. Now I activate my Crush Card Magic card.” Yugi had been right, Kaiba’s strategy was to destroy his deck. “Now when you destroy my monster any monsters you have with more than 1500 attack points are destroyed. Say goodbye to all the powerful monsters in your deck.” Kaiba laughed. He might have taken 1,100 points of damage but he had this duel in the bag.

Dark Magician Girl shrieked as she was destroyed. Yugi gritted his teeth as he discarded all of his powerful monsters from his deck. ‘Saw that coming.’ “I end my turn.”

“Now it’s my turn!” Kaiba called as he drew his card. “I play cost down. Now I sacrifices my Battle Ox to summon my Blue Eyes White Dragon!” Blue light exploded around Kaiba as his signature dragon swooped down from the sky, her roar echoed around them. “Say good bye to your Apple Magician Girl.”

“I don’t think so!” Yugi calls, “Her special effect activates. When you attack Apple Magician Girl I can summon another Magician Girl from my hand. So come forth Lemon Magician Girl!” The blond magician appeared with a flourish. “And your attack is cut in half.”

“That’s still not enough to keep you magician alive.” Kaiba called as blue eyes attacked.

“Maybe not but this will!” Yugi replied. “Activate trap Mirror Force!”

“No!” Kaiba called as his blue eyes white dragon was destroyed. “If you think you’ve gotten ride of my Blue Eyes you’re wrong. Now go monster reborn.” Kaiba activated his one remaining face down. His Blue Eyes came roaring back to the field. “Now destroy his Lemon Magician Girl!”

Lemons Magician Girl cried out as she was blown away by Blue Eyes. Yugi shouted as the attack landed close to him. These monsters were real and the blast was close. His life points dropped by 2,200 hundred points.

“Yugi! Are you alright!” Atem shouted. He trusted Yugi to win, but these attacks were real and his aibou could get hurt.

Yugi gritted his teeth as he straightened up. “I’m alright.”

“My turn is done. Now take your last move so I can finish you!” Kaiba called. All Yugi had on the field was one 1,200 attack point monster and a 2,000 defend point monster. He had destroyed all of Yugi’s powerful monsters. Yugi couldn’t win.

“My move.” Yugi called as he drew his card. He didn’t have a lot of moves he could make at this moment. But if he knew Kaiba he knew what he’d do next. Try to get his other two Blue Eyes on to the field. “I’ll switch Apple Magician Girl into defense mode and place one monster face down. That ends my turn.”

“That’s about all you can do with the pitiful monsters you have left.” Kaiba called as he drew his next card. “I play Card of Sanctity, now we both draw until we have six cards in our hands, not that it will help you much.” Kaiba drew his cards as did Yugi. Yugi kept a straight face as the card he needed ended up in his hand. Kaiba smirked, “I play polymerization, fusing the Blue Eyes on my field with the two Blue Eyes in my hand. Come forth my ultimate creature Blue Eyes Ultimate Dragon!”

Two more dragons appeared on Kaiba’s side, but they didn’t stay for long as the three dragons fused together. The resulting three headed dragon roared menacingly at Yugi. “Now attack his face down monster!” Kaiba ordered.

“Not this time!” Yugi called, “I activate my face down, Block attack!” Yugi played the first card he placed face down, stopping Kaiba’s attack in its tracks.

“You can’t stall forever Yugi!” Kaiba called as his dragon landed next to him. “I end my turn.”

“I’m not stalling Kaiba!” Yugi said as he drew his last card. “You’ve actually given me my winning hand. I set four cards face down. And then I activate the spell defuse! Say goodbye to your ultimate dragon!” Yugi called as the fused dragon became three separate beasts once more.

“So what. There is nothing in your deck that can take down one of my dragons let alone all three.” Kaiba shouted as he looked at his three dragons. ‘What was Yugi planning?’

“That’s where you’re wrong! Now I sacrifice my Elemental Hero Clayman,” he had promised himself he would use his son’s card well and he couldn’t wait to tell him that his card helped him defeat Seto Kaiba, “and my Apple Magician Girl to summon my ultimate dragon. Come forth Gandora the Dragon of Destruction!”

The two monsters disappeared in a swirl of smoke. Darkness covered the field but then thousands of red glowing orbs lit the field revealing the body of Gandora. He roared as he entered the field, Kaiba’s blue eyes roaring in response.

“Oh no!” Kaiba realized this was the end.

“And now I pay half of my life points to activate his special ability! Gandora destroys all cards on the field and gets 300 attack points for each card he destroys.” Kaiba’s dragons screeched as they were destroyed. “Between your three dragons, my monster, my 4 spell and trap cards, and your Crush Card that’s 9 cards making Gandora’s attack points 2,700 and since you only have 2,600 life points this duel is over. Now go Gandora! Attack his life points directly!”

Gandora roared as he glowed a bright red, firing its attack at Kaiba. “No!” Kaiba called as his life points dropped to zero. It was over Yugi had won.

“Yugi!” Atem called as he ran forward to pull his aibou into a hug, picking him up and spinning around. He was so proud of his aibou. The crowd started cheering, for Yugi’s victory.

Kaiba kneeled in his spot. He lost. It was over. He couldn’t duel the Pharaoh again. Yet his eyes trailed to Yugi’s smiling face as he laughed while Atem spun him around. Seto hated losing, he couldn’t stand any perceived weakness. And yet looking at Yugi’s joy, this loss didn’t sting as bad.

He was about to stand up and congratulate Yugi on his victory, like the honorable duelist he was, when Mahad returned. “My Pharaoh this is far worse than we thought!”

The joy was instantly sucked from the room. Jaden was in danger.

I tried my best to make this duel like one from the show. I have played duel links for years so I have an idea of how the game should be played. There are some misplays in here but that’s for plot. I did my best to make all the moves legal with the exception of using the anime effect for Card of Sanctity. Hopefully I did a good job!

[spacebarbarianweird]

Spawn! Astarion x Durge

So, if Durge denies Bhaal, they become immortal (Withers says Durge is alive while Withers is, and Withers is a god of death). Now, Astarion and Durge are an immortal couple, and death can't separate them.

But living with someone for a long time can be bothersome. Imagine a century, two centuries. They start to annoy each other and decide to take a break.

Each goes to live their own life. Astarion as a spawn, and Durge as Jergal's champion.

Another two centuries pass. Durge grows lonely (as does Astarion). Their hearts long for each other, but they have no idea where their lover is. This temporal break-up was painful, and they didn't agree on a time and place to meet again. Actually, they had been so fed up with each other, that sincerely decided not to meet ever again.

You are a monster hunter, known throughout Faerun for your successful endeavors against trolls, giants, dragons, vampires, and more. One day, you enter a tavern to get a quest, and one is available (and well-paid).

You need to find an extremely dangerous and powerful vampire called Astarion. Not to kill, just to locate his whereabouts.

The contractor looks friendly and kind, and they tell you how strong and unpredictable this Astarion is. You get a feeling that it's very personal, but it's not your job to criticize people who pay money.

You spend a few years searching and finally locate Astarion, far, far away. He is an undercover boss of a pirate freehold. Almost no one sees him, but he has been running this place for many decades. You wouldn't dare to attack him (since there is a horde of pirates on his side, and you suspect he isn't the only vampire there) so you return to the contractor with the news.

"Well, now you want us to kill him?"

"I want to come with you."

Again, it's weird. Why does this contractor want to come with you all this way? It's definetely something personal. They probably want to kill Astarion themselves, but why?

You keep hearing stories about his cruelty and manipulative techniques during the journey. But suddenly, you get a feeling that no one would speak this way about their sworn enemy.

You finally arrive at the place. You warn the contractor not to do anything strange and to wait until you finish with Astarion.

Then there he is, alone in the stairway with his best daggers. You feel the danger looming from him. The contractor takes a step, and you don't protest. It's going to be a duel.

"Tav!" the vampire yells. "Tav, is that truly you?"

And your contractor loses all their aura of power and secrecy, running to Astarion with open arms. They fall into each other's embrace, laughing and crying like young lovers.

You can only hear pieces of sentences: "I missed you" and "Where have you been all these years?"

Two immortals. Two immortal lovers. They parted two centuries ago, tired and angry with each other, but now their love and passion are reborn, and they feel the same way they did many years ago while hiding at the inn in Baldur's Gate.

"Well, will you pay us?" you reluctantly ask the contractor, who suddenly looks very young.

"Yeah, sure. You found my husband, so the contract is fulfilled," Durge stands on their feet. Astarion shrugs and throws you a bag of coins and jewels - a much more considerable sum than you were promised. "Take your money and leave; you did the job."

You and your companions look at Durge and Astarion as they hold each other's hands and discuss the centuries they spent apart.

Leaving the strange couple, you hear them giggling.

"Darling, please, don't hire monster hunters to find me next time."

"Just don't hide then."

"I missed you."

"I missed you too."

[grailfinders]

Grailfinders #337: Hai Bà Trưng

happy easter y’all, I hope you’re all enjoying your chocolate, eggs, chocolate eggs, and eggs in the shape of chocolate. we’re back at it again with a crisis, both a water monster crisis, and the fact that I can’t really spell the Trưng Sisters’ names right on this keyboard, so from this point on expect me to use the wrong kind of u.

spelling aside, the Trung sisters are a combo of Glory Paladin for their winning attitude and glowy weaponry, as well as an Echo Knight Fighter because… duh. there’s two of ‘em.

check out their build breakdown below the cut, or their characters sheet over here!

next up: “so what’s it like being split into a thousand consciousnesses?” “eh, it has its pros and Cons”

Ancestry & Background

the Trung sisters are probably human, unless you believe in that ascending to the heavens bit, but either way they’re close enough for it to work here. that means they get +1 Strength and +1 Charisma, as well as proficiency with Animal Handling for their elephants and the Ritual Caster feat to actually get those things. with this feat you get two first level wizard spells like Find Familiar and Comprehend Languages that you can ritual cast as many times as you like- the former one of your lil elephant friends, and the latter is the grail translating for you. you can even add new spells to your ritual book if you find them lying around in scrolls or other spell books, so keep an eye out!

also the Trung sisters are Nobles, so they get proficiency in History and Persuasion. if you took a shot every time we released one of these builds with a noble background the only thing that would save your liver is our update schedule. and again, we know noble is a big step down from king, but we do what we can.

Ability Scores

going off the standard array, Charisma should be your highest stat to start out with. it’s literally one of your abilities, and it makes all your paladin stuff extra juicy. second highest is your Strength, since you kill things with spears and swords. R.I.P., Infinitiger. your third highest stat has to be Intelligence since that’s how we qualify for ritual caster, and you definitely know your way around a battlefield. this means our Constitution is lower than I’d like again, but it’s okay for now. the real problem is your low Dexterity making your outfit choices a little difficult to work with, but at least that’s better than your Wisdom. half of you is too busy being a siscon to pay attention when they’re on watch, and you died because your underlings betrayed you. rough.

Class Levels

1. Paladin 1: starting as a paladin gives you proficiency in Wisdom and Charisma saves, as well as Athletics and Insight. despite dumping their wisdom, the Trungs are good leaders and judges of character. paladins also start out with a Divine Sense, letting you pick out extraplanar creatures nearby. you learn their location and what they are, but not who they are. I don’t think the kons are extraplanar, but if they were that would make them so much easier to round up. also if they get chomped on by a fishman you can patch them up with Lay on Hands- you get five HP per day per paladin level, and you can touch someone as an action to either heal them or use five HP to cure a disease of theirs. real useful when you live on a deserted island with no casters.

2. Paladin 2: second level paladins get a Fighting Style, and while Defense would be the smarter choice for +1 AC your spear and sword are both one-handed weapons, so I’m getting the Dueling fighting style instead. that gives you +2 to the damage done with a one-handed weapon every time you hit with it! extra armor might protect you from some damage, but killing will protect you from all future damage!

you also learn Spells which you cast and prepare using your Charisma, but the only spell I really want at this point you’ll get permanently next level so I’ll cover it then. for now, you can also use your spell slots for some Divine Smites- burn a spell slot, deal extra radiant damage when you hit something, deal extra extra damage when you hit a demon or zombie.

3. Paladin 3: third level paladins have Divine Health, so now you can never get sick. anime characters don’t get sick unless they do, and if they do it’s plot related anyway so your DM probably won’t let you off the hook even if you have this.

more importantly, you are now fighting for the Glory of your people, so you get some oath spells! they’re always prepared and they don’t count against your prep limits- Guiding Bolt hits a guy and gives the next person to attack them advantage, and Heroism is the spell I was talking about in level two. with this spell, you can give a creature immunity to being frightened plus some bonus temporary HP every turn for up to a minute!

you also get two Channel Divinity options, and you can use one of those each short rest. you can either become a Peerless Athlete for ten minutes to make up for how spread out your stats are, or you can use an Inspiring Smite to give temporary HP to nearby creatures after you make a divine smite. both of these options use your bonus action, so you can squeeze them into your turns pretty easily right now.

4. Paladin 4: now that you can cast spells you can become an Eldritch Adept using your very first Ability Score Improvement- technically I should save you getting your Armor of Shadows for later to coincide with your third ascension but I’m not going to leave you at 10 AC for the whole dang build. now you can cast Mage Armor on yourself for free, adding 3 to your AC total while unarmored.

5. Paladin 5: fifth level paladins get an Extra Attack each action, so now you can hit twice a turn! I mean. there’s two of you, that tracks. you also get 2nd level spells, including your freebies Enhance Ability, again to overcome stat spread, and Magic Weapon, to make your weapons all glowy for your NP.  they also get +1 all attack rolls and damage rolls.

you can also Find Steed now to give your elephant the boost it needs to be ridable! sure it’s still not elephant sized yet, but you can get it up to a warhorse, that’s pretty neat! also you can use Gentle Repose to keep those water monsters from doing their con-eating trick. they might not be undead, but it keeps them from getting up again so it’s close enough.

6. Fighter 1: we’ve got plenty of Trung now, so let’s work on the sister part. bouncing over to fightergives you a Fighting Style, which means we can take Defense after all! or Dueling if you were smart and took the AC first. speaking of AC, you also get a Second Wind once a short rest, letting you heal up as a bonus action!

7. Fighter 2: second level fighters get an Action Surge, so now you can make a second action with a second attack for a total of four in a single turn!

8. Fighter 3: third level fighters can become Echo Knights, letting them Manifest Echo as a bonus action. this creates a copy of you with better AC and 1 HP that you can move around the battlefield as you wish, as long as it stays within 30’ of you. you can attack from its position as well as your own, and you can even swap places with your sister as a bonus action too!

you can also Unleash Incarnation up to Constitution Modifier times a day, adding an extra echo attack to your attack action! right now that’s only once, but it’ll get better as we go.

thanks to the echo knight’s funky splitting, we can use buffing spells like Magic Weapon and it will improve both sisters’ weapons at the same time!

9. Fighter 4: fourth level fighters get another ASI, so grab the Slasher feat to round up your Strength score as well as protect the precious cons! once a turn you can slow down a creature you hit with slashing damage, and your critical hits force disadvantage on the attack rolls of whatever you sliced through! if you’re going to bring marshmallows to the front lines, it’s best to make sure they don’t die.

10. Fighter 5: fifth level fighters get… nothing! extra attacks don’t stack like that.

11. Fighter 6: as a consolation prize, sixth level fighters get a bonus ASI, so bump up that constitution for 11 points of health (remember that +1 each level is retroactive) and for more unleashed incarnations! now you can attack up to six times in a single turn! that would use up literally every spell slot you have right now, but you can!

12. Paladin 6: sixth level paladins have an Aura of Protection, so everyone around you gets a +3 bonus to all their saves! now your cons won’t get blown up by a fireball… as much. I’m sure a successful save would still get the cons knocked out though.

13. Paladin 7: seventh level glory paladins get an Aura of Alacrity, so everyone around you gets a movement speed boost. again, it’s keeping the cons out of harm’s way!

14. Paladin 8: at eighth level you get another ASI, so bump up your Strength for stronger attacks!

15. Paladin 9: ninth level paladins get third level spells, and you get Haste and Protection from Energy for free! I’m sure you could argue a D&D build would have to be perma-hasted to even stand a chance at keeping up with a servant, but really the only third level spell I want here is Elemental Weapon. in contrast to magical weapon, you still get a +1 bonus to attacking, but the bonus damage is a little stronger, and you can make that damage an elemental type like acid or fire. I’d use cold damage here for their demon slayer-esque water sword attacks. or you could use something like Crusader’s Mantle to give everyone around you mini-smites for up to a minute.

16. Paladin 10: at tenth level your natural leadership abilities give you an Aura of Courage, so nearby creatures can’t be frightened while you’re around. it’s a shame it only has a range of ten feet, that would’ve really come in handy while you were alive.

17. Paladin 11: I hope you like radiant damage, because an eleventh level paladin has an Improved Divine Smite, adding a d8 of the stuff to every melee attack you make. that basically doubles your damage output most of the time- there’s a lot of doubling going on in this build, almost like you’re two people or something.

18. Paladin 12: twelfth level paladins get one last ASI, so bump up that Constitution again to not die! not dying’s my favorite hobby, and I bet its yours too, we have so much in common.

19. Paladin 13: our last level of paladin gets you Compulsion and Freedom of Movement and a bunch of other spells but who cares because it also gets you Find Greater Steed, letting us finally have an elephant-sized elephant. well, actually a rhino-sized elephant but it’s waaay closer than a horse.

20. Fighter 7: our true final level is going back to fighter to become an Echo Avatar. now you can transfer your mind to your sister and basically play as her, with the max range of the echo increasing to 1,000 feet while you do so. this also doesn’t prevent you from switching places with her, so you can trivialize a lot of traps by just sending the more expendable sister ahead of you.

obviously I don’t think this level’s in character, but it’s at least slightly moreso than the next paladin level where you can break curses by touching people, so here it is.

Pros & Cons

Pros:

while I didn’t go over it much in the build itself, Paladin has some nice spells, and unless you’re super dedicated to playing in-character I highly recommend you look at the full spell list before committing to just using spell slots for smiting and elephants. also, ritual caster doesn’t look like much on the surface but if you play your cards right it gives you access to a ridiculous amount of Utility, giving you plenty to do outside of combat. with ritual caster you have access to spells no paladin would ever be able to cast like drawmij’s instant summons, and you can become the party’s communication hub with spells like Contact Other Plane or Skywrite.

you can attack way more in a single turn than a paladin really should be able to, which means you take the paladin’s burst damage potential and crank it all the way up to eleven! with action surge and unleash incarnation, you triple the number of attacks a paladin should ever be able to get, making you a burst damage machine. assuming a regular longsword with elemental weapon on it, you deal 6d8+36 slashing + 25d8 radiant + 6d4 cold, for an average of just under 200 damage in a single round.

 I know this last one isn’t much, but. riding an elephant is so cool y’all, it gets its own section.

Cons:

pretty much all the damage you do is either radiant or physical, so the second you come across something that can handle those two your damage output is completely neutered. I really hope there aren’t any celestial monsters on the islands…

I know paladin spell slots are really, really good for smiting, but as written we aren’t using them for anything else. okay yeah there’s summoning elephants, but that’s still a very small part of what paladins can do- they’ve got plenty of healing spells and defensive buffs they can offer, and while that might not be in-character, it’s a smart tactical decision.

your AC is bad. but you can just wear heavy armor if you feel like it. yeah two of these are just “if you deliberately kneecap yourself, you play worse,” and I’m sorry, but paladin’s a good class, fighter’s a good class, they’re just two great tastes that taste great together. their biggest real weakness is a lack of area of effect spells, but that’s not super punchy, and even then you can slice through six guys like it’s nothing with the only area you’re really affecting being your sword!

[99problemsandallofthemarefandoms]

Got another one for ya'll.

Mokuba has grown up and moved out. Idk what he does. I feel like the most probable thing he would do would be to start Kaiba corp. America after going to America for college so he can have a normal college life but for this story he stays in Japan.

He could be making indie games or something but he always makes sure to visit his brother. Not like every day but between every week or every other week.

Its been a bit since he moved out and Kaiba has been set in his ways of work, work, a bit of duel monsters and more work. He is certainly never unhappy to see his brother but Mokuba thinks he could use some fun in his life.

So Mokuba drags him out every other visit. One outing Kaiba reconnects with the Yugi gang and most importantly Joey.

So first meeting is nothing special. Mokuba goes back to his life and plans his next visit.

Over the course of the story it's just Mokuba walking in on snippets Kaiba's developing new life. Yugi and the gang have invaded and are playing DND in Kaiba's living room. Kaiba is forced to play or they will play a very bad knock off him in the game which is even more irritating than him having to play or him just not being home as he is out which is surprising as he usually goes straight home to work in the home office.

Eventually he walks in on Joey and Kaiba late afternoon sleep in weekend breakfast kiss over coffee.

"Mokuba I love you but you need to start calling ahead or learn to bloody knock." as Joey sneaks away to put some pants on as he is just in his boxers.

[heleniad]

putting my own two cents out there: i feel like part of the reason why hector treated helen kindly was that he was a loyal, loving husband to andromache, and as a consequence, he did not see helen as a sexual object to be possessed but more as a human being. even menelaus had ulterior motives in coming to troy. he didn't come for helen because he loved her; he came at least partially because the loss of helen was an insult to his person and honor. nobody in the trojan war viewed helen purely as a person EXCEPT for hector and hecuba's wife priam. they saw beyond helen's beauty because helen's beauty did not distract them. in their eyes helen was no longer a 2 dimensional character to be demonized as some sort of siren monster but an actual, breathing, living human who did not deserve the hate so ruthlessly piled against her.

helen herself was a cunning woman who tried to keep priam's favor. she found power and agency in traditionally feminine activities; even in observation she tried to garner some agency. when priam questioned helen on the warriors from the battlefield, mentioning their stature and/or regality, helen made sure to echo exactly what he said. for example, when priam mentioned agamemnon's kingly nature helen made sure to confirm priam's assertion about agamemnon being king; when priam mentioned ajax being 'outstanding among the argives in height and broad shoulders', helen made sure to refer to ajax as 'huge ajax'. in priam's company, helen also made sure to deprecate herself to a large extent by calling herself dog-faced and deserving of death. she knew priam was probably her only hope in keeping herself safe within the walls of troy, and she acted upon this knowledge.

then, there were helen's actions in the odyssey. firstly, she drugged her guests with heartsease, which was a very cunning and strategic move by her, considering her reputation as a bitch-whore who contributed to countless deaths in the trojan war. secondly, in her recounts of the trojan war, she made sure to highlight how she had longed to go home and then how she had actively helped out odysseus when he sneaked into troy. ( also note here that she was the only one to uncover odysseus' disguise. ) in contrast, menelaus talked about how helen circled the trojan horse with the voices of the warriors' wives to lure the men out as a move against greece. this was an extremely cunning move and though helen's intent was ambiguous, i suspect it was because deiphobus was there & helen wanted to prove her allegiance to him in order to secure her own safety with the man. this trojan horse move, then, was a way to both make sure she would be safe for the remaining of her days in troy AND it was a move that could be very much countered by the greeks if they so wished. helen did NOT go around telling everyone that the trojan horse was a trap when she very much had the opportunity to, which suggests that this move was probably not because she wanted greece to lose but to secure her own safety with her new husband deiphobus.

this next part is not in the iliad or the odyssey but while we are on the topic of helen's agency, let's talk about how helen dropping her robe from her shoulders made menelaus drop his sword. in my opinion, helen very much knew what she was doing when she did that — it was a survival tactic and she was wielding her own beauty to her advantage. finally.

now despite all this, helen still suffered from the cruelty of the patriarchy. she was not even personally informed that the duel between menelaus and paris would be taking place — the duel that would determine the whole course of HER future. it was the goddess iris who had to convey the message to helen. many such cases of this are present in helen's life. she was as much a victim in the trojan war as she was an instigator. but let's also not forget that she was a woman who, despite everything, actively fought for her own agency.

[kaiowut99]

Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters GX Episodes 108-109 Subbed (Finalized)

(Previously: Episodes 106-107 Subbed [Finalized])

(Check out my Subbed!GX Stream Masterpost!)

TURN-108: Professor Cobra's Assassin

Professor Cobra announces the "Disclosure Duels," a system of publicizing one's skill and performing duels openly. He also provides all of the students with their own Dis-Belts to gauge their fighting spirit through their passion, focus, and decisiveness in those duels. Cobra then orders O'Brien to duel Judai--and to do so in a way that brings forth all of Judai's latent abilities. Putting his strategy into action, O'Brien takes Shou hostage and duels Judai.

TURN-109: Judai and the Fiery O'Brien

O'Brien aims to bring out all of Judai's latent abilities by using Shou as a hostage. As expected, Judai causes a serious battle to unfold, which he responds to using his Fire deck, activating his Firewall Permanent Trap against Judai's direct attacks to negate his attempts to attack him directly. For his part, Judai Contact-Fuses Neos with Flare Scarab, summoning Flare Neos for a counterattack, but...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sorry, didn't mean to leave these two episodes hanging for just over a month~ sorry Shou

Episodes 108 and 109 are now finalized! Professor Cobra comes in and starts up the Dis-Duels, which will play a big role in this early part of the season, and we get more time with O'Brien as he duels with Judai on Cobra's orders and ends up having a little fun with it towards the end. It's a fun duel, O'Brien makes a fiery entrance with his Blaze Cannon/Blaze Cannon Trident cards, and I love the sequence in 109 as Judai uses Flare Neos with probably my favorite use of the "Fervent Duel" OST track. Also, 109 in general is a fun episode because of all the top-notch artwork going on, with some interesting angles or some really good motion frames from the animation team (Judai ordering Featherman to swoop in against O'Brien [which gets reused once or twice] is so good). Also nice character moments with Shou about reconciling his ideal from Ryou about respecting opponents with the need to have all-out heated duels to survive, a nuance that gets lost in the dub for the most part. Though speaking of the dub, I did like Axel's (O'Brien's) dub voice for the most part, though it has a rough spot or two later on when he's cowering from the Supreme King.

Animation error-wise, we mostly have some quality-of-watching touch-ups, as there weren't any card errors I picked up on; 108 had one minor touch-up near the end, while 109 had just over a handful of mostly split-screen touch-ups. Details below the cut for the interested, as always~

Quick housekeeping: in case you missed it, I reuploaded 105-107 after noticing I didn't catch an update to one of the names under the In-Between Animation credits, along with some minor consistency fixes in the rest of the credits; these were reposted over on NAC and updated in the Masterpost linked above, and 108-109'll join them on NAC in the next day or two.

Anywho, enjoy! With these done, I'll probably go back to some fixes I've been working on for episode 1 that I missed, then I'll get a bit more looked over on Tag Force Special stuff (in case you missed that news~) before working on 110 as a quick two-parter break; stay tuned!

Fixes/Edits! (108)

Near the end of the episode, as O'Brien draws for his turn, there's a coloring error with some shading along the bottom of his left shoulder where the shading is lighter like with the lighter spots higher up; it's fixed for a few frames but then goes back to lighter. Fixed this by recoloring that shading spot in the frames during the quick zoom-out that happens using Photoshop, then masked out and held the shading in the last fixed frame for the rest of the shot.

Fixes/Edits! (109)

After the 108 recap but before the OP, we get this quick scene with Cobra watching on and saying that, even if he loses, O'Brien has to bring out all of Judai's Duel Energy (a scene cut from the dub [I wonder if this error is why]), but there's an odd animation error that happens where the line on the upper left of his mouth (his left) and the jaw shading are pixels away from where they should be--this only happens for the frames where he has this fully open lip-flap and his semi-open lip-flap going. Fixed this in Photoshop by redrawing the mouth line and filling in the jaw shading along the shading that was there.

Later, after O'Brien activates his Firewall and asks Judai if he thought weak attacks would work on him, Judai notes that O'Brien didn't summon any Monsters so it wouldn't be any fun not diving right in; a semi-surprised O'Brien slides in on a split-screen acknowledging this, but there's a quick frame as the split-screen is completed where the border flickers into its final position--fixed this in Sony Vegas by just replacing the earlier frame with the latter. Then, as they split off the screen to show Shou behind them, Judai's side takes a frame longer than O'Brien's to fully get offscreen; fixed in Vegas by using the frame after in that frame's place.

Later, Judai grunts after O'Brien uses Burial from a Different Dimension to return three Fire-Type Monsters to his Cemetery, and O'Brien slides in on a split-screen to say that he's removing one from it to activate Firewall against Flare Neos's attack--but Judai starts moving for it a couple of frames before O'Brien actually starts sliding in, and along with that, the border on their split-screen ends up being off-center. Fixed these in Vegas, first by redoing the split so it's timed with Judai moving, then ending the slide-in with the border centered, moving O'Brien's side into place so that his mouth and hand move properly for the rest of the split-screen. Then, a frame before they start splitting apart as Firewall activates, O'Brien's side moves but Judai's stays still; fixed by holding the split-screen still over that frame.

A bit after, once Judai uses Contact Out to de-fuse Flare Neos and attack to make O'Brien run out of Monsters to remove from play, O'Brien grunts as Judai slides in on a split-screen to remind him about Flare Scarab's power-up effect--but like with Judai in #3 above, O'Brien starts moving for the split-screen a couple frames before Judai starts sliding in. Then, as their split ends, there's a quick frame where they start to split apart to show Flare Scarab behind them but don't actually split; this is likely why their splits then end up sliding out unevenly. with Judai's taking an extra frame to fully slide out. Fixed these all in Vegas by first redoing it so that Judai's slide-in is timed with O'Brien moving; then, I masked in part of Flare Scarab from the next frames over them as they start to split, adding a new border to O'Brien and Judai's splits; and then finally, I redid their split-outs so that they were timed evenly.

After the eyecatch, we see more of Cobra watching the duel, and Judai and O'Brien come up on a split-screen with their current LP counts--they start to split apart a frame before their LP counts disappear to show Cobra, with this quick frame having just white behind them, along with O'Brien's split missing its border. Fixed this in Vegas by just holding the previous frame over it so that the split-out starts in the next frame, once the LP counts are gone.

[continued below because of dumb characters-per-"block" limits]

(6) A bit later, after O'Brien lets Shou go, Cobra looks on in surprise, but there are a few quick frames where the shading along his jaw is incomplete; fixed in Photoshop for the lip-flap frames where it happens, then placed them in the footage in Vegas and moved it into place as needed for the panning shot here.

(7) After O'Brien loads his Volcanic Buckshot into his Blaze Cannon Trident and deals 2000 damage to Judai, he starts to explain Trident's role in that, but Judai's betting that there was more to it; O'Brien slides in on a split-screen to say as much as he explains Buckshot's role, but his split-screen's already halfway into the screen in its first before sliding the rest of the way in, and like with #3 above, the border on the split-screen somehow ends up off-center. Fixed these in Vegas by redoing his slide-in so it slides in more fluidly. Then, because of how off-center the split-screen is, as they split apart, O'Brien's side takes longer to slide out; fixed this, after re-centering the split-screen, by redoing their slide-outs to be timed evenly.

[mayhemchicken]

From what I have seen, the only ones who kill a vampire in Varney are presented to be bad people?

it's...a bit more complicated than that. broadly: kind of? but the reasons why are fascinating.

in the first half of the story, varney is The Villain. the inciting incident of the plot is him breaking into the Bannerworth house and biting Flora Bannerworth, the only female character of note in this part of the story, and the rest of the plot is the Bannerworths struggling against his increasingly scooby-doo-villain-esque hijinks while they try to figure out how to get rid of him. he lies, he cheats, he steals, he insults them to their faces, he kidnaps flora's fiance, he (probably) commits forgery, he breaks into their house over and over again, he stages elaborate spooky theatrical effects to make himself seem creepier, and generally he is a huge pain in the ass. the bannerworths, at this point the story's heroic protagonists, want him gone by any means necessary. and they do try to kill him!

honorably, in a duel.

this is the distinction the story makes: not that it is Right or Wrong to kill a vampire, but that it matters how you do it. the bannerworths, Our Heroes, challenge varney to...let's see...at least three duels. (only one is ever actually carried out.) as far as the story is concerned, this is perfectly right and fair and honorable. nevermind the fact that varney is textually unable to be killed by bullets, as he'll simply come back to life the next time the moon shines on him, this is the Right And Proper way to go about killing a vampire. he is, after all, a gentleman, if a bloodsucking one.

by contrast, the local townsfolk are painted as very much In The Wrong when they go about trying to kill the vampire threat. james malcolm rymer hates the working class, and BOY does it show. enter the true villain of varney the vampire: The Mob. the first Mob shows up at the conclusion of henry bannerworth's duel with varney, henry having failed to kill the vampire because varney, to all appearances, simply resisted the bullet.

The Mob, showing up as they do on the heels of The Honorable Duel, are presented in sharp and deliberate contrast to the gentlemanly way of doing things. they are bloodthirsty, uneducated, and refuse to listen to reason, and are easily stirred up into committing disproportionate acts of violence. the bannerworths are horrified by the sight of them, and even though varney is their enemy and they just got done trying to kill him themselves, they agree that they ought to help varney by trying to drive the mob off, because Surely This Is Taking Things Too Far.

rymer's caricature of the frightened masses is illuminating of a lot of things about his mindset, but it's interesting to note the contrasts here. the approaches his human heroes take are ineffective, at times almost cartoonishly so, at addressing the threat they face. the actions of The Mob, on the other hand, are brutally, often horrifyingly, effective. The Mob gets shit done. often, it's the wrong shit; rymer goes out of his way to highlight the brutality of the actions committed by The Mob, contrasted to the heroes' ineffectual but noble waffling. impotent action, even inaction, is painted as the more virtuous approach - better to not accomplish your goals at all than to accomplish them rudely. protecting your family from a monster is honorable, but not if you're going to be so violent about it.

[astoundingbeyondbelief]

Kaiju Week in Review (November 19-25)

Monarch: Legacy of Monsters remains must-see kaiju TV with its third episode. The flashbacks revisit the U.S. attempt to kill Godzilla with an H-bomb in 1954, making a few retcons to the 2014 film that I think are largely for the better. This might be the Monsterverse Godzilla work that best understands it's adapting a Japanese story. There's also a delightful new critter who shows up at the end of the main story and will surely continue to be a threat in the next installment. On the human side of things, we're starting to see how Monarch became more and more obsessive about secrecy over the decades, paralleled with the infidelity at the heart of the story.

Justice League vs. Godzilla vs. Kong #2 delivers the Superman/Godzilla fight that's probably what people most wanted out of this crossover. I was surprised at how well Godzilla did, although it wasn't quite a clean victory. Camazotz's duel with the Bat-Family in Gotham City was more interesting, as bizarre as it is to see some of the most famous superheroes in the world taking on a Titan who's never even been in a movie before. Meanwhile, Scylla's in Central City and Behemoth's closing in on Themyscira. Odd choices considering Scylla's Greek name, but then I can't see her doing well against Wonder Woman.

As is New Generation Ultra Series tradition, Ultraman Blazar will be quickly followed by a movie (Tokyo Kaiju Showdown) released early next year (February 23). Most of these things are pretty forgettable, but director Kiyotaka Taguchi was also behind the Ultraman X movie, which I thought was one of the best ones. The plot:

A wave of kaiju emerges from an industrial zone, prompting Capitan Gento and the Special Kaiju Reaction Detachment (SKaRD) to engage in the relentless battle. Yet despite their efforts, the endless kaiju attack continues. Suspecting a link to Necromass Co., an advanced chemical company that researches kaiju corcasses and owns factories in the industrial zone, SKaRD rushes to the company’s CEO and renowned chemist, Dr. Mabuse. At Necromass Co.’s research facility, Dr. Mabuse explains the development of the damudoxin, a substance on the brink of achieving immortality. Meanwhile, Alien Damuno, who claims themselves as the “ruler of the universe” appears! Chaos ensues when damudoxin leaks from the destroyed tanks, consuming samples of kaiju carcasses and giving rise to the giant Gongilgan, the Demonic Carcass. Set in Tokyo, the capital of Japan, Ultraman Blazar and SKaRD clash in a showdown against the giant kaiju!

This year's Ultraman Decker movie was available to rent on Tsuburaya Imagination the same day it released in Japanese theaters, so I'd expect the same from the Blazar movie.

I'm typing this hours before I see Godzilla Minus One in IMAX. The date crept up on me, but I can feel every atom in my body vibrating right now, so yeah, almost time for the new Godzilla movie. High hopes with the reviews it's getting!

[thewebcomicsreview]

I enjoy how you write action, do you have any tips for writing action in a webcomic? I struggle with the inherently broken up pace of reading a webcomic interacting with wanting a cool action scene.

To be honest, I don't think I'm particularly good at writing action, and wouldn't offer advice on it if you didn't ask! That said, my first advice would be to go read Ten Earth-Shattering Blows, which I think has great action scenes. Will it help you as I writer? I dunno, but it's a rad comic.

That aside, I think action scenes are just normal scenes that happen to have action, and follow all the same rules. A fight scene is a scene with a story within itself that also (hopefully) adds something to the comic as a whole. And, as a webcomic, you probably want something interesting happening on every page, or at least most pages, and you likely can't spend 200 pages on a fight scene over 11 chapters like a shounen manga or such could. So let's take a closer look at Ten Earth-Shattering Blows, and its first major fight.

Quick recap: Landa (in the dress) is visiting a slummy low fantasy city to try and get help in a quest. She tries recruiting evil goons and they're all "We are evil goons" and she's all "Ah beans". There's some scuffling I'm skipping over before Janflinn, with the maces, secretly reveals to Landa he's been hired to protect her. Janflinn's appearance and position in the story signals to the audience that he's the main hero. His plan is interrupted when a "monster" who saw Landa earlier and freaked out, escapes from a cage that was hanging nearby and jumps on the roof.

Janflinn effortlessly one-shots the monster, and all the characters exposit about how kewl and powerful he is. This establishes him as a powerful badass fighter, and we begin to form a mental image of him and Landa going on adventures.

Except get fucked, the monster gets back up and kills Janflinn with her own face! Your mental image of how this comic was going was wrong!

The monster beats two other guards to prove she didn't just get lucky, then uses Janflinn's weapons to get her mask off, revealing herself to be a woman. She takes Landa hostage, which has plot implications obviously, but also establishes what kind of person she is. She tells the evil goons she'll kill Landa if they attack her, and they're all "We are evil goons" and she's all "Ah beans".

She is challenged to a duel by one of the dudes, and compliments his axe before killing him with a throwing knife. From this setup, you'd expect her next line to be something like "I'm taking it" and taking his axe, but no, she books it. This, again, establishes her character. She's a tough and strong barbarian, but she's pragmatic and isn't going to show off unnecessarily. Also it's setting up a cliche and then doing something else instead.

The goons shoot down at our protagonists with arrows, so the monster pulls them into a building, smashing the innocent rando in the way. This provides a bit of a breather in the fight, so that the Monster and Landa can have a quick conversation establishing why the Monster's still carrying Landa who had no use as a hostage.

Plot points established, goons show up and force our protagonists to move to a new location in a cool and exciting way.

The monster unintentionally drops a sword into the crowd, and yells at the slaves to revolt, creating a bunch of chaos, before fighting a goon who ends up being stronger than he looks and getting the upper hand (Protip! Unnamed goons can still be competent and threatening! Most of the great Indiana Jones action scenes are against competent goons, and good goonery is badly under-rated). While the monster gets out of this jam through some cleverness, this is helping set the tone for her. She's not the Incredible Hulk, and while she's way bigger and stronger than most people in this setting, there are still a lot of dudes even bigger and stronger than her, and she needs to use her wits to survive.

Though, for a finale escape, we actually get a joke at the monster's expense, when her "Ride on a lizard and jump over the wall" plan fails and they have to kind of scrib-scrabble up the rest of the way.

Nevertheless, scrib-scrabble up the wall they do, as people look on in shock at how cool "this woman" is, and she grabs Landa and they ride off on a pig.

So, this whole scene was about 22 pages, with a bit of talking in the middle. What have we learned

This comic will go out of its way to set up a cliche plot and then surprise you with a twist

The monster is our protagonist. Landa is also here, but she is completely useless at basically everything.

The monster has no compunctions about killing people and fighting dirty to do it, and isn't super discriminating about who "deserves" violence.

This setting is full of silly miniboss types, and anyone and any time could potentially be a match for the monster, even if she herself can't always know how tough a dude is until after the fight starts.

The monster is kidnapping Landa for plot reasons

The monster is a strong badass

But she's not the strongest badass in the world, by a long shot, and also has to use her wits to win fights

Her wits are also slightly unreliable, so she has to use determination and pluck to seal the deal.

The monster can start a slave revolt by literally just going "Revolt! >:(". This is not a very stable society.

That's a lot of learning! We are getting a lot of exposition with our muscly violence. Flexposition™! And all this learning and plot development goes miles towards make the fight be a fight scene and not just the comic stopping so people can punch each other for a bit.

As long as the scene works as a scene and does the things you want it to do, all the face punching and chandelier-swinging is the seasoning you add on top.

Of course, a fight scene can have an entirely internal narrative as well, that tells us something interesting (quick example: Luke vs Vader in Empire Strikes Back, and the way Vader starts the fight really casual and bored and gets progressively more pissed off, most good pro wrestling matches, etc etc). The point of your scene can be whatever you want, even "Look how cool this fight scene is!". As long as you know what that point is and keep building to it, you're probably on the right track

[ctrl-alt-em]

A Letter Home

Garnet wandered around the tiny town idly. It was early afternoon and the saloon was empty. It would be a couple hours before she could make a few bucks at the cards table.

Turning a corner, she saw the town’s stable, a small affair near the center of town.

Delacy sat on the wooden fence of the corral, facing a grazing Humble Ned.

Garnet headed towards her young friend. In his lap was his newest ‘The Daring Adventures of Bison Billie’ book and a piece of paper.

Delacy frowned at the page.

Garnet back leaned on the fence next to Delacy, facing the opposite direction. “What are you doing, Delacy?”

“I’m trying to write a letter,” the boy answered without looking up.

Garnet looked at the blank paper. “How’s that going?”

Delacy groaned, “It's a lot harder than I thought I’d be.”

“Who’s it to?”

“My family,” he answered, chewing on his pencil. “They’re probably worried.”

Garnet was surprised. Billie Joe would have been her first guess. Maybe the Tombstone Epitaph, the newspaper he read with Edie whenever they got their hands on it, to tell about their latest monster hunt.

Delacy didn’t talk about his home life much, except about the farm itself. He hadn’t mentioned any siblings, aunts, uncles, or cousins so far. He seemed like he liked living on a farm well enough, but he certainly wasn’t in any hurry to get back there.

The only time he’d mentioned his parents was when they thought he might die in a duel. Garnet still had the slip of paper with the location of his family home tucked inside her Hoyle’s book.

From what she could make out, Delacy’s home life was pretty stable for having lived in Bloody Kansas. She had guessed his hesitation to talk about his family stemmed from his guilt from leaving and left it alone.

Perhaps the guilt of running away had finally gotten to him.

“You know what they’d like the most?” Garnet asked.

“What?”

“To see you in person.”

Delacy looked away and scraped his boot on the wooden railing. He shrugged. “I don’t know about that.”

“Why not?” She shrugged. “We’ll pass right through Vincent on our way to Dodge City. We can stop there for a few days, say hi to your family, get some leads and gossip on Dodge, convince your parents we haven’t kidnapped you, that kind of thing.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea, Miss Garnet.”

She tilted her head at him, “Why’s that, Delacy?”

“I don’t really get along with my parents,” he admitted. Before Garnet could ask the first question that came to mind, Delacy continued, “They took good care of me and my pa is the one who taught me how to shoot a gun when I was real little and all that, but I think my leaving would’ve been more of a relief for them than anything. I wasn’t the favorite child, I know that for sure.”

Garnet’s face fell. She turned to face the same direction as him and moved closer.

“You don’t think your parents love you?” she asked, gently.

Delacy curled into himself more. Minutes ticked by.

“No, I- I know they love me,” he whispered, “It’s… I just wished they liked me.” He wiped his nose on his hand.

“Oh, Delacy…” She brushed his golden blond hair behind his ear.

Garnet didn’t know what to say. She had been very close to her father as a child. It was only the two of them as far back as she could remember. He’d read Hoyle’s Book of Games to her on his knee and he taught her how to shuffle cards as soon as her hands were big enough. He’d taught her about demons, manitous, and magic after he closed the store at the end of the day. The day he died was the worst day of her life. If she had run away one day on a whim, he would have been devastated.

She settled for leaning her shoulder against his in a way she hoped was comforting for him.

“Did you tell your parents anything you left?”

Delacy hesitated. “No, not really. I didn’t plan on leaving when I did.”

Garnet frowned. “What do you mean?”

“I went to town with my sister, Lucy. She’s married to the doctor’s son. I saw the ad that Victoria put in the paper and I figured it was something I could handle. I showed it to Lucy, then she gave me $15 dollars and took me to the train station.”

“Your sister sent you off on a bounty hunting job?” she asked with a raised eyebrow. Delacy nodded.

“Are you and your sister close?”

Delacy grinned a little. “Yeah, Lucy’s the best.”

Someone sending her beloved kid brother off to shoot people didn’t quite sound right to Garnet, but, then again, she also took the same kid to shoot people.

“Well, why don’t you write the letter to Lucy and ask her to tell your folks you're doing all right? Surely she would have told your parents what happened, right?”

He thought about it for a moment. “Yeah, you’re right. I like that idea better. Thanks, Miss Garnet.”

She patted his shoulder. “It’s what I’m here for.”

Garnet climbed up on the fence next to Delacy and pulled out her Hoyle’s book. She flipped through the yellowing pages of the book her father once owned. She smiled at the old memories as Delacy scratched away at the paper next to her.

When he was finally finished, Delacy held the letter up critically before deciding it was good enough. He hopped off the fence. “I’m gonna head to the post office.”

“I’ll head with you.” Garnet slid off the fence and ducked between the railing back out of the corral. “Then why don’t we head back to the saloon? I’ll teach you the proper way to shuffle a deck of cards.”

Delacy grinned mischievously. “Does this mean you’re gonna let me play cards with you later?”

“No, I know for a fact Edie and Silas wouldn’t be happy if I let you gamble at cards,” she answered, knocking his hat over his eyes. “‘Sides, I think you’ll have much better luck with darts.”

[aggimaginary]

The Moon Shines In Friendship (Nimona fanfic) - chapter 2

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Hello everyone! I am so sorry that it took me a month to update my story! I mean, I loved what I had planned for my first Nimona fanfic, but I was busy in college school, and I had more personal things to deal like fanart and other fanfic. So, here's chapter 2, It took me a while too because this chapter is really long. This chapter is a flashback chapter that took place before and during the events of the film! I hope you have fun reading this!

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22 YEARS AGO

At the Academy, young knights-in-training were working very hard to achieve their goals and dreams of becoming real knights. Some used wooden swords to defeat their individual monster dummies, some pushed themselves through an obstacle course, and some practiced duels. Particularly young Ballister Boldheart and Ambrosius Goldenloin. They were assigned together as partners for dual practice. They didn't mind, they were excited. They were always a duo and bow, they had to battle each other. They would try not to play around with the Director's presence. They have to be serious and play as if they are enemies.

At that moment, Ballister poked Ambrosius' hip with his wooden sword.

"Whoops! Careful there," Ambrosius chuckled quietly.

"Sorry," Ballister whispered. Knights never apologize, so he lowered his voice when he said that word.

As the children kept on training, the Director had been observing each and every child in the Academy. Most of them did so well. Ballister had always been the best student she ever had, but she also wanted Ambrosius to be as best as the former, just to maintain the status of his bloodline.

"Cadets, may I please have your attention?" The Director announced, having all the students' attention as they all left their station and placed themselves in line, and stood straight, "We have a very special guest today, and she brought us an unexpected surprise. Students, welcome, Queen Valerin."

As the Director stepped aside, Queen Valerin walked calmly in front of the students as they all bowed respectfully before their queen.

"Please, don't be too formal. I know you are all very busy and well-focused on being knights, but I have a very special announcement to all of you," Queen Valerin announced as the students all stood up straight from their bowing, "We have a new student today, and she's very new, she doesn't come from a noble bloodline."

Todd snicked quietly, "Oh great, another street rat, a girl street rat."

The other kids chuckled quietly as Ballister and Ambrosius heard Todd's insult for the new student, not to mention they also thought about Ballister being the only commoner knight-in-training. Now that there were going to be two, there will be double punching bags in this Institute. Ambrosius just wanted to march right at Todd and punch him, but Ballister extended his arm to stop him, shaking his head and gesturing not to continue what he was doing, especially not in front of the queen.

"Everyone, I like you to meet Chasina," The queen lowered her hand, and pointed below her, but there was no one there, "It's okay, Chasina, you can come out."

Behind the queen's dress, a female child timidly and shyly crept out to show herself. She was very afraid and very shy to show her face, but, as a young commoner, she loved to obey the queen. She then slowly stepped out, fully showing herself. A little girl, probably a year younger than Ballister and Ambrosius' age, with short brown hair that covered half of her right eye, wearing a sky-blue blouse, a cerulean skirt, and a cyan hairclip bow. She was also holding a gray mouse plushie in her arms, and she was covered with a little amount of dirt as if she hadn't showered for a while. It made sense because she had been living in the streets all her life.

Ambrosius gasped in delight as he nudged at Ballister, making him think he was lucky that he wouldn't be the only commoner in the Institute.

Queen Valerin bent down to reach the little girl's level as she placed a hand on her head, "I saw this little girl sneaking into the headquarters, and I saw in her eyes when she held a sword. It inspired me that we should have another lower-class child in the Institute. And I hope you should make her feel welcome."

The other young knights-in-training quietly snorted as if they wanted to welcome this young commoner into the Academy. They already have one. They didn't want to deal with another one.

Ballister just stared pitifully that the new student would have to deal with the same prejudice from the other cadets as he had, while Ambrosius glared spitefully. This was like how Ballister got into the Institute, but since this was a very young female commoner, the young Goldenloin knew those bullies would do something worse to her.

"Well, I should leave you all to carry on with your training," Queen Valerin reported before turning at the young girl, "Chasina, you're going to be alright here, and you'll be the hero that I see in you."

While looking up at the queen, Chasina was scared. She wanted to be a knight, but her lack of self-confidence made her doubt herself. But since the queen herself was the one who brought her here, Chasina just nodded at her, hoping the queen was right with her words. She had no idea what she put herself into when she snuck into the Institute's castle and held a sword from one of the display cases of the deceased knights.

Queen Valerin stood up straight once again and walked out to leave the students back to their training. Chasina quickly tried to follow the queen as she was too scared to be left alone without her supervision, but the door was already closed. The queen left. Chasina was on her own now. She was really scared. She didn't know if she could survive here… Alone.

The Director approached her closer from behind, and placed a hand on her shoulder, "Alright, Chasina, why don't stand over there next to your classmate, Ballister, over there?" she pointed her staff to where Ballister was standing. Chasina looked up and saw a young commoner boy waving at her. Chasina wasn't so excited about this. She was very new, so she didn't know how the system worked here. When Chasina, still holding her toy, walked slowly towards the line, one cadet beside Ballister moved aside, not because he would give her space, it was because he was disgusted by a dirty new commoner. The other cadets laughed while covering their mouths as they watched Chasina stand in line beside Ballister.

Ballister extended a hand to Chasina, but she just stared at him and looked away. She was too scared to meet another kid at her age…, or older. She wasn't ready to socialize yet. Ballister understood that. On his first day here, it was hard to socialize with other cadets. Nobody liked him here… except for just one kid. Chasina just needed time to find trust in other kids. Ballister put his hand back behind his back, giving Chasina some space for herself.

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At recess, Chasina was sitting on the dining table alone, eating a grilled cheese sandwich. This was the only thing she could afford to get at the cafeteria. She wasn't comfortable eating different food since she only ate leftovers and food from trash when she was still living on the streets.

There were so many things in her mind today. It was her first day, and things were getting hard. It was because she started late. Unlike Ballister, Chasina started training a little later than the rest of the cadets. She couldn't keep up with the classes. She needed to read more textbooks and observe demos of how to hold the sword, dodge attacks, etc. She was too slow and even scared that she wouldn't reach her dreams too soon. There was so much pressure already. Her training was too advanced for her to catch up. It was a stressful first day already.

Recess was the only thing she could rest herself from all that training. She hoped she got her head straight once she finished eating her food.

Just then, a group of kids approached her with smirky faces.

"Look what we have here, guys. Another kid from the streets!" Todd laughed as he raised his hands for his fellow cadets to give him high-fives. Chasina remembered Todd from earlier. The guy who would made fun of her already. Chasina decided to ignore him and proceeded to eat.

"Wha- what are you eating? A grilled cheese sandwich?! What are you? A street mouse?" Todd laughed loudly as so did the rest of the knights-in-training. It wasn't her fault that she liked cheese. Chasina loved cheese. The only food she could eat when she tried to survive.

"Look, she is a mouse!" One of the students pointed out.

Chasina tried not to cry when the other cadets called her that as her hair covered half of her face and took another bite.

Shockingly, her mouse plushie got snatched away from beside her. Todd held the toy by its tail.

"Hey!" Chasina yelped, witnessing her favorite toy got taken away.

"She has a stuffed mouse as a pet, too!" Todd showed the stuffed mouse to his fellow cadets.

"Give it back!" Chasina demanded, throwing her unfinished sandwich on the table, and stood up to get her mouse back.

"Awww, you want this?" Todd cooed before throwing the mouse at another student.

It became a Hot Potato Game for the other students as they passed the mouse plushie to each other and prevented Chasina from catching her beloved toy.

"No! Cherry!" Chasina cried, trying to catch her mouse, "Please, I want Cherry! Give her back to me!"

Todd then caught the mouse back into his arms and held it by the tail again. He handed the mouse to Chasina, but he raised it up to prevent Chasina from retrieving it as she was too short to reach her toy, "If you want it, you have to catch it!" He threw the mouse again to another cadet.

"No! Please! Give her back!" Chasina sobbed, still trying to catch her mouse, and extending her arms to reach for it.

"Hey!" Ballister's voice was heard behind the other cadets. They all turned around, and Chasina was surprised to see the same boy she stood next to earlier, "Why don't you give her that mouse back? She did nothing to you!" Ballister bravely marched up to Todd.

"Aww, isn't this sweet? Ballister here thought he was a real knight already!" Todd teased with a chuckle with other cadets chuckled along with him. He grabbed Ballister by his shirt collar, and pulled him closer to his face, "By protecting a very weak princess!" Todd threw Ballister in front of Chasina, who scooted backward slightly, "You know, you're lucky the queen sent in another commoner because if neither of you would become a knight, then you'd both be losers together. High-five on that!" Todd raised both his hands, letting other cadets high-five him again, and they all laughed at Ballister and Chasina.

Surprisingly, the mouse plushie around Todd's arm got snatched from behind. It was Ambrosius as he held the mouse gently in his arms, "Leave them alone, Todd. It's none of your business to tell them what they'll be in the future, especially her," he eyed Chasina, who was shocked to see a noble student would stand up to commoners like her and Ballister.

"Pfft! Whatever, Goldenloin, have fun with your servant and your new toy, and I'm not talking about the mouse," Todd scoffed as he walked away before bumping his shoulder at Ambrosius', and the other cadets followed him.

As those bullies already left, Ambrosius turned, and offered a hand to Ballister, "Bal, are you okay?"

Ballister accepted Ambrosius' hand, and stood back up on his feet again, "Yeah, I was supposed to get that mouse… for her," he tilted his head at Chasina. She was still on the ground, feeling scared to come forward towards the two boys.

Ambrosius looked down at the mouse plush he held, and handed it over to the little girl, "Here. I think this belongs to you."

Chasina almost hesitated to come close and retrieve her mouse because it was held by another noble child. She was afraid to be bullied again. But that was her toy. She needed her mouse. If this child was handing it over to her, then now was her chance to get it back, "Ch-Cherry!" Chasina rushed to her mouse, and snatched it back, hugging it so tightly like she never wanted to let it go again. Small tears flowed down on her cheek. She really loved her toy.

"I'm sorry about Todd. He's always been like that," Ambrosius explained as he stepped forward, causing Chasina to back away a little while holding her adorable little mouse, "Hey, don't be afraid, we're not going to hurt you."

But Chasina remained distant while still hugging her mouse. It was hard for her to make new friends, especially when she had already been bullied. She still stayed still while staring at the two boys at the corner of her eyes. Her left eye was covered by her hair as she was too shy to even look directly.

Ballister and Ambrosius glanced at each other, knowing the girl was too scared to come closer. They understood her, so she needed more time and space to socialize.

"Anyway, I'm Ambrosius," the young noble kid introduced himself.

"And I'm Ballister," the young commoner boy took a step closer to the young girl, and kneeled to her level, "Um, what's your name again?"

Chasina was too nervous to talk, but it was rude of her if she didn't speak at all when she was asked. She responded quietly, "Um... I'm Chasina."

"I'm sorry, what was that?" Ballister asked, leaning the side of his head a little closer to hear her.

"Um... My name is Chasina," Chasina answered even quieter.

"A little louder," Ambrosius requested.

"It's Chasina," the young commoner girl whispered quickly.

"I think I almost hear 'Chasina'. It's that your name?" Ballister tried to clarify what the little girl was saying.

But Chasina only let out a small squeak.

Seeing that the commoner girl felt so pressured and nervous, Ambrosius told her calmly, "Okay, you don't have to say it again. So, you dream of becoming a knight one day?"

Without saying a word, Chasina just nodded. "So do we! Your parents must be really proud," Ballister exclaimed while approaching closer to Chasina, "Where are your parents, by the way?"

That was it. Chasina only lived in a street with no memory of her parents. Yet, she grew up without parents or a family either. She lived alone, all by herself with her toy, "Umm… I don't have parents," she answered, still quiet but clear to hear.

Ballister felt pity for Chasina. He had the same life as she had. All alone in the street, "Aww, it's okay. I don't have parents either. I came from the streets, like you."

"It's true. Ballister here snuck up into the training course and attacked a monster dummy. It's pretty funny," Ambrosius recalled the day Ballister snuck into the obstacle course, and the knights tackled him down. Ballister wasn't so proud of himself that day, but he was glad he was brave enough to sneak in like that.

Chasina let out a little giggle. It was funny.

"Hey, why don't you hang out with us?" Ambrosius suggested.

"Are you sure? I don't want to be a bother," Chasina said, feeling like a burden already.

"It's nothing. We want you to stick with us. We'll help you along the way since you missed a couple of sessions. You didn't catch up when our training started. We'll help you out with make-up sessions," Ballister suggested.

Chasina wasn't sure if this was a good idea. She just met these boys. Why were they so nice to her? Why didn't they like those other cadets? But hearing their voices sounded like they were serious about accompanying her. Chasina slightly turned her head to show both her eyes from her hair, "Well… alright. Thank you."

Ballister offered Chasina's hand as she accepted, and he helped her get up on her feet. She then approached Ambrosius, trying to be brave to face a noble child. He responded by just rubbing Chasina's hair, and she giggled like she was tickled.

It was a good start to a beautiful friendship.

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At the Glorodome, there was the knighting ceremony, and senior cadets were going to be knights tonight. Ambrosius, Ballister, and Chasina snuck out of their dorms just to see the ceremony. They found the right spot for them to watch the whole view. Ambrosius climbed up on the stadium rafters first before Ballister and Chasina tried to catch up with him, "Come on, come on!"

Ballister came up next, then offered Chasina's hand, who was still trying to climb up while holding her mouse toy.

"Careful, Chasina," Ballister grabbed her hand and lifted her up.

Once the children were up on their feet, they continued to walk a little farther to find a better view while Chasina felt hesitant but followed the two boys anyway.

"Are you sure this is safe? I don't think we're allowed here," Chasina said.

"Don't worry. No one will know we're here. We've been here before," Ambrosius reassured her, sitting at the edge of the rafter.

"This is also the place where we hang out sometimes," Ballister added, also sitting down.

"Wow, that's really great," Chasina still felt hesitant about this idea, but she didn't want to feel left out of the fun, so she sat down beside Ballister.

As the knighting ceremony started, new knights rode their horses into the arena, and the whole crowd cheered for their new knights. The knights headed towards the middle of the arena.

"Wow, that's a lot of knights," Chasina commented, couldn't take her eyes off the scene.

"Here's the best part," Ambrosius whispered excitedly.

The three children proceeded to watch the scene. A knight stepped forward before the queen, and she used the sword to announce his knighthood to the public. The crowd cheered loudly.

Chasina was puzzled at first about what was happening, until she figured it out for herself, "Oh, so that's how they would become knights? The Queen officially made them knights?"

"That's right. And someday, it's gonna be us down there," Ambrosius said proudly.

"Do you think we'll be able to do it?" Chasina asked in doubt. Seeing the other knights reach their dream tonight, she couldn't imagine herself being down there with the queen who would knight her one day. She wasn't sure what the future held for her as Chasina doubted if she would ever be a knight, "Do you think I can do it?"

Ballister placed an arm around her shoulder, "Of course. We saw how you worked hard back at the Academy. First make-up sessions, you're already learning."

"I can be a fast learner sometimes." Chasina chuckled proudly, trying to remove Ballister's arm from her, "I'm just afraid that… I might not be able to do it."

"What makes you say that?" Ballister asked with him and Ambrosius glanced at her worryingly.

"I mean, come on. Look at me! I'm no noble, I'm from the streets, and I'm a girl…. A weak little girl," Chasina curled herself and hugged her knees.

"You're not. Did you already know that Gloreth is a girl herself?" Ballister reminded, still seeing Gloreth's statue (its backside) from up here.

"Yeah, but she's brave and determined. I'm just scared and timid. Knights are not like that," Chasina was filled with self-doubt. She even stared at Gloreth's statue from afar, comparing herself to the legendary hero.

"Hey, I was like that too," Ambrosius admitted.

"You are?" Chasina refused to believe that.

"You just didn't know you were talking to the direct descendant of Gloreth," Ambrosius rubbed his thumb and index fingers together while staring at his nails, before glancing back at Chasina with a smug look.

Chasina was confused by Ambrosius' words. She didn't know what he was talking about. It was confusing, until… She stared at Gloreth's statue then back at Ambrosius. She looked back and forth at the giant statue and her friend a couple of times before she realized a shocking revelation.

Ambrosius is Gloreth's descendant that she never ever knew before!

"I didn't know that!" Chasina exclaimed, making the two boys laugh. They couldn't believe Chasina was still clueless about that fact. She should've gotten out more.

"I thought you'd figured it out yourself!" Ambrosius laughed really hard.

"I didn't know!" Chasina admitted. She was completely unaware. She knew Ambrosius came from a noble family since all cadets were born noble with Ballister being the only commoner before her arrival, but she couldn't tell which ancestry belonged to every student in the academy, "But I do know now," Then, she remembered Ballister being a commoner like her. He was so brave and hardworking, while Chasina had a little lack of self-confidence. That made them so different, "How do you get so confident, Ballister?"

"I wasn't so confident, but I did work very hard in class, and it's my dream. And if it's your dream to be a knight too, then I know you'll be able to be one," Ballister advised, making Chasina nod in agreement. It was her dream to be a knight and to protect the kingdom. It was merely impossible for her until the queen decided to let a commoner boy like Ballister train into the Institute. Now, Chasina was brought in as well.

But there was another thing Chasina was thinking in her head, much more important than her dream, "I'm more worried about another thing."

"What would it be?" Ballister asked, but Chasina was hesitant to answer, "Come on. You can tell us."

Chasina sighed in embarrassment. It would be too cheesy or sappy to tell them what was on her mind right now. She held her toy again, and confessed, "It's just that… you guys are my friends. You guys were the only ones who welcomed me here. And what would happen to us if we became knights? Would we ever be friends? Would we… still be friends? What if… we won't be?"

"That's not true. We'll always be friends," Ambrosius assured her.

"But, friendship isn't part of a knight's oath. Our oath is to protect the kingdom, which means taking the risk… even giving up our friendship…" Chasina's voice trembled and nearly cried. She sat back and looked down, proceeding to watch the ceremony. She would imagine that all three of them were down there but wouldn't be friends like how they were today anymore, "We go alone."

With Ballister feeling pity for Chasina and trying to comfort her, Ambrosius looked down at the ceremony. He had the same idea as Chasina's. She was right. For now, they are just children, being happy together while training to be the best knights. But, in the future, as they grew, they would risk losing their friendship when they fulfill their duties. Friendship couldn't last forever sometimes. It depended on how adults would see when they grew up.

Then, Ambrosius had an idea. It would be a risky idea, but it was the only option. He stood up and announced to the two commoners, "You know what? Why don't we make our own oath?"

"Our own oath?" Ballister asked.

"Yes! It might not be a knight's oath, but this is our oath together, knights or not."

"I'm pretty sure you will be a knight, Ambrosius."

"Even if I do, we still have to make a promising oath."

When Ambrosius took a knee down, Ballister and Chasina moved away from the edge and gathered into a huddle.

"From here on out, we swear to each other that we always be best friends. Even if we become knights, nothing and absolutely nothing would stand between our friendship. Not even the Institute would break us apart. We'll always stay close together, and be knights together at the very end," Ambrosius just made an unbreakable and sworn promise. As a noble-born knight-to-be, it was in his honor to make a promise that would never be made to be broken…, ever. To prove it, he put his hand in the middle, to be the first out of the three to swear that promise, "That's a promise I'm willing to keep. I swear," he was now waiting for any of the two to join him. He wanted to make sure that Ballister and Chasina would swear the same promise he was keeping.

"I swear," Ballister was the next one to put his hand on the middle, over Ambrosius' hand. He wanted to make this friendship last forever like Ambrosius and Chasina.

Once Ballister touched Ambrosius' hand, there was a feeling between them that they hadn't felt before. In his defense, Ambrosius already had an interest in Ballister, but they were still children. It might be just a normal liking, nothing more.

Ballister didn't mean to make things awkward between him and Ambrosius when the former touched his hand. The way Ambrosius stared at him made Ballister blush a little while his hair covered one of his eyes, and tried to look away from him.

Seeing the two boys staring so strangely at each other, Chasina didn't know what was happening as she interrupted them, "Um… you guys know I'm here right? Eyes on me," The kids just chuckled hysterically while Chasina still stayed with the same topic they were talking about just now, "But… I swear," she put her hand over Ballister and Ambrosius' hand, she also agreed with this promise. She wanted to stay best friends with the boys who had been so nice to her ever since she first stepped at the Academy. Even if they would reach their dreams as knights, she wished that they would stay like this for a long time.

"Trust me, we'll always be best friends… no matter what," Ambrosius declared as the three had their hands lifted in the air.

Throughout the years, Ballister, Ambrosius, and Chasina grew close together as a trio. To lock up their promise forever, Ambrosius made his own "Decree of Friendship" with just a piece of paper and crayons. He put his signature under the text with a yellow crayon. He passed the paper to Ballister, signing his own signature with a black crayon. He passed the paper to Chasina, who signed her signature with a blue crayon. With the "decree" being signed up, Ambrosius rolled the paper into a scroll and kept it in a small chest.

Ballister and Ambrosius then acted like older brothers to Chasina. Ambrosius gave one of his family's swords to Chasina, just like he gave one to Ballister. He gave her a blue one and modified the G initial of the sword to a C.

When the three were stargazing together in Ambrosius' dorm, Chasina was fascinated by the crescent moon. This gave Ballister the idea of giving her a last name; Moonlight. Chasina loved that name and decided to keep it.

One day, Chasina lost her favorite toy mouse, which was hidden in the corner under her bed. Ballister and Ambrosius found it until Chasina declared she didn't need her toy now that she had two amazing big brothers to look after her. Secretly, Ambrosius kept her toy mouse, just in case she would need it again one day. When the three were stargazing together outside their dorms and laid down under the stars, Ballister surprised Chasina with a new hairpin by removing her old hairclip bow and replacing it with the one he made. When Ambrosius gave Chasina a mirror, she saw the new hairpin Ballister made for her. It was a blue circular hairpin with a navy blue crescent moon surrounded by tiny silver gems. She loved it! She totally loved her new hairpin. She had been wearing that pin ever since and never took it off.

There was also that day when Ballister and Ambrosius helped Chasina dye a streak of her hair with blue and white.

As they grew, Ballister and Ambrosius continued protecting Chasina from being severely bullied until she was a bit old enough to defend herself, and gained confidence.

Years later, Ballister, Ambrosius, and Chasina were now teenagers. Possibly 16 or 17. They did great at the academy together. All three, fight together, side-by-side. No solo, no letting each other down. Even though there were classes that the three had to train alone, most of the time, they were studying, learning, training, and fighting together. They always had each other's backs.

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Another day in training, the three took a hard level at the obstacle course. The three were working together to pass this training test. It was the mid-terms, and they must have to survive this test together. No one should be left behind.

Queen Valerin and the Director were watching them impressively from the side. The queen was delighted by the sight of three knight-in-training fighting together while the Director showed a worried expression.

"Look at them, my queen," the Director said calmly, trying not to express such emotion about her concern.

"I know. Three brave future knights, fighting together to protect our kingdom," Queen Valerin sighed proudly. She loved how three cadets trained together.

"But this isn't the will of Gloreth, Your Majesty. Friendship is a distraction to the duty of knights. Not even friendship helped Gloreth to be a hero," the Director confessed her opinion about the students' friendship.

The queen turned to her, and explained with confidence, "Director, you might not see it, but the way I see it, these three would make a better future for our kingdom. You may think their friendship won't fulfill their duties, but to me, they would do very well, even better than one knight alone," the queen and the Director returned their gaze to the three students as Ballister, Ambrosius, and Chasina finished the whole obstacle. Nothing but debris and messes around them. They defeated dummies and traps together, and they celebrated with cheers and group hugs for their success. Their laughter was still heard by the two women, "I think Gloreth would've done the same, having friends to fight with her for the kingdom."

But the Director thought of it otherwise when she was observing the trio, "Would you even think that friendship would bring threat to the kingdom, Your Majesty?"

"I think not. Knights are stronger when they work together, especially in the name of friendship, so there's nothing to be worried about, Director. The future remains bright in their hands together," Queen Valerin added proudly before deciding to leave to get back to her duties.

As the queen left, the Director completely disagreed with applying this "circumstance" to a future incredible knight like Ambrosius since he was Gloreth's direct descendant and he had to fulfill his duties just like his family and his ancestor had ever done. She believed Ballister and Chasina were a distraction to Ambrosius' future in knighthood and the kingdom would fall apart because of their friendship, as she had always feared when she was young. At her last glance at the three students, a broken robot was still functioning, and about to shoot Ambrosius, but Chasina pushed him out of the way, and deflected the ammo back onto the robot, breaking it down in the process. The three friends laughed at this moment.

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The trio reached the age of 25 or 26. They completely reached adulthood. 4 years left before their dreams would come true.

One night, Chasina went to Ambrosius' dorm to talk to him. She was standing in front of Ambrosius' door room very nervously. She took a deep breath as she wasn't sure she was ready to do this, but she couldn't do anything until she wanted to say something to her "big brother", "Okay, here we go,"

She knocked on the door, and the door was already opened by the Goldenloin, "Chasina, my baby sister!"

Chasina giggled when he called her that as she playfully smacked his shoulder, "Stop calling me that. Can I come in?"

"Sure, sure," Ambrosius stepped aside for Chasina to come into his room. When she was finally inside, Ambrosius closed the door, and turned to his "little sister", "Do you need something, Chas?"

"Oh, I just wanna talk to you," Chasina answered as she sat on Ambrosius' bed.

"Alright. What is this all about?" Ambrosius asked, sitting next to her.

"Well, umm…" Chasina was too scared and too nervous to tell Ambrosius what she wanted to tell him. She didn't want to say anything literally, but it would be something like it was a goodbye message. She has to be specific, but, at the same time, metaphorically. She exhaled for a moment before confessing, "I just wanted to tell you that you're the best big brother I could ever ask for. You're always there for me when I need you."

Ambrosius was touched by Chasina's words as he scoffed in laughter, "Aww, it sounded like this would be your last words to me. Don't scare me like that!" He threw his arm around her back, making Chasina chuckle with him.

"No, it's true, Ambrosius. I just… I realized how important you are to me. I looked up to you since we were kids, and… I could never forget that," Chasina smiled before leaning herself into a hug.

Ambrosius hugged her back like a big brother protecting his little sister with just his arms, "Me too, Chas. You're the little sister I never thought I had," he planted a kiss on Chasina's head before pulling himself from the hug to look down at her, "Hey, what's really going on?"

"Nothing, nothing, I just…" Chasina didn't want to tell Ambrosius what was happening lately. He let out a little yawn, and her eyes were half-closed.

Ambrosius observed the look on Chasina's face. He helped her up and guided her out of his room. He opened the door for Chasina, and led her out, "Maybe you're just tired. You need to get back to your room. I'll take you there."

"No, no!" Chasina quickly answered. She wasn't ready to head to her room yet. There was something else she wanted to do next, "I-I want to go to Ballister, just to say goodnight to him."

"Alright, Chasina, just be careful on your way. Okay, sis?"

"Yes, Bro, I will."

"Great. Goodnight," Ambrosius smiled at Chasina before he closed the door.

Now that Chasina was alone with her thoughts with Ambrosius closing the door, she turned around, dropping her face to sadness. She had to act fast before she could do what she wanted to do tonight.

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Chasina made it to Ballister's dorm room as she knocked on the door.

Right away, the door opened and Ballister was surprised to see Chasina, "Hey, Chasina!"

"Hi, Ballister," Chasina greeted him with a normal expression.

"What are you doing this late? You must get back to your room before the Director finds out," Ballister instructed, concerning for his "little sister."

"Can I just at least talk to you, just one last time?" Chasina requested as if it would be her last request.

"Umm, okay, come on in," Ballister was a little confused at the last part, but he moved aside to let Chasina in. Ballister then closed the door, and turned to Chasina, "So, what do you want to talk about?"

"Umm," Chasina fiddled with her fingers while sitting on the stool. She couldn't bring herself to say what she wanted to tell Ballister. She loved him so much like a big brother, and she didn't want to hurt him. She had to compromise, "Bal, I want to say thank you for… staying with me this whole time. I thought I would be alone, but you and Ambrosius were always there for me, mostly you. You know what it's like to be an orphan commoner, and you made me feel that I'm not alone."

Chasina's speech made Ballister wonder why she would say something like this like it would be the last thing she would ever do. He took another chair, and sat down in front of her, "Okay, where does this come from?"

"Nowhere! Just from me," Chasina lied, making a sheepish smile.

Ballister rolled his eyes and cupped Chasina's face with one hand to make her look at him, "Chasina, you know that I'm always here for you. You know we commoners must stick together," the look on his face made Chasina smile and nod at him. Both of them are commoners, and they still stuck by each other's side every step of the way, "And Ambrosius was there for us as well!"

Chasina chuckled, remembering the protective one of the trio, "Yeah. He's a very nice guy."

"But I was worried. What's gotten into you for saying these things to me?"

"Nothing. I just… I just love you."

"I love you too, sis," Ballister smiled as he kissed Chsina's forehead, and helped her get up from the chair to guide her out of her room. It was already late, and Chasina needed to be in her room, "Let's just talk about it tomorrow, okay? You need to go back to your room." When Chasina was out of the door, Ballister couldn't close the door without telling Chasina, "I'll see you tomorrow. Goodnight."

As soon as Ballister closed the door, Chasina's face dropped to sadness as she turned around, whispering, "There's not gonna be a tomorrow," she let out a sniff before walking back to the direction of her room.

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In her room, Chasina already packed the stuff she needed in her suitcase. Before she left, she turned around just to look at her dorm room one last time. On her bed was the sword Ambrosius gave to her with a carved C behind the G.

Chasina let out a few tears in her eyes. She would regret what she would be doing, but it was for the best of her and her two best friends, "I'm sorry, guys. I don't think I can do this," she slowly closed the door as the light that shined onto the sword got narrower and narrower until it was gone. The sword was just door on her bed, waiting for anyone to hold it.

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Sneaking out of the Academy wasn't easy. Chasina had to improvise her plan to escape with other knights seeing her. She used everything she learned from her training with a couple of new techniques to be sneaky and get out of the fence. She threw her suitcase first over the large fence. Then, it was her turn to jump over, but she lowered herself a little bit to avoid being spotted by a light beam from one of the towers. When the light passed by her, Chasina quickly climbed up the fence and threw herself down to the other side.

Chasina ran as far as she could from the Institute's palace. She just hoped no knights would see her leave, not even her adoptive brothers. When she was already gone so far, she looked back at the palace. She remembered that day she snuck into that place, only to be discovered by Queen Valerin and let her train to be a knight at the Academy. Now, she was sneaking out. She thought she could do this. She thought she could be a knight like she always dreamed of. She thought her two best friends' encouragement would help her, but she was wrong. She had been staying at the Academy for years, and only to this day, she had a lot of thought about going down this path, and it wasn't worth it. Chasina just lost her confidence in continuing her dreams, and had some self-doubt about herself; a female commoner being a knight was highly impossible. All her training was a waste of time if she couldn't reach her dreams for real. She wouldn't know that, but she was sure that she couldn't be a knight… like her friends. Most of all, she didn't want to let her friends down. She didn't want to be a burden on them. She wanted them to succeed… without her. She was only doing them a favor, that's what best friends do… what a friend would do. Even if far away, Chasina wanted to keep her promise to her friends that they made when they were still children. She had to stick by it.

Chasina took out a photo of her, Ambrosius, and Ballister together. They were so happy when they took a selfie. But deep down inside, Chasina had a lot of doubts about herself. She wouldn't know if their friendship last forever if she didn't succeed in what she was trained to be. And she couldn't let her friends go down with her… for her. She had to do what's best for all three of them

Chasina first glanced at one brother whom she looked up to, "Ambrosius," and then the other brother whom she grew close to "Ballister," she wiped a tear with her hand before sobbing softly, "Maybe you're better off without me," she put the photo back on her pocket before walking off even further, "I'm so sorry."

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2 years later after her departure, Chasina tried to survive on her own. She went through a couple of jobs and tried to stay hidden from the Institute. During her free time, she had been self-trained with a lot of new hand-to-hand combat and self-defense moves. Now that she was on her own, she had to protect herself. Without her sword, she was defenseless. She had to fight in a different way this time.

There came a time when she was caught in the middle of a gang that would attack her. Thanks to her self-defense training, she defeated a lot of goons many times, and even had to kick them in the nuts! Unfortunately, she was intruded in an abandoned warehouse, and the structure was unstable. Who knew how long this warehouse was standing?

When she was punching and kicking goons, her moves sent them crashing into walls and structures making the warehouse stand still. Seeing that the whole place would fall down, all of the surviving goons moved out and Chasina tried to flee as well, but the whole building collapsed on her.

Chasina was out cold for a few hours until she woke up, looking unharmed, but she felt her left leg get stuck by heavy debris from what was supposed to be a warehouse. Chasina tried to pull her leg out from under the debris, but she was stuck real tight. She even tried lifting with her hands, but the debris was too heavy. She then tried kicking the debris with her spare leg, but it was no use. She tried kicking it again, causing a broken roof to tremble and close to dropping onto her.

While shielding herself with her arms when the broken roof startled her, Chasina noticed the photo slid out from her pocket. She examined the photo of her, Ambrosius, and Ballister. Oh, how she missed them so badly. She even wondered how they were doing when she was gone. Were they worried for her. Were they thinking of her everyday? Or did they just move on and concentrate on their training with her? Either way, she never stopped thinking about them everyday for the past 2 years. She just hoped that one day, if Ambrosius and Ballister would become knights, they would see each other again.

Her thoughts were interrupted when she heard the broken roof was about to crash down on her, so close to her face. Chasina was horrified and tried kicking the debris off her stuck leg, but still no effect. She then gave an angry and frustrated look.

"Good Gloreth. Just great."

Two months later, Chasina found herself a temporary hideout where she was working on something. Other than her training both from the Institute and her self-training, she also learned gadgetry. What she had been made was not easy. It took her two months to figure out her new and only invention. After fixing a couple of things, she attached it to where her left leg was supposed to be, replacing her old flesh leg with a mechanical one.

In order to free herself from the heavy debris that got her leg stuck two months ago, Chasina had no choice but to chop off her own leg when she found a saw nearby. It was painful and a lot of blood bled out from her body, but she managed to survive as long as she could. She always looked at the photo of her and her friends, which motivated her to keep going, and in hopes of seeing them again when she was ready.

It took her two months to build her a new leg, but it was worth it. She wanted it to be as functional as possible in order to live and survive alone.

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These past two more years, Chasina was still living on her own, still trying to get used to her prosthetic leg, and continued her self-defense and hand-to-hand combat training. If not a sword, then she customized her own weapon of defense and attack; her own hairpin that Ballister gave to her when they were younger. She even made copies of her favorite pin as she used them as shuriken.

She remembered that tonight was the night of her friends' knighting ceremony… when she would have been a knight if she had stayed four years ago.

Even if she won't be a knight tonight, not if anyone would remember her, she can't miss her friends becoming knights they had dreamed of since they were all still children.

A male reporter was currently delivering a report for the whole kingdom, "Good evening, folks. We are coming to you live from the Glorodome. I'm Nate Knight."

His female co-worker introduced herself next, "I'm Alamzapam Davis."

"And tonight's the night we knight the knights! Ain't that right, Pam?" Nate declared as a spotlight shined over one of the helicopter lights, bringing to light the shiny statue that is of the great Gloreth herself.

"It sure is, Nate," Pam replied before pointing out as the two reporters could be seen doing their report in front of the stadium, "But this is also the most controversial knighting ceremony in a thousand years."

"You can feel the excitement and the tension," Nate added on, explaining as crowds of people started to pour into the city, gazing at the giant screens around them to watch the report live. "Tonight, tradition will be cast aside, and the kingdom will change forever because of one man."

Chasina was walking on the streets quietly, blending in with the crowd with her blue cloak on. She removed her hood that covered her face to watch the news on a nearby screen.

"Ballister," Pam identified before a video clip showed of Ballister, when he was younger, eagerly going through a training course, "The street kid with the impossible dream of being a knight."

"I'm here to slay monsters and protect our kingdom," young Ballister declared before getting tackled by a bunch of men in armor.

While watching that clip, Chasina let out a little giggle. She never knew what happened to her adoptive older brother when he got into the academy. Chasina hadn't been there yet, so she didn't remember that time.

A new video then showed young Ballister with the queen and the Director, who gave him a shiny sword with Nate explained, "Impossible, that is until the queen herself made a shocking decision."

The little boy was amazed by how mighty the sword looked while the queen explained to the reporters, "No, he doesn't come from a noble bloodline... but he might just have the heart of a hero."

A new video clip then showed Ballister, who was now all grown up as an adult, duked in silvery black knight armor, and easily defeating all the obstacles that stood in his way while Pam elaborated, "And Ballister made the most of that chance, graduating top of his institute class. A class that includes none other than…"

A new clip showed a video imagery of the handsome, charming man in gold armor, while Nate declared his name, "Ambrosius Goldenloin."

"Hey," Ambrosius said with a shiny smile.

Nate explained a little about Ambrosius, "Direct descendant of Gloreth herself, and the most anticipated knight of a generation."

A new video clip showed Ambrosius shouting "Whoo," which prompted the crowd to respond with the same cheer before he knelt down and posed for a picture with a little boy.

While watching, Chasina rolled her eyes, remembering her other older brother with that ego.

She was waiting for her introduction in the news, but she wasn't mentioned nor shown in the video footage. It was possibly the fact that she had gone for 4 years, and no one knew she had gone missing or left the Institute. Guess she was already forgotten. It was already 4 years, and time flew so fast.

Pam the reporter then mentioned, "With Ballister joining the ranks, for the first time in history, our safety will be put in the hands of a commoner."

"I don't feel safe," a female resident mentioned when asked for an interview.

"It's not what Gloreth wanted," another female resident replied, not liking the idea one bit.

Back with the news reporters, Nate then stated, "So tonight, only one question remains. Will the kingdom accept this knight who might not be right?"

Hearing negative comments from other citizens of the kingdom, Chasina knew both she and Ballister wouldn't be accepted to be knights because they were both commoners. Now that she left, and Ballister was back to be the only commoner left in the Institution, all hates went to him now. She just wished she would be there for Ballister, reminding him he wasn't alone in this… but she wasn't there for him… not at this time since things got complicated for Chasina. All she would do now is wish her luck from afar.

"Good luck out there, Bal. I wish you the best," Chasina sighed as she put her hood back on and walked off.

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In the stadium, everyone far and wide had gathered, excitedly anticipating the knighting ceremony to begin. This year was to be a historic ceremony, and whether the outcome was good or bad, all that mattered at the current moment was the sea of new knights that were to be honored by the queen herself.

Meanwhile, Chasine successfully snuck into the Glorodome and found herself an empty seat where she could see the whole arena. With her self-trained skills, she was stealthy, making it impossible to be noticed when she snuck into the stadium. She still covered herself with her cloak, hoping no one would recognize her. Of course, nobody would recognize her because nobody knew her. She was unrecognizable, probably ever since before she left and disappeared. The knighting ceremony just started just in time when Chasina took a seat. She could now relax and watch.

Lights flickered, spotlights brimming brightly, and the announcer declared, "And now the newest heroes of the realm!"

All of the knights rode into the stadium horseback, decked in armor and swords in hand, with the crowd cheering loud and proud for their arrival.

As Ballister entered the arena on his horse, the bright lights and the loud cheering amazed him; sure, it was always thrilling to watch the ceremony, but it was a whole new surreal feeling to BE the one receiving the cheers and applause, having the lights shine down on him, seeing the excitement and intrigue on everyone's faces. He almost wanted to pinch himself and see if he was dreaming, but now was not the time to be distracted.

Ballister rode up to Ambrosisus, who was soaking in the chanting, but turned his head and offered a warm smile to Ballister, as partial sharing of his excitement, and partial reassurance, letting him know that things were going alright so far.

Within the audience, Chasina clearly noticed Ballister and Ambrosius. She was so excited for them, but nervous for only Ballister and sad for herself that she wasn't there with her brothers. She has regrets about leaving, but it was for the best of her two best friends. She knew they did great without her around, and it was fine with her. She wanted her friends' dreams to come true.

As the knights rode their horses up to the white stage, blue carpet decorating its floor and the stairs, the announcer proclaimed as the lights dimmed, shining a spotlight down on a single throne that stood on the stage, "My lords and ladies; her Majesty. the Queen."

The queen, with the director standing next to her, rose up from her throne and approached the edge of the stairs.

On cue, the knights, in unison, lept down from their horses and approached the queen, standing straight by their horses, as orderly as any army would appear.

Ambrosius was the first to come forward and greet the queen. Before he did, he whispered to Ballister, "Here come the whoo," He turned back to the audience, and shouted very loudly, "Whoo." He earned a large round of cheers for him, many responding back with the same cheer.

Ballister couldn't help but smile, and Chasina, from the bleachers, rolled her eyes, chuckling; Sure, they both knew that Ambrosius would be receiving a lot of praise and cheer for becoming a knight; after all, he was a descendant of Gloreth, who was a legendary knight in the kingdom; any knight would be more than honored to follow in the footsteps of such a legacy, and be very well-known for it.

Ambrosius climbed up the steps and dropped to one knee, bowing in front of the queen and giving her his sword.

The queen accepted the sword and declared while tapping his shoulders ever so lightly with the tip of the sword, "I hereby pronounce you Sir Ambrosius Goldenloin, hero of the realm."

The crowd went absolutely bonkers with applause as the queen then told Ambrosius, "Stand, Sir Knight."

Ambrosius stood up on command and went to stand off to the side, near where the queen was.

Chasina let out a small squeal with happiness. She was happy for Ambrosius. He was destined to be a knight because of his ancestry. But Chasina never focused on that. All that mattered to her was Ambrosius was her friend. And he still is. She should be happy for her friend. Now, it was her other friend's turn; she started to be very nervous for him.

Ballister watched this and knew that he was up next to be knighted; this was it, everything he had worked for had led him to this moment. It was time….to fulfill his goal and be named a hero of the realm. He was excited, nervous, determined, and even slightly scared, but history was gonna be made tonight, and now was his time to make it happen. So, with a breath of air he released slowly, Ballister whispered to himself and made his way up the stairs, "Here we go."

While walking up, he saw the proud smile that the queen had; it was a smile resembling that of a proud mother watching their son. Although the Ballister was but merely a commoner, being handpicked by the queen herself to proceed with training at the institute and succeeding, making it this far, well, that qualified as an accomplishment to be very proud of.

Albeit, the closer he got, the more nervous Ballister began to feel, but seeing the reassuring smile Ambrosius had helped his nerves, although the stoic stance of the Director did not do much to calm his nerves. At the bleachers, Chasina was biting a finger real hard, praying that everything would be alright.

When Ballister was soon standing face-to-face with the queen, she spoke to him, "I've been looking forward to this moment."

"Thank you, Your Majesty," Ballister responded as he bowed down to one knee, feeling gratefulness and sincerity in his tone of voice.

Then, the queen made a surprising announcement, "My people, starting today, any of you should be able to hold the sword if you want it; if you earn it."

This announcement made the entire audience murmur in curiosity, confusion, excitement, and so many other emotions! While yes, the idea of even simple folks like themselves becoming knights did seem fairly exaggerated, and perhaps an improbable task, would this be something that COULD become a viable option for their future?

While the audience had their own doubts and questions, Chasina sighed sadly. She held a sword once and got into training, but she had self-doubt and a lack of confidence during her time at the academy. She doubted herself if she could ever earn a sword like both her brothers. She just wished she could continue, but there was a part of her that made her think she couldn't do it. She snapped out of her thoughts to continue watching.

"I've watched this young man earn it many times over," Before questions could arise, the queen then looked back at Ballister, asking him for his sword, which he easily took out and presented. The queen picked up the sword and gently tapped the tip of it on his shoulder, "I hereby pronounce you Sir Ballister Boldheart, hero of the realm!"

There was an eerie wave of silence in the beginning; did no one want to cheer for him? Did many people still not think Ballister would be a formidable knight because he was a commoner? Was this silence gonna break part to a loud ringing of boos or worse?

Both Ambrosius and Chasina couldn't help but feel a little concerned when the two separately saw the small frown Ballister had when he received no praise after being knighted by the queen herself.

Just then, there was a cla- then another, followed by a loud cheer, and then more cheers. Soon, to Ballister's surprise, the entire stadium was cheering loudly in applause, chanting his name at the top of their lungs, "Boldheart! Boldheart!"

"Boldheart! Yeah," Ambrosius cheered with a laugh also escaping his throat as he felt very happy for Ballister; he knew that if anyone deserved to have a moment like this as much as any other knight, it was him.

"Yes! That's my brother!" Chasina shouted happily as if anyone could hear her. She was happy for Ballister. She believed from the very beginning she met him that he could make a difference for young commoners like both of them.

Ballister himself could hardly believe it; the people finally saw him as a knight. He defied the impossible and made it possible; becoming a knight from common background! He didn't know what to think, other than…It truly is…a dream come true.

As the crowd continued to chant his name, the queen told the knight while giving him back his sword, "Congratulations, Sir Boldheart. Let a new era of heroes begin with you."

However, when Ballister had got his sword back, something strange happened; the end tip of the handle which the queen was holding earlier had…turned on? And it not only turned on, but a green light was emitted, and pointed directly at the queen herself.

The handle of the sword turned into a sort of high-gadget ray, and before Ballister could even know what was happening, the ray blasted a green beam of light that hit the queen square in the chest and sent her flying.

Everything seemed to happen in slow motion; the ray being blasted, the queen getting hit, her crown falling, the shocked look on everyone's faces, and even the disbelief on Balister's face. Everyone in the stadium, the Director and even Ambrosius and Chasina, who let out a horrific gasp, could not believe what was happening!

Without thinking, and acting in quick defense to save the queen, Ambrosius pulled out his sword and sliced it right through the arm that was holding the sword ray, sending the ray's blast upward at the sky, just narrowly avoiding the screens above the stage. Everyone in the audience looked up in shock, not only for what the blast from the ray was doing but also for what had been done; the queen was shot right in front of them, by how they saw it, none other than Ballister!

As much as she was shocked that the queen was killed by a green ray, Chasina just couldn't help but keep her eye on both Ballister and Ambrosius. She saw the whole scene, the way Ambrosius indeliberately sliced Ballister's arm with a sword. It was horrifying. One of her best friends who was her brother at heart got his arm chopped by her other friend and brother at heart. She never ever expected it would come to this. None of the three would think this would happen.

Ballister reeled in pain after his arm had gotten chopped off, but looking away from his arm, he saw the sword/ray drop and shatter upon impact hitting the floor. Broken light shards fell down from the ceiling, but all were oblivious to it for the shock of the events that have transpired were of much more importance.

Ballister looked up and saw the look of disbelief on Ambrosius' face, as well as the surprised expressions everyone else had, but none of their looks shook Ballister's more than Ambrosius'. From afar, Chasina still stared at her now shocked brothers as she covered her mouth in disbelief with her hands and little tears came out of her eyes. She felt that her worst expectation might come true… this might be the start of a faded friendship.

However, no words could be spoken from the three, with one being distant from the two; all that lay between them were the remains of the actions done.

Before that thought could come through, the chandelier from above broke off and fell down, damaging a hole through the stage floor between Ballister and Ambrosius. Chasina helplessly closed her eyes, not wanting to see more of them. She couldn't handle this anymore so she quickly rushed through the crowd to find an exit.

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She didn't know how long it was; hours, days, or weeks. Chasina still couldn't get over what just happened at the Glorodome. It was a nightmare back there. She was still in disbelief at what her brothers had done. On a rainy day, all Chasina had was a cloak, and wet, the rain couldn't stop her from thinking. She wasn't even running from the rain. Just letting it all in. Chasina didn't like to believe, didn't want to believe it. But something in her mind made her ask questions. Did Ballister really kill the queen? Did Ambrosius do the right thing? Her head got messed up with sadness, anger, and confusion. She couldn't tell anymore.

As she passed by, Chasina got a chance to stop at nearby screens of the news.

"The queen killer is still out there."

"Everyone is scared."

"Not since Gloreth's monster has anything been so hated."

"He never should've been a knight."

"He wasn't one of us and hated us for it."

"A commoner."

"He's vile."

"He's got no place in this kingdom."

"He's a murderer."

"He's a monster."

Looking at the news, Chasina shed a tear. She realized that this whole thing started 4 years after she left. It made her wonder if this was the consequence of her disappearance from her two best friends… that they changed without her presence. She didn't only think about herself or her two friends, she thought about how it came to this for all three of them.

Deep down, despite how she and everyone witnessed, Chasina refused to believe Ballister killed the queen. She had known him for a long time. He wasn't the kind of person to murder someone, especially the one who believed in him and Chasina as well. But would it be because she left without telling either of her two friends? Chasina hoped that wasn't the reason. If it did, then it might be her fault, and she wished she would've been there to prevent it from happening.

"Oh, Ballister, what just happened?! What did you do?" Chasina squeaked while holding her tears, and holding the picture of her and the two boys together. She stared at Ballister, having mixed feelings if she would believe he would do such a vile thing. Then, her eyes shifted to Ambrosius, and she let out more tears from her eyes, "Ambrosius, what have you done?!"

She couldn't get over the fact that Ambrosius would do that to Ballister. She wanted to believe it was an accident, but even if it was, it didn't change what she saw. Her brother hurt her other brother.

Chasina turned around, and started sobbing while hugging herself, "What is happening to my brothers?" She really hoped that she would've been there for Ballister and Ambrosius, and maybe protected them from hurting each other in any way.

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When a month passed by, while trying to get her mind off of things, Chasina went to the marketplace to get some food. Living alone in her temporary apartment was so lonely and scary sometimes. She had to survive by herself ever since she left the Institution. Because of taking multiple jobs and getting fired for 4 years, she earned her paycheck every now and then.

While getting some vegetables she needed, she heard electronic wanted signs from a newspaper stand, and it alerted her. She turned around to notice Ballister bumping into a few folks, who looked at him weirdly before walking away. The nearby window of a newspaper stand he passed kept showing electronic "WANTED" signs with his face on it, making him desperately cling to the hood he had on to try and cover his head and face. He almost crashed into a man who was reading a newspaper that had a "WANTED" poster of him on it. Ballister quickly, and desperately tried to hide his face so NO ONE could see him, but it was getting harder to have his identity concealed safely without someone spotting him. And low and behold.

"Wait, Bal?" Chasina said with a very low voice, curious about what her so-called criminal bestie doing out in the open, "What is he doing here?"

"I know he's here! Find him," she heard Ambrosius' voice order out, making Ballister hide behind a car to stay out of any line of sight.

"Ambrosius!" Chasina quickly hid behind a tower of crates with vegetables in them. She took a peak to see Ambrosius leading other knights to search for Ballister.

Then, a woman noticed Ambrosius and smiled, saying, "Look, it's Goldenloin!"

This stirred a crowd to come over and gather around Ambrosius in excitement, which turned out to be the perfect distraction for Ballister. With everyone looking at Sir Goldenloin, no one would even think to turn and spot him!

While Ambrosius tried to tell the crowd that they had to move because he was looking for Ballister, a kid then asked him hopefully, "Can I get your autograph?"

Mentally just biting his tongue, he figured one autograph couldn't hurt, replying while holding out a pen, "Just one signature. Who am I signing?"

While hiding and watching, Chasina remembered that night… the night of the knighting ceremony. How could she forget? It was unnecessarily graphic. She didn't want to think of how Ambrosius would hurt Ballister so badly. But what concerned her the most was that Ambrosius was the one who led the other knights to find Ballister! Despite not having the right information as to why Ambrosius was doing this to their best friend, Chasina could see, hear or even feel with her guts that he was serious with his duties as a knight, even putting his friendship at risk.

"Is he serious right now?" Chasina whispered angrily.

Ambrosius signing the autograph gave Ballister the perfect chance to sneak out and enter the car, hiding out inside of it.

A minute later, loud music was heard from the car Ballister was holding in. It started to get Ambrosius and Chasina's attention, with the golden-armored knight and a blue-cloaked figure turning their heads and seeing the car blasting the music the roof down, and some sort of figure, though Ambrosius couldn't tell who it was, inside with the saleslady while Chasina already knew who. But Ambrosius had a hunch that it could possibly be Ballister hiding in the car, and, after finishing with the autographs, he tried to get the crowd to move so he could take a closer look. This feared Chasina that her "wanted" brother would get caught for sure by her other "heroic" brother. She wanted to just step out of hiding, and help Ballister, but she couldn't show herself yet, and wasn't the right time yet.

But something else caught Chasina's attention. While still hiding behind a tower of crates, she noticed the squire was running for his life, asking the people around him,

"Please help me, help me, please! A little demon baby is after me! Please help me!"

Curious about what was going on, Chasina followed the commotion.

When Squire ran under a bridge pass, he stopped and screamed in fright when the "Demon Baby" appeared in front of him. Frantically wanting to get away, he threw a meek punch, which led to the "demon baby" biting his hand and making Squire shriek in pain.

While witnessing from behind a few people who were helplessly watching the squire get beaten by a "Demon Baby", Chasina let out a little chuckle. She found this scene a little funny. She sometimes liked to watch people get hurt in a comedic way, one thing she wasn't proud of.

Then, Chasina moved aside when the "Demon Baby" tossed Squire around like a beach ball, making the blue-cloaked woman laugh, but she tried to cover her mouth as she was supposed to ignore the commotion as other people in the market did.

The Squire was being dragged against his will by the "Demon Baby", who had him by his ankle, all while the crowd of people watching did nothing but view the current situation, as merely they had no idea what to do, while Chasina just couldn't do anything but watch this hilarious moment. You couldn't see this kind of shenanigans every day.

The Squire kept throwing whatever he could get his hands on at the "Demon Baby" to get it to let him go, but nothing worked, until he threw a piece of pizza at it, making the "Demon Baby" pull it away from "his" face, "Pineapple on pizza? Bleah!"

"There," a knight's voice rang out, making the "Demon Baby" look over her shoulder.

It caught Chasina's attention as well as she looked behind her.

Scrambling to come down the escalator was Ambrosius, who told the people he passed by, "Excuse me; I need to get through; move!"

Adding onto the predicament as the "Demon Baby" accidentally let go of Squire's ankle to get the pizza off gave Squire the chance to get his foot out of the shoe and start to run, freedom in his sight! Nothing could stop him now-

CRASH!

Nothing except getting hit by a car that rams him into a box of pots and pans, making the pans spill over him.

Chasina was a little surprised there, but she couldn't help but find this funny than horrifying. She still kept herself hidden behind the crates but kept her eye on the "Demon Baby" and Ballister, who came out of the car.

"Aw, why did you get to kill him?" The "Demon Baby" asked, pouting.

"He's not dead, I hope," Ballister frantically responded as he and Nimona picked up the unconscious squire while Ballister desperately hoped that running the car into him REALLY did not kill the guy.

"Is that Ballister?" a male passerby commented after seeing Ballister.

"It's the queen killer!" a female passerby exclaimed in shock.

"He's working with a demon baby!" another male passerby stated as Nimona and Ballister placed Squire's unconscious body into the car trunk.

Chasina started to wonder if this "Demon Baby" was associated with Ballister. It made her wonder how did this happened. Chasina even remembered on the news that Ballister was partnered with a pink-haired girl. The "Demon Baby" wasn't that girl. Something felt different for Chasina because of the way she observed her best friend in the shadows.

"Ballister, stop," Ambrosius, holding a crossbow, shouted as he and the other knights headed right towards him.

Chasina was alerted by Ambrosius' presence, and about to catch Ballister for sure. She stayed hidden, but she sat down and took three hairpins as her shuriken out from her pocket, just to prepare for what was going to happen.

Ballister and the "Demon Baby" tried to put Squire's body in the trunk, but the door was not closing.

When Ambrosius got a clear shot at Ballister with his crossbow, Chasina was ready to throw her hair pins at Ambrosius. They won't knock him down or anything. Chasina only wanted to distract Ambrosius to let Ballister and his new companion escape.

When Ballister looked up and saw the concerned/stunned look on Ambrosius' face. Chasina was observing this and got curious as to why Ambrosius suddenly lowered his crossbow. She waited for Ambrosius to get ready to shoot so she could take some action, but it didn't turn out what she was expecting.

As Ambrosius couldn't take the shot, but the other knights did, it was all the more motivation for Ballister to get into the driver's seat and get as far as he could as fast as he could.

The saleslady was kicked out of the car, the "Demon Baby" hopped in, and Ballister immediately drove off, flying the car up into the sky before any more arrows could be shot at the car by the knights below.

While Ambrosius was still trying to process what was going on and why Ballister was doing all of this, the other knights were frustrated, and the people around them were in a panic.

Meanwhile, Chasina went back into hiding behind the crates, and kept herself from laughing as she enjoyed the shenanigans in this market. She rolled her eyes and sighed in relief, but from enjoyment and knowing Ballister was safe for now. She couldn't stay any longer or the other knights and Ambrosius might notice her. Chasina picked up her grocery paper bag and left her hiding spot without being noticed by the people around her. She just hoped she'd see Ballister again, and she would help him in the shadows. She hoped he'd be safe. She began to wonder why Ambrosius lowered his weapon when he got the chance to capture Ballister. It made her think there might be hope between them. Might be hope that their friendship remained intact.

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Early in the morning of the next day, Chasina went out for a little stroll while reading a newspaper. She was already mad when the newspaper was about "the queen killer" and a girl with pink hair. Chasina angrily crumbled the newspaper and threw it into the nearby trash can.

"Ugh! Why do people think of this?!" Chasina mumbled as if she wanted to shout, "My best friend is not a killer."

Just then, at the corner of her eyes, she saw two mysterious figures heading into the Institute headquarters. Chasina turned in that direction just to make sure if she noticed what she thought she knew. Yep, it was Ballister, along with a girl with pink hair.

"Ballister?" Chasina muttered quietly, "What is he doing?"

When Ballister and his companion snuck into the headquarters, Chasina had to follow them, wanting to know what they were up to. But it would be difficult if someone or Ballister himself would see her. Chasina wasn't ready to show up to one of her friends yet. Things got complicated lately.

When she found another way into the Institute headquarters without guards around, Chasina just had to get in from the outside. It might be tough since she might be out of the open, but she was stealthier than being inside the building. The walls of the building were smoother than she remembered. She used to climb these walls as a kid, and now, it felt different when she touched the walls and she had a prosthetic leg. Remembering her self-training when climbing walls without proper tools, she had to improvise by using the building's structure. It'll take her a lot of time, but he had to try. She wanted to know what Ballister was doing here, even if it put him at risk of being arrested. Chasina started to climb by jumping sideways in a narrow gap in the building.

It took her maybe 15 minutes and she got tired, probably because her robotic leg added extra weight to her body, but Chasina made it just in time when Ballister and his "sidekick" faced Ambrosius and the Director. Chasina had to remain low so no one could see her. She remained holding tight at the edge and kept her face hidden. She hoped no one would see her on this side of the building or she'd get caught for sure. She could see and hear everything that was going on.

Ambrosius was standing in front of the Director in defense, set to protect her if needed, while Ballister walked down the stairs, meeting up with Nimona. Both sides at a standstill, he then spoke up, "Ambrosius, the Director killed the queen."

"What?" Ambrosius, surprised to hear this, responded.

Chasina gasped softly with her fist covering her mouth while her other hand still held onto the edge. The person she depended on killed the queen? How? And why? As a little girl, Chasina was always dependent on her teacher, and the Director had always given her advises and wisdom that she needed for her training. She never thought her "favorite teacher" was evil all the time!

The Director snidely responded quietly to try and lure Ambrosius away from thinking she was the suspect, "Another desperate lie,"

"He's not a liar," Nimona quickly remarked, defending Ballister.

The Director let out a laugh, "Says the miscreant, whispering in his ear."

Nimoan took no offense to the tease, answering back, "Aw, thank you."

Ballister then spoke up, saying, "I'm innocent, and I have proof," and reached into his pocket to grab the evidence he and Nimona had gotten.

The Director, noticing this, became a little worried; if Ballister had proof, then it'd mean she'd instantly be exposed and her plans would fall apart! To try and stir Ambrosius to stop Ballister, she told him, "He's got a weapon."

Just before Ballister could show the picture on the phone, a light beam was shot and it destroyed the phone, and the evidence, along with it.

Up in the sky, the knights were on large, white helmet-based hoverbikes, flashlights shining on the duo below, and holding ray guns in their hands, with Todd exclaiming, "Not anymore! Todd rules!"

Then, a lot more knights came in and surrounded Ballister and Nimona, set to shoot in defense if need to be.

Seeing so many knights riding on their hoverbikes and light beams pointed at Ballister and Nimona, Chasina lowered herself a little bit, trying to be as stealthier as possible, but she didn't want to miss what would happen next… though she was hoping for the most important thing.

Surrounded on the roof and up in the sky, with possibly no spot of escaping, Ballister was not gonna run, not at least before he had the chance to try and clear things up with the truth, telling Ambrosius, "It doesn't matter, you shouldn't need proof. you know I'm not a murderer."

Ambrosius stood there, still, and while not verbally responding, emotionally, he was at a standstill; he's known Ballister the longest out of anyone, but still….did he know him enough to know if Ballister…would even do something so…dark?

Then Director, growing more impatient by the minute, told him, "What are you waiting for, Captain?"

"Hurry before the whale gets here," Todd added.

While Ambrosius was still standing there, thinking what meant to be done, Chasina was still hoping that another one of her best friends/adoptive brothers would believe Ballister. In her heart, Chasina believed that he was not a murderer. She was hoping Ambrosius would believe him too. All three of them knew each other very well. Nothing could ever change what they had between them… could it? They made a promise those years ago. Chasina expected Ambrosius to stick by that promise if he remembered.

Nimona tried to encourage Ambrosius to make the right choice, telling him, "Come on, man. Do the right thing."

Ambrosius got a good look at Nimona and asked Ballister, "Who is she, Bal," Then, something in her eyes made him rephrase his question, "What is she?"

Chasina had the same question in her mind ever since she learned about Nimona's presence with Ballister. She squinted her eyes to see a little closer and clearer while keeping herself hidden.

Worried that Ambrosius would do something to hurt her, Ballister tries to calmly, though worryingly, tell him, " Ambrosius, I am begging you to trust me."

But without a clear answer, and the safety of his people at hand, Ambrosius held the sword up high, pointing it right at Ballister.

Both Ballister and Chasina, who just witnessed this, were shocked and in disbelief. Ambrosius, the guy they thought was their friend. Their best friend. A lover, a brother, an only noble who believed to be different from others. Yet, they were wrong.

Ballister thought Ambrosius would believe him. They had known each other when they were still children. They shared each other's dreams. They shared each other's lives. They shared everything together. The only crime they ever committed to each other was they stole each other's hearts. They had been in a romantic relationship for 14 years, though it felt like at the beginning they first met. It was a childhood crush at first sight. They always had each other. Ballister trusted Ambrosius all his life and heart, even when Nimona warned the former about the latter. Ambrosius would've been the only person Ballister had to ask for help because he was the only one in the institute he could ever trust. He loved him. He won't use him to clear his name because of their relationship. It was about that. It was about how the years went by, and they stayed close together and promised to love each other in every single way.

And yet, here they were now. Ballister was heartbroken and Ambrosius made him think their relationship wasn't worth his duty and his legacy as a knight and Gloreth's descendant respectively. Ballister thought there was hope with Ambrosius, but he chose his family's legacy over his heart, over the man he loved.

Chasina couldn't believe what she just witnessed. In all her life, she thought nothing would get in the way of her and the two boys' friendship. She still remembered that day, the day the boys brought her to the stadium where they sat on the rafters, and they all made a solemn promise that she, Ballister, and Ambrosius would stay best friends forever, no matter what. Not even their duties would tear their friendship apart. Chasina wanted to believe it would be true, but it wasn't. It was a lie. Ambrosius' promise was a lie this whole time. He was the one who made the promise first. It was his idea to make it their own oath. Chasina hesitated that day because she believed this promise would break someday. And it happened anyway. Chasina was heartbroken for the same reason that Ballister thought. She even believed that Ambrosius wouldn't let his family's legacy and his duty as a knight stand in the way of their friendship. But she saw it in her own eyes. Her adoptive older brother pointed a sword at her other adoptive older brother. Arm chopping might be an accident, but pointing a sword at a friend was a choice, and he made this choice without having second thoughts at all. He broke his promise. The promise that was sacred to all three of them. And she thought she was the one who broke the promise first, but at least she wasn't a backstabber like Ambrosius.

"Ambrosius… why?" Chasina whimpered as tears streaming down her face. She kept holding on to the edge, but she couldn't stop her tears from forming and shedding because one of her friends made an unfair decision. She looked up to Ambrosius when they were kids. And then, the person she looked up to betrayed their friendship. It made her wonder if he would do the same for her if she were in Ballister's shoes. Would he still be choosing his legacy then their friendship? Then, he might though, "You promise."

He then declared, in possibly the coldest voice that Ballister had heard him talk in, "Arrest them."

Seeing that talking no longer was an option, it left to do one other thing, one Ballister was more than welcome to. He stood firm, telling Ambrosius, "You wanna know who the kid is?"

Nimona seemed to catch what Ballister was planning, commenting in determination, "Oh, I like where this is going."

"You wanna show 'em," Ballister asked Nimona.

"I'd love to," she eagerly responded.

"Let's break stuff," Ballister declared.

"Metal," Nimona replied, her eyes glowing red and her teeth baring fangs as she leaped up.

Ambrosius, the Director, the other knights, and Chasina gasped in surprise as they witnessed Nimona shapeshifting into her mighty gorilla form again. As she landed, she bellowed a very loud roar towards Ambrosius, one that shook him, not a lot, but to a great degree that it stunned him before she ceremoniously booped him in the nose and started to help Ballister fight the knights off.

The Director, seeing that things were now gonna go poorly for them, asked Ambrosius to, "Give me a sword."

However, Ambrosius was more concerned about the Dirextor's safety, blocking her while replying, "We need to get you to safety."

Meanwhile, the fight continued, with Ballister using his sword to block the strikes of the knight while Nimona shapeshifted from gorilla to cat, clawing away at a defenseless knight.

Ambrosius had gotten the director into their aircraft, telling the pilot, "Get this thing in the air now!"

As the aircraft took over, taking the Director to a safe place, Ballister and Nimona continued to defend themselves from the knights that were attacking them.

Wanting to help Ballister and Nimona without showing herself, Chasina remained hidden at the edge as she took out 5 hairpins from her pocket with a spare hand, and threw them at some of the knights that charged at Ballister, knocking them down while the pins made clanking sounds at the metal armors. The hairpins spun back at Chasina, grabbing them immediately when they flew back to her. Chasina hid below before anyone noticed what she did. Helping out without revealing herself was so much fun for her. It made her feel alive.

Just then, two light beams shined in front of her, thus blowing Chasina's cover, and were discovered by a couple of knights on their hoverbikes.

"Halt!" One of the knights shouted, "Who goes there?! Who are you?!"

Instead of fear and doubts that she had been piling up in her head forever, Chasina smirked sinisterly, and answered, "Your worst nightmare!" She had been waiting years to get back at the other knights who wronged her and Ballister as she had 6 shurikens in her hands and quickly leaped from the wall.

Chasina punched a knight off the hoverbike. It was her hoverbike now. Two other knights shot at her, but she managed to dodge them and three her hairpins at them, knocking them off their vehicles. Another three knights approached her when her hairpins didn't hit them. Chasina clung over the hoverbike and swung the knights off.

Even not directly, she was actually helping Ballister and Nimona, giving them fewer knights to fight than more, and it'll be easy for them.

Meanwhile, Ballister blocked his sword at the incoming strikes while Nimona continued to use shapeshifting to knock the knights away. She changed into a wolf to pounce at a knight that came from behind before shapeshifting into an ostrich and running on the knights' heads, knocking them out with heavy foot strides.

While the fight was very serious, Nimona was laughing away, having a ball with getting to fight off these metallic knuckleheads.

Topping things off, she leaped into the air and shapeshifted into a rolled-up armadillo, which she got thrown by Ballister and nailed one knight in the ribs very hard.

"Sorry, no sorry!" Nimona commented as the knight fell over.

When a knight on the hovercraft was firing lasers at him, Ballister quickly pulled up an electronic shield to block before he headbutted the knight on the ground.

Deciding that it was time to get off this roof, he asked Nimona, "You see a way out of here?"

"Of horse I do," Nimona answered, trying to be funny as she shapeshifted into a big horse, getting Ballister onto her back and galloping away.

"Okay, that was terrible," Ballister commented but with a smile as he and Nimona made a grand escape.

Ambrosius chased after them, "Stop that… horse?"

Nimona galloped over to the edge, where two knights were already there, firing at them, Ballister asked Nimona, who showed no signs of slowing down, "We're going over, aren't we?"

"Yep," Nimona answered, adding before making a huge leap, "The only way out is down."

"Why are we always falling?!" Blister shouted as he and Nimona began to free fall from the roof of the Institute.

While Chasina was still standing on the hoverbike, banging two knights on each other's heads, and throwing a hairpin on the other knight behind her, she noticed Ballister and Nimona falling off the roof. She sighed when she realized the fight was moving back to the ground. She didn't want to climb down like how she climbed up earlier, so…

"Guess we're going down!" Chasina let herself fall freely.

Luckily for her, her free fall was safer when she used the knights on hoverbikes to break her falls as she punched and kicked every knight she encountered on the hoverbikes, lowering herself way down while trying to follow Ballister and Nimona, still keeping herself on a low profile.

Nimona easily shapeshifted a pair of dragon wings and caught Ballister, "Ha ha! Told you you'd want the wings. Whoo-hoo!"

Ballister was happy to be not free-falling anymore, and grateful that their fall was now gonna be a little smoother until he saw that company was trailing behind them.

Nimona shapeshifted into a gorilla again, sliding down the building's banister carefully while hugging Balister tightly, before she threw him onto a hoverbike.

"Whoo-hoo-hoo," Ballister shouted as he headbutted the knight riding on it, hopped on, and held on tight, riding it down.

Nimona, meanwhile, leaped up and ceremoniously shapeshifted into a whale, using her mouth to swallow the knights in the air. She landed belly-first on the ground and used her blowhole to shoot the knights out in a wet fashion.

As Ballister arrived and hopped off the hoverbike, he commented to Nimona, "Okay, that was super gross."

"Haha, I know!" Nimona cheered out loud as the group of knights fell down in a splashy glop.

Chasina made it down safely to the other side. When she saw a few more knights coming after Ballister and Nimona, Chasina jumped into their path, waving her index finger before giving one of them a punch in the face

Left alone to fight off a few of the remaining knights that were waiting for him on the ground, Ballister and Nimona fended them off before Ambrosius came charging in, riding on a hoverbike before he leaped down, sword in hand.

As Nimona quickly shapeshifted to fend off the other knights, Ballister and Ambrosius went toe to toe, sword and sword, with Ballister saying, "Well, if it isn't the golden boy."

While Chasina was still fighting incoming knights, she saw both Ballister and Ambrosius dueling with swords.

That was it! Her worst fears came true!

"Oh no," Not only she was worried about the two fighting each other, but also she was out of the open. She couldn't let her two best friends see her. She's not ready. Chasina grabbed an unconscious knight and used him as a puppet to fight approaching knights while keeping herself hidden.

She overheard Ballister and Ambrosius' argument while they kept dueling it out.

"Did I ever mean anything to you? Or was it all just a lie?" Ballister remarking angrily towards Ambrosius.

"A lie? Says the guy running around with a monster," Ambrosius harshly retorted back.

But he got him back with a snark from Ballister, who quickly came in defense of Nimona, telling the golden knight, "Don't call her that! She's smart, kind, and quite sophisticated."

On cue, as the two knights separated, one of the guards was running away in fear, with Nimona, still in otter form, pointing out in hilarity, "That guy just peed his armor! He peed his armor!" Not the most sophisticated comment, but a perfectly timed one, nonetheless.

And adding more to the pleasure, it only made Ballister's point stronger, especially when he mentioned to Ambrosius bitterly, "And she has my back, unlike you."

Ambrosius could feel his strikes becoming overpowered, valiantly trying to fight back while stating, "You lied to me about everything!"

"Only one lying to you is the Director," Ballister retorted back before knocking Ambrosius to the ground.

With the shift of power in play, Ambrosius felt like, now that he was defenseless, that this was gonna mean that he was gonna get "killed" and asked Ballister bitterly, "What? You're gonna kill me now too?"

Overhearing that part in disbelief, Chasina suddenly dropped the unconscious knight. For something in her life, she never heard of Ambrosius saying something heinous about Ballister before. This was the first time, and it hurt her that a friend would say that to her other friend.

Ballister almost felt incredulous by that comment; why would Ambrosius think that?! He was trying to save him, not kill him! He quickly responded in shock, "You believe that?" After stabbing his sword into the ground near Ambrosius's head, just to send the message straight to him, Ballister stated with anger in his voice, "Then you never knew me at all."

Just before Ballister could do anything else, Todd zoomed in on his hoverbike, grabbing Ballister and throwing him into a nearby cereal stand, the booth's theme song playing while the cereal boxes fell and littered the sidewalks.

Todd jumped off his bike and cracked his knuckles, approaching Ballister while telling him, "Yeah. Now I'm gonna punch you in the face."

Chasina gasped when Ballister got beaten up by Todd and the other knights. To save her friend, Chasina ran towards the wall of the gate, where she decided to take the other way around to prevent being seen by her friends by going over it. It was tough to climb onto the wall, but when it came to her friend, she had to take the risk. But when she made it outside and landed on her feet, a few knights piled her down. She didn't see that coming.

Meanwhile, otter Nimona was toying with a knight's arm, saying, "Now, I'm no doctor, but this cast looks delicious," she used her teeth to tear into the armor.

However, when she didn't catch sight of Ballister, she looked up, calling out, "Boss?" When she saw where the crowd of knights had gathered, she assumed that they possibly had him surrounded and were trying to hurt him.

Furious, her eyes glowed as she shapeshifted into a wolf and ran across the courtyard before turning into a rhino and barging through the doors.

Back at the stand, Ballister was trying to put up a fight, but got knocked in the back by Todd, who taunted, "You think this hurts? Wait till you see what we do to your pet monster."

On cue, before Rhino Nimona could reach him, she got shot at with waves of electricity that dragged her to the ground, and no matter what she tried to change into, the electricity kept pouring onto her.

Ballister tried to push his way toward her, but the knights surrounding him kept pushing him back, even his plea "No! Leave her alone," fell on deaf ears.

Hearing Ballister pleading for Nimona, Chasina turned to see how that pink rhino got electrified. She might not know Nimona completely, but the tone of Ballister's voice pleading for her made Chasina realize he cared for that girl. Chasina struggled to break free to help Nimona, but the other knights held her arms and shoulders, refusing to let her go and about to arrest her.

When Nimona caught what little sight of Ballister getting surrounded before her view was obscured, it made her rage go to defying levels, and in a puff of smoke, she shapeshifted into a gigantic dragon; the same dragon that was the mascot brand of the cereal at the booth.

The sight of dragon Nimona made Todd turn around and say happily at first, "Kwispy," before asking in confusion, "Wait, what?"

"Hope you brought milk," Nimona declared in response before shooting gigantic pebble-like cereal out of her mouth, which pounded all the knights away with ease and made them slip and fall to the floor.

While Chasina and the other knights who held her captive were distracted by Nimona's "Kwispy" form, Chasina realized the knights' eyes were on the dragon. It was her chance to escape as she shoved the knights with her shoulder, and punched them aside when they tried to hold her again.

She had that open window to escape now and tried to hide before anyone else saw her.

Ambrosius had noticed the sight of the dragon, asking himself a very confused, "What?"

Dragon Nimona let out a happy roar and shot her hands/claws up in the rock fashion sign.

Just then, a car that was on the road turned and flipped over, narrowly about to hit an innocent little girl who was hiding from the madness before Nimona stopped the car with her tail.

Nimona couldn't help but look up down at the girl and see how scared she was looking up at Nimona, who was possibly the most intimidating "monster" she had ever seen.

Ignoring the warning sirens and calls, Nimona quickly shapeshifted into a small girl and tried to approach her gently, "It's okay."

But the scared girl quickly held up a wooden sword, stepping back in fright because she was scared Nimona was gonna hurt her. It prompted her to nervously say in terror, "M-Monster" before her mom rushed in and picked the girl up, taking her to safety.

It left Nimona reeling in guilt, and at the same time, seeing how scared the girl was… it bothered her seeing how many still viewed her as a "monster" in their eyes.

Distracted by her thoughts, she didn't hear the knights approaching her, ready to capture her.

However, just before they could grab her, Ballister came riding in on a hoverbike, "I've got you, kid," he grabbed Nimona before they could, escaping into the dusty streets, with Ambrosius sadly watching on after being unable to have captured them.

Chasina was watching behind the damaged vehicles and saw what just happened. She saw what Nimona did when she saved that little girl, but she was feared instead. It concerned Chasina for Nimona about how she felt that way.

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4 days later, at the Antlered Serpent restaurant, Chasina was taking a drink… or more or less than 10 drinks already after what happened at the Institute castle today.

"Hey, another glass over here!" Chasina called while raising her glass, slightly drunk.

"Don't you think you had enough?" The cashier asked worryingly.

"Another glass! Something stronger!" Chasina yelled. The cashier rolled his eyes and went to the back to find a stronger drink for her

Everything was all messed up in her life. Ballister was framed by the Director, Ambrosius betrayed him, and both of her friends started to hate each other. It was like their friendship fell apart. Chasina refused to believe this was happening. Her worst nightmare had come true… for real. She still believed all of this happened because she left 4 years ago. It made her wonder what would happen if she stayed with her friends. She even believed their friendship was a worthless child promise that the trio made as… children. She was so mad. Mad about what was happening. Mad at the Director for killing the queen and framing Ballister. Mad at Ambrosius for choosing his duty and the legacy of their friendship. Things would never be the same again, until…

Chasina heard a buzz from her phone. She took her phone out and tapped the notification she received.

It was the news about the Director who revealed the shocking confession.

"I framed Ballister. I killed the queen."

Chasina snapped out of her drunk state and reviewed the number of views and comments in this video. She read all of the hate comments about the Director and the Institute. It was unbelievable! A lot of people believed in this video. They believed in Ballister now.

Chasina sighed in relief that the problem worked itself after all. She was so frustrated about what happened lately, but maybe things would get better soon. She took out the bills from her pocket and put them on the corner. She wore the hood, Bal. Well done." She was heading out of the exit, expecting something improving tonight.

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The next night, Chasina was strolling at the alley when she was watching an exclusive report on her phone about the Director's clarification about her confession. She didn't catch up with the live news, so she watched it on video.

"Citizens of the realm, that is not me in the recording. I know it looks like me and sounds like me, but it is not me. That was the monster working with the real queen killer, Ballister. They are trying to trick you. We are under attack by something that can take any form. It could be anyone. Your spouse, your child, your best friend, the person sitting next to you. None of us are safe so long as the villain and that monster are still out there."

Chasina gripped her phone so hard out of anger, it almost broke into half. She was so angry at the Director's lies that she still accused Ballister and had everyone believe his sidekick was a monster. Chasina couldn't take it. She was sick of having one of her best friends being called a villain when he had never been.

"Ugh! Can't believe this! That liar! That b-" Chasina cut off her words as she wasn't used to swear. She swallowed her words back and took deep breaths.

Hearing the news and the alarm about a "Monster Attack", Chasina was a little startled by one of the warning signs above her.

"What the heck? She rushed out of the alley and turned to the back of the streets. She squinted her eyes to see from afar. A giant black kaiju was crawling into the city and got attacked by firing missiles.

"Oh no," Chasina didn't want to think of who that monster was. She remembered Nimona was pink, and Chasina couldn't want to imagine if that was her. She covered herself more with her cloak, and backed away into the alley, where she would be safe for now. She could still watch live news on her phone when she changed windows.

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It might've been a while since Chasina was still hiding in the alleyway, but she could see live that the "monster" was heading to Gloreth's statue. Chasina was somewhere in that area when she noticed that the "monster" was passing by. Chasina was leaning back against the wall to avoid being spotted. When it was all clear for her, Chasina slowly leaned forward to take a little peak at what was happening in the streets.

Nimona was attacked several times and a lot of civilians ran away from her in fear. She got hit by another blow, knocking her down to a nearby building. Awaking from the impact, Nimona's dark form slowly came to it, but the sight she was greeted with was anything but pleasant. Destroyed buildings around, and all these people who either threw stuff at her or said hateful remarks of her being a monster.

She eyed the statue of Gloreth and, deep within the sadness of her glowing eyes, something… really dark came to mind. After so long of fighting off these people who just want to put a sword through her… why not just make it easier on them and… have it done herself?

Standing up, Nimona approached the statue, stopping just at the tip of the statue, with a minimum of a foot away from her. People watching far and wide, wondering what this creature was gonna do next. Chasina already come out of hiding and ran closer to the street to take a closer look at what was really going on.

Nimona's chest seemed to open up, revealing a white light shining from inside of it, most likely where her physical body was. She raised her head up, and with a scream loud enough to shatter glass, she was about to take the dread step forward that… ended everything.

Nimona thought that it was all gonna be over; all the pain of people seeing her and treating her as the monster they saw her as, the pain of being alone because no one understood who she truly was… one simple poke of the sword of Gloreth's statue through her heart…would end everything. She'd feel free… she'd feel the pain go away… she'd feel… alone?

Suddenly, in all the darkness that consumed her… there was a light….and it was coming from… outside… on her chest?

All of the people around gasped at what they had witnessed. Chasina had the biggest reaction of all as her eyes sparkled with worry and surprise.

Standing on the tip of Gloreth's sword, using his prosthetic hand to touch her, both metaphorically and physically, was Ballister, and the impact of his hand on her made a white light that shined very brightly.

Nimona did not appear to show any response to it, but something about Ballister being there, trying to reach out to her… it… it was like… a beacon of hope? No, a beacon of… empathy. He risked going up to a freak of monstrosity like her….to stop her from going through with this?

Ballister was breathing fast, but not once did his hand move away from her heart. He dropped his sword, which fell to the city of passersby below, who all looked on in shock. The sword literally landed in front of Chasina's feet, and she yanked herself away from the impact. She continued staring at Ballister's sword before looking up again Why was Ballister… trying to stop this monster…from hurting itself?

Everyone looked on in stunned silence; was this a way to defeat it? Or maybe…. was Ballister… trying to save it? But why? It surely did not show any emotions like humans do…. right?

But no one in that kingdom knew how Nimona felt more than Ballister, and he knew of Nimona's pain, anger, and sadness; he's witnessed first-hand how being viewed as someone bad can impact your relationship with others. He knew what it felt like to be cast aside and seen as someone who won't amount to anything just because of what you are, and he knew, what it felt like….to not be seen.

Back at where the incident occurred, Nimona finally showed a bodily response by looking down at Ballister.

Ballister could feel her eyes piercing through him as he looked up, but he did not run; he did not hide, he did not even want to fight; all he wanted to do…was help her.

With guilt and regret heavy in his heart, he told her, "I'm sorry."

She didn't respond, but listened, as Ballister spoke out, "I'm sorry. I see you, Nimona."

His words seemed to not only be impacting Nimona, but also everyone who watched. They were speechless; Ballister, who they saw as a criminal, a queen killer… he was defending them. Not only that, but he was risking his life… to help the life of this monster… who really wasn't a monster. Just a lost soul who wanted to be seen.

Ballister saw that his words seemed to go through to her, and he added, "And you're not alone."

Suddenly, the white light that had come from Ballister's touch began to absorb the darkness that had become of Nimona, making it all eradicated. Once the darkness was gone, all that remained, was the battered bruised, and bloodied, but alive, well, and standing, body of Nimona.

Nimona tearfully looked up at Ballister, and struggled to walk forward, only to wind up falling. But in the nick of time, Ballister caught her, and pulled her into a close hug, with Nimona, while not able to speak for the time being, showing her gratitude by wrapping her arms around his waist and hugging back.

All over the kingdom, everyone watched this interaction….and it was…..unbelievable. Ballister truly was….a knight unlike any other. After all, there'd never been a knight before who could even face a monster head-on and….touch them on such a strong emotional aspect. But Ballister did.

Seeing a beautiful friendship between her best friend and his friend, Chasina held a fist onto her left chest and cried with tears of joy. She never felt so proud of her friend for doing the right thing… the important thing for someone who needed a friend. This moment reminded Chasina so much of how Ballister and Ambrosius offered their friendship to her. Now, their friendship was shared with anyone who needed it.

Ballister and Nimona both separated from the hug, with Nimona shooting Ballister a thankful smile.

Suddenly, the sound of a loud explosion prompted the pair to turn their heads and look over beyond where the wall was, seeing a green light that sparked from where the explosion happened.

Even Chasian down below heard of the explosion as she turned her head and looked in the direction where the explosion was. She might know what was going on, but she could sense that something was wrong, very wrong.

From on top of the statue, Ballister and Nimona could see all of the people scrambling to get away, and Nimona even caught sight of the same little girl from before, who looked up at her in wonder, before her mother pulled her away. While everyone ran in panic to get somewhere safe, Chasina remained still while still wrapping her cloak around her and had her hood still covering her face. She still stood where Ballister's sword was still lying beside her. She couldn't move, she couldn't leave, not when her friend and his sidekick were still on the sword of the statue. She only kept her eyes on Ballister and Nimona, wondering what their plan was now.

Nimona couldn't help but feel bad for all of these people. That cannon, once shot, was gonna have a blast strong enough to hurt so many innocent lives who didn't even deserve such a fate.

Ballister was aware of this too, saying in disdain/concern, "That gun's gonna kill everyone."

Nimona saw the worried expression on Ballister's face, and she thought of a really crazy idea that she knew was gonna work, and it'd help save the day. Was it reckless? Yes! Was it dangerous? Yes! Was it gonna involve something getting broken? Yes….and this was where the idea was gonna be at its scariest.

With a grin of determination, Nimona told Ballister, "Hey, boss."

When Ballister turned his head to look at her, Nimona turned around and told him, fear not once present on her face or mind, "Be right back. I'm gonna go break some stuff."

Ballister had a bad idea about what Nimona was gonna do, starting to ask her, "Wait, Nimona. What are you…?"

"It's time to rewrite this story," Nimona simply answered as she turned around, about to make a leap of fate.

"Nimona! Nimona," Ballister quickly called out to her, but she was already into it, leaping down from the statue, and just before she hit the ground, shapeshifted into a beautiful, fiery phoenix.

The sight of phoenix Nimona wowed everyone in the city as they watched it fly right towards the cannon, which was all set to fire. Its light was bright, but Nimona's flames were even brighter, and it was time to put these flames to the test and rewrite the story.

Back by the cannon, Ambrosius was weakly trying to help the other knights escape when he saw the incoming fiery phoenix and was taken aback greatly.

Before the cannon could properly fire, Nimona crashed right through it, making it blow up with a fiery explosion. The light and impact of the explosion were so bright, that all the knights and citizens turned their heads and shielded their eyes so that they would not be blinded by the light and heatwave that followed.

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A year had passed, and the kingdom never forgot Nimona's heroic sacrifice to save them all. They held a memorial for Nimona as they held out flowers and drawings as their way of thanking her.

Still covering herself with her cloak, Chasina took out a red paper and put it with the rest of the kingdom's tribute for Nimona. The red paper contained a chrome colored "THANK YOU" note, showing gratitude for Nimona. If Nimona was still alive, Chasina wanted to meet her in person to thank her for taking care of Ballister for her. She felt bad for Ballister that he lost his new best friend. She wished she could do something for him… but she wasn't ready. Showing up to Ballister won't fix him just yet.

Chasina… needed more time than she thought.

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She didn't know how long it had been. 5? 6? 7 months? Chasina heard Nimona's return, alive, much to Ballister and the whole kingdom's joy. Everyone loved Nimona now. She wasn't the monster they heard of from their history. She lived a normal life now with Ballister. It was a good thing for her… but not with Chasina. She was still alone in her apartment. She was living under a rock while her friend got reinstated as a knight with his sidekick by his side. She bet Ambrosius was with them as well, not that Chasina' was interested in him anymore.

She and the boys used to be a trio! They worked hard together. They had always been together. But now, Chasina was all by herself. She was a coward, a weakling, a NOBODY.

She couldn't face her friends because she couldn't face her fear of confessing and showing up and couldn't face the past. She left because of self-doubt and never even got in touch with her friends. She felt ashamed that she erased herself from her friends' lives and thought that they didn't need her anymore.

But deep down, Chasina missed them all the time. She wanted to visit her friends all throughout 5 years and even tell them she was still alive, but she still had self-doubt about this decision. She kept wishing for years that she shouldn't leave. She shouldn't left her friends and made them think she was gone. She wished she could be with them and be known to the whole kingdom like them.

Then again, she got tired of hiding and being a nobody to the whole kingdom. Heck, she got tired of even hiding from her friends. She had been gone for too long. Now was the good time to fix her mistake of abandoning her friends and remaining hidden from them for years. Chasina marched towards the door while taking her cloak from the rack.

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Wow! This chapter was really long, but I love the results.

I had a lot of notes for this chapter.

It wasn't confirmed how old Ballister and Ambrosius were as adults, so I guess they were 30 years old, and, as children, they were 8 years old. So, since Chasina is a year younger than both Ballister and Ambrosius, I had her age as a kid was 8, and 29 as an adult. Since this fanfic took several months after Nimona's return, which probably took place a year after her "death", then the three were a year older than their ages in the film.

I do want to have my OC inserted in the film (that was a little lie), but the film was already amazing, so I had my OC appear after the events of the film. Instead, my OC is the character that was "hidden in the shadows" during the film's timeline.

The scene where Young Ballister and Young Ambrosius meet Young Chasina was referenced by My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic and My Little Pony: Equestria Girls when Twilight Sparkle first met Fluttershy (both pony and human versions).

This flashback revealed that Chasina lost her left leg in an accident, and she built and designed her own prosthetic leg, similar to Ballister building his new arm. However, Chasina lost her leg 2 years prior, making her the first one to lose a limb. Her flashback was also referenced by Ducktales: Whatever Happened To Della Duck.

Special thanks to MasterClass60 for helping me with this chapter as she made half of the chapter while I was doing a couple of edits.

I hope you like my new chapter so far. Stay tuned for more! Hope I'll update sooner than last month.

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[gx-gameon]

DM power point party

My friends and I have done one to many power point parties recently. (An excellent time highly recommend)

But it got me thinking about the DM crew and what they would do for a power point party. Because all it is is info dumping about whatever you want.

Téa: different styles of dance and why you should learn.

Complete with demonstrations.

She makes them all try at least one dance move.

Tristan: which duel monsters I could beat in a fist fight.

He goes hard.

It’s a complete guide of the monsters attack and defense points, as well as any flavor text.

He then says if he would fight them or not “I wouldn’t fight Dark Magician because he’s Yugi’s ace and he wouldn’t fight me, Battle Ox on the other hand is Kaiba’s monster and I’m punching it in the face.”

He tends to states if he could win or not. Some of them are wild over estimations of his own strength but it’s all in good fun.

Yugi: the game I think represents each of you best.

He’s gone through and matched their personalities with different board games.

Some are based on the way they think. Kaiba is strategic so he would get get chess (he would also be low key upset if he didn’t get chess or Duel monsters) although you could also give him a resource management game like Catan, I’d be scared to play Catan with Kaiba

Others are based on vibe alone.

Téa gets a corporative game where the players have to work together to win (something like Magic Maze; a great game!)

Joey would probably also get a team game or a corporative game. He is competitive but he also loves his friends and is very loyal.

This maybe a creative ploy to try and get the others to play more board games with him (as some one who loves board games I approve)

Joey: ranking all the people I’ve dueled by how much they annoy me.

He’s poking fun at everyone. It’s light hearted for the most part, and is not based on any skill.

It’s mostly so he poke fun at Rex, Wevil, and Kaiba who is not impressed.

Joey ranks them from most annoying to least annoying.

Mai takes third. She’s his friend but she can drive him mad in a duel.

“Second is the Pharaoh, you’re always respectful and dramatic but there is one person better than you” Yugi is siting their confused because who’s better thank the Pharaoh but Yami/Atem already knows the answer

The winner is a Yugi his best friend and least annoying person. “Yug’s the best person to duel and my favorite buddy.”

Yami/Atem: Which duel monsters card represent you all best

He knows exactly which monster is their spirit card

He might give 3 option and let them pick their favorite.

He knows what their soul card is but it’s fun for him to give them the option to pick and watch them pick their soul card every time.

Other ideas for Atem

Why I love all of you

Very sweet, thank you Atem.

Yugi would do this to.

modern day things that still confuse me.

It’s actually really fun as he puts things on the screen to tell his friends what he first thought each item was/did

Alternatively if this is after he has his memories “things that would send my Egyptian friends into a coma.”

But it’s Grandpa who’s gets everyone.

He video calls Prof Hawkins in. The Professor was more than happy to do a short power point about his research.

He finishes and asks Solomon what his presentation is. He’s expecting his old friend to do something about games

Solomon smirks as he opens his slides

Why my grandchildren are better than yours

Grandchildren? Let him explain

The next slide is a picture of Yugi “my grandson, the King of Games”

The next slide a picture of Yami/Atem “my other grandson, he was once the Pharaoh of Egypt.”

Atem is greatly touched by the sentiment, but it’s the next slide that gets everyone.

The next slide is a picture of Joey, Téa and Tristian “my adopted grandchildren, Joey is a world class duelist I should know I taught him myself! Téa is going to be a world renowned dancer! And Tristian is an incredible mechanic and sharp shooter (according to the manga) I’m so proud of them.”

The whole group is shocked. Solomon goes along with his presentation, it’s just him boasting about all of their accomplishments to Arthur.

Joey is in tears by the end. “You think of me as your grandson?”

Yugi just smiles at him “of course he does, you’re family.”