19 Chapter 19: Heritage.
"Now Shark Drake, attack Photon Titania!" cried Shark.
"Deep Sea Destruction!!"
"I activate my Trap <Zero Gravity> this changes the battle position of all face up monsters." Declared Dextra.
Suddenly all the monsters on the field switched their battle positions.
"And don't forget my Empresses special ability, all your monsters now lose 500 ATK." Dextra reminded as her monster released its poisonous powders. Black veins quickly spreading across Sharks monsters.
[Number 32: Shark Drake – ATK:3300 > 2800, Number 94: Crystalzero – ATK:2700 > 2200, Shark Caesar – ATK:2300 > 1800, Number 47: Nightmare Shark – ATK:900 > 400]
"You! I set a card facedown and end my turn." Shark said through clenched teeth as Photo Titania freed itself from Crystalzero's ice and her attack returned to normal.
[Photon Titania Papilloperative Empress – Rank 8 ATK:2800/DEF:1900 OU:0]
The duel between Shark, General of New Order and Dextra, Captain of the Black Elite continued. Shark had four Xyz monsters in play with two face downs and the Seal of Orichalcos, but his monsters were gradually being stripped of their attack by the effects of Dextra's monsters over the course of the duel.
Dextra's Photon Titania Papilloperative Empress and her Swallowtail Butterspy that was equipped with a 'Kunai and Chain' stood guard before their mistress.
[Swallowtail Butterspy – Lv4 ATK:2300/DEF:1200]
[Turn 9 - Dextra LP:3700 Hand:1, Shark LP:2600 Hand:1]
"I draw. Then I play <Pot of Greed> to draw two more cards."
Perfect, just the card she needed to whittle down Sharks overwhelming advantage in Numbers.
"Say good bye to all your monsters. I play the spell <Raigeki> with the thunder of the heavens it destroys all your monsters."
*BOOM!!*
Suddenly Sharks field was empty, his monsters blasted away by a curtain of lightning and his life points were wide open. But then…
"HA! I activate my trap <Torrential Reborn> this allows me to return all the monsters your spell card just destroyed to the field and then you take 500 damage for each one of them. That's four monsters and 2000 points of damage. Not only that but my monsters return with their full glorious strength."
"Arrgh"
Amidst Sharks laughter a raging storm smashed into Dextra, knocking her into the edge of the Seal. It felt like she was being crushed and electrocuted at the same time. And once she recovered and got to her feet, she was faced with the sight of Sharks restored army of Seal boosted monster in attack position.
[Dextra LP > 1700]
[Number 32: Shark Drake – ATK:3300/DEF:2100, Number 94: Crystalzero – ATK:2700/DEF:1600, Shark Caesar – ATK:2300/DEF:2000, Number 47: Nightmare Shark – ATK:2500/DEF:2000]
The only good thing was they no longer had any Overlay Units to activate their effects with.
Ugh… How could she allow Shark to take control of the duel like that? Such a stupid mistake. Dextra thought, and Wyvern agreed with her. She had been in almost perfect control of the duel up to that point and now all her hard work had been erased along with more than half of her life points.
Shark had brought back all his monsters apart from Shark Drake on the back row, so if Dextra wanted to attack she would have to go through it first.
"I switch Photon Titania to attack but leave my Swallowtail in defence. I then set a card face down. That's all."
With that she ended her turn.
[Turn 10 - Shark LP:2600 Hand:1, Dextra LP:1700 Hand:1]
"I draw, it's time to end this."
Shark had finally gotten use to the pounding pain in his head. Whether it was caused by a rejection between the power of the Numbers and the power of the Seal or not didn't matter. A little pain could be dealt with and he certainly wasn't going to let a little thing like pain get in the way of his revenge now that it was so close.
As he examined his cards he gave a savage smile as the Numbers whispered words of hate and malice into his mind, his very soul, and the Seal filled him with its dark power. The mark on his forehead glowing even deeper in response to his extreme negative emotions.
"I play <Overlay Regen>, as you know this spell allows me to attach this spell to my Shake Drake as its an Overlay Unit. Now Shark Drake attacks your Titania! Deep Sea Destruction!"
[Number 32: Shark Drake – OU: 0 > 1]
[N32 ATK:3300 > PTPE ATK:2800 - Dextra LP > 1200]
Shark Drake blasted apart Dextra's Empress with a blast of concentrated sea water that then ploughed into Dextra, once more smashing her against the edge of the impenetrable Seal behind her.
"Argh!"
Shark enjoyed watching her suffer, and soon he would do far worse to her.
"Now I activate Shark Drakes effect! By removing an Overlay Unit I can special summon the monster it just destroyed back to the field and-"
"Not so fast! I might not know about your other Number cards, but I won't forget the effects of a card I arranged for you to receive. I activate the Trap <Xyz Reborn> and before your monsters effect resolves I revive my monster myself and attach this trap to it as an Overlay unit!"
Since Shark Drake no longer had a target to revive its effect was negated, which also prevented it from attacking again. This was why she had switch Photon Titania to attack mode last turn, so Shark would have no choice but to attack it with the only monster on his field strong enough to destroy it and she could then revive it to protect her life points from the others.
"In that case I attack your Swallowtail with Shark Caesar, go Emperor's Might!"
[SC ATK:2300 > SB DEF:1200]
Dextra's Butterspy was destroyed, crushed between Shark Caesars mighty jaws. But Dextra thought she was safe now for this turn. Sharks other monsters were too weak to fight her ace monster.
"Its not over! I activate my face down <Wonder Xyz>! This trap allows me to immediately Xyz summon using monsters I control!"
"What?!" Dextra was confused. Shark only had Xyz monsters on his field.
"I use my Shark Caesar to rebuild the Overlay Network and Xyz summon <Full Armored Black Ray Lancer>, this monster can be Xyz summoned by using a rank 3 water Xyz monster that has no Overlay units attached to it. And for each Overlay unit it has my monster gains 200 ATK, so with the power of the Seal it gains a total of 700 attack."
[Full Armored Black Ray Lancer – Rank 4 ATK:2100 > 2800/DEF:600 OU:1]
2800!! That was the same as Dextra's monster!
"Full Armored Black Ray Lancer now attack Photon Titania Papilloperative Empress! Armored Spear Slash!"
[FABRL ATK:2800 > PTPE ATK:2800]
Dextra's Empress was destroyed, yet Sharks armoured warrior remained.
"Thanks to my Lancers effect, if it would be destroyed then by sending all its Overlay units to the graveyard I can prevent its destruction. So only your monster is destroyed!"
[Full Armored Black Ray Lancer – ATK 2800 > 2600 OU:1 > 0]
"And now you have nothing to stand in my way. Feel the terror of the deeps, Nightmare Shark attack, end this duel!"
*SLASH!*
Nightmare Shark swung its massive blades and smashed Dextra to the side.
[N47 ATK:2500 - Dextra LP > 0]
<<SHARK WINS>>
"…Kite…I'm sorry…"
Shark had won the duel and Dextra collapsed to her knees on the floor as the Seal of Orichalcos closed in around her. Powerless to resist she suffered as the Seal began to extract her soul.
---
"What's the meaning of this Heartland!" shouted a young man with flaming red hair.
"Like I said, your orders are to stand down and wait Nistro." Mayor Heartland calmly replied.
Heartland was sat at his desk in the central operations roon while in front of him stood the second Captain of the Black Elite and Dextra's second in command, Nistro. He wore his usual black and dark red trench coat over his red shirt and trousers.
*BANG!*
Nistro slammed his fists down on Heartlands desk so hard the surface cracked and the various analysts in the room gave a startled jumped.
"But we have lost contact with Dextra and the base! I should be leading the teams there right now!"
"That task is in other hands, you should be more concerned with the state of your own tasks."
"But!-"
"No buts! Those are your orders Captain!" Heartland sternly commanded.
"Why? Is it because we lost track of Shark? What's so special about him anyway?!" Nistro complained.
Seeing how stubborn Nistro was being and wanting to distract him, Heartland motioned for Nistro to follow him into his private office. This wasn't something to be said in the open. Besides, if something had happened to Dextra then Nistro would have to take over the operation anyway.
Pouring himself a drink Heartland offered one to Nistro but he refused.
"The Shark operation is important, in fact at this moment it is second only to the collection of Number cards. And you lost him! All the resources of the security forces at your disposal, elite teams of operatives and you lose track of a fourteen year old kid!"
"But why is he so important!" Nistro demanded, this was a sore spot for Nistro. A failure that marred him and the Black Elite.
"It's because of his heritage."
"Huh?"
"Do you know what Dr Fakers is always on the lookout for?"
"Uh.. do you mean the Numbers?" Nistro asked with uncertainty.
"No, it's Power. Whether it be new forms of energy, secrets of science or ancient mysteries about the origin of the world, his goal is to acquire the power he needs to save his son. I'm sure Kite must have mentioned his brother to you before, right?"
Outside of Hart the only people Kite was even remotely close to was Nistro and Dextra, they had gone through the harshest duel training together and were the closet Kite had to having friends.
"Yes…"
"Years ago, even before his son got sick, Dr Faker was very interested in archaeology, with uncovering the secrets of the past to create a path to the future. Heh, can you believe it? He believed that the past held lost knowledge that could revolutionise the present. Surprisingly he was right."
"What has that got to do with Shark?" he complained.
"Patience boy, I'm getting to the point." Heartland replied after taking a sip.
Nistro really was a hot head at times, which was why he was only the second in command and Dextra was the one in charge.
"According to records found in historical site across the world, about twelve thousand years ago two alien races came to Earth and fought a great war. One side led by seven great emperors wielding the power of chaos while the other was led by a champion who harnessed the light of order."
"Aliens? Are you serious?" Nitro scoffed in spite of himself.
"Oh when I first heard this story I felt the same way. But trust me that its true, we don't have a clear picture of what it was like back then but these facts we are certain of. This war was waged for centuries in a stalemate that brought disaster to the Earth, mountains crumbled and sea's began to dry up. The land crumbled to dust and the sky itself was said to have split open to bring forth a realm of darkness and shadow. There seemed no end in sight.
Unit one day a miracle occurred. One of the Emperors of chaos turned against his fellows and aided the Champion of order to vanquish his fellow emperors and end the war. The reason? Perhaps the oldest of them all, Love."
"Pah! You sure this isn't a children's story Heartland." Nistro joked. The more Heartland talk the more Nistro thought that he was crazy.
"Perhaps it does sound silly, but it was so long ago that the reason now is actually unimportant. What is important is that after their victory the Champion of order took his forces and left our world but the Emperor who betrayed his kind remained. He took a human form, a human life, and… a human family. His name was Nash."
Heartland took another sip of his drink. He could see the disbelief in Nistro's eyes. If not for some of the things he had seen, the secretes he was privy to, then then he wouldn't believe this tale either. But those were things that could not be shared with anyone.
"Nash disappeared into the flow of history but over the generations it is said his descendants would sometimes awaken their ancestors' power, the power of chaos that was passed down through their blood. They would be called wizards, warlocks, prophets and witches by the rest of the world.
Although there is no real evidence Dr Faker believes that people and legends like Nostradamus, Merlin, Rasputin and others could have been Nash's descendants who had awakened a portion of his power."
"But what does that have to do with Shark?! He doesn't have any kind of power!" Nistro was getting frustrated.
He was sitting here while who knows what was happening to Dextra. If Heartland was trying to make him believe Shark had some kind of alien power then he had obviously lost his mind. He knew Shark, had watched him and studied him for a while now. Shark didn't have any such power.
"But his Sister did." Heartland replied.
"Huh?"
"Rio Kastle, Reginald Kastle's twin sister. Serval years ago, she came to our attention as having special… gifts. Dr Faker conducted an investigation and concluded that her power matched remnants he discovered in several historic sites relating to the ancient war. The power of chaos, and he theorised that she was a descendent of Nash who had awakened the power in her blood. Then he took that power for himself, or to be precise he had Dextra take that power for him. Which is how the girl came to be in a coma for the last year and a half."
"But if Faker has already taken this power then why the interest in Shark?"
"Because you can't have too much power. When the Numbers appeared Dr Faker discovered that they had a strong reaction to the power of chaos we had harvested from the girl, they stimulated it. And then he had an idea, with the use of the Numbers card, and a strong desire for power that a thirst for revenge could bring, perhaps Rio Kastle would not be the only one in her family to awaken. If Shark could also awaken his power and we were to then take that power and combine the two… the benefits might rival those we will get from obtaining all the Number cards."
Nistro was stunned. While he didn't take the story about an alien war in the distant past, or magical descendants seriously, he was shocked at how cold blooded his bosses could be. Was this what was called fattening up the pig for the slaughter?
It didn't change his loyalty or commitment to the man who had given him so much, but it did cause him to shiver. Just what lengths would they go to in order to achieve their aims. And who would have to pay the price.
Please be alright Dextra…. He prayed.
---
Shark watched in satisfaction as the Seal claimed Dextra's soul before fading away.
He finally had his revenge, but this was just the beginning. So far everything told to him by New Order had turned out to be correct, so Shark was willing to believe the rest for now. Which meant his next target was Dr Faker, he was the one who had Dextra target his sister, the man responsible for everything.
As Shark looked down on the soulless body of his vanquished foe, Wyvern had the rest of her subordinates continue into the control room, where they began to salvage all the useful data and equipment possible. Dextra had bought her team a lot of time and her team had done a good job of erasing the hard drives before evacuating but that didn't mean nothing could be saved.
Besides, the real treasure would come once Dextra's soul was interrogated back at their headquarters and her secrets were fully revealed. But now time was running short and Wyvern knew her troops didn't have enough duel energy to handle another drawn out battle now if security forces showed up.
They had to leave quickly.
But as Wyvern ordered her forces out the entire building was washed by a crimson light that penetrated brick, metal and stone. After the light faded away everything had changed, because only Shark and Wyvern could now move, the rest had frozen in place like statues. No not just them, everything from the people to the falling papers and dripping coffee from drinks spilt on the tables had stop. Frozen in time.
A cry broke the silence.
"DEXTRA!!"
