Yu-Gi-Oh GX: Rise of a Monarch

"Now I am using Invocation to fuse Aleister the Invoker in my field and the Ash Blossom in my graveyard to fusion summon Invoked Purgatrio," I said as I summoned one of my favorite monsters,

Invoked Purgatrio - Level 7/Fire/Pyro (2300/2000)

"Shit!" he exclaimed

"Language! But yes, Invoked Purgatorio attacks you directly, and That's Game."

"Man… This sucks… I lost again, 3-0, but at least I managed to lower your life points past 4000 this time,"

"Yeah, you are re-learning the game quite fast, but unfortunately Red Eyes Decks are not THAT powerful, so you might wanna remove Foolish Lances and add some Hand Traps to slow down your opponent, and if it doesn't hurt your budget, (which it most likely do), try to get a Dark Magician Dragoon and maybe the a couple more Red-Eyes fusion cards to quickly summon it," I suggested after the duel had ended.

This dude had recently re-entered the game after a decade or so, had watched some online videos and constructed a Red-Eyes deck. Unfortunately, he had stopped playing the game before Synchros made a huge wave, so he had trouble getting used to how fast paced the game had become.

"Thanks. You are pretty good," he said

"I'm okay, the Invoked Shaddolls are pretty powerful," I told him. I had made quite a few decks over the years, some were Meta, some Anti-Meta, and most just for fun, and Invoked Shaddolls was one of my all time favorites.

"So what made you want to restart the game?" I ask him

"I was bored, happened upon my old Red-Eyes deck and wanted to see if the game was as fun as I remember but I think it has become too fast paced for me," he admitted with a sigh, not that I blamed him.

"Yeah man, I get what you mean," I told him, "The game has changed a lot, now people are spamming monster after monster, to summon the same boss monsters, or use bloody hand traps to destroy their opponents strategy and just FTK them the next turn, but then again, it has its own charm,"

"*sigh* I suppose… I just wish the game was the same as it was in the GX era, you know,"

"Yeah I get you man, I actually wish the same, it was quite fun seeing those duel spirits in the show. I'm Eren by the way," I reached to shook his hand

"Dan," he said as he shook mine,

"Alright man, I tend to come here every other Sunday, so if you see me again don't be a stranger, and if you wanna get a better idea of the game now, a dude named Cimoo has this Youtube channel that is quite fun," I told him.

"Thanks again, and see you later," he said before I left.

I had to finish an essay for my Econ 203 class so I grabbed my bike and rode home. It was a warm, sunny day, but not overly so. It was a nice day to go out.

Instead, I went home, finished my essay. I only had to check spelling, and citations so it wasn't much work but I needed to submit it tonight before 23:59, I have no idea why at such a precise time but that is the due date Professor set.

Once I was done, I quickly ate yesterday's leftover pizza and went to bed and quickly fall asleep,

-- Next Morning --

*Beep* *Beep* *Beep* *Beep* *Beep* *Beep-*

The annoying sound of the alarm clock woke me up,

'Wait a second? I don't own an alarm clock,' I thought to myself as I quickly got to a sitting position, I looked around the room

There was a ceiling fan spinning around, a medium sized desk, a red chair, twin size bed, posters of duel monsters, and Mai Valentine cosplayer in her bikini, which I may or may not have stared at for more than a few seconds.

Overall, it was a nice room, but it wasn't mine. I lived in a tiny studio apartment that I barely manage to pay the rent for with a part time job.

It took me a moment to notice the calendar on the wall, it wasn't as eye catching as the posters. A glance at it told me the date is October 8th, 2004. Not only that, for tomorrow there was a red circle event labeled as: DUEL ACADEMY ENTRANCE EXAM!!!

"Oookay…" i said as I got out of the bed, I was wearing a white shirt and gray sweatpants, which wasn't that unusual,

I walked towards the desk, and sat down, stared at the laptop for a while. It had a KC Logo, and it was so outdated that it looked more like a brick than an advanced piece of technology to me. It was so old that it was still using a LAN cable.

I quickly opened it and opened google, it took a few minutes, a completely alien feeling compared to the seconds it used to take with my Laptop at home. Regardless, the first thing I googled was today's date, and it literally said: Friday, 8th of October, 2004.

"What kind of a prank is this?" I asked myself before searching for "Google Maps" but only got images of maps, I clicked on one and looked at it, and imagine my surprise when it showed the map of the Domino City, "Fuck this shit," I muttered to myself and got out of the chair, I looked around for cameras after not seeing anything I released a sigh of breath I didn't know I was holding,

"What the hell is going on here?" I asked out loud and got no reply, I was about to leave the room when I heard a rumbling noise,

I looked around to see where it was coming from, and found out it was coming out of my desk drawer. I opened it and the noise got louder, and rather than a murmur, it sounded more like croaking.

The only thing in the drawer was a pencil case, a metal box, and a deck holster, and to my utter shock, the noise was coming out of the deck box..

"Ribbit Ribbit!"

"No fucking way," I muttered as I opened the deck box, I looked at the cards in it, most of them were Warrior Monsters with Gilford the Legend and Sword Hunter as boss monsters, a few spells that supports warriors like The A. Force and The Warrior Returning Alive, quite a few equip spells including Axe of Despair and some well known spells like Monster Reborn and Pot of Greed, and of course some common traps like Negate Attack and Call of the Haunted, but there was one out of place monster that shouldn't be in Equip Spell Specializing Warrior Deck.

"Ribbit Ribbit!"

I grabbed that monster card and placed the rest of the cards in the deck box, and put them down. I stared at the monster in my hand. It wasn't a powerful monster by any means, or a monster with a ground breaking effect in the current meta. It was a Aqua Type, Effect monster, it was Level 1, had 100 attack points, 100 defense points, and a pretty good effect that allows you to special summon it from the graveyard in your Standby Phase provided your back row is empty...

"Ribbit Ribbit!"

The card had vibrated a bit, before croaking

"HOLY SHIT!" I shouted as I nearly dropped the Treeborn Frog card in my hand.

"Are- Are you a Duel Spirit?" I ask in a low voice,

"Ribbit Ribbit!" I heard once more and the Treeborn Frog in my hand got out of his card, and smiled at me.

"..." I didn't know what to say, I just stared at him for a moment. I tried to touch him but could't, just phase through him "So am I really in Yu-Gi-Oh World? I mean, I technically did wish for it but… really?"

"Ribbit Ribbit Ribbit!" was the response I got but it seemed to be saying yes,

I- I- I didn't know what to think.

Who brought me here?

Was it the Treeborn Frog?

Egyptian Gods?

Zorc?

Gentle Darkness?

Light of Destruction?

Crimson Dragon?

Red Nova?

Aesir Gods?

Paradox?

Aliens?

Zarc?

Ray?

Or just a Random Omnipotent Being?

*Knock* *Knock* *Knock*

I was brought out of my thoughts when I heard someone knocking on the door,

"Konami, are you alright? I heard you shouting," a female voice from outside the door said.

Konami? What?

"Umm… Yeah, just hit my toe," I said the first lie that came to my mind,

"Okay son, your father has already left for work, but he left you 10,000 yens on the counter so you can bolster your deck before the Duel Academy Exam, I need to leave now, but Ieft your breakfast in the kitchen,"

Son? Yen? Konami? We are speaking English… What? "Umm… Okay, thanks''

"Take care," she said before presumably leaving.

"Son?" I repeated the question, from before, I then looked at my arms, and belly, and noticed I was skinnier than before, also was I a little bit shorter?

I got out of the room, and looked around the house until I found the bathroom. I stared at the mirror for a good minute. I looked slightly younger, like how I used to do when I was 15 or 16. Same nose, same brown hair and eyes, just slightly younger. "Huh… Son of a giant popsicle, how did this happen?" I ask myself as I walk around the house, still holding onto the Treeborn Frog.

The house was that of an average upper to middle, middle class family, except the TV was very old, and there was no Wifi Box anywhere, the one thing I found important was the family photo of an even younger version of myself, with a man with dad bod, and a blonde woman who I would call MILF IF she wasn't, probably, my mother in this world.

I looked around a bit more, and found a few mails addressed to them on the counter. The man's name was George Kujo. The woman's name was Clair Kujo. And there was one question that popped in my head,

"Does that make me Konami Kujo? As in JoJo"

"Ribbit Ribbit!"

Treeborn Frog had picked this moment to reappear, I looked at him, the shock of seeing a Yu-Gi-Oh card speak was gone, and I was slowly accepting that Duel Spirits was apparently real, and I was in a new world full of them.

Now that I was accepting I was in a world ruled by children's card game, a game that I loved, I just needed one thing, "Let's go and get me a bloody banlist,"

======

— Later —

I was sitting in front of Konami's desk, staring at his computer, waiting for the Industrial Illusion's webpage to load. The waiting was killing me.

Once it finally opened, I looked at it intently. As a Mascot it had Dark Magician and Blue-Eyes White Dragon staring at each other, but I ignored the two of the most over-hyped monsters in this world and clicked on the [Banlist] box that stood on the top right corner of the page. (AN: Not that they are weak or anything, just that they are thought to be some of the most powerful cards in the game, which they are not, not by a long shot)

It took a couple of minutes for this ancient internet to load a page, and once it did I released a breath I didn't know I was holding.

"It took you a while," I said as I looked at the forbidden portion of the banlist.

The New Banlist had apparently come out last month, and only a handful of monsters were banned. Chaos Emperor Dragon - Envoy of the End, Sangan, Witch of the Black Forest, and Yata-Garasu.

"Sangan is banned? Too bad, I loved that card before Konami neutered him," I muttered to myself before moving to the spells section of banned cards, there were quite a few banned spells like Dark Hole, Delinquent Duo, Harpie's Feather Duster, Raigeki, and United We Stand.

"So no easy field wipers? Also neither Pot of Greed or Graceful Charity is banned? I guess I can live with that…"

Finally there were only two banned trap cards: Mirror Force, and Imperial Order. "Yugi must have been pissed when he saw his OP trap was banned," I muttered before quickly scanning through the limited and semi-limited portion of the banlist, there were a few good cards that shouldn't exist in this time period, but I suppose cards getting out different years in this world and mine is not that weird. It's not like Synchro monsters are gonna make an appearance in 2008.

I then went through the public card list, there was a footnote that said this was not the complete card list and there are cards not released to the public, but it wasn't that much of a concern… Well it was, but at least this list gave me an idea of which cards existed in this era, and from what I could see, the best archetypes currently available to the public were the GOAT control, which is nearly impossible to collect, since there are only 10 Black Luster Soldier - Envoy of the Beginning in this world.

Then there was the Gadget cards that are quite useful in this format, "But because Yugi fucking Muto used them, their cost is apperantly somewhere north of 100,000 yen a pop, that's like 1,000 dollars, and considering you needed at least 6 to use them effectively… less said is better." I mused. The cost of some cards was crazy in this world, you could probably sell a Dark Magician for half a million dollars, not Yen, Dollars. That is if you casually sold it online, God knows how much you can get from a rich collector.

Then there are cost-efficient decks, the first one that came to my mind is Six Samurai, even though they do exist in this world right now, and I could probably make a powerful deck out of them, they are not that useful as they seem to be missing the cards that gave them insane draw and search power, and both Grandmaster and Great Shogun Shien are very Rare.

Then there are D.D. cards, even though they are powerful and have useful anti meta effects that makes them a nightmare to face against. I was never a fan of that strategy, and using it in a world where the heart of the cards is not complete bullshit, it might be troublesome to build a deck around them.

And finally, there are the Monarchs. One of the most dominant archetypes in the entire game, and one of my top 3 favorite archetypes of all times. Plus, their cost is very manageable, and finally Treeborn Frog could be very useful in that deck.

"Alright it is decided, I will be a Monarch player," I said out loud and Treeborn Frog cheered, "Yeah buddy, with all those tributes you'll be super useful in that deck," I told him and he smiled, he was pretty darn cute despite being a Duel Monster,

I then went through Konami's main deck and put away any card that can be used in a Monarch deck, Mystical Space Typhoon, Heavy Storm, Pot of Greed, Monster Reborn, Creature Swap, Call of the Haunted, and of course, Treeborn Frog.

I then opened Konami's card box. Apparently he kept all of his cards in a metal box, unless he used them in his Warrior Deck.

"Muda, Muda, Muda, Muda, Muda," I kept saying as I went through the cards, most of them were worthless cards like Reinforcements. I then came upon one of the cards that is incredibly useful, Snatch Steal, "Why didn't Konami use this card?" I asked out loud to no one in particular, it didn't matter, I put it away for later use, I then continued going through the cards, and found a few very useful cards. Put them aside for now.

And the most important card amongst those I found was one of the boss monsters I was looking for: Mobius, the Frost Monarch

"Alright… After breakfast, game shops here we come," I muttered as I walked towards the kitchen.