At night, Tenjo Hikari habitually sorted his deck.
This had become a routine for him.
Yu Gi Oh had infinite possibilities, no matter how strong the deck, it could be defeated by just two Book of Eclipse cards. His deck, even more so, was "full of infinite possibilities" because even he didn't know what his deck would be like in the next duel.
"Previously, Pot of Greed turned into Fusion Substitute; Monster Reborn was turned into Super Polymerization. The latter is a bit tricky, with some special combos, but the former has too much of a card effect difference, doesn't it?" Tenjo Hikari rubbed his hand cards, and before long, his eyes lit up, "Wow! Wow wow wow!?"
"What—what is this?"
He excitedly recalculated everything from beginning to end, opened his backup card box, and carefully counted once more.
Those Normal Monsters previously gifted by the Alchemist, those miscellaneous cards he bought in Domino City, had all but disappeared. Out of ten to twenty cards, only one remained—
DD Swirl Slime!
"Seriously, they even print cards like this?" Tenjo Hikari recalled carefully, "Logically, cards printed by Super Polymerization should relate to my opponent and the cards in my deck during the duel, right? Why would this come out?"
This was a quite powerful card; if in hand, it could directly use hand cards to perform a Fusion Summon to summon a DDD Fusion Monster during the main phase.
At the same time, it could banish itself from the graveyard to Special Summon a DD monster from the hand.
Although it was still a "card loss," in terms of card efficiency, this card was already outstanding in this world.
However—this was his only DD card.
Moreover, what puzzled him was—why did this card appear?
"Could it be?" He thought of a possibility.
Because he had always been opposing Akaba Leo, did Super Polymerization determine this?
"So hard to understand, how many more details are undiscovered?" Tenjo Hikari stroked his chin, recalling carefully.
The scope of Super Polymerization's effects was astonishingly large, and now it seemed to determine anything related to Tenjo Hikari.
While he was thinking, suddenly, Tenjo Hikari felt something was wrong.
Why was the room so dark?
"Your Highness!" "Sire!"
He heard the Spirit's exclamations.
The next moment, he sensed a familiar "power," Captain Crystal had already attached to him, emitting light. At the same time, he quickly turned his head, looking at his backup cards.
In the backup card box, sticky and swirling "shadows," like ink, were crazily spiraling with purple radiance.
What was that!?
He was somewhat dumbfounded.
"Sire, be careful!"
Captain Crystal's warning came a bit late; Tenjo Hikari was struck on the shoulder by a fast-moving piece of metal. Thankfully, with Captain Crystal's protection, although painful, he was not injured.
Within the purple storm, he glanced around.
Many of his alchemy materials were dancing, congregating, and swirling within this bizarre wind. In his surprised gaze, these metallic materials began to slowly auto-assemble and change. Gradually, an iron-constructed puppet hand emerged before him, and then, a Magic Staff appeared out of thin air. The next instant, along with the purple light shimmering from the staff, a small figure with completely mechanical, steel joints, even hair clearly twisted together, appeared in front of him.
El Shaddoll Midrash.
"So that's how it is!" The Alchemist floated beside Tenjo Hikari, "Master, you actually completed this card long ago, but—it just didn't want to activate!"
Is that so?
Indeed, in this world, there truly existed cards that didn't want their users to use them, forcibly preventing duel disks from recognizing them or even striking the user with lightning—but that could only be achieved by extremely powerful Spirits or outright "Gods!"
"Wait, why can I see you now?!" Tenjo Hikari suddenly realized.
"Your Highness, your power has been enhanced by it!" Flame Sword and Black Flame were always beside Tenjo Hikari, but since he couldn't see them before, noticing his eyes now, they quickly spoke.
"Peculiar, the cards you've transmuted, are just ordinary cards...why would this happen?" Black Flame furrowed his brow.
"I apologize, sire, this is probably my fault!" Captain Crystal, upon seeing Midrash, finally understood that familiar feeling, "She might be a Spirit from the same Spirit World as me, and because of my existence, caught her attention..."
So that's how it was.
Tenjo Hikari was enlightened.
He thought there was no way his alchemy skills were enough to create an Artificial Spirit like an Artificial Life Form, he wasn't that transcendental.
If it was like this, that made sense.
The various Spirits were chattering, helping Tenjo Hikari understand what led up to this, while on the other side, the green-haired Spirit floating in the air twisted her head, crossed her arms, moving her joints.
She definitely didn't appear to be a normal living being, her head twisted awkwardly, her limb joints could move forwards and backwards. She glanced at Captain Crystal, expressionless, and said, "Long time, no see."
Captain Crystal shuddered.
The next moment, the Spirit looked towards Tenjo Hikari: "Human, you, without permission, created, me me me———"
Saying this, she suddenly got stuck, patting her head, twisting her throat joint. Just as she was about to say something else, suddenly, the entire Spirit froze. The next instant, her demeanor became noticeably livelier, her smile appeared, and she looked much more like a living creature, full of life.
This left Tenjo Hikari stunned.
"Oh, Captain Crystal?" "Eh? Human?"
"Midrash," looked at Tenjo Hikari, her face showing an insane smile. "Never thought a day would come when a card Spirit could reach the human world! It seems, I have another shot at revival!"
No—
She wasn't Midrash!!
In that very moment, Tenjo Hikari realized a problem!
She is definitely not Midrash! No—she "is" Midrash!
Crystal was a bit confused.
He had seen many "Midrash," and he had fought against the Shaddoll Race, but he had never seen such an expression on the spirits of those mechanical puppets.
"...Tierra?" Tenjo Hikari asked tentatively.
"You've heard of me?" [Midrash] said with a smile, yet not surprised, "It seems my divine name has spread to other worlds."
Hiss—
Tenjo Hikari understood.
This is another "Darkness," isn't it?
Tierra, Source of Destruction!
One of the two "Creators" of the DT World.
The logic is simple, since Darkness can create a smurf, Tierra can do it too! Midrash is the "Voice of God," essentially Tierra's "Speaker," and in Card Image stories, Midrash is controlled by Tierra. Among all the Shaddoll Monsters, she's the only one without "control lines," because it's simple—she is directly connected!
It seemed that the spirit of Midrash originally wanted to duel with him to see if he was qualified to be her wielder, but Tierra intercepted directly.
"Compared to the dreadful creatures of my world, humans are quite nice."
Tierra kept nodding, praising, "Human, if you can find my world, help me resurrect, reset the planet, and eliminate the filthy and ugly creatures. I will grant you the name of human Adam, becoming the progenitor of all humans in my world, what do you say?"
"No," Tenjo Hikari interrupted immediately.
How is this different from claiming I, Qin Shi Huang, will resurrect and make you a general?
"Leave Midrash's mind quickly, she's my card now!" Tenjo Hikari said, clenching his fist, "She is a symbol of fusion!"
Tierra subconsciously leaned her head back a bit.
How many dared speak to Her like this in the thousands or millions of years?
"Since you've heard of me, aren't you afraid of me?"
Tenjo Hikari laughed.
He had already learned about the Spirit Realm from Crystal.
For spirits, the events of the DT World happened so long ago, even for them, it's "pre-Creation of Heaven and Earth." Tierra's true form has long been dead!
It's probably turned into oil by now!
You know, to exert power, a "vessel" is needed.
Even the Light Creator needs three Egyptian Gods as vessels, how much power can a single Midrash card exert?
Should I ask if I'm needed for Super Polymerization?
He might not be able to exert the full power of a Super Polymerization, but since Tierra hasn't turned him into a robot yet, obviously power has not been fully exerted either. He can just use Super Polymerization for defense, right?
Without further ado, he took off the card from his neck.
"Stop, wait—you can't exert its power with this body, do you want to perish together with me?" Tierra opened Little Winda's hand, slightly panicked, stopping Tenjo Hikari. Given her status, she quickly recognized what Tenjo Hikari was holding, "I died long ago, so it doesn't matter to me, but without you, who knows how long it will take until then. How about this, let's follow the new era's rules, how about it?"
She smiled: "You shouldn't refuse, right?"
"You can duel?" Tenjo Hikari was very surprised.
"Uh... no, but I can learn." Tierra hadn't felt this awkward for a long time.
"Heh." Tenjo Hikari laughed.
In this world, not knowing how to duel would lead you to become a Darkness, mocked by others!
"I have a condition."
"What condition?"
"Cards," Tenjo Hikari bargained with her, "Help me create cards, you can do that, right?"
"This body is a bit weak. From her memory, ordinary Card Spirits seem unable to directly create cards." Tierra shook her head, "But if it's with what's in your hand, it might be worth trying."
"Don't casually peek into others' memories!" Tenjo Hikari called out, asking her to stop such a rather bad behavior, then said, "Deal."
"I just happened to be going to the world of Magician's Village in a few days, plus I have a club, and I'll be teaching disciples, which you can observe a lot."
"Great!" Tierra nodded with a smile.
Afterward, she suddenly realized.
Wait, hold on.
Wasn't my original goal resurrection?
Isn't using card creation in exchange for resurrection possible?
But after pondering for a moment, she stopped such meaningless thoughts.
For a God, keeping promises is fundamental!
Not to mention, since the new era has entered the age of dueling, finding a human to learn duelism from isn't bad for oneself!
As long as he's nurtured into her believer, resurrection is eventually possible! A hundred or two hundred years is no big deal!