The Adventures of a Dark Duelist

         "What the fuck, where the hell am I?!" I shouted at the flying hallucinogenic tapeworm in front of me. We were just floating above the ground in a forest. He started to chuckle for a moment, I just scowled.

        "Alright, it took me a thousand years to build up this much energy. Basically, I summoned you to this world to mix things up a little, it's boring. In return I can give you any two things or abilities you want." He said in an odd voice... 'Anything?' He must read minds. "Yes anything."

        "I want my yugioh cards, and I want to be able to actually summon the monsters and use the spells and traps." He chuckled and nodded. "I also want the ability to pull slim-Jim's out of any container whenever I want." He laughed and snapped his fingers. On my arm appeared a black duel disk, shaped to match my darkness and fiend deck. I decided to reach into my pocket, and to my surprise, I pulled out a slim-jim. My jaw dropped and I stared at him. "Are you god?" I asked.

        "No, by the way, there are some differences between the rules of that card game, and the cards you currently wield. First of all, unless it says so in the cards effect, tributes are not required, however if you don't tribute it will absorb your energy and breaking the rule continuously will result in falling unconscious or death." I gulped. "Secondly, as you guessed there are no turns, you just gotta put the cards down fast enough." Before I could ask any more questions, he snapped his fing- talon and vanished. I was curious as to what would happen. So I drew my cards and proceeded to do the following: I set down magic jammer, sakuretsu armor, and magical cylinder. I then placed scarab swarm face down. I looked and saw hundreds of scarabs appear, they quickly faded into the ground, and I decided I would follow this path I saw. I looked around the seemingly haunted forest, with the constant feeling that I was being watched. I spun around quickly hoping to get a look at what was watching me. I saw... Nothing.

        "HELP!" I heard a voice in the distance shout. I sprinted through the foliage and came across a clearing, I saw a small orange horse with a freaking cowboy hat, being cornered by a huge as lion-bat-thing. I wanted to rush out and help, but I decided to stay hidden, I reached for my duel disk and grabbed the scarab card and flipped it face up. The countless pests started flooding from the nearby plants, I didn't say anything. I just pointed at the beast, and to my pleasure the bugs obeyed. 'Scarab Swarm, when this card is flip summoned destroy one monster.' I watched as the horse screamed again, this time at the bugs enveloping the creature. When the swarm was done, there was nothing left but bones. 'Once per turn you may flip this card into face down defense position.' I did so and the scarabs began sinking back into the grass. I could hear her hyperventilating from where I was hiding. After about thirty seconds of watching her freak out she started to bolt down a path, I chased after her, but stayed hidden (night time is really dark here). As we were running I took a look at my hand: Beligge vanguard of dark world, Dark Horus, and mystic plasma zone. 'Perfect.'

             To say AJ was freaked out was an understatement. She was running faster than she had at the running of the leaves. She sprinted into Twilight's Library, no she didn't use the door, she used the wall. As soon as she felt safe, she collapsed and took a deep breath in. By this time, Twilight had come down to see what happened

        "Applejack!" Twilight shouted as she ran over to her exhausted friend. "What happened?" She asked as her friend calmed down.

         "Ah-Ah was headin' back from Zecora's, and Ah was about halfway home. A manticore came outta nowhere and cornered me, it was about to eat me when-" she stopped as she shivered.

         "When what?" Twilight asked, concerned.

         "When... These bugs, hundreds o' the things, each a little smaller than mah hoof. They came up and and... And they ate the manticore, cut it down to bone. Then they just, vanished, they just disappeared. So Ah ran all the way here." Applejack looked up at her friend, who was horrified. Twilight was about to open her mouth to ask more, but there was a knock at the door. Twilight nervously opened the door, and in front of her, stood a tall bipedal figure with a black overcoat and a strange device on it's arm. It knelt down and smiled.

           "Hi, sorry about waking you up so late, but I noticed that the orange horse got really scared of my scarabs and I wanted to make sure she was okay." It was smiling sincerely. While Twilight was speechless.

        "Sc- scarabs, that means you control the things that... Oh no, please don't hurt us." Whatever it was, it was taken aback by this.

         "Hurt you? If I wanted to hurt you why would I have had my scarabs help your friend then return to the ground?" It asked, showing Twilight reason not to be COMPLETELY scared of it. They stared at eachother for a few moments before it spoke again. "May I come in? It's cold out here." Twilight broke out of her trance.

         "Yes of course. Please, come in." She said as she let her guest into the house. He then stared at the hole in the wall. He looked at it for a few seconds, then back at AJ.

          "Did they really scare you that much?" He asked the orange farm pony. She had returned to her normal state of mind.

        "Well- those bugs uh yers are vicious little things." She said in her defense, he chuckled for a second.

       "They're actually really disorganized and easy to beat if they don't get the jump on their target, not to mention weak compared to my other friends." Their jaws dropped, not only was he revealing the weakness of one of his creatures, he called them weak. He noticed their reactions and added. "Also, if you ever hear me mention the name 'Dark Horus'" he said as he showed them the card, "leave the area." Twilight's mind started racing.

          'Leave the area? That must be his strongest then. What is that device though? And why does he display the picture and information of his summons on his cards? It had eight stars on it, could that show some sign of significance? What about ATK and DEF, why is one higher than the other? What did it mean return one monster from the graveyard to the field. And why is he warning us about such a creature? Is he extending some information in return for trust?' She looked back to see him withdrawing another card from the holdster within the device. He smiled and placed it on the machine, to her surprise, an orb of darkness appeared in front of him, morphing in shape before it faded. Revealing... A wombat? The small creature looked around the room, before settling it's eyes on the one that summoned it.

          "Um, what is that?" Twilight asked.

           "This is des Wombat, while he's around, only physical attacks can harm me. But he's also a really good pet." He answered as he scratched the creature behind he ear. He then walked over to the couch and laid down. "I'm really tired, so I'm gonna go to sleep. Warning, not threat, if anyone attempts to harm me in my sleep, the scarabs will protect me at any cost." He then laid back and quickly drifted into unconsciousness.

       The two mares simply stared at him for a good five minutes, niether one of them knew what to do, until Twilight did what she always does. She wrote a letter to the princess.

              'Dear Princess Celestia

        We have encountered a form of bipedal creature, he is far smarter and more polite than a diamond dog. He wears a long black overcoat and has some odd device on his left foreleg. The device holds a large amount of strange cards, with pictures of creatures on them. I thought they were just info cards, but when he placed them on a different part of the device it appeared in front of us. These creatures would apparently do anything to defend him, and while he appears to like us, Applejack told me that one of his cards contained a swarm of scarabs. They apparently defended her from a manticore, but in doing so, they consumed it. This being is a potential threat, but he does not seem to have any form of hostile or aggressive attitude toward ponies. I await your reply.

          Your faithful student

                        Twilight Sparkle'

          Her horn glowed, and she cast the spell to send the note, instead of giving it to Spike first, it was a lot more difficult, but she could do it. Shortly after she sent AJ home, she then fell asleep in her bed after a lot of reflection on the situation.

         "TWILIGHT!!!" Shouted a frightened and confused Spike as he stared at the creature on their couch. He heard a groan from upstairs and looked up as a very tired Twilight walked down the stairs. The shout also seemed to wake up the guy on the couch. He was rubbing his head in slight annoyance.

          "Hell of a wake up call little guy. You got some powerful lungs." He then stared at the now alert wombat, it was growling at Spike. "Des Wombat, defense mode." To his surprise, not only did the things posture change, the position of the card rotated. 'Wait can I control it with my voice? Interesting.' He then reexamined his duel disk, he found a holding port on the bottom of it for the cards in his hand, freeing up his actual hand. "As a show of gratitude, and a return of good faith, I'll return my scarabs to the deck. Thank you for letting me stay here miss..."

         "Sparkle, Twilight Sparkle." I then looked at the mark on her flank and put two and two together. 'Their names reflect something about them, well, since my real name doesn't have use here...'

         "Well, Twilight, my name is Shadow Strike." 'Most of my monsters are dark, it works.' I then looked down at the lizard. "And you might be?" He seemed nervous, but hid it well.

         "Uh, I'm Spike." He quickly shook my hand with his claw. Before we head out, I reached into my pocket and pulled out some thing gloves. I then reached in again when they weren't looking and nommed on a slim jim. I then turned back to them with a smile.

        "So when can I head out?" I asked politely.

         "We can go now, I could give you a tour of Ponyville." With that we stepped outside, many of the ponies hid, others stared. One green unicorn looked mildly psychotic. As we walked around though, not much happened.

            Twilight was walking along the road with Shadow to SweetApple Acres as they walked they didn't exactly speak much, to her displeasure. As hey were about to arrive they saw an orange figure charging them from in front, and a shout from behind. Twilight looked behind and saw Rainbow on a collision course with Shadow.

         "Rainbow NO! Shadow look out!" He didn't move, instead he smiled. Right when she was a mere few meters from him he hold out a hand towards her.

        "Magic Cylinder." A large cylinder appeared in front of each of his hands, one aimed toward Rainbow, one towards AJ. She waited for the impact and the loud smack. But it never came, she was shocked to see Rainbow go straight into one cylinder and out the other, she smacked straight into AJ, sending them both to the ground. The wombat then rushed between them, and put up a defensive stance.

          The two hotheads got up and were ready to charge again, but they were held down by a lavender aura.

          "What the BUCK were you two doing!?" She shouted at her friends. Rainbow shot up first.

        "I was gonna stop that monster from eating you!" She shouted as she struggled against Twilight's magic.

        "Ah was tryin' tah stop Rainbow from ending up like the manticore." AJ responded. Dash looked worried.

       "What happened to a manticore?" She asked.

       "My Scarabs ate it." Shadow said bluntly. "But if I wanted you hurt, I would have used Sakuretsu Armor instead of magic Cylinder." He said as the card in question flew into his graveyard. "My name is Shadow Strike what is your-" he stopped himself as he remembered exactly who this was, he had about thirty friends that were bronies. He knew exactly where he was, and who this was. Though he was not a brony he had a favorite, and he just used a trap card on her. "OhMyGodI'mSorryIfIKnewItWasYouIWouldntHaveUsedIt!" He shouted at a barely understandable speed. "I still can't believe I'm here and I met YOU, oh my friends are gonna be so jealous." He stopped his rant and smiled sheepishly at how weird this must be.

        "How do you know who I am?" She asked while slightly frightened.

        "Are you KIDDING?! You're THE Rainbow Dash! Fastest Flier in Equestria, master of the sonic rainboom, element of loyalty, and a shooin for captain of the wonderbolts." Twilight was surprised at how her ego didn't pop from being overinflated by the praise.

        "Well, I'm just that awesome aren't I?" She had completely forgotten the urge to attack the creature.

        "Well, maybe not quite as awesome as Dark Horus, but you're definitely a close second." This pushed one of her buttons she broke out of Twilight's magical grip and flew straight up to him.

        "Oh yeah, I'd like to see this Horus guy!" He cracked a grin and quietly chuckled.

         "Okay." He then placed his Scarab card on the device again, scaring the ever living crap out of Applejack. He then removed both his scarab, and Des Wombat (much to their confusion) and placed down Dark Horus, a massive metallic dragon with a bird head emerged from darkness. Before it stopped moving and awaited a command.

          "Woah." Was all Rainbow could muster. Shadow wasn't done yet.

           "Twilight, would you mind casting two spells, any two?" He asked, she was going to question him. But figured it best not to. She teleported to another spot then back. Horus began to glow.

         "What's going on?" Twilight asked.

         "I activate Dark Horus' ability, when someone other than myself casts a spell, I can ressurect any low level dark monster from the graveyard." Twilight understood his meaning, he sacrificed his friends in order to play a creature that would surely bring them back. "Come on back, Swarm of Scarabs and Des Wombat." Two more dark glows appeared and they formed into the two previously departed creatures. He looked back at Dash with a smug grin before removing all of the cards, and their forms followed.

         "Don't want to terrify the locals." Shadow Strike said casually as he walked back into town, when they entered they heard a lot of commotion. The most common was one about the princesses, but he couldn't understand exactly what. However once they reached the Library it was clear what had happened. Standing inside the Library.

       Were the rest of the bearers.

       The Princesses.

       And the captain of both of the guards.

       "Well I guess my rep proceeds me." Celestia gave a small smile, Luna was simply curious, Shining Armor looked like he was going to kill him, and the cloaked captain wearing Luna's crest was smiling like something was absolutely hilarious. The other three bowed to the Princess and Twilight glared at Shadow. He just grinned. Luna started to get irritated.

           "What are thou doing creature bow before thy princess." She commanded, he got an annoyed look on his face, and before anyone could interfere he answered.

        "No." He said with a small amount of venom. They were all shocked.

        "HOW DARE THY SPEAKETH TO US WITH SUCH INSOLENCE! WE ARE THY PRINCESS!" She shouted at a billion decibels. Everyone in the room held their head in pain, save for Celestia and the Night captain. Shadow stood up in annoyance and stared down the dark princess.

"YOU ARE NOT MY PRINCESS, I DO NOT COME FROM THIS WORLD AND THEREFORE HAVE NO OBLIGATION TO PRAISE YOU!" He then calmed himself. "I hold no respect for titles alone Luna, until you show me a reason to respect you I will not call you by your title nor will I respect you as such." Celestia enjoyed his words, it was refreshing to meet a being that would not coddle them simply because of their position. Luna would have, had he not spoken with a clearly insulting tone.

Before Celestia could even see what she was about to do, she loosed a stream of black lightning from her horn, straight towards the human. He made no effort to stop it. When it made contact he didn't even feel it. "How art thou still standing?!" She roared. Shadow just smirked.

"As I told Twilight earlier." He pointed to the wombat. "While Des here is around I can only be harmed by physical attacks. Try to hurt him and I will slit your throat open where you stand." His last words struck fear and disgust into each one of the main six, and this time it was Celestia's turn to attack, she cast a levitation spell on him and was about to throw him through a wall when he spoke again. "Magic Jammer." He became surrounded in a purple glow and the golden aura dispelled. A card from his hand flew onto the field. "Come on out, Beiige Vanguard of Darkworld." The shadows faded in, leaving behind a skeletal fiend, wielding a spear in it's forelimbs.

"What is that repulsive creature?!" He heart Rarity shout.

"The Princesses brought their guards, I brought mine. Time for a field trip. I activate Mystic Plasma Zone." The entire room shifted around and faded until the entire group found themselves in a dark realm with a Maelstrom overhead. "Here all dark monsters are five hundred points stronger." He then gripped one card in his hand. "I release Swarm of Scarabs, and Beiige in order to advance summon Dark Horus." Three of the six spectators' eyes went wide at the name, while there were a couple gasps of fear when the enormous creature formed.

"Bottomless Trap Hole." He turned his head to the new voice, but not before gaping at his card falling through a sudden expanse in the ground, all eyes were now on the night captain, all of them shocked except for Luna. On the Night Captain's left hoof was another dark duel disk. "Now that I have your attention, let's duel." Both Duelists were grinning like morons as they moved all of their cards into their decks and shuffled.

"What is going on here Captain Night-Shade?" Asked Celestia, and Shining Armor in unison. He didn't respond.

"You want me to go easy on you?" Shadow asked.

"It wouldn't be fun if you did." Nightshade responded.

"Then I'll go first." Stated Shadow. "I set one card and place two face downs and end my turn." Three cards appeared on the field.

"Alright, I summon Ally of Justice Nullifier."

"I activate my trap card, hidden soldiers. When you summon a monster I can summon a level four or lower dark monster from my hand. I play Des Wombat in attack mode."

"I place four cards face down and activate the continuous spell Veil of Darkness, your move." The group was worried, non of them wanted to interfere out of fear and curiosity, while Celestia didn't because she saw her sister with a smug grin on her face as she watched.

"I play D.D. Trainer in defense mode. Next I tribute all three of my monsters in order to summon Arcana Force Ex. The Light Ruler." An enormous Creature appeared in a flash of bright light, it seemed to have two serpent heads portruding from it's back. "When this card is summoned I can flip a coin and it's special ability will vary." He pulled a coin and a slim-jim out of his pocket, before putting the latter back. Shadow flipped it and it landed on tails. "When this card is targetted by a card effect it is negated, destroyed, and this card loses 1000 attack points. Arcana, attack Ally of Justice." The two serpent heads released a blast of energy destroying the odd machine, then a large shockwave headed straight for Nightshade.

Shadow Strike

4000

Nightshade

1600

"When Nullfier is destroyed by a light monster it's effect is negated." The grunting guard said.

"Whatever, your move." Nightshade draws and grins

"I activate the effect of Veil of Darkness. When I draw a dark monster I can show it to you, send it to the graveyard, and draw again. I sent Mad Dog of Darkness to the graveyard." He draws again. "Rare Metal Dragon to the graveyard." He draws again. "I activate my facedown, card of sanctity. Both players draw until they have six cards in their hands. Next I activate card destruction, we discard our hands and draw completely new ones." Both players placed their hands in their graveyards and drew six more. Nightshade flashed a huge grin. "I activate two facedowns, Shadowspell, this card binds your Light Ruler to his spot and reduces his attack points by 700. Next I activate Chaos Contract. I pay half my life points, and any card that requires banishing cards, the tributes can now be your monsters as well. I remove seven of the dark monsters in my graveyard from play in order to Special Summon, Rainbow Dark Dragon!" An enormous black winged serpent appears from a shadow, it's back covered with dark gems.

Rainbow Dark Dragon

ATK 4000 DEF 0

Arcana Force Ex- The Light Ruler

ATK 3300 DEF 4000

Shadow Strike

4000

Nightshade

800

"Now I remove the eight dark monsters in your graveyard from play in order to increase his attack points by 4000."

Rainbow Dark Dragon

ATK 8000 DEF 0

All of the spectators were on edge, three of them more than any others. Twilight was amazed by the sheer amount of power coming from the field, Spike was in awe of the beautiful dragon he was watching, and Celestia just didn't know what the hell was going on.

"Next I summon Pitch Black Warwolf in attack mode." Shadows smile instantly faded, followed by a calm look of acceptance. "I see you recognize it's effect."

"Yeah, while he's on the field, during the battle phase I can't activate traps. My Magic Cylinder won't do anything."

"Correct. Rainbow Dark Dragon, attack the Light Ruler and end this." The mighty beast roared before letting loose a torrent of color straight at the other colossus. Everypony stared at the outcome shocked, they may have been in the dark about a lot, but it was clear that Nightshade was losing at first.

Nightshade

800

Shadow

0

Shadow's vision started fading as he collapsed, the only voice he heard was that of the one that beat him. He spoke almost nostalgically.

"Oh Sammy, are you in for a surprise."