Who Let Him Play Yu-Gi-Oh!-Chapter 56: The Seal of Orichalcos

"Battle phase," Kira commanded.

"Silent Magician, attack the face-down monster!"

The magician spun her staff, summoning a wave of white light that swept across Keith's field.

The face-down monster flipped up—a grinning, monstrous tomato.

[Mystic Tomato, DEF 1100]

The tomato never stood a chance. The wave destroyed it instantly.

"Heh, you fell for it!" Keith shouted. "At this moment, my set card activates!"

A trap card flipped up.

"Trap Card—Michizure! When a monster is sent to the graveyard, I can destroy one monster on the field!"

Keith grinned wickedly, pointing at Kira's field.

"Say goodbye to your Silent Magician!"

Golden light burst from the trap card, and the destroyed tomato's spirit shot toward Silent Magician.

"In response, I activate the quick-play spell 'My Body as a Shield' from my hand!"

Kira waved his hand, and a magic card appeared.

"When your opponent activates an effect that would destroy a monster, pay 1500 LP to negate and destroy it!"

The spell redirected the attack; the tomato spirit crashed into Kira instead. He staggered back, gritting his teeth.

[Kira, LP 4000 → 2500]

"So shadow duels hurt for real..."

Silent Magician looked at her master in alarm, concerned and uncertain.

"Oh? A duelist shielding his monsters?" Keith sneered. "Cards are just weapons, tools. True strength is knowing how to use each piece.

The strong rule the weak—that's the unchanging truth. A duelist is a commander who can sacrifice everything but himself to win!"

Kira eyed him. Dude, are you okay?

At this rate, if I don't shield Silent Magician, won't you just attack directly next turn?

But he realized this was the perfect opportunity to boost his bond with Silent Magician. Putting on a show, he gritted his teeth:

"You're wrong! A duelist must trust their monsters, trust their deck!

Every card is a carefully chosen, irreplaceable partner. If you don't understand that, you're not worthy of being called a duelist, no matter how strong you are!"

He remembered countless speeches about bonds and trust from the anime—just improvise!

Sure enough, Silent Magician looked at him with gratitude. If he could see a favorability meter, it would probably read [Favorability +99].

A stronger bond means better draws, right?

Kira was quite satisfied—almost wanted to thank Keith for setting up the moment.

"So annoying," Keith muttered, face darkening. "You're just like those other guys—always going on about duelist pride and trust in cards...

You guys are the worst."

Kira guessed he meant Yugi and Joey.

Keith, after losing to Pegasus, fell into darkness and would do anything to win—including cheating and stealing. He was the classic by-any-means-necessary type.

"Let me bury your naïve ideals—and your so-called partners—for good!" Keith shouted.

"When Mystic Tomato was destroyed, its effect was already activated! When this card is destroyed in battle, I can special summon a DARK monster with 1500 or less ATK from my deck!"

"I special summon 'Snipe Hunter'!"

[Snipe Hunter, ATK 1500]

"I set a card and end my turn."

[Silent Magician, ATK 3000]

"My turn! Draw!"

When Keith drew, he froze for a moment.

A brief silence, and then his face twisted with a grin he couldn't hide.

"Heh... Heh heh heh... Hahahaha—!"

Kira grew wary.

Did he draw something dangerous?

"It's game over, kid!" Keith laughed. "I've drawn the card—the ultimate embodiment of divine power!

Watch as I awaken my inner darkness. My hatred, my fury, the darkness that will consume the world!"

A slot on Keith's duel disk popped open. He raised the card high, a green light bursting from it.

"Field Spell—

—The Seal of Orichalcos!"

Kira: "!?"

He thought he'd misheard.

Wait, what?

Wasn't Orichalcos from the DM anime arc? Wasn't that all ancient history by now?

Didn't Dartz, the villain, die ages ago, and the Orichalcos god was defeated by the Egyptian Gods? How was this card still around?

But when the card was placed, Kira knew he hadn't misheard.

Green lightning crackled from Keith's duel disk, filling him with energy. His clothes whipped in the wind, and he let out a Saiyan-like yell as green flames erupted from his body.

A hexagram symbol formed on his forehead, glowing green.

"Yes—power, I can feel it!"

Keith roared, green light exploding from him. The dueling field was now ringed by a glowing green hexagram, the light shooting skyward to form an unbreakable barrier.

The Seal of Orichalcos—in the anime, once activated, it couldn't be stopped, negated, or removed. The loser's soul would be fed to the Evil God; until someone fell, no one could leave.

Of course, in the anime, it was a "whoever uses it loses" card—even Pharaoh Atem lost to it once.

So the Evil God was the Orichalcos god after all?

"But wasn't your so-called god defeated by the Egyptian Gods?" Kira asked.

"Fool!" Keith snapped. "The Orichalcos god is the darkness in humanity's heart—the dark will of this planet! No matter how many times it's defeated, it will always return!"

Kira recalled that Dartz did say something like that.

"As long as humans and this planet exist, the Orichalcos god will never die."

So the Egyptian Gods only sealed it away. Its ambitions were never gone.

If the Orichalcos god were to look at the world now, it would be delighted.

The Pharaoh was gone, the Egyptian Gods were gone—wasn't this the Orichalcos god's era now?

Kira felt a headache coming on.

This was no trivial matter. Who said the world of the King of Games was safe? He'd barely arrived and was already facing the apocalypse...

But he didn't think the world would end. Even though the next generation's protagonist, Jaden Yuki, hadn't matured yet, Seto Kaiba was still around. Kaiba had been developing his Blue-Eyes for years; he wouldn't lose to an old boss.

And even if Kaiba fell, there was always the ultimate boss—Yugi Moto. Even Pharaoh Atem left the world to him; who knows how strong Yugi had grown in eight years?

And even in the worst-case scenario, if the Orichalcos god somehow beat Yugi too, Pharaoh Atem would surely rise from the afterlife for one last duel...

No way would the apocalypse happen so easily. His priority was to win this duel and stay alive.

Even if, in the anime, whoever used the Seal of Orichalcos lost, the instant this card was played, Kira could feel Keith's aura shift—he seemed to grow taller, his presence more oppressive.

The Seal of Orichalcos had boosted Keith's destiny power as a duelist.

The Seal of Orichalcos in the anime was an overpowered artifact, letting any ordinary person wield the power of a god. Even the Millennium Puzzle couldn't break it.

So, worst case, the Seal of Orichalcos gave its users a tremendous boost in fate.

"Ah—kimochi (feels good), having power is just different!" Keith grinned, eyes glowing green.

"Now—are you ready to die?"