Cards of Remnant

Chapter 8: Fools and Keys - Part 2

"Woah," Ruby gaped in awe, Russel, Sky, and Dove's eyes equally wide beside her. "Since when does Jaune have that?"

Pyrrha wasn't entirely sure 'Jaune' did have it.

The redhead had only followed Jaune, Ruby, and Team CRDL (why was Ruby in the forge?!) to the practice arena because she'd hoped that she'd be able to find a way to help her friends get out of whatever mess they were clearly in. Then, when Jaune had started dueling Cardin, she'd silently cheered her partner on from the shadows of the stands, barely able to contain her glee when she saw him play the same Gogogo Golem he'd used to save them at Initiation. He was dueling like she always knew he could! Confident, strategic, everything she knew he wanted to be!

And then he'd summoned it.

The bright glow of Number 39: Utopia was nearly blinding to Ruby and Team CRDL further down in the stands, but to Pyrrha, it invoked less awe and more disappointment. Not the monster itself, the golden warrior was the epitome of a shining beacon of hope, but what it meant severely reversed what she'd thought the situation to be. Despite her care for her partner, she was well aware that Jaune did not currently possess the skill to bring out an Xyz monster in an aura body. Which meant that he was not the one dueling.

Indeed, under the light of Utopia's glow, the redheaded Obelisk Blue was able to glimpse a ghostly outline flickering over her partner's body. The spirit of his key pendant was possessing him, the ghostly being's azure, ruby-embedded armor flashing over the blond boy's Rainbow Kuriboh onesie. Jaune probably wasn't even awake. It was... disheartening.

Still, to think that one of the two Xyz monsters the spirit had mentioned manifesting with was a Number. At the Invincible Girl's hip, she felt a pulsing heat slowly resonate from her Extra Deck box, Utopia's summoning acting as a challenge to its kin.

Pyrrha had once heard it said that duelists with Numbers were drawn to each other, that those chosen to wield the legendary Xyz monsters were destined to battle until only one of them had proven themselves worthy to wield all one hundred cards. Personally, the Invincible Girl found that rumor ridiculous. For one, she knew there were more than a hundred Numbers. But those cards that she had encountered, her own first among them, felt far too noble to ever desire such wanton bloodsport between their duelists.

And yet, in the presence of Number 39, some of her own felt different. Like they were trying to reach out to her, touch her mind in a way that they never had before... in a way she didn't think she wanted them to. They were strangely aggressive, hungry for battle in a way that Pyrrha would never wish to unleash upon a friend.

Fortunately, as she unclasped her deck box, she found that not all her Numbers were so afflicted. Where most of them glowed white, one of the cards, the first one she'd ever made, shielded her with a mighty crimson shine, ensuring her mind remained her own. Though even it felt different than usual, less stoic and guarded and more... elated. Utopia's presence had brought her first Number joy.

That more than anything drew Pyrrha's eyes back down to the duel. What was so special about Number 39 and the spirit that wielded it? And what place did her partner have in its story?

"I attack Battleguard General with Utopia!"

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"You... you..." Cardin stammered, the bulky boy stumbling back from the resplendent golden warrior now hovering before the scrub he'd so often mocked. "You can't Xyz Summon!"