My Time in Battle City [Tales of Luna, Book 1]

Chapter 1

That was her Seto, direct and to the point. No reason to wish anyone luck, because it's illogical to depend on luck.

And with that, the giant monitor turned off. Suddenly, everyone around her started to move faster, the excitement in the air was practically palpable. She knew what was going on, but didn't know why or how it was happening to her.

She looked at her own hand, not sure of what she had expected to see, but it just looked like her normal hand. But when she looked down at her clothes she realized that aside from her usual black clothes, she had a double strap leather belt on that she didn't recognize. On the side of said belt, she had four deck boxes.

What the-

It felt a little excessive, but she opened the first one. Looking through the cards, she realized that it was her Blue Eyes deck that she used in Duel Links.

This baby got me to King of Games several times.

She opened the second deck box.

Lunalight.

It was one of her favorites as well. This was getting pretty exciting, she opened the third box.

Red Eyes Black Dragon.

This was a deck she had been building just for fun and not one she used often.

That just left one deck box. She opened it and quickly realized that this wasn't a deck at all, but just an assortment of her favorite cards.

At least I have a few options, I guess.

With that thought, she made her way towards where people were lining up. There were too many people there, however, and someone had mentioned that there were several Duel Stations at the KC Tower.

I always wanted to see what Kaiba Corp would look like in real life.

Maybe she could even get a peek at Seto.

But as she walked up towards the Tower, she realized how much bigger it was than she had originally imagined. In fact, it was much bigger than any single structure she had ever seen. It was almost surreal.

Maybe this is a dream after all.

Once she walked in, she imagined this was what the definition of sophistication would be. At the front desk, she was directed towards where all of their Duel Stations were. She didn't know what she had expected to see, but it was just a huge hallway with dozens of rooms.

One of the doors opened and a person came out with a duel disk in hand. Big helmet of a green hair. It was weird seeing all of these charac- well, people that she recognized and knew about since she was a child. And just like that, she had an urge to have some fun.

"Excuse me." She said, feeling awkward about starting an interaction with a random anime character. "I sense that you are a fellow psychic, the cosmos is telling me that it's your lucky day today."

The boy seemed taken aback for a moment before smirking as if seeing through her joke.

"I see that-" she said putting up a hand towards him. "I see that you passed. You will be in the tournament."

"How do you know that?" He asked looking genuinely spooked.

"From the duel disk, of course." She said smiling, making him look down at his duel disk before looking back at her as if he had been slapped.

"Ha-ha." He laughed sarcastically. "Very funny. I don't have time for this."

"Okay." She laughed as he turned to leave. "Well good luck on the tournament, Espa Roba."

He quickly turned back around, but that was her cue so she turned just as quickly to leave.

"Say hi to your four brothers for me." She couldn't see his face, but she almost laughed out loud just thinking about it.

But as she entered the room, it was her turn to be spooked.

"Please close the door." Mokuba Kaiba said without looking up from his tablet.

She closed the door but stood there looking at him. After a moment of silence, Mokuba looked up.

"You can get started." He said, pointing at the big machine against the wall. "Is there a problem?"

"No, no." She said, quickly approaching the machine. "I just didn't expect to see anyone here. I thought the registration was done at the duel stations against AIs, specifically so that there wouldn't need to be so much manpower on hand in this process."

"Well, you are absolutely right." He stated, setting down his tablet on the small table. "The other rooms only have the Duel Stations in them. I'm just making sure everything is going smoothly in the first few hours of registration, and decided I would see with my own eyes what kinds of duelists show up. So, really, it's kind of lucky of you to have come to this room."

So bright at such a young age.

"Right, well, since you are here." She stated with her best smile. "How does this work?"

Mokuba got up from his chair and grabbed the VR Visor from the machine.

"Here, you put your deck into the machine and put this visor on. And it should get started on its own." Mokuba explained kindly.

Luna instinctively put her hand on her Blue Eyes deck box, but realized that Mokuba would be watching. In their world, only four Blue Eyes White Dragon cards existed, and all four of them were already accounted for. Not to mention, her synchro cards could get her in trouble as this was still Battle City.

She could use her Lunalight deck as it focused more on fusion cards, but Lunalights only came out in Arc-V. For all they knew, she could be playing with made up cards.

So, really, she didn't have much of an option at all.

"Is everything okay?" Mokuba's voice brought her mind back to the present.

"Yeah, but uh-" This could be her chance to make an impression on Mokuba, maybe then she could meet Seto. "I was just thinking, would it be possible for you to up the level of the AIs?"

"Up the level?" Mokuba asked, looking genuinely confused. "Why- oh, I see. You think it will be too easy? Why don't we try as is first, huh? Level 40 is no joke, you know?"

It was a pretty big joke if they were anything like level 40 Duel Links AIs. Anyone could beat that and she wasn't going to make an impression by being just anyone. Plus, this was Battle City, were there even any combos back then?

"I'm certain I can take it." She said confidently.

Mokuba seemed to consider this for a second before shaking his head.

"You will get plenty of chances to prove yourself in the tournament." He stated, handing her the visor. "You only get one chance to get in, after all."

"One chance is all I need." She said with a smile, but Mokuba didn't look too sure. "Come on, you would be doing me a favor, just to level 60 then."

"Just to 60? Were you thinking of a higher level before?" Mokuba asked, sounding shocked but seemingly amused.

"I mean, how far do these machines go?" She had to be confident but couldn't exaggerate, otherwise she could come across as delusional.

Mokuba shook his head but didn't seem to be able to contain his smile.

"You know, the only other person to want a higher level AI was Seto." Mokuba stated as he picked up his tablet once again and tapped a few times on it. "But, of course, he is Seto Kaiba. Last chance, are you sure?"

Luna nodded once and couldn't stop the words coming out through her smile.

"It's time to duel!"