Hey all, DeathbyStorm here. I am back with a new fanfiction. This is an AU fanfiction where Yugi is a regular Egyptologist who gets transported back in time to when Atemu was Pharaoh. He knows nothing of the Millennium Items or shadow magic. I have written this plus the first four chapters and I have decided to start releasing them as I am currently out of school at the moment. If all goes well, this should be about eleven to twelve chapters long with each chapter being about 2500 to 3000 words.

Disclaimer: I am a university student who lives on Kraft Dinner. Enough said.

Tenses

Sands stretched in every direction as far as the eye could see. To the east, the great Nile could be seen near the edge of the horizon, its channel creating a sharp, definitive line between land and sky. Sweat beaded on Yugi's forehead as he searched for any sign of a site yet undiscovered. He had wanted to be an Egyptologist since he was a small child. When his grandfather, a famous Egyptologist and game master, passed away, Yugi's future had been set in stone. Here among the Valley of the Dead was the only place that Yugi could really feel close to him. It was like his soul had come to rest here instead of in the grave back in Japan.

Today was the day. He glanced back at the team digging behind him. They had found a stone tablet in the remnants of a tiny village just outside of the valley and beneath one of the buildings they had discovered the stone tablet. Yugi had taken a look at it just that morning. It was the first time that he had seen anything like it. There were carvings on it, molds really that looked as if they were meant to fit objects. Like any Egyptologist worth his salt, he too had heard of the tale of Pharaoh Atemu and how he had saved the world from a great evil three thousand years ago. In fact, his tomb was the one that Yugi and his expedition had set out to find. So far they hadn't even found an inkling to where he could be buried.

Still, Yugi felt that something big was going to happen this very day. He felt as if his heart was tugging him towards the Valley of the Dead. As the day wore on, the feeling only grew stronger until he finally put the brush that he was using to aid in the removal of sand from the stone tablet. The men around him halted, and looked up at him.

"I'm going for a walk," Yugi said.

The men did not even look up through the hiss of the brushes rasping against ancient sand and stone. He tilted his hat down a little more to help shield his face and set off. The feeling in his chest became stronger as he continued to walk. He continued until he was at the point where the dig had almost completely vanished into the distance.

Yugi glanced down at his feet. There was nothing special about the spot that he knew to be the location of what he sought. It was just a blank patch of sand, like countless others around it. He felt himself fall to his knees and begin to dig with his bare hands. He could feel hot sand burn through his pants and scald his hands. Heedless of this, he continued his frenzied digging. Whatever it was, it was very important. He could feel the siren's song of rightness thrum through his body as he continued to scrape away at the sand.

More than an hour passed, with Yugi struggling to avoid allowing the sand to slide back down into the hole he had made. At last, his fingers scraped against something hard and cool. Quickly, he widened the hole to the best of his ability and ran his fingers around and underneath the edges of the stone tablet. Once he was sure that it would come loose without anymore damage to the tablet than what he had caused to it by unearthing it so carelessly, he gently lifted it up.

His jaw dropped open as the suns rays danced on the face of the tablet. It was covered in Egyptian hieroglyphs, but that was not what caught his attention. What caught his eye was the mixture of hirogana, katakana and kanji written underneath

'Yugi, you may not believe this, but the tomb that you are working to dig up is your own. I cannot tell you anymore than that, for it would ruin everything. - Yugi'

It was his own writing.

With trembling lips, he repeated the statement out loud as if it would prove it to be false and shivered as the air suddenly turned cold. A rumbling, akin to the sound of gigantic rocks ground together began. Yugi was gladdened that he was still on his knees when the ground began to shake. His fingers suddenly closed under empty air as the tablet became sand in his hands. A shadow passed over the sun as the ground underneath him stilled. Yugi glanced behind him and noticed that the hole that he had spent over an hour digging was gone.

"Grandpa was right about one thing. It is really easy to get heatstroke," Yugi muttered. He stood up and licked his cracked lips with a dried tongue. "I wish that I had thought to bring a bottle of water with me when I left the site."

So, with the thought of a fresh drink of water soothing his parched throat, he began the long trek back to the dig. The sun beat down on his shoulders as he glanced around at the strange surroundings. He knew this place better than the back of his hand, yet the other tombs looked newer, and whiter. There were tombs in places where they had never been found before. Yugi's vision swam as sweat began to drip into his eyes. He brushed it away again and wobbled on his feet. It was definitely heatstroke. He didn't know what else it could be. Yugi did know it had taken too long to trek out to where he thought he had been digging.

He only hoped that he was headed in the right direction.

Presently, two figures came into view. Or maybe it was four? Yugi squinted only to have his vision blur even more. Nevertheless, he stumbled towards them. Slowly four became two, and two became a white-haired man standing beside a horse. He gazed towards Yugi with an appraising eye, while running his fingers through the tangled mane of his horse.

Yugi came to a halt in front of him. "Please, you've got to help me. I'm lost."

The man's gaze towards him turned into a glare. "Why should I help you, when you look like so much like Pharaoh Atemu?"

"Pharaoh Atemu?" Yugi mumbled wondering why that was so important. "My team and I... we are looking for his tomb. No one knows what he looks like... I don't feel well..."

Darkness began to eat away at the edges of his vision. He dry heaved as a wave of nausea overcame him.

Distantly he felt a something grip his shoulder.

"What? What about Pharaoh Atemu?"

" ... tomb," Yugi said weakly and collapsed.

Show me some love through a review? Concrit welcomed.