The end of the world began 45 years ago in the small island city of Diamond City. The first shadows bubbled up out of the sea like a Lovecraftian nightmare. It consumed homes, plants, people. The hungry darkness seemed voracious and unyielding at first. The first duelist arrived to quell the darkness, wielding a technology the denizens of the island had never seen before. He summoned monsters to fight monsters, and the company he represented set up shop in Diamond city for good.
The arrival of the darkness coincided with the loss of all communications with the outside world. The entire internet crashed that day. People turned to the only source of information they could trust, Numeral 5. N5 brought industry, and a technology that could defend people against the threat. Even with the N5 defense systems, however, the darkness continued to grow steadily. The city was forced to build upward instead of outward - there was nowhere else to go.
Today, Diamond City is a towering megalith of homes, businesses, parks, and arcologies. Despite their struggles, the people survive. The same threat that portends their extinction is the same thing that binds them together. Over time, the fights against the monsters that came from the shadows became something of a spectacle. And in time, it became a game. The N5 used the public's growing worries and fixation on the problem and turned it into a game. Training the next generation not to fear the darkness, but to outwit it. So that the children of the victimized masses could become their champions.
Thus was born Crux, a card game that when played using special wrist-mounted Dueling apparatuses could bring its monsters to life, turning the imagination of the user into a weapon against the monsters below. Now, the Diamond City Duelists, sanctioned by the powerful Numeral 5 and their subsidiaries, embark on missions to venture into areas touched by the darkness. They venture in search of challenges, supplies, and clues to potentially ending this threat once and for all. But mostly, they fight for survival.
Suggested Reading order:
Duelist Life -> Brands -> Characters
