The Qliphort menace spreads in Secrets Of Eternity, which launches this Friday! While Qliphort Scout became one of the most feared cards of 2014, anchoring the Qliphort Pendulum Scale at 9 and searching a free card every turn, Qliphort Monolith completes the deadly diptych; a Scale 1 Pendulum Monster that rivals the power of Scout.

The Qliphort strategy’s all about amassing a growing armada in your Extra Deck. Since Pendulum Monsters are sent there when they’d normally go from the field to the Graveyard, each destroyed, Tuned, or Tributed Qliphort just comes back. With Qliphort Scout searching a card every turn, the pressure mounts fast. But Qliphort Monolith takes that strategy to new heights…

Qliphort Monolith bookends your set-up at Pendulum Scale 1, matching Scout at Scale 9. You can search it with lots of cards you already use: namely Summoner’s Art and Saqlifice, plus Scout itself. You can’t search it with Odd-Eyes Pendulum Dragon, but Odd-Eyes has already been phased out of many Qliphort builds.

Like Scout, Qliphort Monolith exists to keep the armada growing. In your End Phase, its Pendulum Effect lets you draw cards equal to the number of “Qli” monsters you Tributed for Tribute Summons that turn.

That means if you Tribute Summon Qliphort Shell with two Tributes to make it a 2800 ATK double-attacker, you draw two cards in the End Phase to balance out your Tribute cost. Better yet, if you Tribute away two monsters for Qliphort Disk and Special Summon two Qliphorts from your Deck, you’ll draw two more cards there, adding four new cards to your arsenal in one swift move. Qliphort Monolith is awesome because it rewards you for making plays you were already going to make. It may remind you of a card you might already be familiar with: the currently Forbidden Super Rejuvenation.

The cool thing is that while Qliphort Scout and Qliphort Monolith both get you a whack-ton of free cards, the specific cards they get you are usually going to be different. Qliphort Scout, Summoner’s Art, and Saqlifice all grab Qliphorts and “Qli” cards. Since you’re thinning those cards from your Deck and removing them from your potential draws, Monolith has a better chance of drawing you into everything else: that means power Spells like Raigeki and Snatch Steal; removal to clear the way for your attacks, like Mystical Space Typhoon and Night Beam; or cards you’ll Side Deck in for Games 2 and 3. The Qliphort theme is made up of pairs of monsters that do similar things in different fashions, kind of like the Brotherhood of the Fire Fist monsters. When you get Scout and Monolith going at the same time they make a dangerous combo.

Since you’re presenting the same kind of threat in two different ways, your opponent has to divide their attention and make some tough decisions. Until recently, the standard routine in the Qliphort match-up was to do anything and everything to destroy Qliphort Scout. If the low end of your opponent’s Pendulum Scale was a Qliphort Carrier or Performapal Trampolynx, there was really no pressure to get those cards off the field; it was the Scout that was searching a free card every turn, driving your opponent to victory.

But when you’re faced with Qliphort Scout and Qliphort Monolith together, what do you destroy first? Scout will keep searching more “Qli” cards, but Monolith can dig through one, two, or three cards per turn, delivering a totally different spread of threats. Suddenly your opponent needs even more Spell and Trap destruction just to keep up. Destroy the wrong card and defeat could easily follow.

There’s more flexibility here than you might expect, too. Qliphort Monolith doesn’t care what you Tribute Summon, so long as you Tribute one or more “Qli” monsters. That means you could Summon something like Vanity’s Fiend, Majesty’s Fiend, or Caius the Shadow Monarch instead. You can even Tribute an opposing “Qli” monster in the mirror match with The Monarchs Stormforth.

Qliphorts have become one of the most successful Decks going, but the truth is that they were only operating at about 50% of capacity for the last two months. Secrets of Eternity finishes the picture, and Qliphort Monolith’s a huge part of it. Get ready, because the evolution of the Qliphort strategy begins on Friday!