Plot Summary:
The Shadow RPG continues, Akhenaden is successful in placing the missing items onto to the tablet of the millennium items and releases Zorc Necrophades and Zorc himself reveals Akhenaden was the creator of the millennium items and came back to complete the contract in performing the shadow alchemy of the creation of the millennium items, asks if he wishes for the dark powers that Zorc himself is willing to borrow him, Akhenaden admits and accepts the offer, then he becomes the high priest of darkness, there is lots of important discussion between Yami Bakura and Dark Yugi.
The gang while thinking of what to do, they take notice of Bobasa transforming as he reveals when all the millennnium items are placed in the millennium stone slab (let's call it this way to make simpler and shorter), his "other self" takes over and is revealed, the same masked man that helped Dark Yugi and introduces himself to the gang as Hasan...he now can give the clue where the pharaoh's lost name is and leaves to protect the pharaoh, Yugi guessed to be inside Dark Yugi's tomb in the Valley of the Kings and is where they're going and the gang on the way to Dark Yugi's royal tomb, Yugi reveals that they're not only inside the world of memory that became later a game world...
Hasan arrives in time to shield the pharaoh while revealing important intel about the gang and the former king, when the gang arrives at the pharaoh's tomb, when Yugi reaches the end of the moving statues labyrinth he sees a very familiar card that hints someone is awaiting for their arrival, Yami Bakura shadow spy...
Key Points:
You can tell is a recent awareness for Dark Yugi for the world of memory becoming shadow rpg for even forgotten for awhile that time has stopped and Yami Bakura reminds him, there is also some rules for Dark Yugi that I find curious but also makes sense, the "imperial order" and he can use 5 times per game, if we think about how many times he might have used so far since the game started, I would say thrice (his two authorisations in strengthening the guards in the royal tombs for Mahado, the city for priest Seto and lastly choosing the final battle to be in village of Kul Elna), so now he probably would have two chances now to use...
If you wish to continue reading this post, click "read more" below:
If you wish to continue reading this post, click "read more" below:
Here we have the reveal more or less from Zorc that the betrayal came way before this moment of Akhenaden and not just Akhenaden, he refers...
But first starting with this:
"Geh hahahaha priest Akhenaden... I knew you would come here to complete the dark contract with me...because you are the one who created the millennium items..."
Everyone present comes to know Akhenaden started way long ago, at this time must have been the moment he created millennium items or ommited the cost of their creation, for us readers it was probably the moment he completed the translation of the millennium tome and a little prior to this regarding his ambitions and desires to be a pharaoh...
Dark Yugi's reaction to this...
"...! Zorc made Akhenaden create the millennium items in order to release himself from the shadows!"
I think Dark Yugi/pharaoh is being too soft on Akhenaden, he is giving too much credit to his "good deeds" that were mostly based on his guilty conscience, all his actions were from his own volition driven by ambitions, desires and negative emotions hidden deep mixed with the ones shown on the surface (envy for his older brother becoming pharaoh, wanted to be pharaoh and pass down to his son, bitterness in being his older brother's shadow (his left hand) and not being a pharaoh mixed with his loyalty to his country and the throne which as we can see was weak), Akhenaden claims it was all according to Zorc's will as if implying he was controlled or following Zorc's will and Zorc as if he was reading Dark Yugi's mind and not excusing Akhenaden's claim...
"First you gained the power to summon monsters...You trafficked with demons willingly...and with that power in hand, the ambitious ones began to fight among themselves...I knew that one day, one of you would gather the millennium items in one place...and awaken the great darkness..."
What he says here is such interesting information, specially in the first underline, remember when it came the "first generation of priests" I wrote that there might be three of the 6 priests who knew of the cost and participated in the ritual? two of them were the magicians aiding Akhenaden in translating, making the preparations and creating the millennium items that I bet were probably the one with the Rod and the other with the Ring, this might confirm what I have been suspecting, he is referring, I find also amusing how he doesn't excuse one bit their actions, he reveals that they did it by their own volition and he emphasises "the ambitious ones" fight among themselves, the magicians and Akhenaden, one small detail to not forget there was three magicians/scholars aiding Akhenaden and seems only two of them was able to get each one millennium item, so is possible this "fight among themselves" between the ambitions ones, Akhenaden could since he was pharaoh's little brother despite being one of the most ambitious which leaves between the three magicians and one of them died, Zorc is pretty much refferring to the conspirators (Akhenaden and the magicians) in general in the 2nd underline.
I wouldn't say he did control them, he just knows most of human's nature and knows there is many of those who are greedy and ambitious with thirst for power and used to his advantage, all he had to do was wait...besides we don't know where the millennium tome even came from, from it's very advanced print book technology that didn't even existed at the time and Zorc was in the "world beyond", we can assume it doesn't come from the world they live in but from a different one? with the power to summon monsters? it could be from the "spirit world" or somewhere else, it couldn't have appeared randomly on it's own...(I'm building crazy theories already about this *o*)
Another more few details about this shadow RPG is the special ability from Zorc and Dark Akhenaden (since is power given by and of Zorc, even inside Dark Akhenaden, it still makes Zorc's power), the power to control time and he can only use three times per game, we have seen Dark Akhenaden and Zorc using this power to control before with reversing time to prevent a second reunion and get the millennium puzzle and this time stop time which makes having used twice out of three, if look on the panel ensemble on the left, we see three hourglasses, one of them is far away and the other two that are close together, I think the two close together are the number of times he has used this special ability, since he used reversal time and explains the one at the edge looks like hasn't been used and the other close being in horizontal position means the current use being the time being frozen.
This is one of those evidences I mentioned in previous post, Dark Yugi become aware is a shadow game with world of memory merged with an with RPG world being very recent, when time frozen and talk with the shadow spy reveal...for Dark Yugi knowing only now the special ability of Zorc in general and further confirm it...
Yami Bakura reminds Dark Yugi...
"Do you remember when I turned back time to stop you from meeting your friends?"
Dark Yugi understanding when this ability was first used from the moment Yami Bakura mentions it, it makes it more evident that Dark Yugi's awareness of the game world was just now recent and understood the first time this ability was used was when the shadow game truly started and merged with the world of memory...
Lastly the interesting info the readers already suspected...when Yami Bakura says:
"Can you feel it, Yugi? Can you feel the evil aura from this corpse? Akhenaden's mummy is also playing this game! His soul is one with Zorc's!"
Yami Bakura is pretty much hinting that Akhenaden's corpse still holds some of Zorc's power, Zorc himself given Akhenaden some his own power and as he rightly states, Akhenaden is mostly merged with Zorc's powers and is impressive that even in a corpse there is still rests some of Zorc's power, there is some reasons why is the case... but this will be approached in the next volume...
Here we have the mention of NPC (non-playable characters), the first ones he mentions is a curious one is that their purpose is to be purposeless...examplifying being the townpeople and the soldiers not escorting the pharaoh and finally he mentions Dark Yugi's friends, those who move without the player's will, he is right from their perspective they are NPCs acting on their own, what differentiates the gang from the others npcs explained by Yami Bakura:
"They're strange characters who entered the game world without permission...they don't fit the timeline...but oddly enough...they may be the key to victory..."
However I do disagree a little, they might not be playable because they are more players themselves from a different perspective with a different quest, for these reasons they're not playable, they're players more inside the world of memory than the game world and also being souls walking around the game world for that reason they are strange characters who are not playable but are players as well, Dark Yugi and Yami Bakura quest goes around Zorc and Akhenaden, the gang for find the pharaoh's lost name but both interconnected as Yami Bakura implies being they might be Dark Yugi's key to victory.
The moment Yami Bakura hinted that Dark Yugi's friends might be his key to victory, Dark Yugi remembered about when they talked about their purpose in the world of memory being to find his true name, realising and sensing the importance about finding and himself know his name became stronger, he sensed at the beginning when he entered the world memory and his friends having a quest to find his name, as if all coming together...
Yami Bakura thinking it might be too late now that Zorc has been released from the shadows even if they find it, he does feel pretty confident but "probably" means he won't let down his guard yet since the gang can be unpredictable to him.
This is an interesting scene looking back again, specially when we get the reveal who is it behind the mask in volume 6 and introduced himself here as Hasan, the spirit of the stone tablet from where the millennium items were made, one can wonder, how and why that happened, the answer in at the end of this post and beginning of the next :), when we think about it, it does make sense to be Bobasa to transfom into Hasan, Bobasa had the holes in his belly where it would fit the millennium items and Hasan with it's marks, it's a very curious case...another thing, this is the first time Hasan reveals his name as such...being such an mysterious identity...hmmm, also that now he give the clue where the name of the pharaoh is...
I find this scene very cool, specially for Yugi and Anzu, the clue Hasan gives about where the name of the pharaoh:
"The pharaoh's name rests...in the holy place where his soul sleeps!!"
For anyone who knows even bit of Ancient Egypt knows what place he is refferring to, Yugi think it over calmly about the clue and gets to the right answer being the pharaoh's tomb, he was fast reaching the right answer, well, he is a quick thinker and I find amusing that Jounouchi is surprised and confused how come there is Dark Yugi's tomb from the time he is alive and as Anzu informs him...
"In Ancient Egypt, the pharaohs built their tombs while they were still on the throne..."
Even though I had forgotten by this time because I remember to have learnt this at school but when someone mentions, you pretty much goes "oh yeah!" kind of response, Yugi further continues about where is the pharaoh's tomb being in the valley of the kings (he must have remember the conversation between the two men inside the bar about the village of thieves and Pegasus's backstory in how he met Shadi), even though these are info you learn in school, but most of us don't remember what most we learnt in middle school, so I think these two, Yugi and Anzu must have done a little bit of research before going to the museum, to be prepared in case something happens that is necessary history knowledge.
As Yugi urgent them to the Valley of the Kings, Anzu wonders how they gonna do it since the valley of the kings is on the other side of the Nile, Yugi have a theory and almost sure the world of memory became or merged with a game world and to confirm it, here we see above by starting to fly, then on the way he reveals to the gang about the game world, Yugi did learn the rules of this game world so quickly and how their roles play in this game world, not only is he a quick thinker, he is also a fast learner (Dark Yugi is too, but I have been noticing that Yugi is a little faster).
I have to mention the gang reaction with Yugi starting to fly to be very amusing, the gang were shocked but after seeing him flying in front of them to blush, Honda is kinda easy to guess, you know he has certain standards in what he considers embarrassing for a guy, why is the case embarrassing? I think is for him flying and seeing a guy's ass? who knows xD, Jounouchi is still in shock mixed with bit of embarassment, well Anzu, she is impressed for the flying part and other reasons, who knows, 😏.
There is some interesting fact and something we already knew about Dark Yugi about this scene, starting with Yami Bakura declaring he is going to win, now that the pharaoh can't move, but Dark Yugi doesn't give up easily, so he interrupts him determined he will stake everything on this round and Yami Bakura's reaction to his interruption is very amusing too...
"What does he hope to do? It's a mere bluster! He doesn't have any moves left!"
He is well aware of Dark Yugi tendencies to bluff and also his overconfidence but he doesn't know or doesn't remember for now the other skill Dark Yugi has...
What Dark Yugi is planning to do is the following...
"The japanese term for traditional RPGs is «table talk»! In other words...the players can use their words as weapons!"
The tidbit about the japanese term for traditional RPGs being table talk is interesting, I didn't knew about that but how exactly works, I don't know really, as I have said I'm not knowgeable about table RPG, but we know Dark Yugi being able to use words as weapons in a effective way, sometimes is a bluff, he can't do much here but this probably is to buy time and distract Yami Bakura for his friends and a little bluff (Yami Bakura isn't completely wrong...) and attempt something...
Dark Yugi implying to Yami Bakura of thinking in using priest Seto as a shield because of Akhenaden, even Yami Bakura is surprised and impressed somewhat as if thinking "it's not a bad move...", now this small part I know about table RPGs, the playable characters have their backstories and the players can access to that information as Yami Bakura explains it and by exemplifying basing on Dark Yugi's intention about the relationship between priest Seto and Akhenaden, son/previous pupil and father/teacher...
It also shows how dire of a situation that Dark Yugi is in to make such a desperate move that he usually wouldn't do...
Their talk is always amusing but you can see that despite Dark Yugi being more confortable and more at his "home turf" is duelling but for Yami Bakura is table RPG, both are very advanced in both games but of course to most people, each has their first and second place favourites (Dark Yugi is TCG Magic and Wizards and RPG, Yami Bakura is vice-versa, Kaiba is TCG Magic and Wizards and Chess, Ryou is mostly RPG, Yugi, you can tell he doesn't have favourites, he loves games equally).
During this conversation discussing about Akhenaden wouldn't probably attack his son, priest Seto and Yami Bakura suggests if Akhenaden chosen not to attack would Dark Yugi be willing to give priest Seto character card and of course Dark Yugi wisely isn't willing to...
"I don't think so. Seto's part of my team!"
Dark Yugi is making an unusual expression, it's still smug like he usually does but is a little villainous, I don't dislike it, lots of fans have seem to like it because there is fanarts of him based on the expression he makes in the panel.
As for the meaning of his words, by this time Dark Yugi knows about priest Seto doing the Ka-hunt and saving the girl of the white dragon because of the characters backstories and he knows Kaiba well and see lots of resemblance in priest Seto, including his methods, he is very well aware that despite his methods can be a little extreme, priest Seto has unwavering loyalty to the pharaoh, far more than Akhenaden and close to Mahado's level and dedication.
Yami Bakura puts considered thought and starts to chuckle as if he just found amusing his play about Akhenaden and priest Seto...
The way Yami Bakura says:
"You Fool!I'm the one controlling Zorc Necrophades! Me! Bakura!"
He likes "Bakura" name a lot, the readers, Dark Yugi and the gang pretty much knows already he is Zorc and also what he means is that since the hight priest of darkness has Zorc's power, he can control Dark Akhenaden independently of his parental emotions , Dark Yugi expression says he kinda expected as much but he couldn't buy time for much longer...Dark Akhenaden does feel a bit reluctant to attack...
Hasan arrives just in time to protect the pharaoh but is not only to protect, here how he explains he appeared in here to Dark Yugi and to his enemy...
"Zorc and I are two sides of the same coin! The light and darkness of the world beyond! When the evil god...the will of destruction...awakes...then I appear as well! My destiny is to protect the pharaoh!!"
This is interesting information, it would make sense for now, "evil and good" are still one and the same, you can't learn about evil if don't about good and vice-versa, it's what I constantly say that nothing is black and white, in it's true nature of such is actually very cloudy and grey.
Dark Yugi feels there isn't much time and the state of himself and the priests is really terrible and Hasan remembers him that he still has his friends and Dark Yugi keep track of it about their quest being the key to his victory, so Hasan is hinting to buy more time for his friends to complete their quest...
Some details about table RPGs because I'm not knowleageable about table RPGs, "inside information" and "out-of-character information", even though I know what it technically means if you make association with other things, but I can't help but wonder how it works and what happens when is an table RPG, I say this because this case is a little different because is a shadow game, magical means are being used, Yami Bakura shadow spy for example, even though they're seeing the game world from the top, yet they can't see everything what is happening in detail, but gives general idea of how it works...
When Yami Bakura started more to speak to himself, complaining about the appearance of Hasan and his inconvenience, NPC, a strange one like the gang, he didn't knew about and wasn't part of his plan (honestly, does he think everything goes his way when he plans something? naiveness and conceitedness), Dark Yugi hearing all of this and he asks Yami Bakura as he finds strange because...
"Bakura, how do you know what my friends are doing?! Even I didn't know that! That's out-of-character information!"
There is some interesting table RPG terms in here like the "inside information", but we can confirm that in general the players and rules, most of the time the players must know what each player is doing and now Yami Bakura reveals in a convenient time for him as too late for Dark Yugi do something about it...
"I sent a spy...a piece of my soul..."
He is referring to using parasite mind, one of the millennium ring abilities, Yami Bakura shadow spy as we know...Dark Yugi's reaction in the next key point...
Dark Yugi must have a good guess where this piece of Yami Bakura soul was...(inside the puzzle when Yugi and him sensed something bad inside the millennium puzzle, Alcatraz island) and Yami Bakura tells him that his shadow spy went to prepare himself, he is pretty confident but because he is determined and yet he will overlook the other party won't be as determined, just to remember Yami Bakura despite being Zorc, he has a mix of thief Bakura, I wonder how that worked...for now he is worried about the masked man, but he isn't aware yet that he can't destroy him.
It must be nerve-racking for Dark Yugi as shown in the last panel of the panel ensemble on the left because he can't leave where he is to defeat Zorc, if he leaves to go try to help, he would have to abandon the priests, the time frozen, so even if he wanted to move to help them or the priests, he can't, so he is stuck, all he can do is buy time and have faith in his friends in succeeding their quest.
It's nice to have that ruthless determination but also expect just as much determination from the other side, Yami Bakura, that's one of his weaknesses besides how conceited and confident about his ruthlessness will get him to anywhere, even villains can have their own naiveness.
Dark Yugi will be busy in buying them time...also he always focus more on his partner than his friends a little, based on his sense of responsibility to act as spirit guardian and being his host (it was Yugi being his host allowed him to share bonds with his friends, new memories with his partner and friends).
Good intuition on them for noticing that the statues were not scattered around the labyrinth by chance and are stopped like that because of time being frozen, so they take the chance, also another detail about RPG is that in dungeons you can't fly as we have seen when they played against the twins in Duelist Kingdom, it seems to be a general rule in table games, hmmm interesting...
When Yugi is close to finnish the labyrinth (as we see, he was first to finish) he found this familiar card as we see above, the readers know and even Yugi is already guessing who is waiting for them ahead, Yami Bakura shadow spy, but the way Yugi is in his thought "I wonder...!" and the tone, being a Harry Potter nerd myself, I can't resist to mention this part which reminds me of one of the famous scenes in the first movie... , it was with that kind of tone, I just couldn't resist...😆
Hasan explaining why he is protecting the pharaoh is very mysterious...
"I will protect you...till the end...that...is the duty...I took from afterlife...at his will...the will...of your father...the pharaoh Akhenamkhanen..."
It makes a reader wonder who he is exactly and how did he became the spirit of the millennium stone tablet, it's guardian, even after we find who is behind the mask, it's still a wonder which makes me go back to create crazy theories again, he could have been one of the first generation of the priests who were always loyal to him or someone else secretly, because it seems it was something Dark Yugi's father did in secret, specially finding out his brother betrayed him, someone with unwavering loyalty and dedication (probably similar how Mahado for Dark Yugi as this one for the former king).
See Ya Next Post!
No comments:
Post a Comment