He hadn't meant to go so deep into the Millennium Puzzle, really. Yami was in control of the body, wanting to play some Duel Monsters against the computer. Yugi, even though Duel Monsters was his favorite game and he could play for hours, wasn't too interested in the matches he had been taking part in. There was no emotional connection between the game and he wasn't too fond of battling against a machine. Not to sound too cocky or anything, but playing against a computer was just boring. Yami had agreed but continued to play nonetheless because he was already bored so what was the worst that could happen?
Truthfully, all Yugi had wanted to do inside the Millennium Puzzle was find that room with the Egyptian Tablets. It was a very interesting room and he wanted to see what he could find out about Yami that the two hadn't been able to figure out, which was not a lot. Yugi reasoned that the longer he was in that Egyptian room surrounded by Duel Monsters carved on stone tablets then the more likely he would be to discover some sort of fact that would help him help the Pharaoh. Yami was a Pharaoh - that thought in and of itself was terrifying. He didn't fear the Pharaoh but he feared what that meant. Yami was a king from his own time who was stuck thousands of years in the future to save the world. That meant the world was in danger, and that was terrifying. So he was wondering through the Millennium Puzzle, searching for that room because if he could help save the world then he would.
It was impossible for him to tell exactly how he had been wondering the maze that was the Millennium Puzzle, but he knew it was pushing a long time. He had an idea of the way to go from his time traveling it with Shadi, but then one room led to another and he had absolutely no idea where to go. Each room around him was a trap so he had no other option than to go further down the hall, and then there was a dead end with one door leading to another long hallway and he had to take that door, so he was thoroughly lost. He tried not to feel too fearful over being alone in that maze, but it was hard to contain the worry that he might be lost there for the rest of his life.
'Pharaoh?' he called out through their mind link, hoping he could be heard from deep inside the Millennium Puzzle. He waited a moment, hoping to hear the unmistakable voice of his spirit friend coming to his rescue, but he heard nothing. There was only silence and that was even scarier for him. He was not used to being alone in his mind, as strange as that thought was. He wasn't enjoying the emptiness. 'Pharaoh, can you hear me?!' No response. He was on his own.
He knew he could be brave, so he took a deep breath and held his head up high the way he learned from the spirit. He'd put his faith in the heart of the cards, or the heart of the Millennium Puzzle, he supposed. Even though the spirit wasn't there physically, or even mentally, he knew he was still there. That was comfort enough. Yugi closed his eyes and tried to channel anything he could from the spirit or from the Puzzle. Without any logical reason for his chosen path, Yugi stepped through the door on his right and continued on the path that felt right to him.
After going through a few more doors with the confidence he felt from believing in the heart of the cards, so to speak, he came to a different sort of room. It was similar to the one he was in search for, but it wasn't the same one. There were stone tablets of Duel Monsters, but it was a giant room and there was a giant hole in the middle of the floor which made it impossible to reach the tablets. "Oh," Yugi groaned, dejected. He couldn't understand why he felt drawn to that particular room when he couldn't progress in it, but then he remembered that he lived in a world where everything was a game. This room couldn't have been much different.
Normally, he would talk through the problem with the spirit, but he was all alone so he'd talk through it alone. "There are Duel Monsters cards everywhere," he observed, speaking slowly and examining the room with critical eyes. "On one side, there is a Hitotsu-Me Giant. It is directly across from..." he turned to face the other side of the room. "Horn Imp. Neither are very strong monsters."
Games work in steps, so Yugi chose to focus on only the first two monsters. If that room was indeed a game, then he would need to handle those two first. "Horn Imp has higher attack points than the Hitotsu-Me Giant." He squinted his eyes, trying to get a better look. He was missing something. What good was knowing the attack points of the monsters if he had no idea what he was supposed to do with them? That's when he noticed it, the missing piece of the game - the eye from the Millennium Puzzle. The eye was on the upper left corner of the stone with the Horn Imp. "That must be my monster then..."
It became clear to him at that moment what the game was - it was just a simple game of Duel Monsters. "Horn Imp, attack the Hitotsu-Me Giant!" He wasn't surprised when the monsters on the stone tablets came to life, and he didn't flinch when the noise of the monsters fighting shook the room. Once the Hitotsu-Me Giant was destroyed, he looked towards the next monster. "Summoned Skull... There's no way my Horn Imp can destroy that."
Almost as if the monsters could sense his uncertainty, the Horn Imp turned to face him, the Millennium symbol on the tablet no longer there. The Summoned Skull on the tablet also came to life, and they were advancing on him. Seeing no other option, he turned and went to flee from the room, but as he got to the door, it slammed shut and locked. He was trapped. Now he was properly scared.
"Pharaoh!" he shouted, not having enough sense to speak through their mind link because of the panic. Instinctively, Yugi felt for his deck of Duel Monsters because his cards never seemed to fail him, but he couldn't think of anything his deck could do for him right then. He initially didn't think he would have his deck with him because the Pharaoh was using it in the real world, but there must have been some difference between the real, physical world and whatever world he existed in inside his mind. He backed right up to the door, watching in horror as the Summoned Skull and Horn Imp got closer, both looking as if they were gearing up for an attack. In a moment of great desperation, he pulled out his deck and grabbed the card on top, which turned out to be Celtic Guardian.
"Celtic Guardian, help me!" he yelled, holding the card over his head as his final act of self-preservation. There was a bright flash of light coming from his deck, and then...
The Pharaoh was in his fourth duel with the computer. He wished he was able to say he was having an exciting time, but he was no match for the computer and was having no challenge in beating them. He had no gain by playing against the computer, but he continued to play in the hopes that he would eventually get a challenge. While he was playing, he couldn't help the feeling that was creeping on him that something was wrong with Yugi, but he had no rationale for that. He was safe inside his mind. He could sense his spirit so he knew he was still there, and he didn't go searching for his thoughts because Yugi was entitled to his private time. If Yugi wanted his privacy, then privacy he got.
Even though he rationed that Yugi was safe, he couldn't expel the feeling. He tried to call out for Yugi's spirit but got no response. Deciding he couldn't continue to duel the computer with his level of distraction and working, he finished his fourth game and then head back to the game shop to go home. He wasn't going to search his mind when he was out in the open. On his way home, he ran into Bakura. He was still wary of Bakura after their duel they had in the woods, and then he found out that the Millennium Ring came back. When Yugi had informed him of what Shadi said about somebody stealing Pegasus' Millennium Eye, he suspected it was Bakura. He kept these accusations to himself, unsure if he had any real reason to suspect him.
"Yugi, why the rush?" Bakura asked when they almost literally ran into each other. The Pharaoh was half-jogging while Bakura was walking at a more leisurely pace. "I see you put your puzzle together again. That didn't seem to take you that long."
The last time the Pharaoh had saw Bakura was when they were coming home from Duelist Kingdom. Yugi, on the other hand, had saw Bakura when Bandit Keith stole the Millennium Puzzle. Yugi had informed him that Bakura had saved him from Bandit Keith when whoever was controlling him decided to run to him directly instead of dueling him the way they were. "I just need to get home," the Pharaoh answered, not sounding the least bit worried, but he was nervous. He was not used to dealing with people outside of a duel, so he had little idea how to interact properly. He tried to mimic Yugi whenever he was put in a situation where he had to interact, but that didn't do much to calm his nerves or make social situations come natural to him.
"Don't let me stop you, then," Bakura said, giving a small goodbye-wave and watching the Pharaoh hurry on his way.
The Pharaoh felt his anxiety level's increase on his way home. Something felt really off, and Yugi was still not responding to any of his calls. He nodded at Yugi's grandpa as he walked in, making Gramps aware of the fact that he was no longer Yugi, and then went straight to their bedroom. Then he allowed himself to enter their spirit rooms and exit the physical world as much as he could. "Yugi?" he called out, peaking into the room that was Yugi's spirit room. When he didn't see Yugi, his eyes widened and he spun around to face his own room. It made sense - Yugi had to be in the Millennium Puzzle.
He threw open the door to his own spirit room and he could sense Yugi's soul much more strongly and he felt a panic that he never wished to feel coming from his smaller friend. 'Yugi!' he called out, using their mind link to have a higher chance of Yugi hearing him. He was still learning how the Millennium Puzzle's chambers worked so he wasn't sure if Yugi could hear him through their mind link. When he got no response, he was sure that their mind link didn't work inside the chambers or didn't work as well.
Instead of continuing to try and reach Yugi verbally or mentally, the Pharaoh started running through the Puzzle, using his connection with Yugi to lead the way. He jumped over traps that were set out by his own mind and had to avoid rooms because of the sheer danger. As he went deeper and deeper into the Millennium Puzzle, he felt more than he heard Yugi scream. This made him run faster. If anything happened to Yugi inside of their Puzzle, it would be his fault. It was his fault that there were traps completely filling the chambers of the Puzzle, and he hadn't felt Yugi go in there and hadn't been able to stop him. He should have felt Yugi's spirit in need.
The Pharaoh finally reached the room where Yugi was. He pulled on the door and it was locked, but he felt the eye appear on his forehead and the door flew open. Whenever moments like that happened, he couldn't figure out why it was happening or how he did anything he did, but he didn't stop it from happening usually. As the door flew open, he saw Yugi with one arm covering his head and the other holding a card in the air, and directly in front of him was the Dark Magician who was protecting him from a Horn Imp and Hitotsu-Me Giant. With one Dark Magic Attack, the two enemies were destroyed and the Dark Magician was left standing and Yugi had yet to look up.
"Yugi," Yami said, relief flooding his voice as he rushed forward to check him out for injuries. Immediately, Yugi looked up and his face lit up when he saw the Pharaoh there.
"Pharaoh!" he shouted, grinning up at his friend.
"What happened?" Yami questioned. "Why is it you are wondering the chambers of the Millennium Puzzle?"
Yugi's excitement turned to embarrassment and he looked down at the ground. "I wanted to try to figure out more about anything having to do with you," he admitted reluctantly. "We know you were a Pharaoh in Egypt, but we don't know much else...I guess I wanted to see if I could find anything in the Puzzle that could help. I know you've been through this Puzzle a lot, but I was thinking maybe a fresh set of eyes could find something."
Yami was almost touched that Yugi willingly put himself into danger just to help him discover more about himself and his past. "I appreciate your efforts, Yugi," the Pharaoh said, causing Yugi to look up at him, "but wondering the Puzzle is not safe for either of us, especially not you. We will discover what we need to know - together. You do not need to feel as if you should put yourself in such a position ever again. Why were the monsters attacking you?"
When Yugi was done explaining what had happened, Yami couldn't help but feel proud. Yugi had figured out the game and how to win. It was unfair that during that game, even a little bit of hesitation and doubt could get you killed. Yugi wasn't yet a confident duelist, and he hadn't figured out immediately how to progress in the game. Even Yami himself wouldn't have been sure off the bat. He examined the room, trying to figure out what the solution to the initial issue of Horn Imp being weaker than Summoned Skull. Then he realized something very subtle off about their side of the board. "Look there, Yugi," he said, pointing to what he noticed. "There in the back, behind the monster stones. There is one facing the wrong way."
"A face down card," Yugi said, sounding as if he could smack himself for not noticing it. "Must be a trap them."
"What card do you suspect it to be?" Yami asked, trying to get Yugi to use his brain a bit more. If Yugi could realize his ability to think thoroughly, maybe he wouldn't be as hard on himself as he was likely to be.
Yugi again surveyed the situation. There weren't many spell cards that would be able to help him out in that situation, so it had to have been a trap card. "Mirror Force, maybe?" he said hesitantly, afraid to be wrong. "It would make most sense for it to be a trap of that kind. Horn Imp couldn't stand a chance otherwise."
"Reveal face down card," Yami called out, expecting the tablet to spin around. Thankfully, it did, and it did indeed show Mirror Force. "See, Yugi? You were able to figure out the solution to this puzzle you had been faced with. You had a moment where you hadn't been sure, but you were not given the chance to think it through. You have not failed. The rules of this game were against you, making it nearly impossible to win."
"I should have known."
"How is that? You cannot be blamed for not knowing ancient Egyptian tablets would include face down cards," Yami said. "It is not a thought I would have assumed. Perhaps this was just a game of Duel Monsters set up to look like Egypt. It could just be one of the many things the Millennium Puzzle is trying to piece together, mixing the present with the past."
Yugi fell silent and stared up at the Dark Magician who had appeared to save him. "He came out of my card to save me. I drew a card in the hopes that whatever I drew would help. I got the Celtic Guardian, but the Dark Magician came out of my deck instead."
"That is a mystery," Yami said, nodding a bit and staring at the Dark Magician in a silent 'thank you.' "We both saw the stone at the museum. Dark Magician has always been my monster of choice, and it turns out he is also yours. I feel like the Dark Magician protects us somehow. With him in our deck, we will remain unstoppable."
Finally smiling, Yugi looked back up at Yami. "You're right. He'll protect us. He always has."
"Let us find our way out of the chambers of the Millennium Puzzle - together."
And Yugi had to agree because he found out he hated being inside the Puzzle, but he knew Yami and him could figure their way out of the puzzle with the two of them working together. They could do anything when they worked together.