As the Swords of Revealing Light disappeared at the end of her turn, Dark Ichigo drew a card and looked over her hand. "I activate Pot of Greed, allowing me to draw two cards!" Once she looked over the two cards she drew, she thought to herself, "I got it! Retasu can come back!" "I activate Monster Reincarnation to bring back Aqua Spirit from the graveyard to my hand by discarding one card! I then remove from play Takriminos from my graveyard to Special Summon Aqua Spirit to the field!"

As Retasu returned, she looked around and breathed a sigh of relief. "Thank God, I'm back!" She turned around and faced Dark Ichigo, telling her, "Thank you, Ichi-!" She stopped herself when she saw that there were two Ichigo's in her sight. "Huh? Two Ichigo's?"

"That's my Partner," Dark Ichigo explained to her. "She's the Ichigo you're all familiar with. Anyway, I then summon Dark Elf, with 2000 attack!" As Dark Elf took to the field, she saw that Purin had surprinsgly taken its form. "That's an odd choice... Well, at least all five of them are out on the field now." "I now pay 1000 of my life points to have Dark self attack Great Angus!"

"Huh? What?!" Purin looked around, looking over and feeling her new outfit and being incredibly confused. "Attack?"

"Yeah," Dark Ichigo explained to her. "Attack Great Angus!"

"Oh, right!" Purin replied with a thumbs-up, summoning her rings. "I got this in the bag!" She then readied herself and spun around, declaring her attack. "Pudding Ring Inferno!" Great Angus was flattened by the attack and destroyed.

DARK RINGO: 1000

DARK ICHIGO: 0900

"Not bad," Dark Ringo remarked. "But this is your end. Minto is your weakest link, as is Zakuro!" She then drew her next card. "I summon Gyakutenno Megami, with 1800 attack!"

As Gyakutenno Megami took to the field, Dark Ichigo looked on, fearing that one of her friends was going to die again. However, to the surprise of everyone, the monster almost immediately collapsed to her knees when she was summoned to the field. "Her monster collapsed," Dark Ichigo thought to herself. "What does that mean?!" As Dark Ringo looked on in disbelief, Gyakutenno Megami rose to her feet again.

However, this time, Ringo had occupied her body. Dark Ringo yelled, "Impossible?! How did my host find a monster to occupy?!"

"Ichigo," Ringo begged of her. "Attack me when it's your turn! I won't obey the other me's orders! I don't care what happens to me as long as all of you are safe!"

"But Ringo," Purin remarked to her, realizing the implications of what attacking her would do. "That's going to... That's going to kill you!" She then ran from her position on the field, trying to reach the other side, but being blocked by an invisible barrier blocking both sides of the field. "Ringo! No!" The young girl was torn apart by the idea of losing her. "I don't want you to die!"

"Enough of this nonsense!" Dark Ringo was angry by now, and tried to select another card from her hand with her right hand. However, as she tried to move it, she found that she could not. "Huh?!" Instead, her hand moved by itself and found a pen and a piece of paper that she and Dark Ichigo had been using to count their life points. With the pen, her right hand wrote a clear message:

I WILL NOT LET YOU HURT THEM ANYMORE

SURRENDER PEACEFULLY OR I AM TAKING YOU WITH ME TO HELL

THIS IS YOUR FINAL WARNING

"Shut the hell up!" Dark Ringo then put her hand of cards down on the table and grabbed a kitchen knife located on it with her left hand. "Maybe this will work!" As Dark Ichigo looked on in horror, Dark Ringo stabbed herself in her right hand with the knife, screaming out in pain as she did. The knife went through and put a hole in the hand, enhancing the pain. As she pulled the knife out of the wound, blood poured from it onto the table and onto her cards. "There... There... Maybe now, you'll shut up, host! Now, attack!"

Ringo yelled at her, "Absolutely not!" Then, she felt a sudden deep pain in her right hand, the injury on her real body now hitting her. "Agh! Help me! Somebody help me!" She fell to her knees in pain, screaming loudly and being driven to the point of tears by the pain.

"That's enough," Dark Ichigo told Dark Ringo as her Mew Mark appeared on her forehead. "I'm putting a stop to this nonsense! Let the light break through this Shadow Game!" As a bright light emanated from her pendant located around her neck, she pointed at Dark Ringo. She looked away as the light encircled her. "Mind Switch!"

When the light cleared, a shocking sight appeared. Ringo had taken over her body once more, and Dark Ringo had taken the form of Gyakutenno Megami. As she looked around, she screamed, "This is outrageous! How did you switch me into this form and put my host back in control of my body?!"

"Not your body," Ringo sternly told her from above. "My body! I end my turn, Ichigo!" She then quickly got up to grab a bandage from the kitchen to deal with the bleeding from Dark Ringo's self-stabbing.

"Right," Dark Ichigo replied as she drew a card. "Looks like I've found the sixth and last Magic Card in this deck, parasite. I activate Gravity Lash and target Gyakutenno Megami, lowering your attack to zero!" She then selected her partner to finish Dark Ringo off. "Hey, Partner, how about you finish her?"

"With pleasure," Ichigo replied. "Hey, other me, can I do that thing you do at the end of duels against bad people?"

"Huh?" Dark Ichigo was initially confused. "What thing?"

"Where you point at them and inflict that penalty game thing?"

"Oh, that," Dark Ichigo replied, now realizing what she meant. "You can try it, but I doubt it's gonna do anything, since you don't possess those powers directly. By the way, Partner, you don't mind that, right?"

"Penalty Games?" Ichigo then paused, thinking to herself. "Now that you mention it, I really don't. You seem to be using them responsibly." She then turned around and readied herself. "Anyway, let's do this!" She stuck her hand out, imitating Dark Ichigo, and declared her attack with a loud yell of, "MIND CRUSH!"

To her and her other self's surprise, it actually worked, and Dark Ringo was actually inflicted with a Mind Crush-like attack that saw her explode into pieces and disintegrate into nothing. "Well then," Dark Ichigo concluded. "I was pleasantly surprised."

DARK RINGO: 0000 (LOSES)

DARK ICHIGO: 0900 (WINS)

As Ringo wrapped her hand up, she said to Dark Ichigo from afar, "We did it! She's gone, Ichigo!"

"Right," she replied, standing up from the table and transforming back into the normal Ichigo just as the other four members of the team woke up on the floor.

"We're awake," Retasu said to herself, brushing herself off as she stood up. "Well, thank God that's over!"

Then, all six of them were interrupted by a voice from the other room over, Ringo's father's bedroom. As they all turned to the doorway to the room, they heard a male voice ask, "Huh? I'm alive? Where am I?"

Ringo immediately teared up, realizing her father was alive, and rushed over to her, not caring that her hand was still badly injured. "Papa! Papa! You're okay!" As she ran into the room, she found her father standing and hugged him, crying into his chest. "I thought I'd never see you again, Papa!"

"Ringo, your hand!" Her father was immediately concerned by the stab wound in her hand. "We need to get to the hospital!"

"I know, I know," Ringo replied as she split. "But... We're alive! We've been saved!"

As her father and her stepped out into the kitchen, Ichigo walked up to him. "Mr. Akai, your daughter was taken over by an evil force that almost killed us, but thanks to your daughter and me, we were able to banish that evil force from her body. She won't be in danger anytime soon."

Her father, confused, asked, "So the stab wound...?"

"That was the parasite that did that," Ichigo explained to her. "When the hospital asks, we'll say it was a kitchen accident."

"Normally I wouldn't believe you," Mr. Akai replied to her, sighing. "But with this Mew Mew stuff, I really don't have a leg to stand on in terms of disbelief. Let's get Ringo to the hospital."

"Right," Ichigo replied before she turned to the rest of the team. "Alright, everyone, now that we got this taken care of, we all need to get ready for the finals of the tournament. They're coming up very soon. We have a tough opponent, but we can take him."

"Correct," Zakuro replied to her. "Ichigo, I'm looking forward to facing you in a duel as a true duelist. I'm also looking forward to us beating Deep Blue a second time."

"We all are," Minto replied with an affirmative nod. "Now, let's get our friend to a hospital and get that hand bandanged up."

"Yeah," Ringo replied, still holding the hand in her other hand. "I think the blood soaked through the bandages I put on already. It's dripping on my shirt now." They all then shared a brief laugh as they got moving out of the apartment, all of them relieved that the nightmare that they had gone through was finally over.

Now, Tokyo Mew Mew would move onto the finals of Battle City 4, the ultimate test of the dueling abilities of Ichigo, Zakuro, Minto, and Hime, as well as their allies. Aside from the obvious threat of Deep Blue, Ichigo also focused on Jurou, her former enemy turned rival, who would also be in the finals. This tournament would decide the rivalry once and for all, and pit two of the arguably strongest Early 2000s Generation duelists in the game at that time against each other. This would be one of the most memorable Duel Monsters tournaments ever held, with a high level of skill and competition among the players, as well as the incredible stakes at play.