The Boy with White Hair
True to the doctor's word, the eyepatches had come off within a week. Also true to the doctor's word, the area around his eyes still hurt like hell, and he wanted nothing more than some relief for them. "Achhhhh..." Katsuya winced, rubbing his eyes before having his hand smacked by a flyswatter. "Ow! Mokuba, what's yer problem!" They hurt! And... So did that!
The boy frowned, before going back to his breakfast. "The doctor said not to touch your eyes Katsuya-nii! And besides, there was a fly there." A fly! Watching as the blond squirmed and searched his hand for the fly, he laughed. "AHAHA! Anyways... Katsuya-nii, I'm gonna come by the school today, since my class gets let out early today alright?" Oh really? That was cool.
Katsuya blinked, looking at Mokuba a few moments before nodding. "Alrigh', see yah then! Wait..." He frowned. Mokuba was driven to school... Since when... "Yer walkin?"
He shrugged, smiling. "Eh... Thought I'd try something different... Besides," he said as he grinned. "You walk all the time, so it can't be that hard right?" Yes, but that was because he was used to doing things like that. Things like running late for class. And somehow surviving being beaten by yo-yos. (And those bruises still hurt...)
"Er... Alright..." He winced as the boy pulled on his still fairly tender arm, tugging him off the chair. "Ow ow ow! Hey, easy on the arm!"
"Yea yea," the boy said dismissively, letting go. He seemed fairly excited today, for some reason. "Come on, we'll be late for school!" Oh yea, walking took about half an hour huh...
He nodded, waving his hand before grabbing his bag. "Yea yea, I'm goin..." With those words said, they left the house and moved their separate ways. Probably for the best that their schools were essentially angled from the house in a 'triangle' formation, Katsuya thought to himself. He had a lot to think about... And Mokuba was obviously in more of a talking mood than a 'let Katsuya be quiet for a rare moment' mood. As to what he was thinking about...
Mostly, as much as it made him frown, it was about Kaiba. That voice... The woman's voice he heard when he was talking out loud to her. There was no way it could be her, could it? If she'd been speaking, she wouldn't be saying those things... And besides, Seto normally had a sort of 'undertone' to her words, that chillingly cruel and selfish tone that made her voice almost seem permanently hoarse. Not to mention the whole 'vegetative state' deal. The doctor said that in some cases there was a grunt noise. Not a full blown sentence.
And yet... 'How can you hear me?' He'd heard that much before falling asleep that night, but since then, he hadn't heard anything. What he had heard was faint though... Slightly louder than the 'thank you' he thought he heard before. It was just enough to bug him really, without giving him a clue as to what the hell was going on. "Ehhhh," he muttered as he came to the school grounds. "Probably jus' th' pain killers..." That had to be it... Hallucinations explained everything right? Coming into the classroom, he grunted as a familiar, tri-color haired kid tackled him.
"Jonouchi-kun! You're back!" And still injured!
He groaned, holding his stomach. "Yug... 'M still bruised..." As the boy quickly panicked, Katsuya managed a light laugh. "'S fine! Jus' try goin' easy on th' tackles huh?" At this, a stampede of footsteps came their way, the teens moving to the side to avoid being run over by few of the girls from the class. One in particular looked fairly excited, running right to a gathering of most of the others in the room.
As she shouted, the others turned, blinking. "Big news," she was saying, grinning madly. "There's going to be a new guy in our class!" At the mention of a 'new boy', about half the female students in the room jumped up, Katsuya and Yugi barely avoiding the stampede to get to their seats. Really, they were saying, 'what kind of guy', they were asking... Yeesh... This didn't happen when Kaiba enrolled! (Then again, Kaiba probably scared off the welcoming committee, thereby destroying the problem at its roots.)
Katsuya rolled his eyes, before watching as the Japanese teacher came in. "Everyone," he said, leading in a white haired, pale looking teen to the classroom. Ah... So this was him. "Today we have a new student." He turned to the boy, still smiling. "If you could introduce yourself."
The teen nodded, smiling nervously. "My name is Bakura Ryou," he said, bowing. "Pleased to meet you." Bakura huh... He jumped as the teacher told him to take a seat beside him, grinning. Alright! He got to sit by the new guy! (It was like elementary school all over again! ...That wasn't good was it.)
Nonetheless, he continued to grin and wave the teen over "Over here! I'm over here!"
As he shouted, Anzu turned to Bakura with a worried look on her face. "Bakura, you have to be careful, Jonouchi is the worst in class!"
He growled, turning on Anzu instantly. "Nhhh! What'd you say!"
Katsuya's thoughts were cut rather quickly as Bakura sat down, turning to him with a smile. "Nice to meet you, Jonouchi." Oh hey, he was really... Polite.
"Heh," he said with a grin. "Same here! We're gonna get along fine I bet!" He turned to look at the others a moment, before continuing. He had time... Yea, there was time before the bell rang. "Hey Bakura, lemme introduce yah to my buddies," he said, Honda and Yugi both coming over from their desks. "Tha's Honda," he said as he pointed to the teen, "An she's Anzu..."
Yugi smiled as he looked at Bakura, introducing himself. "I'm Yugi!" Well, about time someone beat him to the introductions he supposed.
The albino again bowed his head, smiling. "Pleased to meet all of you," he said, before turning to Yugi with a curious smile. "Yugi... Ah, does your family run a game shop at all?" As Bakura and Yugi started up a conversation, Katsuya leaned back on his chair. Eh, figured that Bakura would catch the word 'game' in Yugi's name. Those two hit it off right off the bat it seemed. He blinked when the name 'Monster World' came up, turning to his friend.
"Monster World... What kinda game is that?" Sounded like some sort of video game... Maybe something Mokuba would play.
Yugi smiled, before explaining. "Monster World is a mix between a board game and an RPG," he began, before going on. "A player goes on the DM, or 'Dark Master's side, and the others create a team of adventurers to explore the playing field. One team goes out with the goal of beating the others," he continued, "But there's more! The interesting thing is that you can add more pieces to the board, like a village or a forest, so the game can be different each round!"
"Hoh..." As Bakura commented on Yugi's knowledge of games, he grinned. "Sound's pretty cool! I bet even Mokuba would like it!" He'd have to ask later after school, see what he thought. Sounded pretty fun to him at least! "Hey Bakura, think we could play Monster World tomorrow after school? If it's alright with you?" Tomorrow was Thursday after all... So they'd have plenty of time, given that Katsuya didn't have work.
Surprisingly, Bakura didn't answer for a moment, instead gaining an oddly nervous look on his face. It didn't help that his voice was so quiet... As he spoke with Yugi about the puzzle, he had to hold back a frown. Bakura didn't look too good now... Hell, if it was possible, he was paler than he had been when he came in. Maybe he was getting a bad case of nerves from all the attention? Heck, he didn't seem like much of a talker...
In the end however, the screeches of... Well... Half the female class distracted him from his thoughts. "Oi! Jonouchi!"
"Heh?"
As he turned, they glared at him before pulling Bakura up. "Give Bakura back to us, BAKA!" W-What? He never took him! As they left, he heard them talk about already starting a fan club and giving him a class tour.
He shook his head, eyes blank. "Sheesh... Bakura's the kind of guy that attracts ladies like flies..." He briefly had the image of Kaiba chasing after the teen, almost laughing at the thought. Kaiba chasing after a guy... That would be the day. It was still an amusing image to play through his head, before he heard Anzu mutter 'unlike a certain someone...'. Niiiice. Just because anyone he asked last year turned him down completely...
"Bakura's a really nice person, huh Jonouchi-kun." He turned to Yugi, nodding in agreement as the topic was turned to more positive things.
"Yea," he said with a nod, before leaning back in his seat. "We can definitely be good friends..." There were no 'bad vibes', no negative rumors... He seemed like a pretty cool guy, Katsuya decided, leaning back in his chair. A little later, just before the bell rang, Bakura returned to the class alone, looking a little nervous but otherwise alright. Making a mental note to ask if he was ok later on, Katsuya turned his attention back to the class itself. Now that school was going on... He sighed mentally as he tried to make sense of the teacher. It was one thing when his dad hadn't given a damn about his grades...
But Mokuba was sending his mom updates... And his mom was sending back comments. Many. Comments. Damn it... "Jonouchi-kun," the teacher called, snapping his thoughts in two. "How about you read from the text book next?"
Gulping, he nodded a little stiffly. S-Shit, he'd gotten lost in thought again... "Er... O-Ok!"
"Katsuya-nii!"
As Mokuba charged into the school grounds, Katsuya found himself scratching his cheek nervously. No one he knew appeared to have really heard that (Though a few girls had giggled at the sight of him being tackled by a small child)... Nonetheless, he didn't really feel like explaining the names and honorifics and such being thrown his way from Kaiba's kid brother at the moment. "Hey..!" He coughed, turning as Bakura and the others came towards him; evidently, this was the direction the albino lived in, and Yugi was trying to keep the conversation alive as they walked. "Nice tah see yah Mokuba! Er.." He looked at Bakura, who had finally stopped at about the third 'Bakura-kun!' that Yugi had shouted. Mokuba as well looked up, blinking at the teen. "Mokuba, this is Bakura..."
Mokuba grinned, waving at the teen. "Hi!"
The other merely smiled nervously, bowing. "Nice to meet you.. Ah..." He turned to Yugi, who had been patiently waiting for the introductions to pass. By this point, Anzu and Honda as well had shown up, the group appearing to almost surround the guy. "You guys..."
Yugi nodded, smiling. "Hey, Bakura... If you're free tomorrow, we'd like to play Monster World..." Straight to the point! Well, made sense that Yugi wanted to play as well of course.. "Though if it's a problem, we could play at my house instead..." As Bakura stared at the boy in silence a moment, Mokuba turned to Katsuya with a raised eyebrow.
"Monster World..? You're going to go play monster world?" As Katsuya shrugged, he continued to stare. Monster World was the sort of game that people played with a group of close friends over a span of days... Normally nerds... He didn't really see Katsuya playing it... Then again, it could just be one of those things he didn't know about. Like sushi- he'd never had some, and when Katsuya had told him it was raw fish... Well, it was an interesting night. Nonetheless, it wasn't as bad as he'd thought, so he supposed he could give this a chance too. "Ummm... Can I come too?"
This seemed to further increase the look of discomfort on Bakura's face, and Katsuya almost frowned before Yugi beat him to the punch. "Er... You don't seem to like the game much..." Not much seemed to be an understatement. Either Bakura was coming down with something real bad, or... Well. Something.
Bakura quickly shook his head, eyes wide. "Oh no... Not at all, that's not it! I really would love to play with all of you, it's just..." He fell silent, the boys sharing nervous glances before listening. "Well... At my old school, I played this game with my friends... But every time I played, everyone else would lose consciousness..." Uh.. What? Katsuya tensed, blinking furiously as Mokuba gulped audibly. Er... That was a little creepy... They weren't in- "They're still in a coma at the hospital," Bakura continued, looking at the ground. "I understand if you don't believe me, but it's the truth... People avoid me because of these stories, so I transferred schools... I've isolated myself from my family to make sure that nothing happened to them either, so I live alone..." The albino gripped his bag, giving the group a sad frown. "I really want to be friends with everyone, and I would love to play with you... But I don't want to lose anyone else," he said, turning away to run off. "So I won't play! Good bye!"
"Ah," Yugi blinked, before calling after the boy. "Bakura!"
The thoughts in pretty much everyone's heads going home could be summed up to one thing; 'it's not possible for people to go into comas by playing a game... Right?' It couldn't be possible to just randomly collapse in the middle of something like that! Yet there was one glaring point that went against those thoughts. After all...
Wasn't that the last thing Kaiba did before ending up comatose?
Thursday, Mokuba's decision to follow Katsuya to Bakura's was quite surprising. Mostly because, out of everyone who had been present the day before, he'd been the most affected by the prospect of comatose game players. It was a little too similar to Seto's condition than comfortable, and personally, Katsuya told himself, if it wasn't for the fact that Bakura hadn't been in school that day, he wouldn't even be there knocking on his apartment door. Either way... After all that the kid had ended up questioning him about the day before, it was a little alarming to have him standing there with him.
Mokuba stood nervously beside the group, occasionally sending a glance to Katsuya as the teen knocked. "Here it is," he said, taking a deep breath. Nothing was wrong, nothing... Was wrong... He swallowed, attempting to calm himself down after thoughts of the day before came to mind. Comas... No way that was actually happening! "Time to prove that those comas were nothing but freak accidents!" Though in the back of his mind, he somehow felt like he wasn't so sure they were... Nonetheless, they all smiled when Bakura answered the door.
"Yugi! Everyone... You guys..." The albino held the door almost shut, peering through with a pale and nervous expression. He certainly looked like he had seen better days...
So... He was probably coming down with a cold or something... Maybe he should just head back, so that he wouldn't get reamed out by a random butler for giving Mokuba anything contagious. Just get them out of there-
The boy beat him too it however, instead looking up with a somewhat nervous grin. A silent note of 'it's fine' was passed along, his face almost forced into a smile. 'I'm fine,' he seemed to silently say, and with that the blond put a smile on his face as well. Nothing to worry about... "Hey!" The smile grew into a grin as he gave a small wave, attempting to bring more positivity into the situation. "We were worried about yah at school, thought maybe we scared yah off 'r somethin'," Or something... "So... We came to play with you Bakura!" A normal game. Would be nice.
"Yea," Yugi added, grinning. "Lets play Monster World!" Someone had his mind on something... Then again, he was looking forward to that as well.
Bakura instantly reeled back, shaking his head. "You can't," he shouted, sounding almost as though simply mentioning the game had doomed them all. "You guy's shouldn't have-" He cut off, expression changing completely as Katsuya narrowed his eyes. Ok... That wasn't normal. That wasn't normal in any way, and he couldn't have been the only one to notice. Bakura's hair almost stood on end with that 'cut', his expression going completely blank for a brief second. "Welcome," he said, eyes seemingly sharper than before as he smiled. "I'm so happy you came, come in!" That smile...
He shook his head, shaking it off. Stop being paranoid, he told himself as the others cheered. This was nothing... Besides, Yugi was the one with weird personality switches. ...Right? "In that case," he said with a wider than normal grin. "We're coming in!" Nothing was wrong! Maybe being on security for Kaiba was screwing with his head... He'd have never had these thoughts before right? The teen walked inside, taking off his shoes before following Bakura further into the home.
The others followed behind, Mokuba looking around the apartment with evident interest. It was small, but for someone like Bakura, who lived alone, it was more than enough space to live in. "Woaaaah... It'd be cool to live here alone..." As Katsuya laughed at that, they followed Bakura to a separate room in the apartment, listening to the albino as he spoke.
"I had a feeling you guys would come," he said with an eerily dark smile. "Because we're friends..." Ok, how did Bakura manage to make that sound so damn scary? "Actually," he added, moving to the side to let the others in, "I already set the game up!" Wait, why did he do that if he was so intent on them NOT PLAYING before? Katsuya quickly smacked his paranoid side back again (Regardless of it normally being right), instead following the others into the room.
Katsuya and the others stared at the enormous board set up, eyes wide. "Woaah! Sweet!" A village, a forest, and was that a castle way at the back? He was beginning to look forward to this, he thought, looking down to see a similar expression on Mokuba's face. And apparently, so was he. Grins spread on both their faces as they moved in to inspect the multicoloured, plastic table, before they turned to look at Bakura.
Bakura moved to the other side of the table, five chairs on their own end. "Come, take a seat!" The teen chuckled lightly, pulling out some materials from the side of the table. "Let's play a game of Monster World," he said with that same eerie smile. Katsuya's grin faded slightly as they were handed character sheets, Yugi shouting another cheer while they took their seats. Even with all the positivity and optimism he had for the game... That smile was way to creepy...
"Hey, Mokuba," he whispered, the boy turning as Bakura grabbed figurines from the shelf. "You're sure you're alrigh' with this... Righ'?"
The boy rolled his eyes, frowning. Clearly years of living with his older sister had rendered him immune to the effects of a 'yangire smile'. Something that Bakura could probably emulate to a 'tee' knowing his luck. Damn it. "Sheesh Katsuya-nii, it sounds more like you're scared..." His voice was kept to a whisper, like Katsuya's had been, and he turned back to the sheet he was looking over.
He raised his hands in 'defeat', shrugging. "Jus' askin..." It just... Set him off really. That smile was giving him the creeps... It wasn't a 'Bakura' smile at all, and every time he saw it he got a feeling eerily similar to directly before 'Death-T'... But at the same time, now that Mokuba was so set on this, he couldn't just 'leave'... Not without likely doing something that would prove just what that smile meant at least.
"Well," Bakura said, handing the five pencils. "Are you ready to start playing?"
A loud chorus of 'YEA!' sounded through the room, Katsuya nodding with a somewhat nervous grin. Mind as well try getting back into the mood he decided, grabbing his pencil. Alright! "Let's go!" As his grin faltered yet again, he found himself watching Bakura with narrowed eyes. For a brief moment, he thought the teen was staring at Yugi's puzzle...
The moment was lost however, as Bakura moved back to the other side of the room, leaning back in his chair before opening a laptop up. "Let me explain the rules," he began, still smiling. "The players are split into two groups; the DM, Dark Master, controls the monsters and evil creatures that lurk throughout the Monster World. As the DM, who I will of course be playing," a mental 'of course' being repeated by the paranoid half of Katsuya's brain, "My goal will be to stop the adventurers with the best of my ability. You five, the adventurers," Bakura continued, gesturing to the five, "Work as a team. Each of you will pick your character's race, class, and ability scores to defeat the DM! If all of you are defeated, I win... However, if you five manage to defeat the 'Boss Monster', YOU win." Why was it that no matter what, outside of his own interests in the game, he really... Really... Didn't want Bakura to win.
From the back, Honda muttered something about getting to kill things before Anzu elbowed him. Yugi laughed at the scene, nodding before turning to the others and explain the game further. "Monster World combines a board game with an RPG; him being the 'Dark Master' is like the 'Game Master' from older RPGs..." Dark Master, Game Master... Huh.
Anzu blinked, turning to the boy as Mokuba fussed over his character sheet. "Role Playing Game... You mean like the ones online," she asked with a blank look.
"I guess... I mean, video games are more common now, " Yugi began, propping his head on his hands. "But the original ones were played around a table."
From the other side, Bakura nodded. "That's right! And do you know the meaning of Role Play," the teen asked, looking towards the five with a dark grin. Katsuya had to narrow his eyes at the question; of course they did, they weren't idiots... Hell, if anything, just knowing Kaiba increased the meaning of the word ten-fold. But that look he was getting... Hihhhh... "Playing a role," Bakura continued. "You have to become the character! By getting inside the mind of the character and acting our your part, the players can enter an imaginary world! It's the original virtual reality," he said with a smile, not helping Katsuya's suspicions in anyway. "That, is the true beauty of this game!"
Mokuba turned to Katsuya, frowning. "Neh, Katsuya-nii, does Bakura seem different to you," he asked, keeping his voice down lest the others hear the 'nii' part.
He frowned slightly. "I've been trying tah say that for a while now..." And different was putting it very, very lightly in his opinion.
They were interupted by Bakura again, who was now typing in the laptop. "Before we can play, you need to create your characters; I'll input the data into this laptop when you're done." He tossed down a list of races and classes, the five looking over them.
"See," Yugi was saying, showing Katsuya and the others the lists. "We each choose a race from the list, determining our abilities!" Alright, that sounded easy enough...
As Mokuba looked at the list and began working on his character sheet again, Katsuya smirked. "Ooooh Honda! You should be a fairy," he said with a grin, not noticing the jump that Mokuba gave from behind the two.
Honda scowled, snatching the pencil that Katsuya had almost used to write 'fairy' on his sheet with back. "You're the fairy you moron," he shouted back, while Yugi was looking at the chart muttering to himself. ('Maybe I'll be a half elf', he was saying as he tugged his ears)
He laughed, shaking his head. "No way man, that race is made for you! It's girly, with tutus an' everything!" As he did this, he frowned, Honda having grown extremely pale as he looked behind the blond. "Oi... Honda?" Now what was with that face-
"KATSUYA-NII!" There was a loud smack noise, and the blond rubbed his head as Mokuba slammed a pile of books on it.
"OW!"
"Did he just say.." As the others turned amongst themselves to discuss the use of 'nii' in Katsuya's name (Not to mention the use of the first name in general), the teen turned to glare at Mokuba.
Said boy was working on his character sheet furiously, apparently doing all he could to ignore him. It was about that moment that Katsuya realized Mokuba had picked 'fairy' for a race, and just about slammed his face into the table for being a moron. Screw the pain, at least he knew why the brat did it... "M-Mokuba, I didn' mean.."
"Shut up, Katsuya-nii!" Idly, the blond heard the others mutter something about 'again,' 'why is he calling him big brother...' 'weeeeeeird...' Yea yea, get over it...
Bakura merely watched them with a smirk, cutting the conversations short. "Once you've decided on your race," he said as he typed at the laptop, "You need to choose your class."
While Mokuba marked off 'rogue' for his, Katsuya grinned. "Definitely pickin' warrior for this!" Sword and shield, all the way!
Beside him, Honda nodded. "A magic gunman doesn't sound too bad either!"
He looked down the list of weapons, still grinning. "I'm gonna use this one, and this one..." That sword... That dagger looked pretty powerful too...
"Katsuya-nii, you don't have enough money to start with that!" Nhhhh whatever.
While Bakura gave them an odd smile, recording the data as they rolled character scores, Anzu turned to Mokuba with an odd look. "Mokuba-kun.. I've been wondering..."
She was interrupted by Honda, who leaned in as well. "Since when did you call Jonouchi by his first name?"
Anzu rolled her eyes. "Actually, I was more wondering why you said Katsuya-nii." From the side, Katsuya blinked. What was he going to tell them about...
The boy frowned, turning away. "Like I want to tell any of you..." That was Mokuba for yah.
As the woman huffed, Katsuya merely rubbed his head. "Errr... Right... Hey Bakura! We're done here!" The albino took the sheets, looking them over as he typed the rest of the information into the computer.
"Very good... You rolled fairly decent ability scores as well..." He looked up, Katsuya holding back a shudder as that odd smile came back. "Okay then," he said, grabbing the five figurines he'd set to the side. "Let me put the final touches on your miniatures!"
He waved them over to look at the screen, taking a snap-shot of each of them to go with the small character profiles. Katsuya watched as they appeared on the screen, the others staring for a moment while Bakura worked on the miniatures.
Yugi's came first; he had indeed chosen a half-elf Katsuya noted, and had stuck with his real name before taking the 'Beast Tamer Class' and playing with no weapons as a result.
His own character was second- "'Joey'," Mokuba said with a raised eyebrow. "You named your character 'Joey'?" He merely shrugged (He liked the name at least.), as the human and decently armed warrior came on screen a moment before switching over to Anzu.
Anzu as well opted to go with her own name, though she'd picked elf for a race. The character was armed with a staff, a magician, and notably had the lowest hitpoint count of all the characters there. To contrast that however, she had the highest 'magic point' count... Which made sense he supposed.
Fourth was Honda's; he'd named his 'Hiroto', his given name. Like Katsuya's character, it was human, and the teen had apparently picked 'Magic Gunman' after all... Wielding, of course, a 'magic gun'. Which just sounded silly right now, but then again so did 'Magic Gunman'.
Lastly, appearing on the screen just as Bakura came back with the miniatures, was Mokuba's fairy rogue. By far the quickest of the groups, it was also, as they realized when they were handed the palm-sized figurines, the shortest. "WOW," Katsuya said as he looked his own warrior figure over. "You made these look just like us!" Like... Exactly like them. Wow.
He quickly regretted saying this as Bakura gave them that 'smile' again, the blond tuning out the shouts of agreement from the others. "Yes," Bakura said, Katsuya resisting the urge to shudder, grab Mokuba, and get the fuck out of there now. "I pride myself on my attention to detail in games... Now then," he said as the others returned to their seats, placing the figures at the 'start' positon. "Now that all of the data is in, these numbers will make all the difference in a life or death fight. As the DM, I make the critical rolls after all..." He continued smiling, Katsuya wondering if he was seriously the only one freaking out about that look. He... He couldn't be right? He was the guy who didn't catch these sorts of things wasn't he? "Alright... It's all ready! Let the adventure begin! GAME START!"
Katsuya looked over the board as they placed their pieces, frowning. "Heyyyy wait a minute... Where are th' other pieces," he said with a scowl. "There's not a single enemy monster in sight!"
Beside him, Mokuba shook his head and sighed. "Katsuya-nii," he explained as he leaned over the table, "The monsters appear depending on what you're doing; we haven't done anything yet!"
"Come to think of it," Honda said as he crossed his arms and leaned back, "We don't know much about this 'world' at all..."
Katsuya nodded in agreement, frowning. "Yea, like who's th' enemy or what's th' point of th' game!" Come to think, he probably should have figured that part out first. Whoops.
Across from the boys, Anzu snapped her fingers. "The town," she shouted, before pointing at it. "You go to a town to get information in an RPG don't you?"
Beside the woman, Yugi nodded. "Anzu's right! Let's go to the town first!"
"Good idea," Mokuba said, turning as Bakura nodded.
The teen typed something into the computer, motioning for Mokuba to remove the 'top' of the village to the side. "Very good," he said as he regained the eerie smile from before. "You take five turns to enter the village..."
The group moved their pieces forwards, the village being 'removed' to reveal a bar and inn of sorts. "WOW," Yugi shouted, leaning in with wide eyes. "You take off the village model and there are people inside!"
Mokuba and Katsuya also leaned in, staring with equally shocked expressions. "Look at the detail," the boy said, shaking his head slightly. "How much time did these take to build..."
"Ok," Katsuya shouted as he moved his piece forwards. "Lets pull up to the bar and get some news!" As he moved it over to an old man, the others brought their pieces close as well. "Hey, you! Old man," he shouted, the bar figuring turning as soon as he said this. Ok... That was weird. Mentally shaking it off, he continued. "As you can see, we're HIGHLY SKILLED ADVENTURERS! Any way for us to make some dough?"
As Mokuba shook his head in his hands, Honda looked at Katsuya with a deadpan expression. "You start with money... We know nothing and you start with MONEY!" Hey, money did lots of things! Like... Buy better weapons. And stuff.
Ignoring the group, Bakura resumed his role as the DM. "At those words," he began, turning his attention to the village figurines, "The villager sends a glance your way, and sighs as he speaks." Katsuya almost jumped as the old man seemed to actually do that, before settling back into character at his words.
"If money could solve our problems," the figure said rather morosely, "I'd give you all I've got... But before you could claim your reward you'd be dead!"
The voice switched back over to Bakura, and Katsuya mentally shook himself over as the albino continued. "With that, the old man moves away from the bar..." Wait wait wait, that didn't tell him anything! And he wanted to figure out of he was hearing things or not!
"Hey hold on there old timer," Katsuya shouted, moving his piece towards the old man with a clack-clack-clack. "Sounds like you got a story! We're all ears!"
Mokuba looked up at his friend with a nervous stare. "Katsuya-nii, you're really into it..." As Honda nodded, Katsuya froze yet again; shortly after Bakura spoke, the figurine moved again. Come to think, it looked like it was moving on its own the entire time. Yikes... Maybe it wasn't something he ate...
It turned to face Katsuya's figurine, the blond in question staring at it oddly. "Until a few years ago," the 'old man' began, "This village was peaceful... But then the Dark Lord Zorc assassinated the king, and changed the castle into a den of evil!" Katsuya almost jerked back as the figurine's expression even seemed to change, before quietly telling himself it was a trick of the light. "After that, monsters began appearing in our peaceful valley... And many of my fellow villagers have fallen prey to them." TERRIBLE. Er... For figurine-land he supposed.
"WHAT?" Mokuba jumped as Katsuya leaned in, shouting. "They can't get away with that! ALRIGHT! We'll take care of Zorc! So..." He continued leaning in, lowering his voice. "Let's see some gold pieces! Cough 'em up!"
Mokuba shook his head, groaning and face-palming again as Anzu balked. "How mean!" It wasn't mean! It was payment! Payment!
Honda as well shook his head, frowning. "Sheesh Jonouchi, this game really brings out your bad side..." No it didn't!
As he turned to answer to that with a frown, he tensed, listening as Anzu voiced his earlier suspicions. "Hey, Yugi," she asked, pointing to the village. "Is there a speaker in there? It sounds like the old man's really talking..." Anzu, it both looked and sounded like a lot more than a speaker.
Yugi merely shrugged, having apparently not noticed that himself. "In a tabletop RPG, characters other than the adventurers are acted out by the Game Master," he explained, looking back at the board. "They're called NPCs..."
She nodded, while Katsuya turned to look at Bakura with an odd expression. "Then Bakura must be throwing his voice," she said, looking back at the board.
"I guess," Mokuba said as he followed their gaze with a shrug. Yea... That was it... Because that creepy ass grin was telling him otherwise! (Not to mention the 'old man's expression right now.) He turned as the old man continued, finding it a little more difficult to really get into the game now.
"Hear me adventurers," the figure cried from behind the miniature bar table. "Before you start on your journey, you should speak with the man in the corner... He can tell you of the safest route to Zorc's mansion!"
The group looked at the figure in question, moving the pieces over to 'talk' to him. "Hey," Katsuya said as he moved it over, watching as the figure appeared to turn to face him with a questioning look. Hey, that looked like... Like... "AHAHAA!" He laughed, Honda following his gaze before joining in.
As Mokuba looked at the two confused, Honda wiped a few tears from his eyes. "Oh god... Oh god the figure looks exactly like Karita..." The gym teacher... It looked exactly like-
The figurines words were probably what told him just what kind of mess they were in, particularly as he recalled Anzu's words earlier. 'Did you hear,' she'd said, voice filled with worry.
'Karita-sensei is in a coma'. "It's you," the figurine shouted, Katsuya finding himself frozen in shock. "Jonouchi! Honda!" Oh dear god...
"Hey, Katsuya-nii," Mokuba said with a frown. "Did someone just call you?" Great... So that wasn't him then? Just... Great...
The others as well began looking down at the figurine, confused. "Save me you guys," 'Karita' was calling. "He turned me into a figurine!"
As the others continued muttering, Katsuya stared in silent shock as Bakura seemed to give a deathly cold glare to the figurine in question. 'Karita' turned briefly, shaking considerably for a moment as he continued to mutter 'help, please' before finally caving. The figurine turned back to face the corner, seemingly in fear as he spoke again. "Z-Zorc castle," he muttered, Katsuya gulping as he connected the dots in his mind, "Is to the north outside the village... Stay out of the forest," he added, the figurine Karita shaking with fear, "It's full of monsters..."
"Got it," Katsuya said, voice fairly stiff compared to before. This was not good... Not good. If... Bakura was going to seal everyone in figurines... "Okay," he continued with a fairly nervous tone that had Mokuba looking at him with worried eyes. "Let's skip town and start hackin'! Lets... Lets head for Zorc Castle!" It was really hard to keep excited about this game now... Really hard actually. Sure he hated Karita but... Fact was, for all the guy's harshness, he was actually really fair about that class. Which meant he did alright in it, since Gym wasn't something he really had to pay much attention in. This was not good...
Not good at all, he thought as the group moved forwards, thoughts rendering him uncharacteristically silent. But if he said anything now, he could almost be certain that Bakura would just do whatever it was he'd planned to do anyways... Damn it... Damn it... "Alright," Bakura said as they entered the 'field'. "You've just entered an area where there's a danger of random monster encounter... From now on," he continued, grabbing something from beside the laptop, "There's a judgment roll every turn, to determine if monsters will appear. We will use these, 10-sided dice!"
Mokuba blinked, looking at the dice from his seat. "Ten sided dice huh..."
Beside him, Honda raised an eyebrow. "Never seen dice like that before..." He had though; when Mokuba was showing him a crap load of dice games a few days before. (The kid had magic dice hands, really. Magic.)
The group turned as Bakura continued, eerie smile back on his face once more. "The area you're in right now has a monster encounter of 30%," he stated, before gesturing to the die. "The roll will be made with those two dice. The white die represents the single digit. The red die, however, represents the 'tens' digit... Giving you a number between 00 and 99. If," he continued, "The outcome is between 31 and 99, you will have avoided running into any monsters." He rattled the dice in his hands. "As the DM, I make the roll." The dice clattered to the ground, and Bakura continued. "The judgment roll is 21... A monster appears; level 3 goblin!"
Mokuba grinned as a figure appeared seemingly out of no where on the board. "Ah! A monster appeared!" The dice were handed to him, and he grinned; being the fastest character, he was the first to move.
"I was getting bored," Honda said with a grin. "Now the game really starts! Dog pile!"
As Bakura explained the rules of attack, Mokuba shook the dice and dropped them. "The rogue rolls," he shouted, before looking at the dice. "13!"
Bakura nodded, typing a few things into the laptop. "Based on the speed and strength of the rogue, taking into account flight, a roll of 40 or less kills the goblin..." He typed a few more things in as Mokuba grinned, his piece seemingly rushing through the board to take out the goblin. Even Honda seemed to be fairly excited about it, regardless of the fact that he didn't get to make an attack. "Alright! The goblin is defeated!" He looked at the others as they cheered, Katsuya attempting to lighten up even with the prospect of loosing their souls/bodies/whatever it was Bakura would take on the line. "The closer the roll to double zero," he began, "The more damage you do to an enemy. If you roll a 99 however," Bakura said darkly, "You have to take a penalty..."
A penalty..? Katsuya gulped, and the group of figurines continued forwards. Why did he have a feeling he knew what that penalty was... A really bad feeling..."Suddenly, you stop," Bakura stated with his DM voice, motioning to a figurine lying in the center of the field. "As up ahead, you see someone lying across your path." So they did. A cloaked, heavily robed figure just lying there in rags.
Mokuba leaned forwards, blinking. "Ah... He's passed out..." He turned as Bakura continued, listening.
"Without coming closer, you can't tell much about the prostrate figure lying before you. Is he alive? Is he dead? You can find out... Or you can move on without helping him. What do you do?"
Anzu frowned. "I feel sorry for him... Let's help!" She pointedly ignored Mokuba's statement of 'you can't help if he's dead...', turning to the others.
Beside her, Yugi frowned. "It's kind of weird... It could be a trap.."
Scratching his head, Katsuya sighed. Trap or no trap. Well, only one way to find out really... "Right! Leave this to me then," he said, mentally gulping. If he allowed himself to be scared, then what would happen when they really did lose their lives? Besides... If Bakura saw that he was afraid, it could make things worse. "First," he said as he moved the figure close, "I'll poke him with my sword!" Maybe if it was an enemy in disguise he'd blind him or something. Hopefully. Eh, who knew.
"The warrior prods the strange person with his sword," Bakura said calmly, the figure moving to do as he said. "Oh," he continued, a feigned tone of surprise in his voice. "He moves slightly. It appears to be a young man... He looks at you, and seems very afraid." Ok, not enemy then.
Katsuya frowned, looking down at the figurine. Probably another actual person... Damn it, how was this even possible? And what kind of sick game was this anyways? "Hey you," he shouted down at it. "We're not y'r enemy! Nothin' t' be scared of!" Message with double meaning; he would get these guys out of there. ...Somehow.
The figurine looked down for a moment, before turning to the 'group'. "Please help me," he cried, before continuing as per the script. "A monster attacked me in the forest and stole my treasure!"
Honda smirked as the 'stranger' said this, looking over at Katsuya. "Treasure huh? Well, that should make you happy..." Ignoring the fact that Katsuya wasn't responding to that, he turned as the figurine spoke again.
"I was on my way to give it to the hero of the village," he said with wide worried eyes. "I had a treasure, a holy sword, the only thing that can truly defeat Zorc!"
That statement got a few people's attention, and Mokuba leaned over the table with wide eyes. "A sword that can beat Zorc?"
"Please," the figurine continued. "I beg you! Get back the treasure!" The others turned to Bakura, waiting for him to continue. "Do you respond to the young man's request," he asked, not taking his eyes off the figurines.
Anzu frowned, looking over at the others. "I don't know... That villager told us to stay away from the forest..." Oh.. Yea, that was right... At the same time though... Aaaaaah damn it, he wasn't good at this kind of crap!
The youngest of the group nodded, while Honda raised an eyebrow. "Yea, but we're talking the 'only thing' that can beat Zorc here!"
Yugi frowned, looking to the others nervously. "I don't know... Can it really be that easy to find a key weapon to defeat Zorc..?" Pausing for a moment, he looked at the others before turning back to Bakura. "Alright," he said. "Take us to the forest!" Wait, he didn't even say anything- ...Oh well, too late now. Hadn't it been three against two though? Or was it a tie? He should probably be paying more attention to the 'game' than to Bakura now that he thought about it.
The figurine nodded. "Thank you very much! I'll come with you," he said, Bakura continuing from there as the pieces were moved towards a shadowed forest area. "Okay... You heed the young man's plea and head for the forest!" As the board flipped to reveal an even darker form of the woods in the place of a flurry of trees, he continued. "The shadowy green leaves rise around you, blocking the sun. This area has a monster encounter rate of 80%!" The albino ignored Yugi's incredulous shout of '80%?', rolling the dice. "Judgment roll! 5!" He turned to the others, shaking his head in false worry. "Not a good roll for you! The closer to 0, the stronger the monsters that appear! Five monsters emerge from the trees," he cried, the figurines appearing from the board with a snarl. "The players attack first!" Well at least something went right.
"Let's get them," Mokuba cried, shaking the dice as they were handed to him. He quickly frowned however, wincing. "Ack... 74..."
Bakura logged the numbers in, before speaking. "The rogue flies behind the first monster, only to be caught and forced to flee! Next!" The dice were handed to Katsuya, and the blond shook them.
Come on come on... Low numbers... "Alright... Second swing! I throw the 10-sided dice... GO!" They clattered the ground, and he groaned as well. Why was his luck so crappy! "82!"
In front of them, Bakura seemed to show no other reaction than his usual stare. "Bad luck," he shouted. "'Joey' needed a roll of 30 or less to hit Beega! Not only does he miss," he stated, Katsuya scowling as his figurine charged the beetle-like-monster, "He trips and falls, rendering him unable to fight next turn!" Stupid stupid... What kind of a name was 'BEEGA', honestly...
"Ooooh," Honda said as Yugi and Mokuba looked up at the teen. "That sucks... Right," he continued as he took the dice. "Let me handle this one!" The dice clattered to the ground, and he watched the figurines expectantly.
To the group's slight surprise, Honda's figure blasted right through one of the monsters; "21," Bakura said as the struck monster vanished completely. "Very good, one monster is down!" Well hey! That wasn't too bad at all! Ignoring the fact that these figurines were clearly moving on their own now...
Yugi grinned, watching as the figure of 'Hiroto' holstered his gun with a smirk. "You did it!" He grabbed the dice, nodding partially to himself as he rolled. "My turn now!"
The dice clattered to the ground, and Bakura inputted the numbers once more. "25! The beast tamer can touch one monster with spell hands," he began, a pair of hands appearing on the board as he spoke, "And make him into an ally... The hand power has a success rate of 50%," he continued, inputting another number before continuing. "You succeed!"
He grinned, pointing at a round, sheep like monster on the board. "Okay! I choose you!" The other monsters reeled back as the 'hands' wrapped around their ally, before they cleared to reveal a much cheerier looking creature.
"The evil has disappeared from Poki," Bakura stated as the monster moved to stand by the Beast Tamer's side. "He is now your ally!" For a brief moment, Katsuya had to raise an eyebrow as the monster let out a small 'Poki!' Ok... He wasn't going to even think about how the monsters had 'souls' too... And what was this thing a pokemon?
The others looked at the field, Mokuba frowning slightly. "There's still three monsters left though..."
Anzu nodded, grabbing the dice. "I'll take it from here!" As Yugi shouted a 'go for it!', she dropped the die only for Bakura to stare in surprise. Hell everyone was staring he figured.
"00," he shouted, before inputting the data. "Amazing! A super critical hit! This means that Anzu is able to use a top level spell regardless of apprentice status!"
As he said this, Anzu's figurine raised its arms in the air, a large explosion appearing on the board as the remaining monsters vanished. That was astonishingly realistic. The reaction could only be summed up with one thing really- "Wowww," Yugi cried. "You blew away three monsters! You did it Anzu!"
Mokuba as well stared, Honda and Katsuya merely blinking. "Hehhh... So that's what a super critical hit can do... Well," he said as he leaned over the board. "Let's keep going..!" He frowned however, as the 'stranger' began to laugh. What... As Mokuba cut himself off, Katsuya had to frown slightly. Alright... Why was their party member suddenly cackling villainously...
The group reeled back as the figurine began to physically shift, laughing. "So you are the five heroes who would defy me," he said, Katsuya growing pale as Bakura's expression grew dark and smug. "You fell for my trap and entered the forest of death," the figurine continued with a cackle. "This will be your grave!" As the others stared, Bakura continued, the frightening smirk never leaving his face. "What's this," he said, the five figurines watching in apparent horror. Bakura's voice held a false image of shock, along with an almost mocking tone. "The young man's form changes and grows before your very eyes... For he is none other than..." Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck, Katsuya thought. Don't finish that- "The Dark Master Zorc!" AUUUUGHH.
Damn it! "Zorc!" Mokuba and Yugi's jaws dropped, as did the others. They ran into the boss already! The characters were level one, how were they supposed to beat that! Katsuya watched in horror as the Zorc figurine, a good five times larger than their own, continued to laugh madly.
"Before you die," he cackled, grotesque face shifting into an unreadable expression. "There's one thing you should know! There is no sword in the world that can defeat ME!" Well wasn't that just wonderful. As Zorc continued laughing, Bakura looked at the others with narrowed eyes, before he grabbed the dice. "The players," he began, smirking, "Completely decieved by his lies, are caught with their defenses down! Therefore, Zorc takes the first attack... And his success is determined by this roll!" The dice fell. The feeling from before came back all to violently, and briefly he wondered if he was going to be sick. Something was going to go wrong... Right now, something was...
As the dice clattered to the ground, spinning, Katsuya felt that cold feeling in his stomach increase to just about every part of his body. "Mokuba," he whispered, the boy looking up at him with a frown. "We need to leave..." Screw their chances; those chances had just jumped out of the window like Gozaburo on a bad day. "...Now."
The boy's frown deepened, and he looked back at the table a moment. "Now," he asked, still frowning as the dice continued to spin, "What... What do you mean, Katsuya-n-" He turned as the dice finished rolling, the rest of the group staring in shock. Shit... No... Shit not those numbers! While the others were merely groaning Katsuya wondered if all the blood had drained from his face just yet. Not this-
"00," Bakura shouted, turning to the players with a wicked grin. "Super Critical hit! Zorc's shadow power assaults the players, and his target is YOU," he cried, pointing directly at the one in the middle. "MOKUBA!" The boy blinked with shock, watching as Bakura continued to grin maliciously.
No... SHIT SHIT SHIT SHIT! "MIND DOLL!" Katsuya watched with horror as Mokuba's body went tense a moment. For a brief second, it was as though he'd been shocked still; his eyes widened, hair stood on end... And just as quickly, those same eyes lost their colour and the boy's body keeled to the ground, Katsuya grabbing for him as he fell. No... This was almost exactly what Kaiba was like, no... NO!
Katsuya turned to Bakura, eyes wide with rage... "YOU BASTARD!" The others jumped at the outburst, staring at him in shock. "WHAT DID YOU DO!"
"Sheesh Jonouchi, calm down," Honda said as he stared at his friend with fairly wide eyes. "We'll call a hospital, he probably just fainted..."
The blond turned on Honda, snarling. "You call that FAINTING? His eyes are OPEN you moron! LOOK AT HIM!" Before anyone could respond to that, a tiny, scared voice came from the table, the others turning with shock.
"K-Katsuya-nii..." Katsuya froze, turning to look at the table with horror as the small, lead figurine form of Mokuba's fairy character looked back at him. "Katsuya-nii! W... What... What happened! Why is everything..." He stared, slowly blinking before he moved his gaze back from the table to the albino across the table.
Seto was going to slaughter him when she woke up, Katsuya thought to himself as he turned to Bakura with wide and rage filled eyes. Cut him into tiny pieces that no one would ever find, if he was lucky.
But he was going to put the white haired bastard before him through HELL before that happened.
AN: Don't you just hate it when you're playing a game, minding your own business and HOLY SHIT YOUR SOUL GOT STOLEN. Worst. Luck. Ever. For a while, I wasn't gonna do this... But the image of Mokuba the figurine was to adorable to pass up. Interesting story on that actually; I got the race from a friend (BlackRockTaffy), after giving her the list the manga provides... She had originally picked the exact same combination that Miho Nosaka from the first series anime picked. Which, of course, had me saying 'Taffy, I don't want Mokuba to be a Miho. I want Mokuba to be cool.' (No offense to Miho or anything but... Yea. Cute and cool are two different things.) In her defense, she hadn't seen the first series anime... Anyways, in the end I picked a rogue. Cause they're small and speedy. (Or rather, speedy and good for the smaller races.)
Oddly enough, right after this, I ended up drawing a bunch of Seto figurines as well, even though Kaiba goes nowhere near the game... Hnnn...
Anonymous Review Responses
We have two reviewers today!
First, from the very avid reader and reviewer Iona - I think I'll go with 'fluffy'. I like the way it rolls of my tongue. Fluffy. Fluffyyyyyy. -stabbed by Bakura- Anyways. Jonouchi WAS pretty spaztic about the Monster World game wasn't he? Even after getting his soul sucked in he was gung-ho about it! I just hope I didn't kill it with his paranoia... Though now that it's in the open from this chapter, he doesn't really bother hiding those thoughts in the next ones. Because it's fairly out in the open what's going on, so really, it's all just hack and slash from there. It will never get boring for these people... Never never never. xD
Oh wow! I had actually forgotten that he put that thing together... (The pop-up-pirate mock up I mean.) It's been a while since I read the early-early chapters... Huh... I had figured he was good with things like that, but I can't believe I forgot that it was a canon fact... (He actually says, flat out 'I'm good with my hands', as he apparently puts together a lot of 'garage kits'.) Also, this review had me re-read the Zombire chapters. ZOMMMMMMBIREEEEEEEE! (There's a card for him too. oAo ) Suddenly I feel unworthy of this compliment... I try to put in the little things, but I forgot completely about this... o-o;
Second review! Please welcome Lurkerella! Good to hear you like the fanfic! As for Seto being a girl's name... Wow. I... Did not know that. Most of my reasoning behind the name difference is in the kanji rather than the name actually... See if you can find out what their names mean! I know that Seto Kaiba's name uses the kanji for 'rapids' (Which shows up in both girls and boys names), and the kanji for 'person', or 'hito'. Specifically, that last kanji is read as 'To', and is a common suffix for boys names in Japan. For girls, it isn't quite as common... At least, it wasn't last I checked. Names tend to be 'upgraded' a fair amount of times in Japan from what I can tell, so you never know, it could be very unisex now. Thanks for bringing that up though, it's a neat fact! (Also wow. TWO girls you know named 'Seto'? That's crazy.)
Usagi's Manga & Japan Corner/Guide
The section that appears more and more to be running out of catchphrases! It didn't even compliment itself, see?
'Yangire', a term that Jonouchi mentions mentally, is similar to a 'Yandere', which is derived from the words 'yan' for mental/emotional illness and 'dere' which is effectively 'to show affection' (Or along those lines)... Except where the Yandere is all sweet on the outside, and snaps into a crazed something when the target of their affections is taken (Bringing 'she'll do anything for love' to the VERY NEXT LEVEL), the 'Yangire' doesn't even have the love part. A Yangire looks and acts extremely innocent and calm... And then just goes completely batshit crazy. 'Higurashi' is loaded with this at certain points; specifically, outside of each character's individual personality, just about anyone who completely looses it in that show is Yangire. Needless to say, if you don't count the fact that Bakura and 'Yami Bakura' are two completely different people, you can see where the comparison comes into place.
Jonouchi's mention of a 'yangire smile' refers to the absolutely crazy grin a yangire tends to have... Quite unlike the 'stepford smile' mentioned much earlier in the fanfic to describe Kaiba's false one; the 'Stepford Smile' references the book and movie 'The Stepford Wives' (Creepy 'perfect wife' movie. Hihhhh.), and has three categories. One obviously centers on the book's theme, and doesn't match Kaiba in any way whatsoever; perfect smile, submissive 'housewife' (The smile hides a sad, weakened person. Second one hides a shallow, or even 'soulless' one.). The category that Kaiba fits in however is very very different, and also very blunt. To quote TV Tropes on the subject - 'This smile hides a very unstable and crazy person.' - Fits pre-mind crush Kaiba to a tee... if you think of the 'smile' as Kaiba's job. (Stepford smilers in this category and the second one are very... Very... Obsessive about whatever it is their life is meant to revolve around. VERY. OBSESSIVE.) Oddly enough, this category is also home to Bakura and Malik...
Some of the dialogue that Mokuba uses in the later half of this chapter comes from what Jonouchi was supposed to say. Speaking of Jonouchi, he should probably start listening to his paranoid side, shouldn't he? He really DOES get into the game though. REALLY. It was actually a little hard to get him to do that for obvious reasons... On a side note, anyone else see the 'pokemon' similarities with 'Poki' saying... 'Poki'? Good thing nothing else does that. Oh wait... Scratch that. Look at when Kaiba first uses duel disks; after winning with Blue Eyes, he says 'RETURN, BLUE EYES!', at which point the duel disk releases an enormous beam of light, 'pulling' the dragon back into the disk. Or at least that's what it looks like in the manga.
An interesting note, but 'Zorc's human disguise closely resembles a Bakura (The good one) in the manga, at least in facial expressions. Another interesting note is that, much like Bakura's hair when he's 'Yami Bakura', when Zorc sheds his human disguise, the hair pokes up like large horns before making the transition. On the topic of Zorc... Yes. It's a reference to that Zorc. Thankfully however, there is no suggestive (Bit more than suggestive really) snake there. There is only pants.
From above, when mentioning Miho; she originally appeared once in the manga (Specifically chapter nine... Where Chono-sensei appears and gets puzzle shadow game-ed.), as a crush of Honda's. He asked Jonouchi for help in gaining her attention, and Jonouchi ended up going to Yugi... Afterward, Miho politely said she wasn't interested, and from that point on, Honda was on the 'main cast'. On a side note, the Miho in the manga was quiet, as well as the school's assistant librarian. In the first series anime however, she was added as another 'main character', and very... Well.. Different. Namely in that she was suddenly a ditz that spoke in third person. (She did have good points though.) During the 'Monster World' episode of the anime, she picks fairy for her race, and 'merchant' for her class. (Her excuse later is that she thought she could get lots of money that way.)
For those wondering, the races in the Monster World game are Human, Elf, Half-Elf, Hobbit(Lord of the Rings anyone?), Dwarf, Pixie-Fairy (A race that has a flight advantage), and 'Birdtail' (Another race with flight capabilities.). The classes however, were Warrior, Magician, Priest, Martial Artist (Fairly certain that one translates to 'Monk' for DnD), Magic Gunman, Merchant, Beast Tamer, Bard, Enchanter, Diabolist, Illusionist (I keep wondering why these last three aren't grouped together.), annnnd Thief... Which I translated into 'rogue'. You'll notice later that I add 'Ranger' as a class. Because... Well, I had a feeling that Magic Gunman replaced it, but all the same, magic gunman. Only Honda could pull that off and do alright.
This arc isn't just any arc guys- get ready for some serious business! (And such.) See you next time!