"Thank you, Yugi." Ryou pulled his friend into a brief hug. "Thank you for not holding back."
"I would not dishonor you by dueling less than my best," was Yugi's warm reply before releasing him and stepping back.
"It is time for the final duel of the semifinals!" Roland announced, and the two teens walked back towards their friends.
Joey hung back reluctantly as Seto walked to the center of the platform, Noah doing the same and the two meeting in the middle.
"Duelists, please shuffle each others' decks."
The silence was tense between them as they complied, eyes narrowed at each other in thought and malice.
"I think we need to agree on the stakes of this duel before we begin," Seto said when Noah's deck was shuffled and ready to be returned to him.
"What stakes do you propose we play for?" Noah seemed amused. He was so confident of his own victory that he might agree to more than he should.
"Winner takes all, for the Millennium Items and the god cards."
Noah smiled sinisterly. He had two of each, Seto only one, but they were still powerful and that god card was why he had hosted this tournament in the first place. He needed to win it in order for any of this to be a success.
"And, if I win, Ishizu's soul is freed from the Shadow Realm."
"Agreed. And if I win, your soul joins hers there." Noah held out Seto's deck to him, and they took back their cards from each other before Seto held out his hand.
"Do you promise?"
"Yes."
They shook hands, sealing the deal with a gesture that Seto hoped the Shadow Magic would accept as binding.
"You've got this, Seto!" Joey cheered as his friend turned his back on Noah Kaiba. This was out of his hands, and all he could do now was trust.
Shadows seethed at Seto's feet as he walked back to his mark. When he reached it, he turned around and activated his duel disk.
"Let's duel!"
The shadows leapt into the air, spreading out overhead and underfoot until they encompassed all three individuals—Seto, Noah, and the referee—in the Shadow Realm. All of the others remained on the outside, behind a wall of magic.
"It shouldn't be a surprise that I'm turning this duel into a Shadow Game," Seto said calmly. "Nobody on the outside can see or hear us, and vice versa."
"That's a pity. I was planning to give them quite a show." Noah activated his own duel disk. "I was thinking something along the lines of…" Noah put a finger on his chin as if coming up with an idea in the moment. "Tying you up and seeing what it takes to make you beg to be freed."
Don't let him upset you, Seth warned, preparing to mount a defense of Seto's mind the instant he felt Noah attempt to spy on them.
I don't plan to.
"That doesn't sound much like a duel."
"Maybe not, but I think your little friends would get a kick out of seeing you the way my father used to see you."
"You don't know as much as you think you do," Seto replied calmly, drawing his starting hand. "For this Shadow Game," he said, shifting the conversation away from Gozaburo Kaiba. "Whenever a player loses life-points, they will be ripped straight from their soul with all the pain that implies."
"Sounds like fun." Noah grinned, his own starting hand drawn as well. Roland flipped a coin and it gave Noah the first turn of the duel.
"I draw, and for my first turn, I summon Mystic Tomato in attack mode."
A weak monster like that in attack mode? That's got to be a trap.
Seth wanted to answer, but felt Noah's presence at the edge of his mind and was too occupied with their mental defenses. It was the one critical weakness with the way they intended to fight this duel: if Seth was busy protecting Seto's mind, then he couldn't consult on strategy. The strain of protecting their mind would wear on both of them, and this is why Seto's strategy was formulated to get Obelisk on the field as quickly as possible.
"I also place two cards face down and end my turn." Noah smiled, sinister and confident as his Eye continued to push against Seth's defenses.
Seto drew his card and added it to his hand. Not a bad line-up, he could make a strong start with these cards.
"I have to thank you for summoning a monster, especially one as pathetic as your fanged fruit." Seto spoke with unveiled disdain. "That allows me to special summon Cyber Dragon from my hand."
The metallic dragon burst onto the field with a flash of light and a satisfying screech.
"I also summon Cyber Dinosaur to join it."
The dinosaur was massive, but its attack was weaker than the dragon.
"Cyber Dragon, attack his Mystic Tomato!"
The cybernetic creature slithered through the air, prepared to strike.
"Not so fast! I activate my trap card, Nightmare's Steelcage!" Noah smirked as the metal cage materialized around Seto and his monsters, making the brunette frown. "My trap card will stop you and your monsters from attacking me for two turns. Sorry about that, but at least you should feel at home in there."
"Like hell I do," Seto growled in response, trying to stay calm. Last time they dueled, part of Noah's strategy had been to provoke Seto, to make him angry enough to slip up. Thanks to Seth, that hadn't worked.
He didn't have Seth's help with his temper this time.
"Is there anything else you want to do, or is it my turn now?"
"I lay one card face down and end my turn." Sapphire eyes glared at a single golden one.
"I draw." Noah added the card to his hand and extracted a different one. "And I place this monster face-down." The card was set in defense mode beside his Mystic Tomato.
His monster is either weaker than ours, or it's stronger, and he's just baiting another trap.
"That ends my turn." The Millennium Eye gleamed at him, and Seto could feel the extra push at the borders of his mind before the assault finally relented. Not fully, but a bit.
I hope he doesn't plan on keeping this up for the whole duel.
Seth sounded weary, and Seto was immediately concerned. They'd barely started dueling, and he was already tired?
I can keep going, Seth assured. I can guard you as long as I need to.
If you're sure.
Seto wasn't sure, but he didn't have much choice. Seth was already defending his mind again with his memories of war, rightfully mistrusting this brief reprieve.
Seto drew a new card to his hand: Graceful Charity. Not as good as Pot of Greed would be right now, but not a bad card to draw either.
"I activate Graceful Charity, allowing me to draw three cards and discard two from my hand."
He drew three more cards and had to suppress a smile. His Blue-Eyes, while powerful, would be more useful to him in the graveyard now that he had Monster Reborn in his hand. Polymerization joined his precious dragon in the graveyard. He wasn't prepared to summon it yet, though. Noah still had face-down cards that concerned him, and he didn't want to put his Blue-Eyes in the line of fire until he was sure he could make the best use of it.
"I end my turn."
With those words, Nightmare's Steelcage dissolved, and he breathed a low sigh of relief. He'd hated the cage, but it hadn't affected him as viscerally as Noah seemed to have hoped. Even better, he would be able to attack Noah's weak fiends on his next turn.
"My turn," Noah announced, then drew a card that made him grin. Like before, he didn't use it, but tucked it into his hand and reached for another one. "First, I summon Bowganian in defense mode."
The floating eyeball materialized, wielding a crossbow and prepared to take aim.
Noah's hand moved back to the card he had just drawn.
"You're really going to enjoy this part, Seto."
His grin was vicious and the brunette tensed. Had he already drawn his Egyptian god? Noah had three monsters on the field now, so he had assembled enough sacrifices to summon one.
"I summon Lava Golem to the field!"
"But you already summoned a monster this turn," Seto protested immediately.
"That may be true, Seto, but Lava Golem is a special kind of monster." He placed the card on his duel disk and the beast in question began to rise up out of the shadows—on Seto's side of the field. "By sacrificing two of your monsters, I can special summon Lava Golem to your side of the field. I'm afraid you'll have to move your cyber beasts to the graveyard."
Both Cyber Dragon and Cyber Dinosaur were caught in the Lava Golem's molten fists and crushed in sacrifice to it. Seto could have been fine with that, given the monster's stats. He could have been fine with the impressive heat of the monster, burning his back, and with how the air shimmered around it like it truly wanted to incinerate all that it touched. But then a new cage materialized around Seto, one attached to the beast that kept him uncomfortably close to that intense heat. This cage was much smaller, too, and though Seto was tempted to reach for the bars, to pull and push and test for a way out, he couldn't let himself look so distraught by this turn of events. He couldn't let Noah know that it bothered him.
"I do love surprises, Seto. Don't you?"
Seto moved his cards to his graveyard with narrowed eyes.
"How's this for a surprise? By sending my monsters to the graveyard, you've allowed me to special summon Interplanetarypurplythorny Dragon from my hand!" Seto placed the card in attack mode, the spiny, ugly purple dragon emerging from the shadows as if it had been one with them until this point.
He'd expected Noah to use sneaky tricks to remove his monsters from the field, and he'd been prepared with some equally sneaky cards.
To his credit, Noah didn't seem the least bit phased by his summon.
"In that case, I'm going to flip-summon Dark Jeroid, changing him from defense mode to attack mode!" The equally ugly fiend seemed to climb out of a dark pit in order to join Noah's other monsters. "And thanks to its special effect, I can target any monster on the field and reduce its attack points by eight hundred! And I choose to target your dragon!"
The purple dragon's attack points were now reduced from 2200 to 1400. Not good, but Seto did still have Lava Golem, a monster as strong as his beloved Blue-Eyes. There had to be a catch, though, besides making Seto deeply uncomfortable. Noah wouldn't just give him something so strong without there being a serious downside.
Why did he target the dragon instead of Lava Golem? It's the stronger monster.
Seth wasn't free to speak, though, so Seto was left to speculate on his own.
He might have a magic card that specifically targets monsters with high attack power. He also might have targeted the dragon because that card is actually mine, so it's a more personal attack. That would be a terrible strategy, but I think that's something he would do.
"Next I'll activate the magic card Mystical Space Typhoon, and use it to destroy your face-down card!"
Seto grit his teeth as he moved One-Time Passcode to his graveyard. He'd been counting on using that to protect his life-points against a direct attack. In the graveyard, it wouldn't do him any good.
"And lastly, I'll place a face-down card of my own." Noah placed his card behind Dark Jeroid. "That ends my turn. But there's something you need to know about the golem I gave you."
"What do I need to know?"
"Lava Golem may be a powerful monster, but every turn that he's on your side of the field, he's going to take one thousand of your life-points."
The only warning Seto had was a split second where his chest merely stung, then the full force of the pain struck him like a blow to the back. The air was knocked out of his lungs, and he stumbled forward, his forehead knocking into the bars of the cage as he tried to stay on his feet. Long fingers wrapped around the bars to steady himself, because he needed to grab onto something. Seth's wordless concern swept over him like a wave, doubling the distraction. Seto closed his eyes, forcing air back into his lungs.
Focus. He needed to focus.
He could feel the hot metal under his fingers and released the bars, straightening up more shakily than he liked. Noah's laughter rang in his ears, but he forced himself to ignore it. That didn't matter right now. Ignoring the heat and the resonating pain in his chest, he reached for his deck and drew the top card.
He blinked. World Legacy Clash could be a useful card if Noah summoned anything powerful to his side of the field, but he couldn't afford to banish one of his own monsters in order to weaken one of Noah's already weak fiends.
He'd have to keep holding out for a better card.
"First, I summon Luster Dragon from my hand." Nothing in Seto's voice gave away the pain he felt or how unsteady he'd been just moments ago. The sparkling, gem-encrusted dragon shrieked, the noise bird-like and defiant. With 1900 attack points, it was the second-strongest monster in his command. Now it was finally time to start sweeping Noah's monsters from the field. "Luster Dragon, attack his Bowganian!"
"Not so fast!"
The dragon was already launching its attack though, soaring through the air and aimed directly at the one-eyed machine.
"I activate Mirror Wall!" The reflective glass wall materialized just in time to block the dragon's attack on Bowganian, causing it to crash into a warped image of itself. "Mirror Wall allows me to cut your dragon's attack points in half, reducing them from 1900 to a mere 950 attack points, much less than Bowganian's 1300. Not only is your monster destroyed, but you lose three hundred fifty life-points!"
As his Luster Dragon disintegrated, Seto felt the pain in his chest once more, but much milder this time. His life-point counter went down to 2650. Almost half his life-points lost in one turn. This wasn't part of his plan.
"You'll need a lot more than a wall to stop me, Noah!" he declared, his doubts hidden. "Lava Golem, attack his Dark Jeroid!" Because of Mirror Wall, the process of attacking the fiend halved Lava Golem's attack points, but it was still enough to destroy Noah's monster. Seto smirked as his purple dragon's attack points returned to their original 2200. "Because you were foolish enough to leave Dark Jeroid in attack position, you still lose three hundred life-points!"
"You've barely made a dent in my life-points, and you're almost down to half!" Noah scoffed. "Is that the end of your turn?"
He hadn't summoned his Blue-Eyes White Dragon yet, but that was on purpose. He couldn't afford to attack with it and leave it weakened, but he couldn't summon it just to leave it exposed to Noah's magic cards either. His monsters were still stronger than Noah's, so he didn't need the monster to protect his life-points from an attack. He would end his turn here, and keep his Blue-Eyes safe in the graveyard.
"It is."
"Then it's time I took your life-points down a bit more. My Bowganian has a special effect, you see."
Of course it does. Seto confined his grumbling to his own mind, wondering regretfully if Seth would have seen that coming. He hated the fact, but he knew that he was a better duelist with Seth present.
"At the beginning of every turn that Bowganian is on my side of the field, you lose an additional 600 life-points!"
Seto grit his teeth and bore the force of the blow, feet braced on the bottom of the cage to keep him from losing his balance again. He really was down to halfway, now, but at least Noah would be joining him. He didn't know all the special effects of Noah's cards, but he knew how Mirror Wall worked.
"Mirror Wall requires that I pay 2000 life-points at the beginning of each turn in order to keep it on the field, or else it's destroyed. I'm going to pay that 2000 because, trapped as you are, I still don't trust you."
Seto couldn't help but smile as he watched Noah fall to his knees from the pain, crying out from the impact. He deserved it, the wretch. Panting and grunting, Noah struggled back to his feet.
"Now that that's done, I draw"—he glanced briefly at the new card—"and I activate Pot of Greed from my hand, allowing me to draw two more cards!"
Pot of Greed went to his graveyard and two new cards were drawn, making his hand three cards, better than the single card he'd had when this turn started. Seto watched him order his cards and look back at him with the start of a smirk.
"First, I activate Goblin's Secret Remedy from my hand, restoring 600 of my life-points." The counter went up, bringing his life-points above two thousand once more, and the card joined the graveyard. "Second, I'm going to summon a monster." He grinned, toothy and cruel. "And I know you're just going to love this one."
Seto tensed, sure that Noah hadn't drawn either of his god cards—he would have been too obvious if he had—but unsure of what he could have in his hand.
"I summon Holding Legs in attack mode!"
Golden manacles manifested on Noah's side of the field, and Seto tensed. He knew what was about to happen. He remembered coding this program himself, and true to their coding, Holding Legs soared through the air towards him, slipping through the bars of the cage and latching onto his ankles.
Is this what he was talking about when we started the duel? When he said that he wanted to tie me up?
He stared down at the metal clamped onto his legs. He was already in a cage. This shouldn't make him feel more trapped.
Snap out of it, Seto.
I'm fine!
But it was the nudge that he needed to lift his gaze back to his opponent.
"That was a waste of a card, Noah." He straightened up, trying to look as confident as possible. "I know you've had that card for a few turns, at least. Do you think I'm not watching your hand, not keeping track of every draw?"
"Shut up. You're in chains and a cage, and as soon as my turn is over, you're losing another thousand life-points. Criticize me all you want, but I have the upper hand. My turn isn't over yet, though." He placed his last card on the duel disk, face down. "I set one magic card and end my turn."
Being prepared for the pain didn't help as much as he'd hoped. He was knocked forward into the bars of the cage by another blow to the back. This time, his fingers missed the bars and he fell to his knees. At least the smashing of his knees on a hard floor was a familiar sensation, and it almost grounded him.
"You have no idea how much I've looked forward to this moment, Seto."
He had to force air into his lungs before he could answer.
"The one… right before… I crush you?" Seto panted, trying to blink away the haze obscuring his vision.
"No. The moment that I have you on your knees, bowing before me. Now I just need you to beg for mercy, and this would truly be perfect."
"Never." The response was instantaneous. "I never begged in front of your father." Seto sucked in a deep breath. "And I'll never beg for you."
His gaze dropped from Noah to his own hands, wondering if he could actually keep this up. He knew that he had the cards to win, but Seth's exhaustion was seeping into his own mind, and the pain made it hard to think. He'd forgotten about that.
But then again, he'd never had a high stakes duel when he was living in pain.
Outside the walls of shadow, the group of friends waited in concerned silence. In the same instant, Joey and Yugi both felt something they couldn't describe. It was like hearing a scream, but they didn't hear anything at all. It was like feeling pain, but nothing hurt. It was like hearing bad news, but knowing nothing.
"Yug, did you feel that?" Joey glanced over at his friend, not knowing how he knew that Yugi shared this sensation, but knowing somehow.
"Yes." The shorter teen looked at Joey with wide eyes. "Seto's in trouble."
Mokuba's hand found Ryou's and held it tightly while Marik stepped closer to Ryou's other side, their shoulders brushing together.
"That's it, I'm going in." Joey took a few steps forward and reached one hand into the shadows, only to yank it back with a cry of pain. "Shit, that hurt! It zapped me or somethin'." He examined his hand, which looked unharmed, but still tingled with residual pain and electrical current.
"I guess he really didn't want any of us watching his duel with Noah," Duke guessed from his spot beside Mai.
"But why?" Mai asked, knowing full well that she wasn't going to receive a satisfactory answer. "Does he just not want us to see him lose again?" She remembered too clearly witnessing the end of the duel Seto lost against Pegasus. He'd been facing the Millennium Eye then too, and it had ruined him. "Everybody loses sometimes."
"Not Seto." Mokuba clenched his jaw. His brother was a winner when it came to Duel Monsters, no matter what else he couldn't control in their lives.
Joey cleared his throat, deciding to speak up.
"Noah twisted the truth about Ishizu to make her look bad and try to distract her during their duel." Joey had been keeping this explanation in his back pocket just in case. "I know he was worried about what Noah might try to say about him. I guess this was his way to keep it from being a problem."
Ryou bit his lip. He knew that Seto had secrets too sacred to share. Did Noah know about those secrets too? But how? He snuck a glance at Duke, who now looked as worried as Ryou felt. At least he wasn't alone in his concern.
Mokuba squeezed Ryou's hand, and he squeezed back.
"Seto's going to win," the kid insisted, glancing between the faces of his brother's friends.
"I believe in him too," Yugi assured. "But I think he might need a little help." Yugi cupped the Millennium Puzzle with both hands and a golden eye began to glow on his forehead.