Poor planning, Yuugi. Poor planning.
Yuugi explains that he's not capable of reducing Jonouchi's life points to zero no matter the circumstances, so he requests that Jonouchi hold onto the Millennium Puzzle for him. Jonouchi stares in shock, teeth clenched. He watches Yuugi slouch back to his side of the dock, both wordless, as Yuugi's chain rattles along the anchor hanging above. Mentally, Yuugi acknowledges the timer on the bomb for the anchor, which has around twenty minutes left on it, in which time it'll explode if neither he nor Jonouchi have won by that point and drop the anchor to drown them both.
But Yuugi thinks he's not going to give up until the end, even though it sure SEEMS like he's already thrown in the towel. He's still banking on bringing back Jonouchi's heart within the time limit for the chance to survive. He begs the injured Red Eyes lying on the dock to help him if it still has some power left.
So there both players are, sweating, looking ragged with rings around their eyes, though Yuugi only has 700 points to Jonouchi's 3100. Marik's apparition behind Jonouchi looks fucking furious, ordering Jonouchi to take off that puzzle and destroy the disgusting thing along with Yami's soul trapped inside. Don't know how he'd destroy the thing, necessarily, but maybe he could throw it in the water? Jonouchi grips the chain of the puzzle, pressing both sides extending from it, effectively cinching it up and making it HARDER to remove. Marik doesn't seem to notice, though, rationalizing that Yuugi's giving it to them means that he's surrendering. He's suddenly smirking again, too, which makes me aware of how many mood swings he's displayed in his short time in the story thus far. The highs and lows are extreme, dude.
Possessed!Jonouchi has on a little grin now too, muttering about a win while Marik mumbles in his brain that they've won as well. Jonouchi laughs, tearing the Millennium Puzzle from his neck (still cinched up, BTDubz, so I'm not entirely sure HOW) and says he wins while Yuugi stares at him. He looks like he doesn't have the energy to be much more than concerned, so this ordeal must be taking its toll.
Marik instructs possessed!Jonouchi to take apart the puzzle and throw it into the sea, convinced that this ritualistic dismemberment of Yami will ease his hatred of 1000 years. But then he tells possessed!Jonouchi to send Yuugi to hell after that, which doesn't really suggest that his hatred will be eased too terribly much by that point if you ask me. Marik makes like it's mercy, sending a friend to die with Yami so he won't feel so alone, but I don't buy it. Guy just gets his kicks from murdering by this point, I'm guessing.
Possessed!Jonouchi pops the face-piece of the puzzle off the front, with the Eye of Horus on it, and weighs it in his palm. Yuugi looks on, eyelids drooping, like he's ready to pass out. Holding out the piece and grinning on it like a weirdo, possessed!Jonouchi listens to Marik egging him on to throw that piece into the ocean, that way there can be no way to take the action back. Hmmmm, I seem to recall a similar action by Jonouchi with this VERY piece of the puzzle. I wonder when THAT happened?
I don't know, let's see if Jonouchi can fill in the blanks for me.
Jonouchi recalls the puzzle piece floating down through the pool water, which is weird because he wasn't in the pool to see that. A series of less nonsensical recollections come back to him, though, including laughing from the window above the pool that it was fun throwing the piece in, claiming that Yuugi deserves this for taking forever putting the damn thing together anyway as Honda praises him for being such a douchebag, being beaten up by that anti-bullying bully, watching Yuugi get beaten up in turn for trying to defend them, rising from the pool where he had retrieved the piece he threw, and a phrase, a riddle about something you can show but can't see.
Back in the present, Jonouchi is still standing frozen with his arm wound up for a throw, but he hums, unable to follow through. His hand refuses to move from that spot in the air, much to his surprise. He brings his fist down out of the sky, cradling it in his other hand, doubled over again. Jonouchi opens his hand to regard the puzzle piece inside.
Yuugi's eyes are open wide again as he gapes at Jonouchi and mutters his name in amazement. Jonouchi holds the rest of the puzzle in one hand to push the piece he took out back into its face, then loops the chain back around his neck. Marik's pendulum points back at furious, and he demands to know why Jonouchi didn't follow his order.
Jonouchi grunts that he's a duelist, and the hatred of 3000 years, or 1000, whichever the story thinks is best I guess, doesn't concern him. He states that the outcome of the duel is all that matters, looking across at Yuugi again. Marik's brows contract in offense, and the next panel shows his overbearing presence looking down on Jonouchi with extreme judgy-face. And I do mean judgy. He decides it's not necessary to keep Jonouchi alive anymore, and he'll be the next to be gotten rid of along with the Millennium Puzzle. Wait, wait, wait! Is he telling me that it was NECESSARY to spare Jonouchi's life before?
... Why?
Whatever, possessed!Jonouchi says it's time for Yuugi to pick a card! Any card! Yuugi pauses to give Jonouchi a critical stare, though, knowing that Marik's influence has loosened a bit. With fourteen minutes left on the clock, Yuugi renews his vow not to give up until he's brought Jonouchi's heart to its senses. He shouts that it's his turn, as possessed!Jonouchi already informed him, and rips a card out of his Duel Disk in a very Yami-esque manner. When he looks at it, he appears a little exhausted again, sweating.
He manages to take stock of the field again, though, and notes that Jonouchi's attack positioned Rocket Warrior is likely to transform into a rocket again when Jonouchi's turn comes back around. Yuugi says that Yami must use the cards the same way he does, though I'm not entirely sure what that means. Regardless, he slaps two cards face down on his Duel Disk and plays Beta Magnet Warrior in attack position. With that, he ends his turn.
The next panel shows the contrasting attack points between Rocket Warrior and the newly weakened Red Eyes Black Dragon, 1700 and 900 respectively. Possessed!Jonouchi announces that it's his turn as Marik tells him to kill Yuugi on this turn. He draws a card, Marik yakking on about how Yuugi missed his chance to change Red Eyes to defense with its points this low. Possessed!Jonouchi has his own train of thought on using the Panther Warrior he just drew to bring down Red Eyes. Murder echoes through his head as he glares at Yuugi across from him. I feel like this panel isn't going well with the horror movie I watched last night.
Yuugi doesn't look nearly as disturbed as I feel, though. Good for him. He's instead giving Jonouchi a glare of his own, though not malicious in the slightest. I'm not sure Yuugi's even CAPABLE of looking malicious.
Turns out that Panther Warrior wasn't heading for Red Eyes at all, but the Magnet Warrior instead. To make the situation all the more frustrating for Marik, Yuugi reveals one of his face down cards, Magic Arm, a pair of symbols on a latticed arm that he took from Jonouchi in their card exchange. Both Marik and possessed!Jonouchi look on in shock.
Yuugi shouts at his Gilfar to attack the Rocket Warrior.
So, what did I think of this chapter overall? All of Jonouchi's refusals to take opportunities to hurt Yuugi or beat him seem to have given Yuugi a new lease on life, given that he starts to perk up quite a bit after each one. Every time, he reiterates his insistence on fighting to his last life point, and bringing Jonouchi's heart back, and every time that affirmation gets a bit stronger. He doesn't seem nearly as willing to bite the dust as he did in the previous chapter, so I get the impression that he's starting to see how effective his efforts really are, and how successful his experiment is. He may even be coming to figure out that Jonouchi's increased disobedience might be signs that he finds Yuugi too valuable to let go of. Which is a seriously happy thought to me in the midst of this miserable mini-arc, let me tell you.
What Jonouchi's tiny acts of resistance also give me is a sense of intensity to this struggle. With how slow the progress is, you would think it would get a bit boring, but instead, you're struck with awe at the simultaneous dissemination of two facts. The first is that Marik is not a weakling. His influence is strong, and it's taking every ounce of Jonouchi's energy to fight his suggestions. Even in his disobedience, he still has the surly attitude given him by Marik's unbridled hatred seeping into his brain. The second fact is that Jonouchi's affection for Yuugi is too strong to be poisoned by that same hatred, and that hatred is LOSING. Because of the slow nature of this defeat, though, we're seeing a really intense psychological battle.
The only real issues I had with the chapter were the physics of taking off the puzzle, and Marik's statement that he would no longer try to keep Jonouchi alive. The second more so than the first. Again, why would he be TRYING to keep this pawn alive to begin with? Did he think he would just continue to use Jonouchi as a pawn after this point, much like his "doll" from before? A possibility, but after he decides he's not interested in saving Jonouchi for uncertain nefarious purposes in the indefinite future, why did he even have him continue to duel? Why not just wait out the clock? What does it matter at this point? All the people he hates, both directly and peripherally, would be dragged into the sea if he just had Jonouchi sit back and refuse to take his turn.
Of course, given how hard Jonouchi is fighting him right now, that also wouldn't work, but it would make sense for him to TRY that track, at least.
In the anime, Marik wanted the Millennium Puzzle for... some reason. Not sure why. He needed it for his evil plans. That being said, Marik sure is being a dick to his new business partner, Bakura, by planning to destroy the Millennium Puzzle for good!
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of being a dick, I imagine sparing Joey was only so that he'd have to live with the guilt of being brainwashed into killing his friend. Marik seems like that kind of person.
Also, I don't think that Trap Card to redirect Rocket Warrior's effect into Pather Warrior is a thing you can do, but I'm too sleepy to look up how Rocket Warrior's effect works in the TCG. I'm going to say it's very likely bullshit, though.
I mean, Marik is a bit of a dick anyway, so at least it's in line with his overall characterization. And I suppose the idea of sparing Jonouchi to make him live with the guilt is also a fair extrapolation; he certainly knew about Pandora's depressing condition and decided to indulge it. I suppose this would be just another example of that, just less "active."
DeleteQuite frankly, I'll take your half-asleep assessment of the possible bullshit over KT's unbalanced game hacks any day!