Chapter 264: Five Pieces Complete? The Phantom Fusion of the Forbidden One!
"Fusion Summon! Albion the Sanctifire Dragon!"
[Albion the Sanctifire Dragon] [Level 8 / LIGHT]
[Dragon / Fusion / Effect]
[ATK: 3000 / DEF: 2500]
["Fallen of Albaz" + 1 LIGHT Spellcaster monster]
The first Fusion Summon since the hero squad had assembled: Necro Fusion's banishing method removed Albaz and Ecclesia from the Graveyard. They met the Sanctifire Dragon's requirement of "LIGHT Spellcaster monster" with Ecclesia in that role.
One thing about Painful Choice: for all the criticism of how much it hurt, the card efficiency it generated was genuinely extraordinary. Sending Forbidden One pieces to the Graveyard while casually including Fusion Materials that Albaz could use was just part of the package.
Pure white light shattered the Necro Fusion's spiral effect. The beautiful, sacred dragon guided by a Virtuous soared above the barren Fusion-world landscape, showering it with holy radiance to oppose the ultimate attack of Exodius the Ultimate Forbidden Lord.
"Another 3000 ATK card!" Finesse observed. "Is this duel running some kind of Blue-Eyes White Dragon special? Everything on the field seems to come in at 3000."
The two Grinder Golems were 3000. Exodius the Ultimate Forbidden Lord and The Legendary Exodia Incarnate were at 3000 ATK. And now the newly summoned Fusion dragon was also 3000.
Chiaki may have left the Chronicle, but her spirit hovered around the field anyway.
Amon spoke: "Even if you Fusion Summon something new, if it cannot stop Exodius the Ultimate Forbidden Lord's attack, this duel ends right here!"
He was stating it with full confidence. Could something actually stop Exodius, which was immune to the opponent's card effects?
Amano tapped the Albion the Sanctifire Dragon card on the Duel Disk: "Amon, this Fusion is exactly my answer to Exodius!"
[During your opponent's turn (Quick Effect): Target 2 monsters in any GY(s) (1 from each); Special Summon both, 1 to each player's field.]
The dragon born to cut through causality directed its pure sacred light into both players' Graveyards.
"I Special Summon Exodia the Forbidden One from your Graveyard to your field in Defense Position! And I Special Summon Left Arm of the Forbidden One from my Graveyard to my field in Attack Position!"
"Revive! 'Sanctifire Rebirth Light!'"
One Forbidden One piece on each field, pulled from their respective Graveyards.
[Left Arm of the Forbidden One] [ATK: 200]
[Exodia the Forbidden One] [DEF: 1000]
Summoning a single hand or leg to the field had been abstract enough. A standalone head sitting alone on the field was something else entirely.
The more interesting sight at this moment was Amon's expression.
Because Albion the Sanctifire Dragon's effect had moved Exodia the Forbidden One out of Amon's Graveyard and onto the field, even if Exodius's final attack landed successfully, the fifth Forbidden One piece would not be in the Graveyard when it counted.
"'ULTIMATE MAGICAL GOD FLAME CANNON'!"
Exodius the Ultimate Forbidden Lord delivered its "final strike," and Amon's last Left Leg of the Forbidden One was sent from the Deck to the Graveyard by the effect.
But the promised victory never arrived. All that remained was the steel shell of the Grinder Golem consumed in magical flame, and Amano's Life Points climbing from Rainbow Life's recovery.
[Grinder Golem: Destroyed]
Amano LP: 6000 -> 7000
Amon: "Thanks to Diffusion Wave-Motion's effect, even if you summon a new monster, Exodius the Ultimate Forbidden Lord can still attack!"
That was true. But with the last Forbidden One piece just sent by the attack, Amon had nothing left in his Deck.
All five Forbidden One cards had been Limited-1 throughout Yu-Gi-Oh's history. And Amano remembered from the anime that Amon's hand had contained exactly five Dark Magician pieces.
Amon raised his hand to declare: "Destroy Albion the Sanctifire Dragon! 'ULTIMATE MAGICAL GOD FLAME CANNON'!"
The anger of being denied the win condition was visible in the attack, the magical flame surging with more heat than before.
[Albion the Sanctifire Dragon: Destroyed]
Amano LP: 7000 -> 8000
Ecclesia, from inside the deck: "It took a lot of effort to Fusion Summon that thing and all it did was dig through the opponent's Graveyard for a bit."
That was selling it short: they were both roughly Painful Choice bonus material.
Albaz, cutting in with a Duelist's perspective: "No, the Graveyard disruption matters enormously. Applied correctly, it sealed the win condition!"
And he was reading it correctly.
The Spell Card that had Special Summoned Exodius the Ultimate Forbidden Lord, Ritual of the Ultimate Forbidden Lord, had a final clause:
[If a card effect other than "Exodius the Ultimate Forbidden Lord" sends a "Forbidden One" card to the GY, that card returns to the Deck instead.]
This was a built-in limiter to prevent players from simply dumping all five pieces into the Graveyard through other card effects for an easy automatic win.
Right now, the face-up Exodia the Forbidden One had been forcibly summoned to Amon's field. There was no card effect that could put it back in the Graveyard: only battle destruction or being used as a Tribute for an Advance Summon.
That was exactly why Amano had specifically Special Summoned Exodia the Forbidden One in Defense Position: so it could not attack and destroy itself, keeping it alive on the field and out of the Graveyard.
And because the turn Grinder Golem was Special Summoned restricted Normal Summons, Amon also could not Tribute the head piece through an Advance Summon.
For this turn at minimum, Amon's attempt at a win condition had been completely blocked.
"Make your choice, Amon Garam!" Amano pressed the moment. "Without a win condition available this turn, are you going to keep fighting?"
Left Arm of the Forbidden One, at 200 ATK, was still on Amano's field from Albion the Sanctifire Dragon's revival effect.
Even with Diffusion Wave-Motion in effect, Exodius could continue attacking. But every hit under Rainbow Life would add more Life Points to Amano's total rather than reduce it. Every attack would push Amano's total higher.
Amon had not been thinking about Life Points when he launched this offensive. He had not cared about recovering his own, or draining Amano's, because the win condition did not require either. Now, looking at the gap between their Life Points, the situation was entering genuinely dangerous territory.
Amon LP: 2000
Amano LP: 8000
"I choose to end the Battle Phase."
"You blinked, Amon Garam."
"A single Left Arm of the Forbidden One on the field has no relevant effect on the duel state."
That was accurate. A Forbidden One limb: in hand it enabled an automatic win, in the Graveyard it boosted relevant ATK values or contributed to a win condition, and sitting on the field it was entirely useless. Reading that correctly was exactly why Amon had chosen not to press the attack and hand Amano even more recovered Life Points.
"I then activate the Spell Card, Token Thanksgiving: destroy all Tokens on the field, and recover 800 LP per Token destroyed!"
[Token Thanksgiving]
[Spell Card: Destroy all Tokens on the field. Gain 800 LP for each Token destroyed.]
Alternate-world duelists appeared to bring Life Point recovery cards routinely. With your actual life on the line during a duel, that was a reasonable priority.
The two Grinder Tokens dissolved, lifting the numbers on Amon's Life Point counter toward something safer.
Amon LP: 2000 -> 3600
"I set two cards face-down. Turn end!"
Turn change. Amano looked at his Duel Disk. "I've got one turn to work with."
The win condition block on Exodius the Ultimate Forbidden Lord was only in effect as long as Exodia the Forbidden One remained on Amon's field, outside the Graveyard. One turn to make something work, while facing a Forbidden God that was effectively invincible.
"I am not stopping here, Jaden." Amano said it quietly to himself.
Losing a Duel Chronicle did mean being ejected and having to start over next week. But having walked this far down the path to save a best friend, having assembled the entire hero squad: this was not the kind of responsibility that could be shrugged off with "try again later."
"Everything is riding on this card. My turn. Draw!"
The card he drew in the moment it mattered answered with something that felt like Chiaki's will.
"I see." Amano looked at what was in his hand. "It wants me to use this to beat the Dark Magician." He looked up. "I'll get revenge for both of you, Kaibas."
"I first Normal Summon Left Leg of the Forbidden One in Defense Position!"
[Left Leg of the Forbidden One] [DEF: 300]
He pushed the last Forbidden One piece from his hand into the Duel Disk, then activated the card he had drawn this turn.
"Spell Card, Card of Demise: draw until I have 5 cards in hand! After the fifth of my own Standby Phases following this card's activation, well, I don't need to read the rest of that."
No side effect was going to matter. He needed to draw right now.
Five cards added to hand in rapid succession, one draw after another. That single card alone had Amano's draw count approaching what Amon had generated through Graceful Charity and two copies of Dark Spirit Art - Greed combined.
Amano looked at the five cards now in hand. "So this is how I'm supposed to beat Exodius the Ultimate Forbidden Lord."
"First, Spell Card, Foolish Burial: send Priestess Who Receives the Star Chalice from my Deck to the Graveyard. Then, Spell Card, Tri-Wight!"
[Tri-Wight]
[Spell Card: Target 3 Level 2 or lower Normal Monsters in your GY; Special Summon all of them.]
"From my Graveyard, I Special Summon Priestess Who Receives the Star Chalice, Right Arm of the Forbidden One, and Right Leg of the Forbidden One to my field!"
If summoning a single hand or leg was abstract, and a solitary head was unsettling: at this moment Amano's field had four separate floating Forbidden One body parts arranged around Eve, and the image had crossed from abstract into the genuinely uncanny.
Eve: "What... what are you doing, Amano? Are you trying to reassemble me into a head again?"
"Not you this time. You're playing a different role! Quick-Play Spell, Enemy Controller!"
[Enemy Controller]
[Quick-Play Spell: Tribute 1 monster you control; take control of 1 face-up monster your opponent controls, until the End Phase.]
The effect that, through a mechanical input, transferred control of a monster to the opponent. Amano aimed it directly.
Exodius the Ultimate Forbidden Lord, immune to the opponent's card effects, could not have its control switched. But there was exactly one other monster on Amon's field that could be targeted.
"I Tribute Priestess Who Receives the Star Chalice! I take control of Exodia the Forbidden One!"
[Priestess Who Receives the Star Chalice: Tributed]
[Exodia the Forbidden One: Control transferred]
As Eve's light dissolved with the Tribute, the final piece that Amano had always wanted but never obtained arrived in her place on his field.
Not assembled in hand. Not assembled in the Graveyard. In this moment, on Amano's field, all five Forbidden One pieces stood complete.
In all honesty, even lined up on the Monster Zone without doing anything, five complete Forbidden One pieces assembled together was a genuinely imposing sight.
Left Arm. Right Arm. Left Leg. Right Leg. Exodia the Forbidden One.
"Amano Rei, what are you planning?"
Amon could not work out what was happening. Was this some kind of abstract performance art?
"Watch carefully, Amon Garam! The king's power has one more way to fight! I'm only showing this once!"
Amano drove the critical Spell Card into the Duel Disk's back row.
"I activate Polymerization! I use all five Forbidden One monsters on my field as Fusion Materials!"
"Polymerization? Fusion?" Amon had never considered this in any of his scenarios. Amano was performing a five-Forbidden-One Fusion.
Because of Ritual of the Ultimate Forbidden Lord's protection clause, any Forbidden One piece sent to the Graveyard by a card effect other than Exodius would return to the Deck rather than go to the GY. The head piece's Graveyard-exit via Fusion would send it back to Amon's Deck, not the Graveyard, and would not satisfy the win condition.
"Amano, are you going for Quintet Magician?" Finesse called out. "But Quintet Magician can't beat Exodius!"
She was right that five Forbidden One pieces were all Spellcasters, making Quintet Magician the natural Fusion target.
But she was also right that Quintet Magician could not beat Exodius the Ultimate Forbidden Lord, immune to opponent's effects and indestructible in battle.
Quintet Magician could not win. But this card could.
The Fusion Mastery system skill activated. Yui's inherited power to fuse any Level 10 or higher Fusion monster.
The savage Fusion energy on Amano's field built to an impossible peak, drawing the individual floating limbs and the solitary head into the vortex, the ultimate magical fire erupting from the center of the spiral.
"Left Arm, Right Arm, Left Leg, Right Leg, and Exodia the Forbidden One!"
"Five-Body Fusion!"
"Phantom divine force and Exodia's sealed power resonate as one, breaking the chains of a thousand years with this one moment!"
"Five bodies unite, call forth the name of the god! Fusion Summon!"
"Illusory Summoned God - Exodia!"
[Illusory Summoned God - Exodia] [Level 10 / DARK]
[Spellcaster / Fusion / Effect]
[ATK: ? / DEF: 0]
[5 "Forbidden One" monsters]
[Effect 1: This face-up card cannot be destroyed by opponent's effects.
Effect 2: Once per turn, during damage calculation involving this card (Quick Effect): This card's ATK increases by your current LP amount.
Effect 3: Once per turn, when a Spell/Trap Card effect activates: Negate that activation.
Effect 4: During your or your opponent's End Phase: Set 1 "Exodiaz" Spell/Trap from your Deck.
Effect 5: During your Standby Phase: You lose 1000 LP.]
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