Gekiha Dan – Episode 38

Not that I’m owed anything by a series that existed long before this review was even a thought at the back of my mind. But I find it to be extremely rude that my battles keep being interrupted halfway!

Anyway, last episode we came to the delightful revelation that 2 siblings who act like a married couple… Are infact the reincarnation of 2 lovers who died right before being married and got unlucky enough to reincarnate in the bodies of Human siblings.

As long as we can be mature enough to understand that yes this is weird and no we’re not into it, we can move on knowing it’s what we have. We can stew about the reasons one might want to write this kind of subplot at a time where it’s relevant.

Thankfully nothing so blatantly controversial as the series main rival being fated to suffer through a long limbo until he reincarnates if he doesn’t marry his sister ever happens again…

Now where we we? Ah yes, it’s Leon vs Yuuki.

Leon is on a single life left while Yuuki has 3.

But Leon’s just summoned The Providence Hououga and launched an attack, and Yuuki’s entire board is exhausted.

Clackey for some reason takes issue with Yuuki choosing to take from the life here..

The guy’s got THREE, Hououga can’t refresh as it’s at Lv1, there’s no issue with taking a life here.

Not with that hand. We saw Yuuki’s hand last episode, it consisted of Mist Curtain, High Elixir, and an additional copy of Sacred Laevateinn.

His aim is to not waste valuable magic like Mist Curtain on a Hououga that can only attack once, if Yuuki saves it for when Hououga is Level 3 then he can blank a turn where he’d almost assuredly die.

Yuuki takes from the life, dropping to a nice crispy 2.

Yuuki’s currently in an excellent position, and his hand keeps him rather save, I don’t really see a need for this amount of faith, though in this case it’s well placed.

Leon attacks with Amenborg, Yuuki could use High Elixir here but he’d have to give up both his Spirits to gain the lives, it’s a much more attractive prospect to wait until next turn to blow his defense magic, meaning he has this turn and next turn to fish out a victory.

Teetering on the edge of 1 life each, this means that no attacks can be carelessly ignored now, the game state has just become interesting.

A person’s gameplay very much changes when they’re on 1 life, no longer able to hide behind the safety of taking lives, but given it’s late game, Core is almost always available.

Full Power, Trading blows, where a single mistake costs you, oh the adrenaline!

on Leon’s End Step, The Fruit of Wise Tree activates it’s Lv2 effect, refreshing every single one of Leon’s spirits.

Leon’s turn is now over.

We interrupt this battle to go back to whatever the hell Suzuri was doing with Magisa’s bike.

Ah, so that’s the plan, they need to destroy the barrier so their big ship can get moving.

Kazan points out rather casually that they’d need to bust through the barrier and get on The Golden Lion in order to disable it.

In essence, the Barrier can’t be disabled from the inside.

When Magisa drops the “Just do it, LOL”, Kazan basically speaks for me.

There’s a slight problem with a Plan to get outside the barrier to disable it… when the Barrier is intended to keep those inside from getting out of it.

Is anyone other than me thinking that Magisa’s Magic gets less “Washed out” as the plot requires more nonsense?

Nine?

We already know that Suzuri, Hyoudo and Zungurii are on the demolition team, and we know that Dan, Clackey, Mai and Magisa are rescuing Kajitsu.

Kazan’s being mission control for the Demolition team, what’s Serge doing-

…Actually don’t answer that, Serge deserves a break

It seems that once the topic came up, Suzuri AND Kenzo both immediately demanded to be on the team to destroy the barrier.

Well given they specialize in Swift and Demolish, this fits pretty well.

When Mai prods them for why they want to be the ones to destroy the barrier, they give this rather strange answer.

…Guys you knocked Belga the fuck out, you are BOTH due free coffees for the rest of your lives. Nothing could be more useful than taking a Metal pipe to the back of that twat’s cranium.

Zungurii naturally has been sitting around unable to do much damage in spite of being 99% of the reason Dan is here in the first place, he naturally wants to help out AND get that sweet catharsis while he’s at it.

Gods, I feel like Magisa has mentioned the name of her bike before but it’s called the “Superketta”?

Not the best at names are you, Magisa?

Damn guys, straight for the throat?

At least Zungurii wants to ride it.

If it doesn’t give me +1 on my attack rolls and let me overcome magic resistances, it’s going in the Bag of Holding.

Also that guy behind Magisa loooks like he’s evaluating the life decisions he made to somehow have the exact same boss with a completely different goal.

Probably feels like just last week he was pointing a gun at these guys, now he’s helping them.

It seems like the “Superketta” has the ability to essentially turn all the energy invested into pedalling into magical energy, with that energy they can smash through the barrier.

So it works like one of those eco-bikes, except the energy the bike generates goes back into the bike rather than powering your TV.

Suzuri puts his all into pedalling the Superketta, as a result, his Blue Symbol starts to appear, recognizing the effort he’s investing.

There’s a brief moment of hilarity where he stops pedalling and the Superketta falls incredibly slowly.

But that’s quickly corrected as he gets back into it.

They even get a cool rainbow coloured barrier, now to somehow ram this thing through the barrier.

Also there’s like a sick guitar riff playing through this entire sequence.

So you know how I asked what Serge was doing? Apparently it was tying up every single soldier they defeated to rocks.

Jesus, he gets the most tedious of the tasks.

Also look at Belga’s grumpy ass face.

The Destruction Team finally make it beyond the barrier after generating enough Magical energy.

This anime does dabble in comedy, it wouldn’t be out of place if they just dropped out of the sky because they stopped pedalling to do a fist pump.

Yuuki Turn 9, 4 core steps, 4 lives lost, and 3 core gained from Reload Cores, he’s working with a total of 15 core.

He starts by levelling up Walhalance and Fjalar both to Lv3.

Walhalance attacks.

As it’s now at Lv3, a potent effect activates, Walhalance returns every one of Leon’s Spirits with 4000 BP or less to the hand.

Amenborg fits the bill, so it’s returned to Leon’s hand.

The issue with this is that Amenborg is a Swift Spirit, meaning it’s very easy for Leon to simply resummon.

Assuming he didn’t put 3 core on Hououga just to fail to reach it’s Level 2 which requires 4 core, Leon should be capable of re-summoning Amenborg back at the level it was originally.

Also my favourite theme is playing, still have no idea what it is but I want to know!

Looks like Leon’s designating Hououga to block, if he was planning to chump block, he could resummon Amenborg at Lv1.

Which means this isn’t the kind of assumption you should be making! Yuuki!

Also seems like I was wrong, Leon did add the 3 core leftover all to Hououga.

On his last turn, Leon spent a total of 8 core, 1 to summon Amenborg, and 7 to summon Hououga, this turn he spent 1 to use Nature Forces, seems he only added 1 core to Hououga though, as he moved 9 core from the Trash back to it.

Walhalance doesn’t even compare to a fully levelled Vanity Deity.

Bit early to say, Yuuki still has 2 potential avenues for defense.

Plus we don’t know what card he true, and he hasn’t spent any of his core.

Yuuki ends his turn.

Let’s get an update on how our up and coming bikers are doing?

You can say that again…

I certainly hope they know how they plan to actually do that, is there a switch? Or do they just kick it until it explodes?

Guess they’ll break that window when they get to it.

Speaking of…

I suppose the windows are necessary for the people inside to be able to fucking see but god damn at least guarantee they’re as reinforced as the ones on the cockpit.

Then again the Golden Lion is so astronomically large compared to any other Core Ship that the builders probably went “Fuck it, if anything goes wrong its on you.”

Well I’d expect it to be.

Along with the rest of the ship I’d imagine. Surely they didn’t put all their eggs in one basket.

What’s this? A competently organized separation of assigned forces? You shouldn’t have!

I’m not sure what’s funnier, the fact that Zungurii goes full Mario Kart on these guys.

Or the fact that Stormtrooper logic means that any given standardized henchman has enough empty space in their heads to give a Hot air balloon lift.

Bewitching Turn 10.

Leon summons The HellSacred Gungnir at Lv2.

I do wonder what the lore reason for the existence of such a card is. If the Sacred Gungnir is the Lance of the White King, what on earth is HellSacred Gungnir? How does it exist? How’d it come about?

Leon moves to the attack step, declaring that Hououga attack.

Hoo boy, It’s Lv3 effect involves sending Core from the reserve to the void… Leon’s got 19 core to work with total, 10 are on Hououga, 3 are on a Nexus, he’s just spent 3, and placed 2 on HellSacred Gungnir.

…Hououga’s only refreshing once this turn?

Yuuki’s got more than enough core for this, even with only 1 reduction.

Yuuki uses High Elixir, moving 2 cores from his reserve back to his life.

To be fair they could have left it at this and I would have lost my shit laughing.

“I use High Elixir”
“Oh.”

Leon may be an absolute prick and rely on rather unfair tactics, but he’s not an idiot, he’s probably aware of the calculation I just drew.

Yuuki restores 2 lives.

Yuuki, quite comfortably, loses another life, now in spite of this being the 5th life he’s lost this game.

Yuuki has 2 lives remaining.

Clackey ponders if Leon would have done a Full attack this turn if Yuuki didn’t have High Elixir as if it was ever a question.

Yuuki had 1 blocker and 1 life, Leon had 2 spirits.

Math is hard.

Leon ends his turn, and The Fruit of Wise Tree’s Lv2 effect refreshes Hououga.

Leon asks Yuuki if he regrets the battle…

My guy he wasn’t even going to have a battle initially, he was just going to give himself up, just like that.

It seems like Otherworld King’s answer to losing the Red Horizon Ladder, as he’s alluded to having Dan do before… Is to just build another one.

It seems like Leon is confirming that the completion of the Horizon Ladders means that Kajitsu will come to harm given how they interact with Mother Core.

What, is his dental plan better or something?

My guess is that Otherworld King’s knowledge of Mother Core may lead Yuuki to be able to utilize that knowledge in some way to somehow get Otherworld King his way, while separating Kajitsu’s fate from it.

…But to do that would require Otherworld King to consider Kajitsu’s life a worthwhile enough reward for pursuing an alternative, and I dunno about you, but they’re the reincarnations of 2 people he’s killed once before, and he had no qualms putting a 12 year old boy into a brain-coma.

Kajitsu’s life seems like a small price to pay compared to everything else the guy’s sacrificed.

Dan argues that the Red Horizon Ladder was destroyed, and he won’t allow the construction of a second.

But Leon remarks that it’s only human to try again after failing once before.

Dan was only able to destroy it by stimulating Kajitsu to the point she couldn’t control Mother Core’s power and blew it up.

Dan only needs to fail once for their plan to work.

They can be stubborn because they have the advantage.

Kajitsu interjects, telling Yuuki that Leon’s just trying to make him question his resolve and to ignore him.

Yuuki Turn 11, he summons The Sacred Laevateinn, and passes.

Leon began his turn with 20 core available, 15 of which are used up by cards on his field.

Hououga’s Lv3 effect is to refresh itself by sending a core from your reserve to the void when it snatches a life, it’s ideal to leave as much core in the reserve as possible here.

Though Magisa believes Leon is still hiding behind the naive idea that using Kajitsu’s Key Spirit will somehow bother him.

Hououga attacks.

As taking a life will just cause the attack to repeat, Yuuki blocks using Sacred Laevateinn.

Blocking Hououga however triggers it’s effect at all levels, the powerful Windstorm: 3

Now Yuuki will have to exhaust 3 spirits in addition to the one he blocked with.

Or he would have, if Artifact Fjalar didn’t also have Armor: Green.

Yuuki takes this moment to insult Leon’s intelligence about not knowing Fjalar’s effect.

We know from last episode that Leon was completely unfamiliar with Artifact Fjalar before now, and Yuuki only specified it’s Armor: Red when discussing Victory Fire.

I’m sure it was very skillful, Yuuki did so much skills with that play of… You making a mistake.

This could be a compelling argument, but that extra blocker means you can’t win with the Amenborg in your hand.

Being forced to end your turn sounds very much like “suffering from it”

Laevateinn is destroyed.

At the end of Leon’s turn, The Fruit of Wise Tree’s Lv2 effect refreshes Hououga.

Yuuki Turn 13, he summons his favourite card, The IronKnight Yggdrassil and ends his turn.

It’s effect when summoned would return all Spirits of 3000 BP or less to the hand… If any existed.

Bewitching Turn 14, Leon once again skips his Main Step.

Hououga attacks.

Yuuki uses his last available defense, Mist Curtain.

As Yuuki is unable to block Hououga without putting his Spirits at risk, using Mist Curtain allows him to once again Blank Hououga’s threat, by rendering it incapable of taking lives this turn.

Leon makes a fair statement. At the moment the only thing Yuuki is doing is acting in ways that prevent him from losing. But when winning is impossible, “Not losing” is the only thing you can do.

If Yuuki can stop himself losing he can buy himself time to produce an answer to the current situation.

There’s a rather amusing quirk of some people thinking the answer to their deck building problems is to include more Magic that allows them to stay alive, but it’s important to build a deck that can further it’s own position, not just maintain it.

For the umpteenth time, Leon ends his turn, and his Nexus’ effect refreshes it for blocking.

Such is the way White functions, it is the deck of defense, to be firm until your win condition arrives is the way.

Seems though the cat’s out of the bag, the Rescue Team are getting ready.

If your Magic is so washed up should you really be wasting it on Aesthetics?

I have watched and played enough Dark fantasy to perceive that question as a threat.

Can Magisa replicate actual Battle Spirits Magic in that way? It wouldn’t be surprising if she could but once again, this magic seems less and less Washed out the more it’s necessary.

Fine, tickle my curiosity, I don’t care.

Yuuki Turn 15, well, we can see he drew something incredibly extravagent there.

Kajitsu knows from Yuuki’s demeanor that something good has arrived.

Oh ya, much greater, incredibly deadly as well.

Yuuki levels down Yggdrassil.

Suddenly, and quite from out of nowhere, Yuuki declares Tribute, designating The IronKnight Yggdrassil.

Unfortunately Dan, for this card it was the only viable target for the Tribute.

Yuuki summons… something, he doesn’t actually specify the name of the card he’s played.

We can, however, see it very clearly, and damn is it a beautiful card.

Though those Wings aren’t really Silver, they’re Pink.

Whatever it is that Yuuki’s summoned, Leon has been able to correctly articulate it as an X-Rare… somehow.

If it wasn’t clear, this was the card that was given to Yuuki by Kazan, the card from the Future.

Yuuki ends his turn.

While this is a new card, neither Yuuki nor Leon have specified the card’s name just yet. So I won’t talk about it until the name is explicitly stated.

Whatever it is, Yuuki appears to have summoned it at Lv1? There’s also been no level specified for it.

Unfortunately this new Spirit lacks the BP required to attack safely into a 16000 BP Hououga…

Infact very few things can attack into that Spirit safely, only two other Spirits in this show actually tops it in terms of base BP value. And one of them is the Red Vanity Deity, Catastrophedragon… the Strongest Red X-Rare.

…Yet.

Wait why was holding Kajitsu a requirement for any of this? Is Leon threatening Kajitsu’s safety in some way to force Yuuki to not win?

So far though Yuuki hasn’t made any particularly bad misplays that I can think of.

Speaking of still having Kajitsu, it seems Magisa’s plan has begun.

Mai and Clackey seem to be surrounded in the same floating Magic Orbs that the Superketta can produce it seems like.

From the moment that the Core soldiers begin to do something unexpected, Pantera completely tunnel visions into trying to figure out where Dan has gone.

Not gonna lie but isn’t the magic-casting Witch being missing a little more worrysome?

I suppose Pantera was hoping to duke it out with Dan later, so his escape would be not within his hopes.

Dan arrives with Magisa, gliding on an enlarged version of her hat to stuff Pantera into.

What a completely goofy way to incapacitate somebody.

Kajitsu barely hesitates when it comes to taking Dan’s hand, I see a bond of trust has built between the two.

Also Magisa just dunking on the soldier with her staff the second he tries to maintain a hold on Kajitsu.

Dan’s out here trying to rescue Kajitsu and Clackey’s out here doing god damn Naruto moves.

Also look at Kajitsu’s modest little shoes, they’re adorable!

Rescue operation complete.

I’m sure Yuuki’s been “Going all out” the entire time, but at least now Leon doesn’t have the leverage if he wished to use it.

Is it just me or does Pantera look incredibly pleased with himself for getting nabbed for no discernable reason?

Seems Leon was intending to use Kajitsu as a hostage incase things got bad, Leon had set up not one but 2 methods of insurance.

Pantera finds the situation as amusing as it looked.

Dan makes a clear suggestion, given that they’re in the recent habit of turning enemies into friends, and Dan is fully aware that Pantera’s number one function is to defeat Otherworld King, Dan offers Pantera the opportunity to join them.

It’s within his parameters to find a strategy to defeat the guy, plus he’d be amongst humans willing to teach him more about being human.

Seems something actively prevents Pantera from betraying Otherworld King in that regard, either love for his creator? Or perhaps a failsafe.

Pantera’s decided his work here is done. He didn’t do anything, but his work here is done.

Though, it depends where Pantera’s leaving to, is it possible he intends to usurp the destruction team from taking out the Golden Lion’s barrier?

Or is he just straight up deciding Leon’s a bitch and he’s going home?

Dan is… somewhat skeptical of Pantera’s words, he’s a Robot, so he’s used to speaking very plainly, though he can lie he probably won’t if he doesn’t gain anything from it.

Pantera didn’t say he didn’t want to or didn’t see a reason to, he didn’t even outright refuse, he said he couldn’t.

Now the mystery is “Why is he unable?”

Back to Grand-Lolo 3, Blue World Drift.

Seems the Superketta survived the initial crash and Zungurii’s distraction allowed them to get going again.

Damn these guys are trained, they can really outrun a Magic-powered super-bike?

My guy your systems are down, how the hell are you cutting off the lock to the door from there?

This is an incredibly sensitive operation, I don’t believe dumb ideas like ramming it are going to-

…I suppose who needs logic when you have whatever’s powering these dudes’ braincells.

Kazan means physically, though I believe the question is also valid mentally.

Yeah but now the door is bust.

And without a door, stopping those guys from storming you is going to be rather difficult.

There is a slight problem with that, there are DUDES coming up on them!

This is a lovely time to not know what a Panel is in the middle of an INFILTRATION

Why the hell would Kazan, one of Yuuki’s soldiers, know the password to a Panel on a ship he’s not typically stationed on?

You’d think Leon would use his own set given how much he dislikes Yuuki.

Also it looks like the door has other doors as part of it for extra nonsense, because apparently that’s a thing.

They’ve got a Door that can lock using a standard locking mechanism and an additional door just for extra locking. Mhm.

…Cool, how do you get out now without getting captured?

…Take it out?

…Or just learn to code an entirely separate system from our electricity based energy.

I suppose given it’s human wisdom and the Core systems are used for power, presumably a human-designed operating system based on Core energy would be designed as something familiar I guess.

What programming language d’ya reckon they use?

Kenzo inputs the data from Kazan, the Core shuts off and therefore the Barrier is gone!

Seems the “Barrier” mainly caused an issue with the Ship’s operating system, which is why they couldn’t take off with it, but the Superketta, a manual bike that utilizes Core energy and doesn’t have any kind of programming like that, functioned normally.

Seems like the Barrier was entirely intended to keep ships using a Core system OS, such as The Violet, or Yuuki’s own ship, from performing any sort of actions.

We have liftoff!

I am impressed that they somehow managed to re-open the door, get on the Superketta, and start cycling away in spite of the fact that the door was surrounded by soldiers.

As Yuuki’s ship takes off, it bumps The Golden Lion.

Seems that in spite of it’s size that bump was enough to knock it off it’s axis.

And it doesn’t seem like the Golden Lion does well when not upright.

Forget coming out of the window you came in, let’s break a second window, that’ll show em.

Kenzo, Suzuri and Zungurii are safely out at least.

I can only presume that The Golden Lion is so astronomically big that no one ever really thinks of trying to charge it or resist it.

As a result it’s protocol for handling situations like it being fucking capsized are probably minimal, especially when perhaps the only ships large enough to achieve it are ones owned by Otherworld King.

Seems Leon left his book behind, oh boy I wonder what he’d do if he lost it.

Bewitching Turn 16, he skips his Main step for a 3rd turn in a row, and attacks with Hououga.

Surely this time he’ll get it, right? Right?

And it seems they just didn’t say the name during the summon for effect, or the level for that matter, but says the name here as if we always new

alright I’ll review the damn card.

The WingDeity Grand-Woden is the White X-Rare from BS08. A Tribute Spirit requiring a Spirit of Cost 5 or greater. Unsurprisingly for Yuuki’s aces, it hails from the Armed Machine and Mounted Warrior families.

It holds a Double Symbol, meaning it can provide 2 White reductions on it’s own and take 2 lives at once.

At all levels it holds a completely new White Keyword introduced this set, Ice Wall. Like Armor, a Spirit with Ice Wall holds the ability targeted towards a certain colour, if the opponent uses a Magic of that colour during their own turn, you can negate that Magic by exhausting the Spirit.

Grand-Woden holds the Ice Wall keyword… for all colours. Meaning if the opponent uses any Magic during their own turn, Grand-Woden is free to negate it by exhausting itself.

“But if I can only use it on their turn, then I can’t attack with the Double symbol”

Sure you can, that’s what the next effect is for.

At Levels 2 and up, Grand-Woden gains a nasty effect for any Spirit holding 2 symbols, it refreshes anytime a differently named Armed Machine is exhausted.

Meaning as long as you end with it refreshed, you can totally attack and negate magic freely. Or go balls to the wall and swing multiple times with 2 Symbols.

Anyway, notably, Yuuki has summoned Grand-Woden at Lv3, so it’s BP is 10000.

As an aside, Grand-Woden has the naming convention of Grand-Lolo, but “Woden” is an alternative naming for “Odin”. To call this “Grand-Odin” however would imply it’s an evolution of the ImpregnableFortress Odin, the White X-Rare from BS01, which it isn’t.

Also also, Walhalance is named after “Valhalla”, Odin’s palace that housed the Spirits of Heroes and Warriors, and Gungnir is Odin’s Spear. In this show’s case, referring to the White King’s Armor and Weapon.

To refer to this card by Odin’s name itself then would suggest this represents the White King’s Soul. The naming scheme of Grand-Lolo being attached to it could reference Yuuki’s goal of having a world suited for him, a World where he and Kajitsu can marry.

Which gives a strong implication that the man in the future was indeed the reincarnation of Yuuki Momose, which is also foreshadowing that whatever Yuuki’s mission is… He won’t succeed.

It’s possible Yuuki knew this, but intends to fight his grim fate regardless of how bleak it looks, or the proof of his failure.

This is of course, less than Hououga’s 16000 BP, there’s a 6000 BP gap to clear there.

As Hououga’s been blocked by Grand-Woden, Windstorm activates.

Unfortunately, the only target, Fjalar, has Armor to Green, and so isn’t exhausted

Yuuki now activates Fjalar’s effect during Flash timing, now by exhausting it, Fjalar can add it’s BP to a different Armed Machine, this emulates the Walhalance power boost by shoving the effect onto the card to be exhausted rather than the card which would benefit.

Grand-Woden gains 5000 BP, totalling a whopping 15000 now.

In addition, since the exhausted Fjalar was an Armed Machine, Grand-Woden refreshes.

He did, and that’s bad news for you.

You really think he’d exhaust Fjalar pointlessly to close a gap if he didn’t have something else?

During Flash timing, Yuuki uses Avalanche Aura.

Now Grand-Woden has a total of 17000 BP!

Needless to say, Hououga’s 16000 BP isn’t going to cut it this time!

Leon responds-

Also holy shit the card models look so clean, makes me real happy.

anyway, Leon uses Mobius Loop during Flash timing.

Mobius Loop is White Magic from BS03, naturally its been used during Flash timing, so Leon only wants that 2000 BP battle boost, but during the Main Step it lets you bounce a nexus to the hand, and if that Nexus belonged to your opponent you get a Core in your Trash.

It’s good against defensive Nexus strategies that might annoy the crap out of you, Purple Nexuses have a tendency to be quite imposing on the way you’re allowed to play.

If this goes through, Hououga will be granted a BP of 18000 and then Grand-Woden will be destroyed.

Unfortunately for Leon, Grand-Woden is refreshed.

Yuuki activates Grand-Woden’s Ice Wall: White, Grand-Woden now exhausts itself in order to negate the Magic that was just used.

So Mobius Loop doesn’t have any effect, Hououga doesn’t gain 2000 BP, Leon doesn’t pass go, and doesn’t collect 200 dollars.

Hououga is destroyed.

It’s one thing to not have the out.

It’s another thing entirely to have the out and get wrecked anyway.

Leon gets called out by Yuuki over his handling of Hououga, Yuuki states that the way Hououga was controlled wasn’t done in the way Kajitsu would have, Kajitsu has a playstyle that’s slow and patient, like the acting of a “beautiful and sweet poison”, a description Kajitsu uses herself.

Leon’s playstyle however, has been a series of exploited assumptions, one after another, each choice from the moment he selected Green as his deck of choice was intended to force Yuuki to draw assumptions for Leon to exploit for a series of small advantages. Such as whipping out off-colour cards, and choosing continuously not to support Hououga with supplementary spirits just to annoy Yuuki.

Hell even outside the game Leon was attempting to rig the fact that the battle hadn’t been decided and therefore until it had, he could do precisely whatever the hell he wanted. Having not yet been bound by any sort of rule.

“Sinister” might be an understatement, and though I like Leon’s style, there’s no reality more fitting for a character like him other than total failure. Such is catharsis

Kajitsu’s happy, given that Yuuki said the equivalent of “My Sister who literally can’t eat anything that isn’t sweet and passes out if she loses her temper plays Hououga better than you”

While Yuuki does have 2 lives remaining, remember that Leon’s been holding onto an Amenborg this entire time since Yuuki returned it to his hand.

10 core just got dumped into his reserve, there is nothing stopping him from Swift summoning it.

Leon lines up the attack with HellSacred Gungnir.

During Flash timing however, Yuuki uses Chivalry

Yuuki refreshes all his Spirits, the only downside being that he can only attack with the Mounted Warriors refreshed with it’s effect…

Which would be rather difficult to do on his opponent’s attack step.

Due to being low on core, Fjalar’s supply is needed, dropping it to Lv2.

It seems Yuuki was choosing a far less aggressive style of play because of Kajitsu’s situation, now however he’s throwing card after card with zero regard or cares.

HellSacred Gungnir didn’t have a chance in hell. It’s destroyed.

Surprisingly, HellSacred Gungnir’s effect to raise it’s Cost when selected for a Tribute makes it an ideal target for Grand-Woden.

How… strange.

Leon blurts out some uncomfortable laughter, before screaming that his card is waiting for Yuuki’s next attack.

We know one of the cards in Leon’s hand is Amenborg, but when Leon knows he can defend he usually doesn’t lose his composure like that

it’s possible that Amenborg is the only response he has, and that alone isn’t sufficient to stop Grand-Woden’s attack, given once Fjalar swings it will be able to do so again.

Either way, Leon ends his turn.

Yuuki Turn 17.

Yuuki, probably to mock Leon, skips his main step.

Fjalar attacks, which is a strange choice as Grand-Woden can refresh when any other Armed Machine Spirit exhausts.

During Flash Timing, Leon summons the Amenborg I’ve been going on about since just about forever at Lv2.

Yuuki didn’t even level Fjalar here, so both spirits are destroyed as they share 4000 BP.

It’s impossible to show due to the framed nature, but Leon here is shaking immensely in spite of the goofy smile on his face.

Yuuki declares an attack with Grand-Woden, causing the sky to shatter.

Leon admits defeat, and demands that Grand-Woden defeat him.

Grand-Woden is, certainly, one of the prettier spirits designed by the artists at this time, it’s a very pristine looking spirit, very sleek, compared to the rough edges concerning the likes of Walhalance, Thor, etcetera.

Leon takes from the life, dropping from 1 life to 0.

Yuuki is the winner!

Apparently my Partner waltzed in while I was writing this bit, and wanted to let everyone know something about the Otherworld King’s Soldiers

“Their Helmets look stupid”

End of announcement.

It appears that Leon doesn’t really care about any of his failures so long as his copy of “Otherworld Observations” is preserved, though I don’t really know what it is about that book that makes Leon cling to it while being as much of a dick as he is.

Something tells me The Golden Lion isn’t leaving port for a good while…

Time to relay good news, firstly, Zungurii excitedly relays that they were succesful in removing the barrier.

…Which I feel should be self evident given they’re currently in flight so y’know, bit tautological to say now.

The result of the battle is not so self evident to Suzuri and Kenzo however as we don’t know if they’ve seen Yuuki or Kajitsu in the meantime.

Ah ruin the mood why don’t ya Magisa?

Oh, right, those.

…I’m not gonna lie I briefly and completely forgot about them, even though they were discussed last episode.

Oh come on Kenzo you were part of the lecture in the previous episode

And more than that, they’re the excuse Otherworld King uses to subjugate the Otherworlders, forcing them into slavery to get them built, and MORE than that, the side effects of Mother Core’s “Rejuvenation” is that Kajitsu becomes deathly ill.

I’m sorry this could be a meme format in and of itself that’s fucking hilarious.

Kazan being completely impassioned about asking what they can do about the Horizon Ladders only for Yuuki to say “We got a plan” and Kazan immediately swings his head around.

It’s just so funny.

Dan drops this cold as hell line. Tickling the Blood knight in me there buddy.

Got a plan for that? Tell me how you plan to destroy them all!

Dan first prefaces that he has absolutely zero idea what this will do to Mother Core.

And by extension, Kajitsu.

Well that solves that problem.

Kajitsu quells Yuuki’s concerns about this, stating that this time around, they have to live on for people beyond just each other.

Oh wow, this late in and we have more Toppa references?

If you’re not quite familiar, in Toppa there were 6 Core systems in 6 stadiums that needed disabling, this is kind of like that, 6 Horizon Ladders need destroying.

No one but you Core soldiers have tried.

Well I suppose the Mazoku have also tried, shame that it seems only Humans can bear the Core’s Light.

Imagine if a Mazoku received it? Otherworld King would be browning his pants.

Magisa asks the obvious question.

This… answers the question slightly but not totally but it’s fine!

Dan intends to send each of the Core Soldiers to a different Horizon Ladder I imagine, each one will be individually tasked with the complete annihilation of said Horizon Ladder.

Though it seems this shot of Otherworld King at this time suggests to me that this guy very clearly knows they’re coming… The question becomes not if he’ll try something, but what?

But that my friends, is a discussion for next episode.

It’s clear to me by the fact that this episode did not seem padded in any way that the presence of the 2-part episode was necessary for ensuring that the story could be told without rushing any facets of it.

I’ll retract my earlier complaint last episode about it being a 2-parter, though I really dislike 2-parters.

In any case, right now we’re moving on from Leon and heading into the endgame as we inch closer to that ever-climactic episode 50.

Anyway, let’s have a look at our card of the day!

What else would it be, if not The WingDeity Grand-Woden?

It’s not a stretch to say that this card, in particular, is incredibly strong. It can wage many attacks on your turn, and provide an immense amount of defense on the opponents given it can refresh on any Armed Machine exhaust, and negate Magic as long as it’s not exhausted.

It’s reductions are quite generous too, normally a Cost 8 Spirit has around 4 reductions but Grand-Woden has 5, making it’s minimum cost 3.

It does have weaknesses though, namely that it’s offense can be interrupted if you use Magic when White attacks, which is perfectly fitting given that White’s main weaknesses are meant to be shifting to an aggressive position, being vulnerable during that offense is entirely in-character for the colour.

There is also the issue of Tribute, this keyword is dropped sometime after the next Saga of cards, this saga being the “Booster Set Saga” and the next Saga being the “Constellation Saga”

I may have mentioned in Toppa but Tribute is an immense detriment as it requires you to give up something powerful in order to obtain something powerful, that is presumably the point but there are various cards that are strong which don’t require such prohibitive costs.

Just to put into perspective how much Tribute was disliked even at this time, BS08 introduced a number of cards that allowed you to ignore Tribute costs, BlackAmenborg discussed last episode was one, Dark-Crimson debuted a while ago was another, but there was even a series of these.

BS08, the same set Grand-Woden released, produced a series of cards, 1 per colour, that enabled you to simply ignore Tribute. It’s not like in the case of BlackAmenborg where you needed to designate it as a target, Platinum could ignore the tribute of say, Dark-Siegfried entirely, no Cost 6 card even needed, as long as you didn’t use an effect when it was summoned, it was free reign.

All of these were in the Dragon Knight family and all share “DragonRider” in their title. This also means that Dark-Crimson was capable of summoning these Spirits off of it’s own effect. The White Platinam was given some favouritism however as it’s the only member of it’s series who’s 2nd effect isn’t a direct form of support for the Dragon Emperor family. Meaning it was right at home in Grand-Woden decks without having any of it’s effects wasted.

Anyway I’ve rambled plenty, I’ll see you guys in the next one, buh-bye.