Chapter 151. The Ancient Gears' Constant Topdecks! Yata-Garasu's Infinite Loop—"Old Ai" Takes the Win!
Short video clip.
The opponent, the King of Ancient Gears, only pondered for a moment before beginning to draw.
King of Ancient Gears: "My turn! Draw!"
King of Ancient Gears: "I Normal Summon [Ancient Gear Commander]!"
King of Ancient Gears: "I activate its effect to send [Ancient Gear Golem] from my Deck to the Graveyard, then Special Summon [Ancient Gear Tanker]!"
King of Ancient Gears: "I'll use [Ancient Gear Tanker]'s effect!"
King of Ancient Gears: "I Special Summon [Ancient Gear Dark Golem] from my hand, ignoring its Summoning conditions!"
King of Ancient Gears: "I activate [Ancient Gear Commander]'s effect—when I Normal or Special Summon [Ancient Gear Golem], I can activate it."
King of Ancient Gears: "I Special Summon [Ancient Gear Golem] from my Graveyard, ignoring its Summoning conditions."
King of Ancient Gears: "I activate Dark Golem's effect to add [Ancient Gear Advance] and [Ancient Gear Fusion] from my Deck!"
King of Ancient Gears: "I activate [Ancient Gear Fusion]!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "I activate [The Unstoppable Exodia Incarnate]'s effect!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "Your Ancient Gear Fusion is negated."
King of Ancient Gears: "Then I'll Link the Dark Golem and Commander on my field!"
King of Ancient Gears: "Link-2 confirmed! [Ancient Gear Ballista]!"
King of Ancient Gears: "I activate Ballista's effect."
King of Ancient Gears: "I add [Ancient Gear Golem] from my Deck."
King of Ancient Gears: "I activate [Ancient Gear Advance] and add [Ancient Gear Duel]!"
King of Ancient Gears: "Continue with Advance! I Tribute [Ancient Gear Ballista] to draw 1 card!"
King of Ancient Gears: "I activate [Ancient Gear Tanker] to destroy Advance! So my Ancient Gears gain 600 ATK."
King of Ancient Gears: "I activate [Ancient Gear Commander] in the Graveyard—banish it to directly equip [Ancient Gear Duel] from my hand!"
GX world.
Seeing this string of plays, students and teachers at Duel Academy who had half-forgotten Ancient Gears watched this sequence and their expressions instantly changed.
After confirming that Commander's effect really worked like that, they realized these Ancient Gears were not the Ancient Gears they knew.
Professor Chronos' Ancient Gears—that was the build they were familiar with.
What they were seeing now felt familiar, yet foreign.
King of Ancient Gears: "I activate the Trap [Ancient Gear Duel]!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "I activate the Trap! [Wrathful Inferno: Exozodo Flame Cannon]!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "By its effect, I unconditionally destroy all the cards on your field!"
King of Ancient Gears: "No matter."
King of Ancient Gears: "I activate this Spell!"
King of Ancient Gears: "[Power Bond]!"
King of Ancient Gears: "I fuse the Ancient Gear Golem in my hand with 2 copies of [Ancient Gear Wyvern]!"
King of Ancient Gears: "Come forth! [Ultimate Ancient Gear Golem]!"
King of Ancient Gears: "By Power Bond's effect, [Ultimate Ancient Gear Golem]'s ATK is 9400!"
King of Ancient Gears: "I also activate the Continuous Spell [Ancient Gear Fortress]!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "I see! So strong!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "Too strong! I have no choice but to activate this Trap!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "[Tri-and-Guess]!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "I declare Synchro!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "As long as my Extra Deck has more Synchro Monsters than yours, I recover 3000 LP!"
Compare Synchros?
All the duelists pulled odd faces at once.
For Synchros, Ancient Gear decks basically don't pack them.
Most of their focus is Fusion.
But Old Ai of the Millennium probably doesn't run that many Synchros either, right?
In other words, it's hard to tell whose Extra Deck has more of the declared type this time.
Just as they were thinking that, Old Ai's Extra Deck immediately revealed his Synchro lineup.
[Shooting Quasar Dragon] ×3. [Cosmic Blazar Dragon] ×3.
[Cosmic Quasar Dragon] ×3. [Stardust Sifr Divine Dragon] ×3.
King of Ancient Gears: "?"
King of Ancient Gears: "Why the heck are you running so many Stardust bosses?"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "What do you know?"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "This is called the Stardust dream!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "Looks like mine's higher!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "My Life Points—recover 3000!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "So my Old Ai's final ATK is 11,000!"
King of Ancient Gears: "Oh? Interesting."
King of Ancient Gears: "Then I activate a Quick-Play Spell!"
King of Ancient Gears: "[Limiter Removal]!"
King of Ancient Gears: "My [Ultimate Ancient Gear Golem]'s ATK doubles to 18,800!"
King of Ancient Gears: "Battle Phase!"
King of Ancient Gears: "Old Ai? Kami?"
King of Ancient Gears: "I destroy your Old Ai directly."
King of Ancient Gears: "You take 7800."
King of Ancient Gears: "At the end of my turn, by Limiter Removal's drawback, the Ultimate Golem is destroyed."
King of Ancient Gears: "I trigger the Ultimate Golem's last effect to bring out [Ancient Gear Golem]!"
King of Ancient Gears: "Your move."
Both sides went crazy ramping up ATK.
In the end, Ancient Gears seized the advantage.
King of Ancient Gears LP: 3600.
Old Ai of the Millennium LP: 3200.
Old Ai of the Millennium: "My turn! Draw!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "I'll activate [Millennium Cross] again!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "Its effect presents the Five Old Ai—I'll bring out [The Unstoppable Exodia Incarnate] again!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "I activate the Spell [Demon God Flame Cannon]!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "I can pay half my LP to destroy all cards in both players' Spell & Trap Zones."
Old Ai of the Millennium: "After that, I can treat the five Forbidden One monsters in my hand/Deck each as Equip Spells that raise this card's ATK by 2000."
Old Ai of the Millennium: "Come! Exodia the Forbidden One! Left Arm of the Forbidden One! Right Arm of the Forbidden One! Left Leg of the Forbidden One! Right Leg of the Forbidden One!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "All of you—equip!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "[The Unstoppable Exodia Incarnate]'s final ATK is 10,000!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "Exodia Cannon!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "Battle Phase! Attack!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "This attack inflicts piercing! Face the wrath of the dark archmage!"
King of Ancient Gears: "I activate [Destiny HERO – Dynatag] in my hand!"
King of Ancient Gears: "During damage calculation when monsters battle, I discard this card."
King of Ancient Gears: "The battle damage I would take becomes 0, and both players take 1000 damage."
Old Ai of the Millennium: "Damn! You're actually packing HERO cards?"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "You almost killed me!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "But it's fine! Your Ancient Gear still gets destroyed!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "My turn ends."
At this point, a sudden Destiny HERO card out of the Ancient Gears left Professor Chronos from the GX world stunned.
Wait, what?
An Ancient Gear deck, and you're running Destiny HERO?
Moreover, not even a piece that goes into Destroy Phoenix Enforcer lines, but a pure hand trap?
That said, it's understandable.
At least with this line, he successfully blocked all the damage.
He also put the opponent down to 600 LP.
The advantage kept widening.
But a problem arose.
The Ancient Gear player had no hand.
"Mamma mia! No way! He's out of hand resources!"
"This is bad."
"He can only rely on the heart of the cards?!"
Professor Chronos tensed up at once.
It wasn't easy to run into someone who shared his faith in Ancient Gears.
He couldn't lose.
King of Ancient Gears: "My turn! A destined draw!"
King of Ancient Gears: "Draw!"
King of Ancient Gears: "The card I drew is [Ultimate Slayer]!"
King of Ancient Gears: "I activate it!"
King of Ancient Gears: "I shuffle your Old Ai back into the Deck!"
King of Ancient Gears: "Hahaha! Looks like I'm still a step ahead!"
King of Ancient Gears: "Alright, I end my turn!"
Old Ai of the Millennium nearly coughed up old blood on the spot.
What was that?!
Old Ai can negate Spells/Traps.
Old Ai can't be destroyed by monster effects.
Old Ai has over ten thousand ATK.
With all those resistances, he still topdecked a card that answers it.
The key with Ultimate Slayer is the opponent cannot activate monster effects in response to its activation.
Old Ai of the Millennium: "My turn, draw one card."
Old Ai of the Millennium: "I activate [Pot of Duality]!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "Reveal three, pick one; I choose to add [Legacy of the Duelist]!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "I activate this Continuous Spell!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "My turn ends."
King of Ancient Gears: "My turn! I continue to believe my Deck will respond!"
King of Ancient Gears: "Draw!"
King of Ancient Gears: "The card I drew is [Overload Fusion]!"
King of Ancient Gears: "Hahaha! The Deck responded again!"
King of Ancient Gears: "I can banish monsters from my Graveyard as Fusion Material to Fusion Summon a DARK Machine Fusion Monster."
King of Ancient Gears: "Come forth! [Chaos Ancient Gear Giant]!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "Useless! This Continuous Spell has an effect!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "As long as it's in the Spell & Trap Zone, each player can Set only 1 Spell/Trap from hand per turn, and monsters Special Summoned from the Extra Deck cannot attack that turn!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "I suppose your next words will be 'there's a bug…'"
King of Ancient Gears: "I enter the Battle Phase!"
King of Ancient Gears: "My Chaos Ancient Gear Giant attacks directly!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "What the—there is a bug!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "Why can your Giant still attack?!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "Hold it! That card is unaffected by Spells/Traps!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "Fine, fine! But your Giant doesn't have the triple-negate!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "Open the Trap! [Primite Howl]!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "I declare the Normal Monster [Left Leg of the Forbidden One], then Special Summon it from the Graveyard in Defense Position!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "And battle damage this turn becomes 0!"
King of Ancient Gears: "I destroy your Left Leg."
King of Ancient Gears: "I end my turn."
Old Ai of the Millennium: "I activate the Spell [Draw of Fate]!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "Since my LP are lower and the highest-ATK monster is on your field, I can activate this."
Old Ai of the Millennium: "I reveal three cards with different names from my Deck; they're shuffled and returned to the top."
Old Ai of the Millennium: "Then I draw one."
Old Ai of the Millennium: "Since your luck was so good—able to flip the game twice—then I can, too!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "The card I draw is [Dinowrestler Pankratops]!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "I Special Summon Pankratops, Tribute it, and destroy your Chaos Giant!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "My turn ends."
At this moment, both sides were competing to see who could topdeck harder.
Ancient Gears, with two turns of sheer ripping, successfully brought the advantage back.
But it was quickly overturned again by Old Ai's three-card victory formula off [Draw of Fate].
Many duelists from the DM world couldn't help but suck in a sharp breath.
As expected from high-tier worlds' duels.
Who would've thought these people could resonate with their Decks like that.
So the question now: both players were out of hand.
Next turn, the Ancient Gear player would have to rip again.
But the two cards sitting on Old Ai's field were both cards selected by [Draw of Fate]—the only difference would be their order.
In other words, the next few turns would decide the winner.
King of Ancient Gears: "My turn! O gods! Help me once more!"
King of Ancient Gears: "Draw! I draw [Ancient Gear Fortress]!"
King of Ancient Gears: "Curses! I end my turn!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "The remaining two cards I chose are both on top of my Deck."
Old Ai of the Millennium: "It seems the gods won't favor you twice."
Old Ai of the Millennium: "This draw of yours has already foretold my victory."
Old Ai of the Millennium: "That's right—the card I draw next is [Upstart Goblin]!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "And when I activate it, you gain 1000 LP!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "I'll then draw into the last arranged card!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "That card is [Yata-Garasu]!"
Yata-Garasu?
The instant they saw the card, duelists across all worlds were stunned at first, then their expressions shifted.
That's right—this is the very card once released from the forbidden room.
A card that once enabled an infinite loop, leaving the opponent with no cards to draw.
And then—with 200 ATK—it would slowly peck the opponent to death, one turn at a time.
No, wait.
Hold on.
The Ancient Gear opponent had exactly zero cards in hand.
Which means, as Yata-Garasu's attacks continue, he'll never replenish resources again.
No way.
Old Ai of the Millennium: "I Normal Summon this card."
Old Ai of the Millennium: "Each time it inflicts battle damage to you, it skips your Draw Phase."
Old Ai of the Millennium: "In other words, you already have no hand, and the infinite loop is online."
Old Ai of the Millennium: "But did you think I'm going to peck you to death little by little?"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "No!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "I activate [Legacy of the Duelist]'s third effect!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "I can skip my draw to add 1 monster from my Graveyard to my hand each time!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "In other words, the monsters I'll be adding back are the Exodia pieces!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "Battle Phase!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "Yata-Garasu, attack!"
Old Ai of the Millennium: "End Phase."
Old Ai of the Millennium: "Your turn—no card to draw."
His last words made duelists in all six worlds' pupils contract.
He's not even relying on Yata-Garasu's slow torture.
Instead, it's the five Exodia pieces he stacked into the Graveyard from the start.
This is the final victory-formula combo.
With that realization, everyone's eyes snapped to the remaining footage.
Turn one: in the Draw Phase, he retrieved [Exodia the Forbidden One] from the Graveyard. After Yata-Garasu attacked in the End Phase, the turn passed back.
Turn two: in the Draw Phase, he retrieved [Right Arm of the Forbidden One]. After Yata-Garasu attacked in the End Phase, the turn passed back.
Five turns later, Old Ai of the Millennium revealed the only five cards in his hand.
Exodia's full body was assembled.
Old Ai of the Millennium claimed victory.
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