"What a shame." Yugen chuckled lightly. "If you'd destroyed my materials before I carried out the Synchro Summon, there's a good chance I wouldn't have been able to gather the materials to summon Light Spear again, and I wouldn't have been able to use 'Synchronized Exit' to dodge Grand Aerial Assault's effect."
"You misjudged it, Poma. As a result, Grand Aerial Assault's effect this turn basically became meaningless."
Poma gnashed his teeth. "That damned bastard Godwin..."
Outside the field, Yusei spoke in a low voice. "That said, in the situation just now, under the premise that Poma didn't know Godwin's back-row set card was 'Synchronized Exit', statistically it really was most likely for him to choose to wait for Godwin to Synchro Summon and then use the Bomber's effect."
"And that earlier taunt from Godwin looked like he was trying to lure Poma into impulsively burning the Bomber's effect early, but now it seems maybe Godwin instead used the taunt precisely to make Poma think he had that intention, predicting that in his caution Poma would all the more hold back the Bomber's effect and save it for the Synchro Summon..."
As the saying goes, truth within falsehood and falsehood within truth—Poma thought he'd reached the third layer and seen through the taunt, without realizing that even his "seeing through" had already been predicted by the other side.
Looking only at the outcome now, it would actually have been more profitable to use Grand Aerial Assault's effect before the Synchro. If Godwin didn't have a new Four-Star Monster in hand, he really would've stopped Light Spear Dragon from appearing.
Jack said coolly, "It's not just the Duel. That Duelist named Poma, even his thoughts are completely laid bare before Godwin. In the most literal sense he's being played with in the palm of his hand. I'm afraid things developing like this was entirely within his expectations..."
But at that, he suddenly paused and shook his head.
"No, perhaps even if Poma had chosen to activate Grand Aerial Assault's effect before the Synchro, Godwin would still have had some other countermeasure."
He had no proof, but his intuition was telling him that.
Ever since coming to the city and getting to know Godwin, for the first time Jack suddenly felt that Godwin was a truly terrifying man.
"Ice Barrier Dragon - Light Spear Dragon's effect activates." Yugen said. "Discard any number of cards from your hand, and you can bounce any number of cards on the field back to their owner's hand!"
Poma: "Nanda to! (What did you say)!?"
The Dark Marker brute's pair of pitch-black eyes bulged wide.
Bounced back to the hand, again bounced back to the hand!
He'd finally managed to send away an Abyss Soldiers, and now this thing pops out on top of that. And it's an arbitrary number of bounces... This thing is ten times more disgusting than Abyss Soldiers—it's basically the Synchro Era fully-powered-up version of Abyss Soldiers!
"Discard one card from my hand." Yugen said. "First, 'Giant Bomber - Grand Aerial Assault'. Let's have it return to the hand."
As Yugen pitched a card, the dragon head raised at Light Spear Dragon's muzzle, and the chill of the Ice Barrier instantly congealed in mid-field.
The massive Bomber had no way to react; its metal joints were instantly locked in frost. Countless ice spikes pierced up from beneath the ground, crawling along the Bomber's body, freezing its steel frame of over ten meters tall into an ice sculpture.
A heartbeat later, the sculpture shattered with a crisp crack into a storm of ice crystals, and the data stream released by the fragmentation flashed straight back into Poma's hand.
Poma stared at the Bomber forced back into his hand, the corner of his mouth twitching, his expression downright ugly.
Even though he had a Dark Carrier on the field that could provide Infinite endurance for the Bomber, the Carrier could only fish Giant Bomber back from the graveyard onto the field. Once it's bounced to the hand, even the Carrier is powerless.
And "Giant Bomber·Grand Aerial Assault Style" can only be Special Summoned from the Card Deck by the effect of 'Summoning Reactor'. Even in the hand it can't be Normally Summoned by tributing. Sitting in his hand it's pure dead weight, a total brick with no use whatsoever.
"And the card I just discarded was the Monster 'Scholar Spirit'." Yugen continued. "When Scholar Spirit goes to the graveyard, I draw one card from my Card Deck."
Yugen drew another card.
"Next up is that Carrier." Yugen said. "Even though without Giant Bomber, the Dark Carrier isn't much of a threat, having Defense Power on the level of a Blue-Eyes White Dragon is still pretty annoying."
As he spoke, another card from his hand slid into the graveyard.
"Light Spear Dragon's effect activates again—do me a favor and send that Carrier back to your hand too."
Light Spear Dragon threw back its head with a roar, countless ice spikes shooting forth once more, lancing toward the massive Dark Mother Ship hanging in midair.
But this time Poma didn't let him have his way. "Activate my set card! Trap Card 'Subspace Material Transmission Device'!
Select one face-up Monster on your own field; the selected Monster is removed from the Game until the end of this turn's End Phase!"
His thick finger pointed at the only remaining Carrier on the field.
"Remove 'Dark Carrier' from the Game!"
A device forged from some unknown metal materialized in the field, releasing waves of transparent, multicolored ripples. Those ripples enveloped the pitch-black Mother Ship, as if piercing the barrier of space itself. The Carrier gradually turned translucent, until it vanished beyond the other side of the Dimension.
Only then did the myriad ice spikes called forth by Light Spear stab upward from below, all of them striking nothing.
"Oh? Using a Trap to let your Monster run off for a bit, huh." Yugen said. "But that means you're basically stark naked now."
With that, he swept his hand out.
"Then Ice Barrier Dragon - Light Spear Dragon, direct attack Poma!"
With the attack declaration, the faint hope in Poma's heart—"With such a broken effect, maybe this dragon can't attack during turns it uses its effect"—also dissipated without a trace.
Self-restriction on attacks? Limitations on using its effect? Sorry, the invincible Light Spear doesn't have that kind of clause.
Frosty breath blasted from Light Spear's muzzle, an endless surge of cold rolling over Poma. Poma's machine roared and shook violently; it looked like if it weren't for its three big wheels keeping the chassis steady, it might well have flipped straight over from this single hit.
Poma: "Uwaaaah!"
[Poma, LP4000 → LP1700]
After a bout of intense shuddering, Poma barely managed to keep his D-Wheel steady and maintain his course.
In the High-speed World field, for every 1000 points of damage taken in one go, the D-wheel Hand loses one High-speed Counting, and the D-Wheel's speed drops accordingly.
Right now Poma had taken 2000 damage in one breath, losing two High-speed Counting in an instant. The two sides had originally both had five counters; after this hit Poma's counters fell to three.
A gap between three and five High-speed Counting is pretty big. It means a huge batch of High-speed Spells that had been available are now sealed off again. For example, the Fusion Magic "High-speed Fusion" used for Riding requires exactly four counters to activate.
With only three High-speed Counting, he can't even think about carrying out a Fusion Summon.
The moment he lost those counters, Poma was immediately left far behind by Yugen. But he quickly stabilized his D-Wheel and desperately accelerated to catch up once more.
"Hooooaaaah!"
Poma roared.
"My rage, and my younger siblings' hatred, isn't something on this level!" Poma shouted. "Something like this isn't enough to shake me off!"
Yugen laughed. "Yeah, that's how it should be. If this ended with you flipping your ride, that wouldn't be nearly satisfying enough for me."
As he spoke, he slid another card from his hand into his back row.
"I set one more card. Turn end."