#and as usual Yuma and Astral make me so emotional that it's hard to find the words to describe how much the end of the manga hurt

[astralhope]

Another thing in Zexal manga ending that broke my heart (among many other things) is the fact that Astral wasn't going to tell Yuma and the others that he would sacrifice himself after gathering all the Numbers.

He wanted them to come back to Earth before completing his mission so that they would never know. He would have disappeared from their life with a simple goodbye, he would have become just a memory for them.

They would never know what had happened to him, Yuma would never know about his sacrifice to stop E'Rah completely.

He wanted them to only be happy about their victory, to return to a normal life.

He didn't want Yuma to be sad because of him, because of what he must do.

But Yuma knew what Astral was hiding from them, and he wasn't going to accept that. How could he? After all those battles, how could he let Astral sacrifice himself? All those discourses about hope and the future, and then Astral would seal himself for all eternity, alone, without letting any of them know what his real fate was.

No, Yuma wouldn't accept that, even if that meant fighting against Astral, even if he had to fight against all the Numbers with Utopia as his only hope. He was ready to do anything to keep Astral from sacrifice himself.

[cantripcattrip]

Happily I will offer them to you

Yuya liked two things, shiny objects and his boyfriend. What better things to do than put shiny objects on his boyfriend.

( Or Kattomatoshipping with Dragon! Yuya and Pirate! Yuma)

In truth Yuma had never understood the need to wear jewelries. Sure the Emperor Key shined brightly upon his neck but necklace had too much emotional value to not wear it. Chokers dug too much into his flesh when he slept, bracelets just smudged the ink whenever Yuma drew his maps, anklets made it hard to put on his boots, and rings made his hands feels weird when he punched some one. Earrings were the only thing Yuma could comfortably wore, even then he tried to make them unnoticeable because unlike Astral, Yuma knew he would get his ears ripped off if he went into battle wearing the dangly pairs the other boy had.

So for the life of him Yuma could not understand why he was just sitting here within Yuya's room while his boyfriend went around his hoard of treasure to find yet another ring to put on his fingers.

Correction, Yuya was going through YUMA's treasure ( Technically Yuma just told Kotori who handle their money to just put his share into their supply fund but apparently his friend had been saving quiet a few items for him) to find yet another ring to put on Yuma's fingers. He knew there was something fishy when Astral was dodgy when he ask about their crew covertly unloading some mystery box.

Yuya himself was in his half human transformation. Red scale littered his body and his spiky red tail sway from side to side as he rummage through the treasure box.

"Honestly Yuma, all this treasure and you're not going to use any it?" Yuya turned around with much more than a ring in hand, green and red eyes dilated in pure joy.

"I was going to use them." Yuma protested as he offered his hand to Yuya and gently Yuya slid a simple silver ring with a single crimson gem onto his index finger. "You know, to buy food."

Yuya barely managed to stifle a laugh at that respond and moved on to Yuma's hair placing a moon shape clip within Yuma's black locks, its crystal tassels sway slightly as Yuma turn his head. Slowly Yuya knelt and hold out the last item within his hand, an anklet. The golden jewelry spiral around Yuma's ankle, it's violet gems bloom like flower against Yuma's tan skin.

" Is there something wrong, Yuya?" Yuma asked when he noticed his boyfriend seemingly frozen in place.

"Pretty." The other boy whispered, his wide eyes still glued onto Yuma ankle.

"Well, if you like it that much you can have it."

Yuya head whipped upward, his adoring gazed now fell on Yuma. " So does that mean I can have you?"

"W-what ?" Yuma shuttered, face as red as his eyes.

Yuya's wings drooped at Yuma's reaction and his lips quiver. Turn his head, because if he looked at those shiny eyes a second more he might not be able to say anything at all, Yuma tried his best to amend the situation. " D-don't be silly, you already have me."

This wasn't the first time they had this conversation. Still Yuma couldn't help but flustered whenever Yuya says such things.

And like usual, Yuya immediate perked up, tails wagging like an excited puppy.

" Now come on, I haven't seen you in ages." He complained before it got into Yuya's head to put even more jewelries on him. "You promised me cuddles, remember ?"

Yuya had the audacity to a laughed. Still as he snuggled closer to Yuya, face buried in Yuya soft green locks careful not to get his remaining eye poked by Yuya's white horns, Yuma couldn't help but smile.

"I'm glad I met you." Yuma whispered.

"I'm glad I met you too." Yuya replied.

[skittymon]

So after some encouragement from twitter, I’ve decided to write down my feelings about the Yusaku/Revolver rivalry, since their second duel is coming up, and I don’t have the highest exceptions in it, except that were bound to learn more about the Lost Incident, and Ignis.

Also to keep it fair I’ll be analyzing the past rivals only up to their second duel, with the exception of GX. That being said let’s dive in.

I’ll be basing rivals and their rivalries based off three points:

1. Their motivation to win.

2. Their effect on the protagonist, or vise versa.

3. Their threat as a rival.

Off the bat Revolver does hold for point three: he’s the leader of a terrorist group, however as a rival Revolver lost most of his treat, at least to me, after losing to Yusaku. Of course other rivals have as well, but I respect them more as a rival and character than Revolver. Let’s go over previous rivals.

To get the easy ones out of the way: Reiji and Kaito. 

While both of their first duels against their protagonists ended inclusive, it’s very clear Reiji and Kaito would have both won their duel. Which is amazing considering protagonists is ygo are usually unbeatable. So their threat as a rival stands.

Not only that, their motivation which we learn well before their second duel against the protagonists is phenomenal: Reiji’s discover his father started an interdimensional war and wants to stop it, he’s a rival to Yuya to push him further to evolve him and his dueling so Yuya can become a powerful Lancer. Kaito wants to save his little brother who is suffering and gets off on pain now. He antagonizes Yuma and Astral because they hold the number cards that can save Haruto.

Finally, their effect on the protagonists. After Yuma and Astral’s duel the two are afraid, of losing and disappearing and I’m pretty sure after that Yuma goes to the Duel Temple, I may be mistaken. Yuya, learning other people can use Pendulum Summoning, shuts down once again and it takes a duel with Shuzo to pull out of it.

So both Kaito and Reiji are phenomenal rivals, the best if I might say. 

And while both did win their duel against Yuma and Yuya the second time, those duels happen at later points (ep 72 (i think) and ep 51 of Zxl and A5 respectively) which is later than the presumably ep 34-36 range that the second duel of Yusaku and Revolver will take place, so these points were ignored will giving Kaito and Reiji their checks.

Next, Jack, since his first (on screen) duel with Yusei ended inclusive as well. However, according to Jack, Yusei would have won their duel had it continued. 

So instead of effecting Yusei, the inclusive duel effects Jack and causes him to struggle and wonder if he is worthy of being King. So their rivalry passes the second check.

Now motivation, Jack’s motivation prior to their first is to find a better life than the shitty one he had in the satellite. He achieves this goal and vows to never look back. But when Yusei, his past, comes after him he strives to beat to prove that he’s better than Yusei, the satellite, that he’s better than garbage. So point one checks.

Point three for all the rivals from now one is gonna be iffy because they lose against the protagonist, and that to me, makes them not a threat. But for Jack, he didn’t technically lose, and as the final boss for the fortune cup and seeing his resolve to beat Yusei makes it hard to willingly want him to lose.

Next we have the interesting case of Manjoume, who sadly has never beaten Judai. Revolver has a good chance of being on this boat too considering than chances of Yusaku losing the duel with everything at stake is slim to none. But what makes Manjoume such a good rival in my book?

Let’s take a look at point two first: effect on protagonist or vise versa. Honestly, to me, Manjoume doesn’t make a difference on Judai, the only ones to do so are Ryou and Edo, but ho boy does Judai make an impact on him.

After losing his credibility from being defeated by a Osiris Red, Manjoume loses practically everything, favor from his teachers, his ‘friends’ and I’m pretty its at this point he loses respect from his brothers. So what does he do? He builds himself back up.

That episode where Manjoume is outside South Academy, looking for cards and climbing to the top has to be my favorite in season 1. Hell Judai was my favorite protag before Yuya came along and damn did I want him to lose so Manjoume’s efforts could pay off - point one checks out.

A well written ‘loser’ who may have never beaten his rival but damn do I want him to. 2/3 points to him, I understand why people would claim Ryou or Edo are Judai’s true rivals.

Finally we have Kaiba and Shark the two who lost their first duel against their rival, but won the rematch.

Now, only Shark actually won out of skill (granted season ones rules are bullshit), but I’m 80% sure Yuma was over confident in that match, I don’t remember. But lets look at the lead up to those duels since that’s where we are in Vr.

I’m gonna be honest and say I hated Kaiba for the longest time. He’s an asshole and at like six years old destroying someones property is the worst thing someone can do. But once Mokuba was introduced? I felt bad for the guy. HELL, he had to see Mokuba’s unmoving body - HIS ONLY FAMILY THAT LIKES AND HE GIVES A FLYING FUCK ABOUT. 

Sadly I have to leave out the AMAZING second duel of their and what Kaiba does to be fair but I will say that point two checks out with Yugi after that duel.

But what about point three? Kaiba lost to Yugi before. HOWEVER, that won was practically bs as Yugi had managed to summon the one monster that legally causes automatic win, which was now lost. That win had nothing to do with either of their skills, just luck and what cards they happen to have. Without Exodia, Kaiba has a solid chance to defeat Yugi and with the title of World Champion (at least in the dub) Kaiba is very much a real threat. 2/3 points.

Now Shark. Shark is interesting in the fact he doesn’t have a point one at this moment in zxl, thats his entire arc. He doesn’t know what to do with himself so he turns to the thug life. This downward spiral started because he lost to Yuma. And Yuma was able to his journey to becoming a better duelist because of his first duel with Shark. Both influence each other greatly - just in opposite ways. Point two stays.

Now point three is very meh because with Astral’s help, Yuma can win probably easily but at this time in zxl Yuma and Astral relationship is...rocky with Yuma blatantly refusing Astral’s help. But seeing how Shark is even worse off than Yuma his threat as a rival doesn’t stick that well. 

1/3 points however that’s intended in the story and Shark turns this around after their second duel.

Now how does Revolver stack up against the previous rivals? 

I already stated he doesn’t have a threat as a rival and I mean it. ‘He has a powerful new card!’ Yea okay but....look what happens if Yusaku loses:

-Ema stays dead forever

-A bunch of other people will die

-Yusaku would have failed to protect the LINK VRAINS thus breaking his promise to that little boy and god forbid if a protag can’t keep a promise

-No more speed duels which is the series gimmick

-The actual end of the digital age thus no more duel besides table duels and no will watch episode of that

so I hardly doubt Yusaku will lose with all that’s at stake. At most Yusaku wins and Revolver somehow manages to take Ignis from his somehow.

So...no threat. In verse yes, but people watching? lmao hell no.

Point two, effects on the protagonist or vise versa.

....

I got nothing.

Besides getting information from one another (Yusaku learning more about the Lost Incident and Revolver discovering his one of the six kids) from their first duel to know they haven’t effected each other.

Yusaku didn’t stop the KoH, in fact more hooligans apparently joined based on the Another Incidents. No one in the KoH questioned Revolver’s authority despite losing to the guy who causing them the most problems. 

The only thing that might pass is that Yusaku and Ignis’ relationship deepened but consider there’s a good chance Ignis is going to betray him I guess not. Oh and Firewall Dragon showed up, yea (not counting that as influencing since Yusaku could have potentially grab Firewall from any data storm).

So no point two.

Finally point one, what is Revolver’s reason for wanting to beat Yusaku?

Well that’s easy, he wants Ignis!

Why?

Because he’ll destroy the world as we know it!

How?

Uhhhh...

It is really worth putting society back to an era without technology?

Maybe...?

Yes, most likely we’ll learn the answers during the duel but that why I brought ulp the previous rivals. At this point, before any of the other rivals second duel against the protag we have learned:

Kaiba is dueling to save his little brother who’s soul was taken and has seen his lifeless body

Manjoume is dueling to get his respect back after we have seen him fall to the pits and valiantly brought himself back up

Jack is dueling to prove he is King, it’s his destiny, and that he’s more than satellite trash and he won’t go back there.

Shark doesn’t have purpose and Yuma has to throw himself out there to save Shark from ruining his own life.

Kaito is dueling to save his little brother who screams in terror and helps destroy an entire world.

Reiji is dueling to stop his father’s plan and to help bring peace back to the dimensions.

So while Revolver’s motives are noble, there’s not a lot of backbone to them. Does he feel guilty that his father’s project caused this? I know those professor people Faust and Ava did but does he? 

I feel like I don’t know Revolver at all. I know about him, but I don’t know any of his emotions and that just makes him feel like a level boss for Yusaku to defeat, not his rival for the show.

So dude, for me of course, gets a soft 1/3.

So year here you go. I hope after this hyped up duel I’ll learn to like Revolver more cause haha he’s kinda disappointing to me atm.