At this moment, everyone present was almost the strongest batch of duelists in some world. The existence being targeted and stared down by so many powerful people was the "ending" of all despair in this world.
The Goddess of Despair, E-Ra.
However, being stared at by so many duelists, the Goddess of Despair E-Ra showed not the slightest panic. She just calmly, smilingly looked at these people.
Fear?
That was impossible.
An existence like her, so long as she didn't seek death, no one could kill her. She wasn't like Darkness, needing to gamble her own future and fate to fight with humans.
On the other side, Quattro and Crow had also rushed to Hart's side. Quattro reached out first, preparing to lift Hart up. In the first instant of raising his hand, he was stunned. His pupils shrank. He shockingly looked at Hart.
"You look in bad shape. Let me." Crow saw Quattro's poor physical state and took over, lifting Hart. He looked at him, brow furrowed tightly.
The situation was dangerous.
It seemed that forcing a Rank 12 Rank-Up had thrown Hart Tenjo's body into severe damage. Not just vomiting blood and bleeding from the five orifices. This intensity of Rank-Up itself was hard for him to bear.
He'd probably need a long time to walk normally, and would be bedridden for the next month or two.
Carrying Hart back, Quattro's expression looked strange.
Kite coughed and straightened his body, looking at Quattro: "What's wrong, Quattro?"
Though the multiple, high-Rank Rank-Ups in a short time, and Number monster and divine demon attacks, had left Kite's body in bad shape, he was watching Hart constantly, so he'd noticed Quattro's abnormality first thing.
Quattro furrowed his brow and hesitated for a moment.
"That body doesn't feel like Hart's body."
"What do you mean!" Kite pressed.
"...Too healthy."
Too healthy?
What kind of words were those?
A few people didn't sort out the logic first thing.
Hart Tenjo, from any angle, was in a state of severe injury, not something that would heal in a day or two. This could be called too healthy?
Kite reacted first. He quickly ran to Hart, carefully touched him, had Orbital 7 scan, then softly exclaimed: "Rea, really!"
Too, too healthy!
Though his body was severely depleted from overusing Xyz Monster power, the problem was, the illness inside his body seemed to be completely gone!?
"Could E-Ra have eliminated his illness to control Hart Tenjo more strongly?" Jack guessed.
This kind of thing was common in their neck of the woods.
Earthbound Immortals or other faction gods, to make their God's Chosen bring out the strongest power, would provide the God's Chosen with perfect physical condition.
Forget eliminating illness.
Someone like Crow could be directly resurrected.
So his guess wasn't strange.
"No." Hikaru furrowed his brow, tone low. "That thing wouldn't be that kind-hearted. Kite, I'm afraid it's the reverse!"
The reverse!
Kite's pupils shrank. He glared back at E-Ra.
"So that's it!" Astral suddenly understood.
It seemed because of the Goddess of Despair, his body could slowly solidify in the real world. This let Jack, Crow, and Tori Meadows see his existence with the naked eye too.
"So that's it..." Astral said with sudden realization. "Yuma, weren't you always wondering why Hart couldn't get better no matter what?
Earlier I was thinking. With Dr. Faker's talent, even for the rarest disease, the most incurable illness, there should be a way to let Hart move like a normal person, at worst using money and mechanical assistance."
If it were an ordinary family, indeed there'd be no way to forcibly extend life like that.
With Dr. Faker's wealth and talent, this kind of thing actually wasn't difficult. It was even quite, quite easy.
But why couldn't even Dr. Faker find a way to extend life? Why did even Dr. Faker have to go to extremes, sacrifice his best friends, to obtain from another world the means for Hart to live on?
"The answer is emerging." Astral pointed at E-Ra. "It's you! From the very beginning, you targeted the Tenjo family!"
From the very beginning!
From the start!
From when Dr. Faker showed his talent, from when Kite showed his abnormal superhuman constitution, E-Ra had targeted the Tenjo family!
This deduction was very likely.
Because Hikaru remembered, in the original Yu-Gi-Oh! ZEXAL manga, the reason Dr. Faker exited early, dying before the opening, was because he'd suffered the Goddess of Despair's curse, suffered the "curse of despair." That was why he'd mysteriously died of illness in the laboratory.
In this world, because of the world's differences, target differences, the curse being shifted to Hart wasn't strange.
"E-Ra!" Kite finally realized this too. He trembled and spat these two words from his mouth, staring at E-Ra with fixed intensity.
The Tenjo family's tragedy, and even all the tragedies derived from it, at their root source, was E-Ra!
"That's right, Kite." Seeing Kite had thought it through, E-Ra stopped pretending. "The reason your little brother, from birth, had to face the pain of not living long, is precisely because of despair's curse."
Kite's right hand trembled.
"Truly a beastly goddess." Jack's words were rather direct.
Quattro, after being stunned for a while, also flew into a rage: "Wait. In other words, it's all because of you. That's why my father died in that expedition. If not for you, he wouldn't have died at all.
Even more, after he died, you still had to control him, make him work for you!!??"
Even more disgusting, even now with father completely dispersed, he didn't even know that the true culprit he should have been getting revenge on was actually the Goddess of Despair he'd thought had saved him!
"How laughable, Thomas Arclight." The Goddess of Despair smiled, as if everything had nothing to do with her. "How could your father's death be related to me? I only cursed Hart Tenjo alone. Your father and Kazuma Tsukumo were both because of Faker's excessive love for his son and his inability to calmly restrain his malice.
What I did was merely tell Faker, at his most despairing moment, the method to save Hart Tenjo."
"Truly bastard-like." Crow's expression grew hard to keep too. "Never seen such a low-class god."
Compared to the gods where they came from, the Goddess of Despair was a beast among beasts.
Trying to shift responsibility with one sentence?
Indeed, Dr. Faker killing his best friend was an unforgivable crime, but that didn't mean cursing someone's child was right!
Hart was still an infant back then!
This kind of thing also came to our dimension to contest for "One God"?
Somewhat disgusting.
"E-Ra!" Yuma was more direct. He put on his Duel Disk and shouted at E-Ra. "The things you've been spreading, darkness and despair everywhere, I've had enough. Absolutely cannot let you do these things freely anymore!"
"That's right, E-Ra." Astral also shouted at E-Ra. "I'll defeat you and recover all the memories you stole!"
"That's right. Though unrelated to our dimension, we can't allow this kind of god to travel arbitrarily between dimensions!" Yusei firmly nodded and also raised his Duel Disk.
Those with grudges wanted revenge, those with grievances wanted redress. Even without grudges or grievances, they were still proper people of justice. They couldn't allow such a great threat to run around loose.
"Heheh..." The Goddess of Despair laughed. "Though I'm very interested, the time for a decisive battle with you isn't now.
For me, this world's One God war has already ended. All members of my team have failed, so I can now withdraw from this competition."
Same as before.
She wasn't like Darkness. She didn't need to fight humans to the death. For her, the only one she truly needed to target was Astral. All those other people were just casual dabbling, seeing if she could scoop up some benefits.
Since the pie-from-the-sky good deal of One God was no longer within her grasp, what need was there to stay here?
Who was she?
The Goddess of Despair, E-Ra!
Since the dimensional passages of multiple dimensions had opened, her characteristic of being able to freely teleport instantly before despairing people was maximally utilized. These people had certainly forced her out of Hart's body, but so what?
She'd leave when she wanted!
Almost without pause, her body began fading, slowly turning transparent. Clearly, she was preparing to go elsewhere.
"She wants to escape!" Quattro shouted.
"Damn it..." Astral grew anxious. "Yuma!"
"Right!"
Yuma raised the Emperor's Key and hurriedly prepared to rush over and chase the Goddess of Despair.
But at this moment, Team 5D's long-prepared plan was executed.
Jack Atlas raised his hand. The Wing Mark slowly lit up. The crimson Crimson Dragon mark flashed with radiance. Red Dragon Archfiend roared and flew out from his deck, charging out to stop the Goddess of Despair.
Behind Crow, the enormous Earthbound Immortal mark lit up. In the sky, the Earthbound Immortal's geoglyph manifested. Purple-red radiance covered the entire sky, cutting off the Goddess of Despair's chance to escape from the sky.
Kite gritted his teeth and pressed a special button on his Duel Disk. His Photon Chain flew out, preparing to block the Goddess of Despair.
But no use!
Compared to the professional deity that was the Goddess of Despair E-Ra, these existences fundamentally couldn't stop her.
The next second after the Goddess of Despair's figure completely turned transparent, a golden, mechanical existence abruptly appeared behind the Goddess of Despair. Accompanying Yusei's grunt, this golden figure delivered a booming punch, striking the Goddess of Despair.
She staggered a few steps in the air, but the victory at the corners of her mouth was self-evident.
Couldn't stop her!
So long as despairing existences still existed in the world, she could directly leave and seek the next despairing person!
"Roooar!"
Just as Tierra prepared to give this goddess a couple of punches, in the sky, no, in the world, a strange dragon roar sounded.
"Rooooar!"
Crimson Dragon!
Crimson Dragon's voice rang in everyone's ears!
Even Xyz Dimension people who didn't know Crimson Dragon existed heard that voice. Even more, the originally confident Goddess of Despair abruptly returned from her dissociated state back to the real world.
"Wha, what's happening?" E-Ra floated in the air, shocked. On all four sides of her were the ace cards or special collaborators of everyone present.
"Too laughable, E-Ra." Hikaru calmly spoke. "You thought the One God war was something you could just not participate in if you didn't want to? Or leave whenever you wanted?"
E-Ra was stunned on the spot.
Bad...
She understood.
Her earlier thinking had been that since anyone could participate in the One God war, then coming to join the fun and freeload was a matter of course.
If she won, wouldn't she directly obtain power at the same level as "the Source Number"?
But now, Hikaru's words made her realize.
No.
Under heaven there was no such good thing.
Just as the power she granted mortals wasn't "without cost."
Just now, Crimson Dragon's voice proved this!
Her expression suddenly changed.
Earlier, when those two so-called "DT" other-world gods had entered and exited other dimensions, Crimson Dragon hadn't stopped them. Or rather, until now, Crimson Dragon wouldn't stop others from leaving this dimension to adventure in other dimensions.
She'd thought she could really leave at will, unbound.
Now it seemed...
Wrong!
That was because the Crimson Dragon had been watching!
So long as it judged that existences participating in the "One God war" weren't fleeing, then do whatever you want!
But if some existence participating in the One God war wanted to leave, and never come back?
Forget about it.
Yanked back in one second.
As for wanting to arm-wrestle with me, Crimson Dragon?
I see you're not putting me, the current One God of the Synchro Dimension, in your eyes!
E-Ra felt cold sweat dripping from her forehead.
The current Crimson Dragon was the genuine current One God of the Synchro Dimension. He could arbitrarily change everything in this world. He was this world's god of matter, and also this world's god of time, god of space, god of dueling, god of death, god of destruction...
He was this world's "One," this world's "All"!
With her individual power, defying Crimson Dragon's obstruction was impossible!
"Damn, there's even this kind of thing."
Of course, she still had methods.
Not letting her leave this dimension, she could just casually find some other human of this dimension. Leaving was still easy.
But that would be meaningless and pointless!
Setting aside the surrounding existences' obstruction and tracking, if she couldn't return to the Xyz Dimension, there was no point in leaving.
"Heh... whatever." The Goddess of Despair stopped trying to leave and looked at everyone present.
What she wanted to do was seek out those who held hope, make them despair, then absorb more power. Ultimately she'd destroy the Xyz Dimension's planet and the Astral World. This way, she could become stronger unrestrained and freely seize the power of the Source Number.
But now, all plans had stalled.
Because so long as she didn't handle these people before her, she'd have no way to safely return and continue seeking those people.
"Since that's the case, then I'll grant you despair in advance."
"My name is E-Ra." She slowly declared.
"I am the goddess of despair!"
"Now, I grant you what you need, despair!"
While speaking, the Goddess of Despair's power manifested. Everything in the room began dispersing. Radiance shone across the city, this world. When everyone came back to their senses, they seemed to have already left City, left the Synchro Dimension, even left the world humans lived in!
Because what lay beside them were endless stone tablets!
These stone tablets were inscribed with names, surnames, and birth and death times!
Under the radiance, the stone tablets cast reflections longer, wider, and larger than the tablets themselves. Those pitch-black shadows swayed dimly, like darkness, like despair, strengthening the Goddess of Despair, making her even more massive, even more powerful!
This place was the graveyard!
The final destination of all who held hope!
The graveyard of hope!