Changes

The large majority of the story arc revolves around a new gameplay element, which is created specifically for this story arc, known as the "[[Deck Master]]". In these duelsDuels, each player would select a Deck Master, which begins the game outside of the playing field. Each Deck Master has a [[Deck Master Abilities|unique special ability]], which can be used at any point in the duel Suel as many times as desired. It is to be noted that even Deck Masters which otherwise have no special abilities (such as [[Normal Monsters]]) have a special Deck Master ability. As well, it appears that some Deck Masters retain their normal special abilities in addition to their Deck Master abilities i.e such as "[[Jinzo(anime)|Jinzo']]'s " ability to negate all Trap cards.

The Deck Master can also be specially summoned Summoned to the field, without any prerequisite such as tributesTributes, fusions Fusions (for [[Fusion Monsters]]) or rituals (for [[Ritual Monsters]]). However if the Deck Master is lost, so is the dueldoes its controller. If the Deck Master is itself tributed Tributed or otherwise replaced, the new monster would become the new Deck Master, and the old Deck Master's abilities were lost (in theory, the old Deck Master could be returned by normal means - but without the Deck Master abilities, although this point is not elaborated upon in the story arc). It is not explained how a monster that cannot be specially summonedSummoned, or a monster that can only be summoned Summoned in a special manner (such as "Fusion only") can be designated as a Deck Master, as no such monster was used as a Deck Master in the story arc.

It is also not known whether a Deck Master card counts as against a duelistDuelist's main (or Fusion, if the Deck Master is a Fusion monster) decksDecks, as this concept is not elaborated upon in the anime.

When a member of Yugi's group duels Duels in this Virtual World, he/she is given a [[Duel Disk]] with a completely new deck by their opponent, and they must build a new Deck.

'''''Note''': Since the Virtual World story arc does not appear in the original manga, the Big Five have no names in that context.'' The Virtual World arc can be seen as a sequel to the [[Domino City Battles|Legendary Heroes]] arc (episodes 43-45) as it features The Big Five looking for revenge within a virtual reality system similar to the one they were defeated in.

Aboard [[Seto Kaiba|Seto Kaiba's ]] airship, the eight [[Battle City]] Finals duelists finals Duelists prepare to head for Alcatraz (''KaibaCorp Island'' in the English dub), the site of the semifinal and final rounds of the Battle City (Yu-Gi-Oh!) tournament. However, the trip takes a mysterious wrong turn, and finds itself landing in an undersea fortress - apparently, a mysterious force is set on revenge against Kaiba. Forcing many of its passengers off the ship, the mysterious force leads them into another room, where they reveal themselves to be the Big 5, who are the five former board members of KaibaCorp, who were assumed to be fired by Kaiba sometime before the Battle City tournament for attempting to take over his company from underneath him.

The Big 5 seek revenge against Kaiba for firing them, as well as [[Yugi Muto (''Yugi Mutou'' in the English manga) ]] for foiling their plans to take over the company on two different occasions (by defeating Maximillion Pegasus (''Pegasus J. Crawford'' in the Japanese versions in Duelist Kingdom and the Big 5's ''Five God Mythic Dragon'' in ''[[Legendary Heroes]]''). To do so, they force their participation in their own virtual Duel Monsters tournament, in a similar vein to Kaiba's ''Legendary Heroes'' games. There was also an added stipulation: if one of the protagonists were to lose, the Big 5 also threatened to take their bodies for themselves and escape into the real world.

As the group enter the virtual world, however, they find themselves separated: Yugi in a forest near a lake, [[Téa Gardner (''Anzu Mazaki'' in the manga and the Japanese versions) ]] in a canyon, [[Tristan Taylor (''Hiroto Honda'')]], [[Serenity Wheeler (''Shizuka Kawai'')]], and [[Duke Devlin (''Ryuji Otogi'') ]] in and around a castle, [[Joey Wheeler (''Katsuya Jonouchi'') ]] in a mansion, and Seto and [[Mokuba Kaiba ]] in another forest. Each of the separated groups, as it would turn turns out, would face faced a different member of the Big 5.

As it turns out, the Big 5 are controlled by [[Noah Kaiba]], the legitimate biological son of [[Gozaburo Kaiba]], and stepbrother to Seto and Mokuba. Noah had died (or, in the English dub, had his body "rendered useless") in a traffic accident when he was young, but his mind was preserved in the virtual world. He believes that, as Gozaburo's biological son, he is the true legitimate heir to KaibaCorp, and that he, not Seto, should be the one running the family business.

How Noah enlists the help of the Big 5 is unclear, but it was implied that, as a result of the earlier encounter between them and the main characters, the minds of the Big 5 were similarly preserved in the virtual world (In in the English dub, the Big 5 reveal that when [[Mythic Dragon (anime)|Mythic Dragon]] — the monster at the end of the "Legendary Heroes" arc — was destroyed, so were their bodies, but not their minds). In the virtual world, each member of the Big 5 would use a different monster as their Deck Master and their personal avatar.

[[Gansley]], a businessman with a penchant of quoting famous philosophers (in the original) or business acumen (in the English dub) would be the first to duelDuel, against arguably the strongest of any of the main characters - Yugi. Despite wanting to choose his trusted "[[Dark Magician (anime)|Dark Magician]]", "[[Kuriboh (anime)|Kuriboh]] " chooses itself as Yugi's Deck Master. Forced with this choice, Yugi proceeds to duelDuel. Gansley's strategy to defeat Yugi was simple - by using a supposedly invincible sacrifice-and-revive combination, he could force Yugi's monsters to attack Yugi directly, without fear of being harmed. Yet, Yugi is persistent, and eventually has the last laugh - by combining "[[Kuriboh (anime)|Kuriboh]] " (who Gansley dismissed as "weak") and "[[Rainbow Blessing]]", Yugi could set up a play which could allow a monster to bypass Gansley's defenses, and attack Gansley directly, which he does to win the duelDuel, using "[[Swift Gaia the Fierce Knight (anime)|Swift Gaia the Fierce Knight]]".

As Yugi proceeds to find a way to reunite with his friends, Crump manages to trap Téa Gardner into a duelDuel. Being a competent amateur player in her own right, she chooses a deck Deck of all-female monsters, including "[[Dark Magician Girl (anime)|Dark Magician Girl]]" as her Deck Master, to which Crump scoffs at, citing it as an unwise decision, thinking that [["Dark Magician Girl]] " would not be effective without her male counterpart (in the English dub, this is replaced by remarks suggesting a perversion towards young girls). As an additional catch, whenever either duelist Duelist lost [[Life Points]], part of their body would be frozen, and encased in ice. Despite being at a disadvantage for most of the match, "[[Dark Magician Girl (anime)|Dark Magician Girl]] would " eventually help helped Téa by summoning Summoning herself to the field and using her own Deck Master ability, allowing Téa to draw the "[[Sage's Stone (anime)|Sage's Stone]]" card. With that card, Téa would summon Summoned "[[Dark Magician (anime)|Dark Magician]] " from nearby Yugi's Deck (thus helping Yugi to find Téa) and win the duelDuel.

With Yugi and Téa reunited, the focus shifts to [[Johnson]], who is slated to face Joey Wheeler. Believing he finally escaped the virtual world, and eager to get his hands on [[Yami Marik Ishtar ]] for what he did to [[Mai Valentine (''Mai Kujaku'')]], Joey discovers that this was an elaborate trap set by Johnson, who proceeds to duel Duel him. Johnson manages to get the upper hand in the duel Duel through a combination of his Deck Master ability, "Clear the Courtroom" (which ", at the cost of 1000 Life Points" , cleared the field of all cards), as well as the (somewhat illicit) ability of manipulating the outcome of Joey's luck-based moves. Yet, just as it seems that Joey's luck was about to run out, Noah appears and insists that Johnson forfeit the duel Duel for cheating. Joey, in the spirit of a "true" duelistTrue Duelist, convinces Noah to let the match continue, knowing well that Johnson would not be able to cheat again, and eventually wins by outwitting Johnson at one of the mind games he claimed to be an expert at.

Tristan Taylor, Duke Devlin, and Serenity Wheeler manage to find each other, yet they find themselves faced off against [[Nezbitt]], who wants to take Serenity's body for his own. With Tristan and Duke willing to protect Serenity from harm, they try to convince Nezbitt that they should take her place, but he settles on a three-on-one duelDuel. Serenity, despite having never played in a duel Duel herself, and knowing little about the rules, is relieved that Tristan and Duke would help her along, but miscommunication between Tristan and Duke would ultimately cost Tristan his Deck Master. Crestfallen over Tristan's sacrifice, Duke manages to use his dice tricks and his signature monster, "[[Orgoth the Relentless (anime)|Orgoth the Relentless]]", to buy some time. Convinced by her older brother (who had managed to find her) that she, too, must fight in the spirit of a "true" duelistTrue Duelist, Serenity vows to continue playing. Serenity would ultimately deal the final blow in the match, thanks to her Deck Master, "[[Goddess with the Third Eye (anime)|Goddess with the Third Eye]]", whose ability allowed her to [[Fusion Summon]] monsters without "[[Polymerization (anime)|Polymerization]]", using the remnants of Tristan's playing field.

With Nezbitt having technically won Tristan's body, Nezbitt uses it to kidnap Mokuba, while Yugi and friends seek to restore Tristan, who now resides in the body of a robot monkey (which is actually a brown version of "[[Acrobat Monkey]]"). Kaiba, in pursuit of Nezbitt, encounters [[Leichter (''Daimon'')]], the last member of the Big 5. Eager to put Leichter aside, Kaiba tries to use his "[[Crush Card Virus (anime)|Crush Card Virus]]" (''Deck Destruction Virus of Death'' in the Japanese version) strategy against him, only to fail as he realizes that Leichter's Deck Master was "[[Jinzo (anime)|Jinzo]]" (''Android Psychic Shocker''), which destroys renders the opponent's [[Trap Card]]suseless. Combined with "[[Imperial Order (anime)|Imperial Order]]", a card that rendered [[Spell Card|Magic Cards]] useless, this left Kaiba with only [[Monster Card]]s. Furthermore, Leichter would use "[[Satellite Cannon (anime)|Satellite Cannon]]", a monster that could only be destroyed by Level 8 monsters or above, and whose power increased the longer it is in play (but only while attacking), in an attempt to ensure his victory. However, Kaiba manages to summon Summon "[[Blue-Eyes White Dragon]]", a Level 8 monster, in time, and uses it to destroy "Satellite Cannon" and win the duelDuel.

Throughout the Duel, the viewers learn of how Seto took over KaibaCorp: In the Japanese version, on Seto's birthday, he and Mokuba were given 2% shares in KaibaCorp. In the English dub, Seto was given ten million dollars; quite how Mokuba acquired 2% of KaibaCorp is never explained. In the Japanese version, Seto had to return one hundred times the investment within one year, while in the English dub, he merely had to return ten times the investment. Seto had shown his cruel business tactics when he accomplished his feat in just one day, and with that task completed, he managed to get the Big 5 into transferring their shares of KaibaCorp to Seto, so that both Seto and Gozaburo had 49% of the company each. However, Seto had blamed Mokuba for leaking the information out to Gozaburo (when in fact it was Seto himself), making Seto's attempt fruitless. When it seemed that Gozaburo had won, Mokuba then threw a bombshell of his own: he'd never turn his back on his brother, and combined with Seto's 49%, his 2% would be enough to oust Gozaburo from power. It is not completely clear what happened to Gozaburo after this; in both the Japanese and English versions he 'disappears', while in the manga, he commits suicide.

Unaware of this, the Big 5 continued to try and take more bodies so that they would not have to share Tristan's, and manage to convince Yugi and Joey into a duel Duel with everyone's bodies on the line, in a winner-take-all duel. During this duelDuel, the Big 5 (who started with 8000 Life Points) manage to summon Summon their signature monster, "[[Five-Headed Mythic Dragon(anime)|Five God Mythic Dragon]]", by tributing Tributing their five respective Deck Masters. However, it is destroyed by "[[Mirage Knight (anime)|Mirage Knight]]", a monster that was summoned Summoned after Yugi and Joey were able to fuse "[[Dark Magician (anime)|Dark Magician]]" and "[[Flame Swordsman (anime)|Flame Swordsman]]" together (which were, respectively, Yugi and Joey's Deck Masters) to create "[[Dark Flare Knight (anime)|Dark Flare Knight]]", who destroyed itself by attacking "Five God Dragon" and taking no battle damage due to its effect, allowing "Mirage Knight" to be summonedSummoned. The duelDuel, however, did not end, thanks to the [[Trap Card]] "[[A Deal with Dark Ruler (anime)|A Deal with Dark Ruler]]", allowing the Big 5 to summon Summon a new Deck Master, "[[Berserk Dragon (anime)|Berserk Dragon]]" - a monster that gradually weakened the longer it stayed on the field. After surviving a round of attacks, Joey, who the Big 5 thought was the weaker link of the two, and was allowed to survive on 300 Life Points, would set up "[[Dark Magician]]" by transforming him into "[[Dark Magician Knight]]" by using the Magic Card, "[[Knight's Title]]", allowing him to use his Deck Master's special ability (which, he explains, would only work on [[Warrior]]-[[Type]] monsters) and was able to transfer most of the [[ATK]] of "[[Flame Swordsman]]" directly to "Dark Magician Knight", which was enough to destroy "Berserk Dragon" and win the duelDuel.

With the Big 5 defeated, Noah banishes the five and takes matters into his own hands. He challenges Seto directly, fully intending to take his body in order to escape the virtual world, and claim the position that he believes he deserves. Noah tells Seto that he would win in seven turns, with each turn representing each of the seven days of creation (this detail, like all other religious references, was removed from the English dub). Despite Noah's choice of "[[Shinato's Ark (anime)|Shinato's Ark]]" (''Miracle Ark'') as his Deck Master, Seto manages to get into a position in which one of his monsters could attack either of Noah's two monsters and win the duelDuel. However, Mokuba suddenly appears to support Noah, effectively stopping Seto from attacking Noah's monsters for fear that Mokuba would be hurt.

Because of this, Seto had effectively played into Noah's hands: Noah was never in any danger of losing the duelDuel, thanks to another of his Deck Master's abilities that gave him Life Points based on the number of discarded monsters. Now with the upper hand, Noah begins to take control of the duelDuel. Meanwhile, Seto attempts to get through to his brainwashed brother, to no avail. With one last hope, Seto summons Summons his "Blue-Eyes White Dragon", which manages to break Mokuba free of Noah's control. Yet, thanks to his Deck Master, Noah's Life Points continue to rise. Desperate, Seto uses "[[Last Turn (anime)|Last Turn]]" to force the duel Duel into one final winner-take-all [[Battle Phase]]. Seto chooses "Blue-Eyes White Dragon" to attack while Noah chooses his Deck Master to defend. Although "Blue-Eyes White Dragon" wins the battle, the destruction of "Shinato's Ark" allowed Noah to summon "[[Shinato, King of a Higher Plane (anime)|Shinato, King of a Higher Plane]]", a more powerful monster that destroys "Blue-Eyes White Dragon", allowing Noah to win the duelDuel. As a token of his victory and his apparent worthiness of the title of head of KaibaCorp, Noah turns Seto and Mokuba to stone.

Yugi, however, is enraged over Noah's actions: had Seto not tributed Tributed "[[Different Dimension Dragon]]" (''Twilight Zone Dragon''), the duel Duel would have been a drawDRAW, since this dragon cannot be destroyed in battle (in the real game, it cannot this was an error; "Different Dimension Dragon" can only be destroyed by monsters with ''less'' than 1900 [[ATK]] or less). Instead, "Blue-Eyes White Dragon" was summoned Summoned so that Seto would save Mokuba (in the English dub, this detail was omitted - Yugi is enraged over how Seto had effectively been blackmailed by Noah earlier when he had used Mokuba as a human shield). He challenges Noah to continue the duelDuel, with Yugi taking Seto's place. With Life Points being 7400-400 in favour of Noah, and no monsters on Seto Kaiba's side of the field (and no cards in his hand), Noah gladly accepts, intending to quickly win, and turn both Yugi and his friends to stone. Should Yugi win, however, he demands that everyone be set free from the virtual world.

Having to duel Duel against a different kind of duelist Duelist in Yugi, Noah uses Spirit Monsters, a type of monster that returns to the hand at the end of the turn, and the "[[Spring of Rebirth (anime)|Spring of Rebirth]]" Magic Card to attack Yugi and increase his own Life Points in the process. Although Yugi manages to use "[[Cyber Jar (anime)|Cyber Jar]]" to destroy all of Noah's monsters, including "[[Shinato, King of a Higher Plane]]" (which Seto forced Noah to Summon to the field as a result of Noah needing a target to declare as a defender for the effect of "[[Last Turn (anime)|Last Turn]]"), Noah uses another Deck Master ability to pull "[[Shinato, King of a Higher Plane]]" back to the sidelines, but with the caveat that Noah now cannot Summon "[[Shinato, King of a Higher Plane]]" back to the field for the remainder of the duelDuel. Because of his Spirit Monsters, "Spring of Rebirth", and another Deck Master ability, Noah's Life Points continue to accumulate to the point that Noah simply allows Yugi to directly attack him every turn - an effort that turned largely fruitless as Noah would manage to gain even more Life Points.

Being confident of himself, Noah offers Yugi a chance to forfeit the duelDuel, but for every turn that Yugi continues to play in which Noah is not defeated, one of Yugi's friends would be turned into stone. With time running out, Yugi ends up in a situation where he has 100 Life Points to Noah's 10,000, facing off against Noah's most powerful Spirit Monster (which stayed on the field due to a Trap Card), with nothing on the field and no cards in his hand. Worse, all of his friends are eventually turned turned to stone. It seemed all but lost for Yugi, when he is reminded that even though all of his friends (Seto and Mokuba included) are turned to stone, they are still there in spirit to cheer him on. With a new-found confidence, Yugi draws "[[Card of Sanctity]]", allowing Yugi to draw six cards. With these six cards, he revives Seto Kaiba's "[[Blue-Eyes White Dragon]]" and fuses it with the two "[[Blue-Eyes White Dragon]]" he has drawn to form "[[Blue-Eyes Ultimate Dragon]]", and he uses his fifth card, "[[Quick Attack]]", to allow "Blue-Eyes Ultimate Dragon" to attack Noah's monster immediately. He then uses his final card, "[[De-Fusion]]", to split "Blue-Eyes Ultimate Dragon" back into three "Blue-Eyes White Dragons", and attacks directly with all three, winning the duelDuel.

With the duel Duel won, Yugi demands that Noah free everyone from the virtual world. However, Noah reveals to everyone that, in the process of entering the virtual world, they were all knocked out and placed in virtual reality pods (not unlike those used by Seto in the ''Legendary Heroes'' arc). Everyone is later shocked to find that it was Gozaburo, or at least, a digitized copy thereof, who had attempted to trap everyone in a complicated plan to take over the world by trapping everyone in the virtual world (In in the Japanese version, Gozaburo was going to use missiles positioned in space to manipulate the world to his will). Desperate to tell the world of Gozaburo's impending atrocity, they are determined more than ever to escape the virtual world. With Noah willing to help Yugi and company despite his duplicity, they follow him to a large door that was said to be a secret backdoor that Gozaburo had not discovered and closed. However, Noah's true colors are revealed as they trap Yugi and friends within their own recent memories, although all would eventually free themselves from the trap.

Meanwhile, Noah and Mokuba discover a virtual replica of Domino, in which Noah tricks Mokuba in order to escape the virtual world in Mokuba's body. Noah (as Mokuba) then aims a missile-armed satellite in order to destroy the undersea fortress (and thus the virtual world), and proceeds to leave on a helicopter alone. However, once there, he experiences a change of heart due to Mokuba's willingness to forgive Noah (and even helps convince Seto to find a way to create a new, if somewhat artificial, body for Noah), and proceeds back into the fortress, only to find the satellite controls having been destroyed by [[Yami Marik]]. With only 60 minutes until the fortress is destroyed, Noah begins working on a way to save everyone.

Meanwhile, Seto, being too smart to fall for their trap, proceeds to the virtual KaibaCorp headquarters, where Gozaburo waited. Gozaburo challenges Seto to a duel Duel to see who was worthier of running KaibaCorp (similar to how Seto had played chess with him as a child). Gozaburo quickly finds a way to discard the five pieces of "[[Exodia the Forbidden One]]" (using "[[Painful Choice (anime)|Painful Choice]]") in order to summon Summon "[[Exodia Necross (anime)|Exodia Necross]]", a monster which, as long as the five pieces of "[[Exodia the Forbidden One]]" were in the [[Graveyard]], it is immune to virtually every card (The [[Left Leg of the Forbidden One(anime)|Left Leg]], [[Right Leg of the Forbidden One(anime)|Right Leg]], and [[Left Arm of the Forbidden One(anime)|Left Arm]] granted [[Exodia Necross|Necross]] immunities to Magic Cards, Trap Cards, and Monster Effects respectively) and grew more powerful with every battle it was involved in ([[Exodia the Forbidden One(anime)|Exodia's Head]] prevented it from being destroyed from a monster attack while the [[Right Arm of the Forbidden One(anime)|Right Arm]] ensured that its ATK increased by 1000 points whenever it engaged in battle).

Although Exodia Necross seemed unstoppable, Seto realized that, like himself with "Blue-Eyes White Dragon" so long ago - ironically before his defeat at the hands of Exodia, Gozaburo is using the power of only one monster, believing that it alone would win the battle for him. By using the "[[Soul Demolition (anime)|Soul Demolition]]" Trap Card, Seto manages to remove the five parts of Exodia from play from Gozaburo's Graveyard, weakening it so that "Blue-Eyes White Dragon" could destroy it and win the duelDuel.

The airship proceeds towards the Battle City Finalsfinals, completing the originally-planned trip. Meanwhile, Mokuba mourns for the stepbrother that he only briefly knew.