The Working Tiger

The greatest distance in the world was when they were clearly in the same duel, yet he was inside the cage while the other guy stood outside it.

Yeah, that was the truest portrayal of Mello's feelings right now.

Looking at the iron cage before him, heated red-hot, then at the big idiot overhead who seemed to be dripping lava all over and grinning foolishly at him, Mello was speechless for a moment.

All he could do was take a deep breath, then another, then another.

Then curse silently in his heart.

Fuck, Lava Golem. He had actually forgotten about that.

He should have known. Lava Golem was a monster the Duel King called his ace, and it had played pivotal roles more than once in key duels, including the battle against The Arbiter.

He should have remembered that this thing existed.

It was just that Kira had not used it much in the later intelligence reports. Plus, throughout this duel, Mello had been busy dealing with the Volcanic lockout, burn damage, and card-destroying cancer deck. He had been so overwhelmed that he had not had the spare attention to think of anything else.

Thinking back on it now, Mello felt that he had been far too naive to genuinely worry, even for a moment, that the opponent might bring out a big monster for a straight-up fight.

This was that Duel King, the god of Ancient Egypt in charge of taking revenge on society!

Would this guy really seriously summon his ace monster and fight you head-on?

Though Lava Golem itself had nothing to do with Volcanics, it was a Fire Attribute card, its artwork resembled the Volcanic series' style, and its effect of eating the opponent's monsters while burning their Life Points made it easy to associate with