Ai discovers the Zaizens' whereabouts in LINK VRAINS; he engages a Duel against the two to retrieve the other half of the code key from Akira.
This episode contains the following tropes:
- Armor-Piercing Question: Blue Maiden tries to question Ai's reasons for attacking humanity despite the fact that they both share a common sadness. Ai brushes her off, however, while also questioning her about Pandor's presence, who took over in Aqua's place since her termination.
- Forced to Watch: Ai brings Playmaker, Soulburner, and Revolver in as intangible projections to watch his duel with the Zaizens. He also sends a video feed to Kusanagi.
- Ironic Echo: Time stopped moving forward for Yusaku since the Lost Incident up until the conclusion of the Tower of Hanoi incident. Now, Ai feels that time has stopped moving forward for him as well due to his own failure to save the rest of the Ignis from Bohman, and is unable to move forward unless he defeats all who stand in his way.
- Mood Whiplash: Blue Maiden and Ai engage in a heated exchange following the latter's activation of "Judgment Arrows"... then Ai and Roboppi suddenly change the mood with Puns involving the words "clever", "cutlet", and "meaty". note
- My Greatest Failure: Blue Maiden addresses her own failure to protect Aqua when dissuading Ai from fighting as they both share a common sadness.
- Rejected Apology: Akira attempts to apologise to Ai on behalf of SOL Technologies, as he feels equally responsible for contributing to the termination of the Ignis. Ai, however, is having none of it, and coaxes Akira into making his move.
- Sadistic Choice: Ai forces Akira to either duel him with the SOL Technologies code key at stake, or risk the lives of everyone on the SOL Technologies airplane, which he can force to crash.
- So Proud of You: Discussed; Ai points out that Aqua would be proud of Blue Maiden for utilising her "Marincess" deck effectively, which has been Blue Maiden's most important deck since her partnership with Aqua.
- Villainous Valor: Even though Ai is forcing Akira to duel him by holding the plane and its crew hostage, he points out that he could have just demanded the code key without conditions and even allows Aoi and Akira to duel him together.
- Wham Shot: Ai activates "Judgment Arrows", the very same Link Spell initially curated by Lightning himself as part of his plans to conquer and control humanity.
- What the Hell, Hero?: Soulburner goes off on Ai for using Judgement Arrows.
