Ryo Bakura (manga)

Ryo Bakura is a character in the Yu-Gi-Oh! manga. This is the original depiction of Ryo Bakura, as created by Kazuki Takahashi.

Bakura is a polite and slightly socially awkward friend of Yugi Mutou. He is interested in gaming, especially tabletop games, with his favorite being Monster World.

Bakura was the twenty first century holder of the Millennium Ring. This caused him to bear host to the evil spirit Dark Bakura, who could take control of Bakura's body when in possession of the Ring. Dark Bakura often manipulated Bakura to achieve his goals and turn games with Bakura's friends into Shadow Games. Despite knowing the danger of the Millennium Ring, Bakura was fond of keeping it close to him and keen on learning the secrets of the Millennium Items.

Monster World
Bakura came into possession of the Millennium Ring after his father bought it from an antique shop in Egypt. Unbeknownst to him at the time, it contained the soul of Dark Bakura, who gained the ability to take control of his body when he wore the Ring.

Bakura used to play Monster World with his friends. He created his own miniature, a White Wizard Bakura, which he brought up to level 13 through his games. However Dark Bakura would take control of Bakura, without him knowing, and turn the games into Shadow Games. As Dark Bakura defeated Bakura's friends, he inflicted the "Mind Doll" Penalty Game on them, trapping their souls in Monster World miniatures, leaving their human bodies in comas. Bakura was aware that his friends fell into comas when he played games with them, but had no knowledge of the causation. As a result, Bakura had to keep changing schools and isolated himself by living in an apartment.

When Bakura transferred to Domino High School, ha sat next to Katsuya Jonouchi and quickly befriended him. During the lunch break of Bakura's first day, Jonouchi introduced him to his friends Yugi Mutou, Anzu Mazaki and Hiroto Honda. Bakura was impressed to hear that Yugi's family owned a game store. He told his new friends about his interest in gaming and how he liked Monster World. The others liked the sound of Monster World and suggested that they play it the next day. Bakura reluctantly agreed, thinking about what happened when he played games with his older friends. Bakura asked Yugi about his Millennium Puzzle and was about to tell him that he had a similar item, but stopped after feeling a pain in his chest.

A group of girls, who thought Bakura was cute pulled him away from Jonouchi and the others to give him a tour of the school, although he was slightly uncomfortable about this. The gym teacher, Mr. Karita, spotted Bakura with the girls and called him over and acted disrespectful towards him. He also said that boys having long hair was against the school rules and ordered him to have his hair shaved by the next day. Bakura went into the bathroom afterwards, where he heard Dark Bakura for the first time, but thought he imagined it.

As he was leaving school, he met Yugi, Jonouchi, Anzu and Honda again, who asked about playing Monster World. However Bakura said that he could not play with them and told them about what happened to his older gaming friends.

At home, while Bakura was writing a letter to his sister, Amane, he heard Dark Bakura again. Dark Bakura introduced himself and said that he had been living inside of Bakura since he got the Millennium Ring. Bakura tried removing the Ring, but found that Dark Bakura had now pierced its prongs into his chest. As rent, Dark Bakura said that he had been granting Bakura wishes, including one to let him play games with his friends forever. He reminded Bakura of Karita before saying he was going to pay his rent tonight. Dark Bakura then took full control of him and defeated Karita in a Shadow Game.

Bakura skipped school the next day. Yugi, Jonouchi, Anzu and Honda came to his apartment to cheer him up. Bakura tried warning them to get out, but Dark Bakura took control, posed as Bakura, and invited them in to play a game of Monster World, which he turned into a Shadow Game.

Dark Bakura managed to trap the souls of Anzu, Jonouchi, Honda and Yugi in their miniatures. Dark Yugi then took control of Yugi's body and continued to play on their behalf. Dark Yugi succeeded in getting Honda's character to blow the left hand off of Dark Bakura's avatar, Zorc. Due to his connection with Zorc, Dark Bakura then lost control of his own left hand to Bakura. Bakura used that hand to make Dark Bakura miscalculate the damage Zorc inflicted on Yugi, Jonouchi, Anzu and Honda, so that they each still had one hit point remaining. He then typed on the laptop that he was not going to let Dark Bakura kill his friends or control him anymore. Dark Bakura slid the laptop to the other side of the table to stop Bakura interfering. However Bakura swapped Dark Bakura's brainwashed dice with regular dice on one turn and then threw the brainwashed dice on another turn, forcing Dark Bakura to get a 99, the worst possible roll. Frustrated by his meddling, Dark Bakura impaled his left hand on one of the diorama's towers to stop him. Yugi and his friends then began to suspect that the Bakura they were facing was not the same Bakura they befriended. Dark Yugi then got Yugi's character to use his training hand to pull the White Wizard Bakura out of Zorc's left arm.

The Wizard Bakura introduced himself as an NPC created by Bakura, who obeyed Bakura's will. Wizard Bakura lowered Zorc's defenses, allowing the others' attacks to do serious damage. When Zorc transformed into Last Zorc, Bakura used "White Magic Shining Shield" to defend the party from "Zorc Inferno". Not having the strength to defend them from another attack, he urged them to defeat Zorc on their next turn.

Dark Yugi's party came close to defeating Zorc. It came down to a lowest dice roll wins scenario between Dark Yugi and Dark Bakura, with Dark Bakura winning in the event of a tie. Both rolled 00. However Bakura had sealed his soul in Dark Bakura's brainwashed dice and was able to make them self-destruct, destroying his soul in the process.

Once Zorc was defeated, Dark Bakura collapsed and dropped the Millennium Ring. Dark Yugi checked on Bakura's body and reported that he was dead. However part of Bakura's soul still resided in the Wizard Bakura, so Dark Yugi rolled for the wizard who used his magic to return the soul back to Bakura's body. Everyone Dark Bakura trapped in miniatures returned to their own bodies afterwards.

A few days later, Bakura built a diorama as a memento of his and his friends adventure in Monster World.

Duelist Kingdom
At school, Bakura saw Yugi's grandfather, Sugoroku, on the on Yugi's camcorder and mistook the device for a video phone when Sugoroku spoke to him. Jonouchi explained that Dark Yugi lost a game of Duel Monsters to an apparent video recording of the Millennium Eye holder, Maximillion Pegasus, after which Pegasus used his power to seal Sugoroku's soul in the videotape. Yugi and Jonouchi said that they would have to go to the Duelist Kingdom Duel Monsters tournament in order to return Sugoroku to normal and Bakura showed interest in going to the kingdom to learn the secrets of the Millennium Items. He shocked his friends by showing them he still carried the Millennium Ring, but insisted it was safe as long as he did not wear it. Bakura went to Yugi's house after school that day. He saw Yugi's invitation and watched a videotape Jonouchi received from his sister Shizuka, but initially mistook as another tape from Pegasus. Bakura then learned about Shizuka needing an operation to prevent her going blind.

One week later, Bakura went to Domino Pier to travel to Duelist Kingdom with Yugi, who was participating to save his grandpa and Jonouchi, who was also participating to save his sister, and Anzu and Honda who were traveling to support them. In addition to supporting Yugi and Jonouchi, Bakura traveled to learn more about the Millennium Items. The group had to spend the night on the floor of the ship's common room, but Bakura was optimistic and said it would be fun like a sleepover. That night, he helped get the rescue equipment after Jonouchi jumped overboard to try and save Yugi's "Exodia" cards that Insector Haga threw away.

In the preliminaries, Bakura cheered for Dark Yugi as he defeated Haga. and Jonouchi as he defeated Mai Kujaku, although he initially tried to talk Jonouchi out of accepting her challenge, fearing he would lose. As the group got hungry, they located fish cooking over a fire. It belonged to Ryota Kajiki, who shared it with them, before revealing it had actually been bait to lure in Duelists. Bakura then cheered for Dark Yugi as he Dueled and defeated Kajiki. Bakura learned of Pegasus' plan to takeover KaibaCorp after Mokuba Kaiba tried to steal Dark Yugi's Star Chips and then supported Dark Yugi as he defeated the Ventriloquist of the Dead. Finally before nightfall, he supported Jonouchi as he defeated Dinosaur Ryuzaki.

During the night, Bakura, Yugi, Jonouchi, Anzu and Honda found a spot under some trees to sleep. As Bakura, Honda and Yugi tried stopping Jonouchi eating a wild mushroom, Mai arrived and after teasing Jonouchi for a bit proposed a truce for the night. She shared the supplies she had brought with the group and ordered the boys to do the cooking. Considering himself to be good a cooking, Bakura offered to do all of it, while the others did some other jobs to help prepare. After the meal, the boys went under the trees to sleep, while Anzu and Mai took the tent.

Bakura, Jonouchi and Honda were woken when they heard the commotion from Mai and Dark Yugi's Duels with the Player Killer of Darkness. As the boys tried going back to sleep again later, they were woken by Bakura screaming as he noticed a needle on the Millennium Ring was pointing towards Pegasus Castle. He theorized that it was reacting to the Millennium Eye. He admitted to the others that learning the secrets of the Millennium Items had been one of the reasons he had come to the island and assured them that he would not put the Ring on.

The group were prevented from falling asleep again by the sound of Kaiba's helicopter landing on the island. Jonouchi challenged Kaiba to a Duel to get revenge for Death-T, but was defeated. As Anzu tried telling Kaiba off for mocking Jonouchi, Bakura tried to say that Jonouchi was Dueling to save his sister's eyes, but Jonouchi told him not to tell Kaiba.

The next day Jonouchi was abducted by Bandit Keith, Ghost Kozuka, Takaido and Satake. Bakura and Honda searched Battle Boxes to see if they could find him, while Yugi and Anzu checked the forest. The groups rejoined after failing to find him and Dark Yugi then saw a vision of Jonouchi underground. They found Jonouchi in an underground cave just after he defeated Kozuka in a Duel. However before they could leave, Keith, Kozuka, Takaido and Satake rolled a boulder in front of the exit.

With the Millennium Ring pointing in the direction of the Millennium Eye, Bakura was able to navigate in the direction of Pegasus Castle. This brought the group to the Meikyû Brothers' dungeon. Jonouchi and Dark Yugi Dueled and defeated the [Paradox Brothers|Meikyû Brothers]] to gain access to the exit. Bakura, Anzu and Honda celebrated Dark Yugi and Jonouchi each reaching 10 Star Chips. However the group still had to solve a riddle to find which of two doors was the true exit. As they searched for clues, Dark Bakura spoke to Bakura. He asked him to put on the Ring, so that he could take control. As a master thief, Dark Bakura said he would have no problem choosing the correct door. Bakura refused at first, but when Dark Bakura pointed out that he and is friends would be trapped otherwise, he complied. Pretending to be Bakura, Dark Bakura was able to aid Dark Yugi in fooling the Meikyû Brothers into letting him choose the correct door. He returned control to Bakura afterwards.

The group were delayed from entering Pegasus Castle after Yugi lost five Star Chips in a Duel with Kaiba. As the group tried to cheer Yugi up, Bakura said that there must be some Duelists left that Yugi could win another five Star Chips from. They then met Mai Kujaku, who repaid the Yugis Star Chips that she owed them. With Yugi, Jonouchi and Mai each on ten Star Chips, the group proceeded to enter the castle. Saruwatari refused to let Bakura, Anzu and Honda inside as they were not finalists. However Jonouchi knocked him unconscious and the group entered.

Bakura watched the Duel between Kaiba and Pegasus and saw that Mokuba had had his soul stripped from his body. He tried to convince Mai that Pegasus had mind reading powers and witnessed Kaiba's soul being sucked into a "Soul Prison" after he lost.

Bakura joined the finalists for a dinner party. Here he saw a portrait of Shadi. Dark Yugi, Jonouchi, Anzu and Honda told him that Shadi was a Millennium Item holder, who had nearly killed them in the Trial of the Mind. This enforced Bakura's suspicions that the secrets of the Millennium Items were hidden on the island. When Honda asked Dark Yugi to try and save the Kaiba brothers from Pegasus, Jonouchi showed them no sympathy, but Bakura backed-up Honda. Although Bakura thought Kaiba seemed selfish and arrogant and did not know the full extent of what he did at Death-T, he thought that Kaiba could not be all bad, since he risked his life to save his brother. However he apologized when Jonouchi told him that he did not know what Kaiba was really like. The finalists each had a Millennium Eye replica in their soup as part of a bingo to randomize the pairings for the semi finals. Bakura asked Dark Yugi if he could have his replica eye afterwards.

After Bakura went to his room for the night, Dark Bakura took control. Bakura later regained control and found himself in the hallway being questioned by Pegasus' guards. He lied that he was looking for the bathroom and was told to use the one in his room. He met Honda as he was returning to his room and as a favor, distracted the guards, so that Honda could sneak by to look for the Kaiba brothers' bodies. Dark Bakura took control of his body again afterwards and freed Honda, who had been captured and put in the dungeon.

Bakura and Honda were not present for either of the semi finals, as they had spent the night looking for Mokuba were bring him to a bedroom in the morning. As they did so, they spotted Jonouchi running around looking for his "The Honor of the King's Right". Before Dark Yugi faced Pegasus, they informed their friends where they had been. As Bakura urged Dark Yugi to kill Pegasus, Honda noticed he had been acting different, like when they were at the dungeon, but thought it was a bad time to bring the matter up.

At the beginning of Dark Yugi and Pegasus' Duel, Bakura commented on how much of an advantage Pegasus had. When asked if he was doubting if the Yugis could win, he said that he was not, but if he was in Yugi's position, he would not be able to think of a way to win. He celebrated when the Yugi's used their Mind Shuffle technique to overcome Pegasus' mind reading and destroy "Toon World". However he was certain that Pegasus was keeping his better cards in reserve. When Yugi became unconscious, due to the nature of the Shadow Game Dark Yugi was unable to perform the Mind Shuffle. However when Pegasus tried to perform another Mind Scan, he was blocked by an apparition of Bakura, Jonouchi, Yugi, Anzu and Honda. When the Yugis won, Bakura said that he felt their pain of fighting and joy of winning. Bakura then heard Pegasus say that the Millennium Items contained an evil intelligence and tell the story of how he met Shadi and acquired the Millennium Eye. He felt some sympathy for Pegasus after hearing this.

Bakura and his friends went to Mokuba's room to find his soul put back in his body. As the others went outside, Dark Bakura possessed Bakura again. He proceeded to kill Pegasus, steal his Millennium Eye, leave the replica in its place and leave undetected. After Bakura regained control, he and his friends got a lift back to Japan in Kaiba's helicopter.

Dungeon Dice Monsters
Bakura attended the grand opening of the Black Clown, along with Yugi, Jonouchi, Anzu and Sugoroku. As they purchased their own Dungeon Dice Monsters Booster Packs, they got separated from Yugi. In his excitement, Sugoroku invited them back to his house to try and play Dungeon Dice Monsters, without worrying about Yugi.

Later that day, he lost control to Dark Bakura, who went to the Black Crown to support Yugi in his Dungeon Dice Monsters game with Ryuji Otogi and seal a part of his soul in a piece of the Millennium Puzzle. He then returned control to Bakura, who had no idea where he was. Bakura saw Mr. Clown drag Yugi into a secret room to play the Devil's Board Game and the room caught fire just before Jonouchi, Anzu, Honda and Sugoroku arrived. Yugi refused to leave without the Millennium Puzzle. Jonouchi ordered Bakura and the others to get to safety, while he helped Yugi get out.

Bakura, along with Jonouchi, Anzu, Honda and Ryuji visited Yugi the day he was leaving the hospital after the fire.

Battle City
Bakura agreed to meet Anzu, Honda and Sugoroku at the beginning of the Battle City tournament to cheer for Yugi and Jonouchi. However he stayed up all night writing an adventure for a tabletop role-playing game and showed up an hour late the next day. He met Anzu and Sugoroku, but Honda had left on a trip. As the three of them searched for Yugi and Jonouchi they found a mime that had been standing still for a day. Bakura shouted "boo" in front of him, but got no reaction.

The group found Jonouchi chasing a thief, who had taken his Deck and Duel Disk. Unbeknownst to the others, the thief had added cards to Jonouchi's Deck. Bakura was skeptical about the thief's excuse that he was a competitor and had his own Deck and Duel Disk stolen. He questioned Jonouchi's decision to Duel the person the thief claimed stole his Duel Disk. While the thief was fetching Jonouchi's opponent, Jonouchi told the others that Shizuka's eye operation had been a success and that he was fighting to give her the courage to remove her eye bandages. Jonouchi's opponent, Insector Haga, then arrived. Bakura watched as Jonouchi defeated Haga.

Bakura pointed out how the two cards Jonouchi had won through the ante rule, "Jinzo" and "Insect Queen" were weird and scary. Jonouchi thought Bakura was making fun of him at first, but Bakura said that he loved grotesque cards and would like to have them in his Occult Deck. The idea of an Occult Deck, made Jonouchi afraid to Duel Bakura.

As Jonouchi searched for his next opponent, Dark Bakura possessed Bakura as the Millennium Ring had sensed the presence of Marik Ishtar's Millennium Rod. Dark Bakura separated from the others, who thought Bakura got lost in the crowd. He then stole a Duel Disk and Puzzle Card from a tournament participant and confronted Marik. Dark Bakura agreed to help Marik in exchange for his Millennium Rod. To help him get close to Yugi's friends, Dark Bakura stabbed Bakura's armed and relinquished control to Bakura, who fell unconscious.

Marik brought Bakura to outside the aquarium and began helping him walk. Anzu, Jonouchi and Sugoroku spotted Bakura. Marik explained that he found Bakura unconscious in the street and treated him as best he could. Bakura had no recollection of how he had been injured or where he got the Duel Disk. The Duel Disk's original owner then arrived with a friend. Marik got injured trying to defend Bakura from them and Jonouchi fought the two of them off. Sugoroku then called a taxi in order to take Bakura to the hospital. Marik won their trust from this event and lied that his name was Namu.

Bakura was taken the hospital and given a room. As soon as Sugoroku took his eyes off him, Dark Bakura took control and slipped out. He defeated and took the lives of other participants, qualifying Bakura for the finals.

At Domino Stadium, Dark Bakura met some of the other finalists and returned control to Bakura. Marik used the Millennium Rod on Bakura to brainwash him into not feeling the pain of his injury. Bakura insisted that he did not need to go to the hospital and offered to let Jonouchi touch his wound. He said that he entered the tournament to Duel Yugi and Jonouchi and acted as though he had won the Puzzle Cards himself. When asked how he got his Duel Disk, he said it was a secret. Yugi was suspicious that Dark Bakura could be involved and could not believe that Bakura would enter the tournament himself.

When Marik, still under the alias Namu, arrived at the stadium, Yugi and Jonouchi began to feel suspicious of him, but Bakura and Anzu, under the influence of the Millennium Rod, thanked Marik for helping Bakura earlier and insisted that he was their friend. As Rishid, who was pretending to be Marik arrived, Bakura showed Yugi that the Millennium Ring was pointing towards him. The finalists and their friends then boarded the Battle Ship for the quarter finals.

A bingo machine determined the pairings for the finals, starting with Yugi and Bakura. At the beginning of the Duel, Dark Bakura took control and revealed himself to Dark Yugi. As Dark Yugi was about to win, Rishid, still pretending to be Marik, arrived and claimed that Bakura was being possessed by the Millennium Rod. He said he would release his real personality and Bakura was then given back control of his body. He began to feel the pain of his wound, which had more of an affect on him than Dark Bakura. Rishid explained that if Dark Yugi attacked with "Slifer the Sky Dragon", it would kill Bakura. Dark Bakura was unhappy with Marik's plan, so he took back control of Bakura's body and allowed Dark Yugi to attack him, insisting that he would not let Bakura die. Dark Yugi complied and won the Duel. After the Duel, Bakura was taken to a room to be treated and Anzu, under Marik's influence, took the Millennium Ring to stop Dark Bakura taking control of Bakura again.

A piece of Marik's soul still existed within Bakura's body from when he had possessed him before. After Dark Marik took control of Marik's body, Marik helped Dark Bakura regain control of Bakura and the two used his body to confront Dark Marik. Dark Marik defeated them in a Duel and took the Millennium Ring.

The next time Bakura woke up, he was under buried in the rubble on Alcatraz just after the Dark Yugi defeated Dark Marik in the tournament finals. He made his way back to the Battle Ship and washed up. He found Mai had recently woken up after suffering one of Dark Marik's Penalty Games. She told him to pretend that she had stopped breathing in order to fool Jonouchi. Afterwards, he asked where the Millennium Ring was. His friends lied that they did not know, as they did not want him to get possessed again. It was announced that the Duel Tower on Alcatraz was going to self-destruct soon and that the Kaiba brothers were not on the blimp. As Bakura searched for Kaiba, he found the Millennium Ring in Yugi's room. He was happy to find it and put it back on, but thought it was mean of Yugi to lie to him. After the Duel Tower blew-up, Bakura and the others went back to Japan, while the Kaibas went to America.

Memory World
One night, Dark Bakura possessed Bakura to stop a thief from stealing Yugi's Egyptian God Cards and give Yugi the Millennium Eye. The next day, Bakura went to school tired, unaware that his body had been awake late the night before. He, Yugi, Anzu, Jonouchi and Honda discussed Dark Yugi regaining his memories and Dark Yugi assured them that he would not forget them if he got his old memories back.

After school, as part of the ritual to regain Dark Yugi's memories, Bakura and his friends went to Domino Museum, where Dark Yugi was to present the Egyptian God Cards to a tablet. After doing so, Dark Yugi left Yugi's body and Bobasa explained that he had went to the Memory World to relive his past, including his death. Bobasa said that the others were allowed to enter the Memory World to help him, but before that he used the Millennium Scales to test them. Since Bakura shared his body with Dark Bakura, the Scales detected evil in his heart and he was not allowed to enter.

Monster World figures
Bakura created his own Monster World avatar, Bakura, a White Wizard. He managed to bring its level up to 13.

Duel Monsters Deck
Although Bakura was not shown using it himself, he took pride in the "Occult" (オカルト, Okaruto) Deck that Dark Bakura used, saying he loved grotesque cards and referred to it as his Deck.

The Occult Deck relied on utilizing monsters which were in the Graveyard. Its main combo involved having "Dark Necrofear" in the Graveyard, where the spirit of its marionette would possess his opponents' monsters, while "Dark Necrofear" moved the planchette on "Destiny Board" to spell out "DEATH".