"Any card—so long as it exists—has a power that is needed."

bakugouisabitch:

Because no souls were ever sealed in them.

Wait give me a moment to explain the Yamis to you because i love spreading ygo meta:

Both the soul of the Pharaoh and the soul of the Thief King were sealed inside the items:

Atem was sealed together with Akhenaden/The Dark Priest in the Millennium Puzzle when he won his battle against Zorc all those years ago:

The fact that a piece of The Dark Priest (who is, after all, a Zorc-influenced Akhenaden) was also inside the Puzzle might be a good explanation as to why Yami Yugi is associated with the dark - or as The Dark Pharaoh - and was pretty ruthless in his “judgment games” at the beginning (in the early Season 0 manga).

The soul of Thief King Bakura, instead, was sealed together with a piece of Zorc himself inside the Millennium Ring:

And this is why “the new entity”, Yami Bakura, is both TKB and Zorc (he’s actually the soul of TKB with a piece of Zorc’s soul, so technically there’s more TKB than Zorc in him).

This is what happened in the real events (not the RPG) 3000 years ago. When the Pharaoh and the Priests destroyed Diabound and thereby killed TKB’s soul, he sealed his soul inside the Ring. I like to think it was his will to live, his desire for not having obtained what he wanted (to avenge his dead people), that’s why he just couldn’t die. And through the “help” of Zorc’s magic and all the dark alchemy involved with the Items, he managed to hold on to his soul and come back as a haunting/vengeful ghost. Because he didn’t die in peace.

The other Millennium Items, like the Rod or the Tauk for example, don’t have the ghosts/souls of their ancestors inside them because they never got to seal them. And why? It’s cause their souls rest in peace, for a lack of better words. They died peacefully and “normally”, with proper burials and ceremonies and such, and with “peace of mind” - something that Atem and TKB never got to have when they died 3000 years ago.

This is also why after the Ceremonial Duel Atem gets to enter the afterlife because his soul is finally put to rest in peace.

You are right about Yami Malik. And let me add some more things:

He was the split/other personality Malik created in order to survive. I informed myself over some DID (Dissociative Identity Disorder) aspects and I read that it’s very common for people to “develop” this condition due to traumatic events that happened to them in their childhood. It’s like a very harsh “side effect” of PTSD, where the people who suffer create this other person - a non-existent family member, a friend, whatever - that they long for at this moment. In Malik’s case, it was like an older version of him, capable of killing everything that stands in his way and unafraid of everything. This is Yami Malik, a big protector/killer figure he needed at that moment…

… otherwise, he would have died.

Of course, since Yu-Gi-Oh! is not an accurate psychological novel, they kind of dramatised the whole deal (cause ygo is very extreme in everything) and made the whole other personality like a bad monster/darkness personality that needs to be destroyed or whatever…

I conclude by saying you should really read the manga. Just as a bit of advice. The whole deal of souls and ancient spirits are explained better there. The whole Memory World Arc in itself is, albeit disappointing, much better explained. In the anime, they don’t explain shit and most things don’t even make sense tbh.

Read the manga, guys.