Any conversation about Lord of the Tachyon Galaxy will almost inevitably turn to one card: Spellbook of Judgment. Prophecy Decks first made the Top 32 at YCS Santiago and San Diego, then five were in the Top 32 in Lille, and they also captured some Regional Top 8's. Now that the ultimate Spellbook has just been released, it'll take them to a totally different level.

During the End Phase of the turn this card was activated, add "Spellbook" Spell Cards from your Deck to your hand, except "Spellbook of Judgment", up to the number of Spell Cards activated after this card's resolution, then, you can Special Summon from your Deck 1 Spellcaster-Type monster whose Level is less than or equal to the number of cards added to your hand by this effect. You can only activate 1 "Spellbook of Judgment" per turn.

When you have Spellbook of Judgment, your goal is to play as many Spell cards as possible after Judgment resolves. For every Spell you play, you'll get a Spellbook in your End Phase. Plus, you get a free Special Summon that gets bigger and bigger for every Spell activated after Judgment. But what does that mean?

Say you started your Duel with Spellbook of Judgment and Spellbook of Secrets. If you don't have one of those cards, use Spellbook Magician of Prophecy to search it out. Since both cards are searchable, it's not a tough hand to put together.

1. Start by activating Spellbook of Judgment.
2. Then play Spellbook of Secrets to get Spellbook of the Master from your Deck.
3. Summon a Spellcaster monster. If you already Summoned Spellbook Magician of Prophecy, you're set.
4. With a Spellcaster on the field, activate Spellbook of the Master to copy Spellbook of Secrets.
5. Use that effect to search for The Grand Spellbook Tower. Activate it.
6. Play the rest of your turn as you like. You might want to Set as many cards as possible, because...well, you'll see why.

Once you hit the End Phase a few different things are going to happen.

• First, Spellbook of Judgment's effect will let you search your Deck for three more Spellbooks. With three in your graveyard, you can even search out Spellbook of Fate and use any of its effects on your next turn (or this turn if you didn’t go first, since Spellbook of Fate is a Quick-Play).
• Spellbook of Judgment then lets you Special Summon a Level-3-or-less Spellcaster.
• Here's the fun part: Special Summon Justice of Prophecy. Since you're in the End Phase and you played a Spellbook this turn, you can activate Justice's effect. Banish her to add High Priestess of Prophecy and another Spellbook to your hand. Since you couldn't search a second Judgment with your first copy, now's a great time to grab another one so you can do it all over again next turn.

You only needed two specific cards for that combo: Judgment and Secrets. And since Secrets turns into Master which turns into The Grand Spellbook Tower, you only really gave up one card—Judgment. In return you got a whopping five cards in your End Phase: four “Spellbook” Spells of your choice and High Priestess of Prophecy. Next turn you'll be able to Special Summon the Priestess for free with her effect, destroy a card with her ability, draw a card with The Grand Spellbook Tower, and banish one of your opponent's cards with Spellbook of Fate.

…And play Judgment again.

That's what Spellbook of Judgment does for you if you have an average hand. Let's add one more card to the mix.

This is the same hand we talked about in our first example, but now there's a Toon Table of Contents with it. Toon Table is a Normal Spell: it lets you add one “Toon” card from your Deck to your hand. You can use one Toon Table to get another, use your second Toon Table to get your third, and the third one gets you Toon Gemini Elf. Toon Gemini can't attack the turn it's Summoned, but it’s a 1900 ATK Spellcaster that lets you play Spellbook of Fate. And, when it inflicts Battle Damage to your opponent, they have to discard a random card.

So you play Judgment. Then you Toon Table, for Toon Table, for Toon Table, for Toon Gemini Elf. You Summon Toon Gemini, then play Spellbook of Secrets, Spellbook of the Master, and The Grand Spellbook Tower. You play any additional cards you want, and you Set everything else.

Now when you hit your End Phase, things get even crazier, because Spellbook of Judgment doesn't just count “Spellbook” Spells—any Spell Card will do. Since you activated at least three Spellbooks and three Toon Tables, you get to search out at least six “Spellbook” Spells to add to your hand. You can bring out Justice of Prophecy for another Spellbook and a High Priestess, or you might be able to just Special Summon the High Priestess right to the field. If you choose to go with Justice, it's possible to end your turn with a total of six cards in hand, plus Toon Gemini Elf and The Grand Spellbook Tower on the field, plus three more cards Set in your Spell and Trap Card Zone. You'll head into Main Phase 1 on Turn 2 with thirteen cards, tearing through half your Deck in the process. Of course, the trade-off to this is that you had to put Toon Table of Contents and Toon Gemini Elf into your Deck, cards that normally won’t make the cut outside of a Toon Deck, giving you even less room for cards other than Spellbooks. It’s still crazy when you pull it off though.

It's a good time to be a Prophecy Duelist because few Decks have ever been this strong. Spellbook of Judgment can be found in Lord of the Tachyon Galaxy booster packs, look for it in stores now!

© 1996 KAZUKI TAKAHASHI
© 2011 NAS · TV TOKYO