''Cardfight!! Vanguard'' (season 3)

Months after the conclusion of the VF Circuit, Aichi enters high school as a freshman at Miyaji Academy. However, he has trouble adjusting to his new school life due to the academy's heavy emphasis on studies. After school, Aichi goes to Card Capital while being tailed by a classmate, Naoki Ishida. There, he sees the many customers playing Vanguard, which Naoki has no knowledge about. He spots Aichi conversing with Team SIT Genius in the back of the shop. Curious by how different Aichi's behavior is in the card shop compared to how he acts at school because of a card game, Naoki becomes intrigued to Vanguard. And so, Aichi teaches Naoki about Vanguard through playing an actual match, with the latter being lent a new Narukami trial deck to use from Shin. As they cardfight, Naoki slowly gets immersed into the game. After Aichi eventually wins, Naoki buys the trial deck and hastily leaves in a frustrated manner, which worries Aichi. But he is later comforted by Kai who tells him that Naoki has in fact taken an interest in Vanguard.

The news of Kourin transferring into Aichi's class becomes a hot topic, especially when the male classmates start talking to Aichi to get closer to her once they learn that the two know each other. Then, Aichi gets an idea on how to promote Vanguard at his school. Because there is no Cardfight Club, Aichi decides to make one himself. The next day, he tries to recruit enough members to officially start the club (needing a minimum of five people, including himself) by handing out leaflets in front of the school. His pleas fall on deaf ears until Kourin agrees to be a member. Her enlistment is followed by several other boys who want to join (only to be with Kourin), but she proposes that anybody who wants to become club members will have to defeat either her and Aichi in cardfights before they can enter. The two easily beat all of the challengers, but then Naoki steps up to play against Kourin with honest feelings of wanting to join the club.

Aichi's Cardfight Club is attracting attention all around the school as male classmates (who are mostly interested in being with Kourin) have him teach them the rules of Vanguard and again attempt to play against Kourin in order to be inducted to the club but to no avail. Additionally, the female students gossip about a rumor that claims Aichi only started the club to get close to Kourin, which makes Misaki worry. Aichi tries to ask Misaki to join the club, but she declines because of her job at Card Capital.

Tatewaki Naito, the student council chairman of the Miyaji Academy High School Division, deems Aichi's Cardfight Club to be unnecessary for the school and orders the vice-chairman, Itsuki Suwabe, to devise on how to abolish it. Elsewhere, the Cardfight Club finds an empty classroom to serve its official headquarters. Then, the school's American football team, the Miyaji Vipers, barges in and takes the club outside to the academy's sub-ground where the Vipers' quarterback/captain, Kongou "the Catapult" Ikki, challenges Aichi to a cardfight, with the former appropriately using a Spike Brothers deck. This is an elaborate plan set up by Suwabe to have Kongou defeat Aichi and thereby crush the Cardfight Club members' spirits into not wanting to continue the club.

After Aichi tells his friends at Card Capital about how his school's student council is causing problems for the Cardfight Club, he repeatedly requests for Misaki to join as the fifth member. However, she still turns him down, having mixed feelings on the matter and being insulted by Kourin for not being serious on becoming a member. Then, to quickly shut down of the Cardfight Club, the student council creates a deadline for all potential clubs with at least five members to report to the council, or else they will not be officially recognized by the school. At the last second, Misaki declares herself as the Cardfight Club's fifth member after resolving her feelings of earnestly wanting to join the club. As an initiation test and to prove herself to Kourin, Misaki cardfights Aichi.

Miyaji Academy's unofficial Cardfight Club is set up to have an intramural match against Hitsue High School's Vanguard Club, in which Kai, Miwa, Morikawa, and Izaki are members. The two teams play in a best-of-5 match, and opponents are randomly selected. Under the conditions that Naito established, if the Cardfight Club loses this match, then it will be dissolved.

Kourin defeats Izaki, which ties the score 1-1. The third game pits Misaki against Hitsue Vanguard Club's ringer and old Q4 teammate, Kamui Katsuragi. Although Kamui gets an early lead, Misaki mounts a comeback with Battle Deity of the Night, Artemis. Kamui then combines the Break Ride of Beast Deity, Ethics Buster and the Limit Break of Ultra Beast Deity, Illuminal Dragon to stand four of his rear-guards to launch multiple attacks in one turn. However, Misaki protects herself, only taking one point of damage from Kamui's five attacks. In what seems to be a hopeless situation, Misaki rides Eternal Goddess, Iwanagahime and uses its Limit Break to retire Kamui's front-row units. Weakening Kamui's defenses, Misaki wins and puts Miyaji Academy up 2-1.

Aichi faces Morikawa in the last fight of this intramural match. Although initially mad with using Kai's Kagero deck and not his own, Morikawa nonetheless puts a great amount of pressure on Aichi. All the while, Kai watches the fight as an opportunity to see if his Kagero deck is strong enough against the current Aichi, who strikes back with the Break Ride of Solitary Liberator, Gancelot to empower itself and his rear-guards. Morikawa defends and makes it to his next turn, in which he rides Dragonic Overlord the End. Pairing its Personablast with the Break Ride effect of Dauntless Drive Dragon, Morikawa attacks Aichi with the End three times in a row. Determined to win for the sake of the Cardfight Club, Aichi withstands the onslaught and then uses Gancelot's Break Ride again on the following turn to land a final blow. Aichi emerges victorious over Morikawa, meaning that the Miyaji Academy Cardfight Club wins the intramural match. Aichi and his friends are then congratulated by Hitsue Vanguard Club, with Kai coming to the conclusion that Aichi has indeed grown stronger, perhaps more so than himself.

Now that the Cardfight Club has become official, the new faculty advisor Nakamurabashi has the club decide on a captain and vice-captain for the club by order of Naito. Since Aichi was the person who started the club, he reluctantly accepts the position of captain. As for vice-captain, Shingo is the only person who honestly wants the job while the others are apathetic on the matter. Not wanting to make a hasty decision, Nakamurabashi recommends to hold off until tomorrow on who to elect for vice-captain. After school, Misaki is convinced by her friend Akari Yotsue to try out for vice-captain. The same happens with Kourin being persuaded by Takuto.

Shingo tells Naoki about a Cardfight Circle formed in the middle school division of Miyaji Academy. Shingo suggests that the two of them should pay a visit to the circle and build a relationship between it and the Cardfight Club. Naoki agrees, but he is unaware of Shingo's scheme; he plans to use this as his chance to impress the underclassmen and take them under his wing, thereby raising his status over Naoki. The two go to the Cardfight Circle's clubroom where they meet Emi and Mai, who are two of the three members of the circle. Naoki and Mai play a friendly match, in which Naoki shockingly loses to Mai's Bermuda Triangle deck. After the game, he asks her for advice in a somewhat intimidating fashion. But this earns him to be reprimanded by Misaki, who later enters with Aichi.

The Cardfight Club receives an invitation to and then registers for the upcoming Vanguard Fight High School Championship, a tournament that will feature high school Vanguard teams from all over Japan. Naoki suggests to check out some of the competition, which leads to the club visiting Fukuhara High, an elite private high school that is associated with Team AL4 and located next to its headquarters. The club is greeted by Tetsu, who leads everyone into the school where they watch a cardfight between Asaka and Leon, much to Aichi's surprise. Asaka tries to end the game by using Starlight Melody Tamer, Farah's Personablast and the Pale Moon strategy of superior calling units from the soul during the battle phase for additional attacks. Despite the multi-pronged assault, Leon defends himself and then rides Last Card, Revonn on top of Blue Flight Dragon, Trans-core Dragon. This activates the latter's Break Ride effect, forcing Asaka to discard a card from her hand. He then utilizes the Limit Break of Revonn to gain more power and critical value. Also getting a heal trigger, Leon plows through Asaka's defenses for a comeback victory.

After Naoki makes another offhand comment towards Suiko, the two start their cardfight. Suiko criticizes Naoki for being a good but uninteresting fighter. He tries to prove her wrong when he activates the Limit Break of his new ace card: Armor Break Dragon. At the cost of discarding three cards from his hand, Naoki not only eliminates Suiko's front-row rear-guard units, but he also increases Armor Break Dragon's power and critical value to unbelievable heights. Despite this, Suiko defends against Naoki's attacks with almost all of the cards in her hand. On the following turn, Suiko wins the game with Chief Nurse, Shamsiel by moving cards to and from her damage zone thus increasing most of her units' power.

The Cardfight Club is forced by the student council to take the main stage on the day of the academy's upcoming School Festival. The student council hopes to use this chance to embarrass the club and tarnish its reputation. Despite the daunting task, the club decides to do a stage play using one of Shingo's prewritten scripts and with costume help from Emi and Mai. The script is loosely based on The Tale of the Bamboo Cutter but with Vanguard units; Aichi is given the role of the bamboo cutter (Little Sage, Marron), Misaki is the heroine (CEO Amaterasu), Naoki is the villain (Eradicator, Vowing Sword Dragon), and Kourin is the hero (King of Knights, Alfred). Although Kourin is seemingly busy with her job as an idol, Misaki notices that she is in fact preparing for the play. However, on the day of rehearsal, Kourin does not show up, which leads the club (except Misaki) to think that she is not serious about the play and that Aichi should take the role of Alfred.

The Vanguard Fight High School Championship finally begins with the Miyaji Cardfight Club having to attend the Kanto regional qualifiers. In the waiting room, the club sees Fukuhara's and Hitsue's Vanguard teams. In particular, Hitsue's team has a surprisingly strong look of determination to win the entire tournament. The first round pits Miyaji Academy against Hitsue High in a best-of-3 match. In the first game, Kai defeats Shingo, which puts Hitsue up 1-0.

The second game features Miwa vs. Misaki. For the sake of his teammates, the typically-carefree Miwa goes all out with the Limit Break of Hellfire Seal Dragon, Blockade Inferno to retire all of Misaki's grade 2 rear-guards and gain a significant amount of power. Misaki completely defends herself, but she is left with a weakened battle formation. Nonetheless, on her next turn, Misaki rides Goddess of Good Luck, Fortuna and reassembles her forces. She also activates Fortuna's Limit Break to perform three drive checks and manages to get two drive triggers to increase her overall power, ultimately winning the game and tying the score 1-1.

The decisive fight between Aichi and Izaki ensues. Although Izaki is underestimated by the majority of the people watching, he nonetheless is serious about wanting to catch up to Aichi's level of strength. Aichi notices his fighting spirit and the two continue to play to the best of their abilities. Despite the large amount of pressure from Izaki's Ancient Dragon units, Aichi pulls off a comeback victory. Izaki sheds tears of frustration over this loss, but his effort is rewarded with applause from the crowd.

The members of the Miyaji Cardfight Club draw lots to decide who will play against the Fukuhara Vanguard Club in the final round of the Kanto regional qualifier. Naoki is selected to be first, Kourin is second, and Aichi is third. After some pre-fight conversations between Miyaji and Fukuhara, the two teams send their fighters for the first game.

Naoki once again fights against Suiko. Unlike what happened in their previous encounter, Naoki chooses to not preemptively use the Limit Break of Armor Break Dragon in order to maintain the cards in his hand. He survives Suiko's Break Ride combo attack, but he is left in a tough situation and begins to question himself. With some encouragement from Aichi, Naoki trusts his instincts and activates Armor Break Dragon's Limit Break, climactically winning the game and putting Miyaji up 1-0.

Kourin and Asaka fight each other in the second game of the final round with both of them having their own reasons to win. Kourin hopes to win for the sake of her teammates while Asaka fights for Ren. The cardfight is a seesaw battle until Kourin deals 5 damage to Asaka. However, this allows Asaka to use a Limit Break Ride combination move with Miracle Pop, Ava and Nightmare Doll, Chelsea. She superior calls more of her units to the field to launch multiple attacks, which gives her the win over Kourin. Although frustrated by this loss, Kourin is comforted by her teammates that they will win in the end.

Aichi and Ren face off in the third and last game of the Kanto regional qualifier. As the fight unfolds, Kai watches and is concerned about them. Despite Aichi's best efforts to land a final attack with Blaster Blade Liberator, Ren survives and finishes the battle with a final blow from his reborn avatar: Blaster Dark Revenger. With that, Fukuhara High wins the regional tournament and therefore moves on to the VF High School Championship. Aichi apologizes to his teammates, but they are not upset by his loss and instead cheer him up. During the awards ceremony, Kai leaves after coming to the conclusion that both Aichi and Ren have become too strong for him.

After reporting to Naito about the Cardfight Club's loss at the Kanto regional tournament, Suwabe moves on to his next plan of terminating the club. He gets the Paranormal Power Research Society, a group of delinquent-looking students who are interested in supernatural forces, to challenge the club to a cardfight on the rooftop of the school. However, instead of the Cardfight Club, Leon and Team Dreadnought appear and accept the challenge. Nonetheless, Eru Nakagami, the leader of the Research Society, engages in a Vanguard fight with Leon. Nakagami uses his Dark Irregulars deck and also unleashes his sealed paranormal powers to push for victory. Regardless, Leon defeats Nakagami by putting him in a no-win situation with Last Card, Revonn.

Aichi has an ominous nightmare in which Misaki, Kourin, Naoki, and Shingo all leave him. Worried about the dream, he then goes to school and is relieved to see his friends are there, except for Kourin. After school, Aichi arranges for the Cardfight Club to meet at Card Capital. Naoki goes back into the classroom to retrieve his bag and then decides to follow the student council's secretary, Maki Nagashiro. He is eventually led into a strange hidden room where he sees Maki talking with an unknown person about monitoring the Cardfight Club.

As the battle continues, the Reversed Takuto tries to entice Kai into using the Link Joker clan for himself, claiming that it will give him great power that can even help him defeat his rivals Aichi and Ren. Kai rejects him by saying that he wants to use his own strength and not rely on anything else. Despite having two rear-guards locked thus weakening his overall offense, Kai tries to finish the match with Dragonic Descendant's Limit Break. However, Takuto blocks his attacks and then rides an unknown Link Joker unit which locks all of Kai's rear-guards. Then, Takuto draws Kai into an image of him fighting Aichi with Link Joker. Within this image, Kai, succumbed by power, uses the unknown Link Joker unit against Aichi, which effectively destroys Kai's earlier beliefs of using his own strength. As Takuto explains, Kai has been reborn...

The Reversed Kai battles Tetsu, with the latter surprised by the former's usage of the Link Joker clan. Although initially thinking that it is only natural for Kai to have switched decks in the pursuit of strength, Tetsu soon realizes that something is off with Kai. He relates this with Ren having been overcome by Psyqualia and tries to open Kai's eyes, but to no avail. Kai uses Star-vader, Nebula Lord Dragon to finish the game, and as he leaves, Tetsu soon becomes Reversed.

Asaka and Suiko look for a way to reach the rooftop where Ren begins his fight against the Reversed Tetsu. As they battle, Ren recalls how he and Tetsu first met each other.

One day, a young Ren got himself in trouble with a group of violent delinquents, the leader of which was Tetsu. Ren tried to get Tetsu into playing Vanguard, but Tetsu did not care about it. Eventually, after much pushing from Ren, Tetsu decided to play a game with Ren. After losing that game, Tetsu was motivated to keep playing until finally winning against Ren and becoming interested in Vanguard. Since then, the two became friends and had formed Team AL4.

Asaka and Suiko finally reach the rooftop where they witness the fight between Ren and the Reversed Tetsu unfold. Tetsu pulls ahead in terms of damage with a heal trigger, but Ren turns the game around with Revenger, Raging Form Dragon. Tetsu declares "Final Turn" and Crossrides Demon Marquis, Amon "Яeverse", using its Limit Break to try to finish off Ren. He fends off all of Tetsu's attacks but is left with little resources of his own. Ren's last attack with Raging Form seems to fail when Tetsu nullifies it with a perfect guard until Ren's twin drive check reveals another Raging Form. It is at that moment in which Ren activates Raging Form's Limit Break to Superior Persona Ride the one he checked and launch a final attack on Tetsu, thus defeating and reverting him to his normal self.

Kenji arrives back in Japan via airplane. While waiting at the airport for his friends Yuri and Gai to pick him up, Kenji meets Kai and decides to have a cardfight with him, unaware about the existence of Reverse or of the current situation about it. Despite Kenji's best efforts, the Reversed Kai soundly defeats him.

Elsewhere, Team SIT Genius is hanging around the cardfight lounge in the same airport until Takuto's secretary brings the group to a private room where they meet Kenji who is now Reversed. Kenji challenges Chris to a cardfight, which he accepts. The battle reaches a turning point when Kenji rides Dark Dimensional Robo, "Яeverse" Daiyusha, an evil version of the original Daiyusha. Kenji uses its Limit Break to weaken Chris' vanguard and deal major damage to him. Realizing that Kenji is acting like a completely different person, Chris resolves himself to finish the game with a Break Ride combo using School Hunter, Leo-pald. However, Kenji wards off his attacks and activates "Яeverse" Daiyusha's Limit Break again to defeat Chris and subsequently Reverse him.

Yuri is challenged by the Reversed Kenji to a cardfight, with Yuri noticing that Kenji is not the same as she knows him. As the battle progresses, Yuri recalls how she first met Kenji. One day, Yuri and Gai were scouting for a third member for their as-of-yet unnamed team until Kenji, who was a weak player at the time, offered to play against her. Despite Kenji losing to both her and Gai, Yuri decided to make him the third member of the team, being oddly drawn to him. As time went on, Kenji's skills improved through hard work, and the team, now known as Caesar, won the Japanese Vanguard National Championship. Yuri also gave her pendant to Kenji which he wears around his neck to this day.

While shopping for a camping trip, the Cardfight Club watches a news report about the upcoming VF High School Championship, Ren Suzugamori, and Leon Soryu. Elsewhere, at a hotel lobby, Jillian defeats Kishida, who wanted to challenge Leon. She returns to her hotel room with both Sharlene and Leon inside, the latter of which being in deep concentration for the VF High School Championship. Jillian and Sharlene reminisce for a bit and then try to make little leaf boats as a way to cheer up Leon. Instead, Leon makes the boats and brightens the twin sisters' moods. When the three leave their room, they are confronted by the Reversed group of Kenji, Yuri, and Team SIT Genius.

The high school students of Miyaji Academy go out on the school's traditional camping trip in the mountains. For the first activity, the students must undergo global orienteering. So, teaming with Akari, the Cardfight Club treks across the mountain and reaches various checkpoints before returning to the campsite. Along the way, Akari tells the group about a legend that if two people confess their feelings for each other under a large tree by a certain lake on the second day of the camping trip, then they will be together forever. Kourin tries to talk with Aichi at one of the checkpoints but misses her chance. The Cardfight Club and Akari make it back to the campsite and are surprised to learn that they are the first to return, which earns them praise from their classmates and also angers the student council.

As Aichi and his classmates continue on their bus ride home, the middle school division of Miyaji Academy is having an open house. Team Handsome attends in the hopes of convincing Nagisa to go to Miyaji instead of Hitsue Middle School (where Kamui attends). But unbeknownst to them, a Reversed cardfighter lurks the school grounds.

Kamui quickly realizes that Kourin is Reversed and resolves himself to defeat her in a cardfight to lift the spell from her. He quickly deals 5 damage to Kourin, who responds by using the card that she could not bring herself to use against Aichi during the camping trip: Broken Heart Jewel Knight, Ashlei "Яeverse". She uses its devastating Limit Break to retire Kamui's units while increasing her own forces to eventually overpower and defeat Kamui. Meanwhile, Kai returns to Japan and is escorted by Takuto's assistant until he sees Miwa.

Continuing his broadcast which is only visible to cardfighters, Takuto reveals everything about Reverse and the black rings in the sky scattered around the world. He explains that those are gates which grow with each fighter becoming Reversed, eventually enveloping the entire world in darkness. At the end of the broadcast, as Aichi and his friends come to grips with this revelation, Kamui finally succumbs to Reverse and challenges Aichi. Soon becoming overwhelmed by an increased number of Reversed fighters, Aichi and his friends escape along with Gouki, Nagisa, Emi, Mai, and Rekka thanks to the timely arrival of Shin.

Elsewhere, Miwa fights Kai using the latter's Kagero deck in an attempt to open his eyes. However, his efforts end in vain as Kai defeats him with Star-vader, Chaos Breaker Dragon while also telling Miwa that he became Reversed of his own volition to become as strong as Aichi and Ren.

While everyone is still coming to grips with this entire situation, Leon appears before Aichi and his friends. He not only tells them the solution to returning Reversed fighters to normal is defeating them in cardfights, but he also informs them that he plans on going to fight Kai and wants Aichi to join him. He agrees, but then Leon proposes to have a fight instead. Shortly into the battle, Leon calls the fight off, noting that Aichi's heart is locked by the thought of having to fight Kai. Leon leaves after further deeming Aichi as being unable to achieve victory in his current state and unworthy of fighting alongside him. While Aichi looks inside himself for answers, Naoki follows Leon outside and says that he wants to go with him in Aichi's place. Leon decides to test Naoki's skills in a cardfight with Shingo observing them.

Meanwhile, Jun Mutsuki gathers his fellow underground fighters in an effort to counterattack the Reversed fighters until Miwa appears before him. Quickly realizing Miwa's Reversed state, Jun cardfights him. Although he drives Miwa to the brink of defeat, Jun is unable to deal the final blow to him. Miwa wins using Dauntless Dominate Dragon "Яeverse", leaving the now-Reversed Jun to take on the other underground fighters.

After much training, Naoki finally constructs a suitable deck with help from Shingo. The two then decide to go and reclaim Miyaji Academy from the Reversed fighters inhabiting it. They encounter Maki, who summons all of the Reversed fighters (except Kamui and Kourin). Together, Naoki and Shingo take on all of the fighters, defeating them one by one. However, unbeknownst to Naoki as he continues fighting, Shingo loses to Maki. After beating the last of the Reversed fighters, Naoki searches for Shingo but then comes across Naito and Suwabe, who have been hiding from Reversed fighters and are unaware of Maki's involvement with Reverse. Soon after, Naoki finds Shingo but is shocked to discover that the latter is Reversed.

Naoki uses Eradicator, Tempest Bolt Dragon to defeat Shingo, thereby freeing him of Reverse. Naoki, Naito, and Suwabe then take Shingo inside the school where he regains his senses. Meanwhile, Aichi thinks about what Leon said to him as he walks to Card Capital. Once there, he wonders where Naoki and Shingo are, and Misaki deduces that the two have gone off on their own to take on any Reversed fighters.