Genkai has everyone head inside a dark room, where she says the next test will involve actual fighting. The eight remaining candidates introduce themselves, then an order of fights is chosen. The fights take place in complete darkness, and the first battle sees Kazemaru defeat Kuroda, who uses a technique that looks similar to Yusuke's spirit gun, but is a lot more powerful. Botan then arrives, as she was worried about Yusuke, and as they discuss Kazemaru's technique, Kuwabara appears. After making sure Botan isn't Yusuke's girlfriend, he tries proposing to her, but Genkai tells them to get back inside unless they want to be disqualified.

They head back in. The next fight sees Shorin defeat Chinpou, and the next match has Kuwabara against Musashi. Musashi is able to block off his own spiritual energy, and hits Kuwabara several times. Kuwabara is ok though and says his punches are nothing compared to what he's received from Urameshi. Musashi then uses his special wooden sword, and performs the shin battou ryu: koushi ken (true unsheathed blade style: photon sword). Kuwabara is hit hundreds of times, but his body is so tough that part of Musashi's sword breaks off. Kuwabara picks it up and as Musashi strikes again, he uses the fragment and his own power to create a spirit energy sword. He hits Musashi with it and defeats him.

The next match puts Yusuke against Kibano. Yusuke messes around before the fight begins, resulting in Genkai throwing her cigarette at him (which he avoids) and telling him if he fools around she'll count it as a disqualification. The match starts, but Kibano uses a special helmet which cuts off his own sensory organs, making it possible for him to sense his opponent's location even more keenly. With Yusuke unable to see him, he floors him with a move called dai wan kou baku shou (great strong arm explosive charge). Yusuke is knocked down, seemingly defeated...

Manga differences

-The whole "arrows drop from the ceiling" thing was something only in the anime, in the manga Genkai just decides what order everyone is going to fight in herself.

-In the manga, Kuroda takes his glasses off before his fight, in the anime he keeps them on. He also doesn't reveal his knives in the manga, but does in the anime.

-The first fight is not shown at all in the manga other than Kazemaru using his blast attack. The anime expanded on it by showing Kuroda using his knives.

-Botan appears inside the arena in the manga. The anime added a scene where she appears outside, and all of the stuff Kuwabara does (like the marriage proposal) isn't in the manga.

-In the manga, Botan says Shorin outscored Chinpou in terms of spiritual power levels, in the anime Koenma says it (the Spirit Realm scenes in this episode aren't in the manga at all).

-In the manga, before his match, Yusuke decides to have a smoke, and pulls out a pack of cigarettes, but Botan stops him and takes them from him. As showing kids smoking in a cartoon was a problem (see this and this episode), it was changed so Yusuke messes around and Genkai throws a cigarette at him instead -the key thing is there's a cigarette still involved, which will be important for the next episode.

-In the manga, Yusuke only lands one hit on Kibano, in the anime he hits him four times.

-The episode ends with Yusuke seemingly defeated, but in the manga he gets up straight away.

Notes

-It's not clear if the defeated fighters are dead or not, as they aren't seen again after they lose.

-Kazemaru has a Buddhist manji symbol tattooed on his forehead. Due to the meaning of this symbol to Western viewers, some versions of Yu Yu Hakusho which were aired on TV edit Kazemaru's forehead so it has been removed.

-The sound used for when Kuwabara uses his energy sword for the first time is the same sound as a lightsaber turning on in the Star Wars films. This sound is used throughout the rest of the series.