‘Why’s he walking over towards me?’ Salnys thinks to himself feeling a bit panicked, ‘I mean, he doesn’t look shady, but I should definitely still be wary.’
Salnys straightens himself out in his seat and avoids looking at the armored man. The man takes a seat across from Salnys and turns towards him.
“Why so tense?” The armored man says, he sounds pretty young, “You look new here, both by the way you’re acting and the fact I haven’t seen you here before.”
The armored man takes his helmet off and holds out his hand, “It’s a pleasure to meet you, my name is Samuel Alneb Dove the III, but most call me Dove or Sam; whichever is easier.”
He smiles as I accept his hand, the glove is strangely warm, almost as if I were actually holding his hand, and he also has a REALLY firm grip. He releases his grip and Salnys gets a better look at the man in front of him. He has stubble running across the entirety of his chin and has a wide smile. He has plain brown hair and brown eyes. He has well-defined features and his resting face, or his current face at least, holds a determined look.
“Anyway, what are you doing here?” Sam Inquires, “While it is nice to see the younger generation coming here to keep this fight club going, it’s still pretty unusual to see younger people here.”
“I brought him here,” Timothy says, startling Salnys, “I needed to claim some old bets, but now I need to work some stress out.”
Timothy vaults into the ring and many people seem pretty excited. Another man vaults in, he’s the same height as Timothy and looks like an orc. He has many different tattoos on his face following various patterns. The man vaulted in and left all of his weapons outside of the ring; seeing this, Timothy drops all of his weapons and draws himself into some sort of fighting stance. The other man responds with a similar one.
Many people drag past the table Salnys and Dove are sitting at to toss in bets at the betting table; Dove keeps his eyes glued to the ring analyzing the combatants. Salnys decides that he might as well bet something. He looks through his pockets for any money he packed with him and finds 10 Galla. He walks over to the betting counter and sets down 3 Galla. The person staffing the counter swivels over and prepares to swipe the Galla, but he pauses and looks Salnys up and down.
“You haven’t bet here before, have you?” The man inquires as he withdraws his hand from the money.
“Ah, no sir.” Salnys responds.
“Well, I’ll need some form of identification the first time you bet here, but ya won’t have to show it after I see it though,” He knocks his fist on his head as he continues, “I got a good noggin.”
Salnys digs through his bag and tosses a small slip of paper he was given when he was sent off to the academy; he was told that this could function as a temporary identification before he got a permanent I.D.
The man looks the paper up and down, “Hmmm, not from around here, cool,” He then pushed the paper back to me, but right as he was about to take the bet, he turned to look at the arena and said, “Sorry bud, match is already over, try again next match.”
Salnys looked over and, sure enough, Timothy’s opponent was yelling that he yielded, and Timothy had him pinned to the ground. Salnys sighs, takes his bet back, dodges the crowd, and heads back to his seat. Once he gets back, he notices Timothy has sat down at the table with Dove but neither of them has engaged in conversation.
Dove waves as Salnys approaches the table, “Say, have you fought anyone before?”
Salnys raises an eyebrow, “No, why?”
Dove grins, “Do you want to?”
Timothy perks up as Salnys and Dove are talking; he smiles.
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
“It’d be good experience for you.” Timothy says grinning as he does.
Salnys snaps his head between both of them and sighs, “Fine, I’ll fight someone. Who am I gonna fight?”
Dove’s grin somehow gets wider as he hops into the arena; he leaves his weapons and helmet behind. Salnys sighs again and hops into the arena and the crowd gathers around.
A man on a platform, presumably an announcer, begins yelling, “Let us welcome our contenders, on one side we have a recently reappeared contender, we haven’t seen him for 8 years, it’s the destroyer, the breaker, the decimator, the... uhh...” The announcer stares into space for a moment before continuing to talk, “Anyways, on the other side we have a new contestant! He can yell his name now if he wants to.”
Salnys shifts uncomfortably for a moment before just yelling loudly which causes the crowd to yell in response. The announcer shrugs and also begins yelling loudly, it stops when Salnys stops yelling due to his throat beginning to hurt.
The announcer, after letting the last of the yelling die down, shouts, “Alright, get ready! 5. 4. 3. 2... uhm, whatever comes after 2! GO!”
Dove begins to approach Salnys; he’s walking. Salnys thinks about getting into some sort of fighting stance or approaching before remembering he has the magic focus that Jonny gifted him. He grips it and puts a small amount of mana into it, he feels the small orb heat up and magic be expelled from his skin but nothing else happens. Salnys tries again but this time he dumps much more mana into it, he feels heat fly from his hand and something smash into the dirt under him and he jumps. This warrants a chuckle from Dove, who’s still approaching at a walking pace. Salnys holds out his fist and tries again; focusing on Dove. The ball of magic, which Salnys knows is a magic missile due to some fights he had seen when he was younger, flies towards Dove and continues flying due to Dove sidestepping the shot. Salnys tries a few more times but feels drained after the 6th shot.
Salnys sighs and decides to walk towards Dove to attack him. Salnys holds his fists up and prepares to attack but the moment he got in range of Dove he felt pain fly through his gut as he was punched. Salnys tries to hold his ground and throw a punch but is knocked over by a kick the moment before anything can connect. Salnys pitifully crawls back to try and put some range between the both of them, but Dove is moving a bit quicker now, the moment Salnys gets back up he’s knocked down again by Dove, but the moment Salnys hits the ground he pushes himself forward and grabs onto Dove’s leg and pulls to try and get him to trip but can’t as it feels like he’s trying to tug on a solid iron bar.
As Salnys tries to push himself back, he is ever so graciously aided by a leg launching him backward, he believes he hears something crunch as he’s launched backward, but he doesn’t feel much. He gets himself back up and runs towards Dove who’s still moving at a brisk pace and Salnys runs at him and tries to look like he’s going to punch him, but instead with his opposite hand, he launches a magic missile. Dove makes a surprised noise as he goes to block it, but he does not in time, and it impacts his face.
He quickly corrects himself before locking eyes with Salnys and saying, “Whew,” He grins widely, “That had some kick to it.”
He launches Salnys back with another powerful kick, definitely breaking something this time, and starts running at him. Salnys yelps in fear and kicks himself backward, shielding his face with his hands. He contacts the wall, but right as he does, he feels his wounds mend and he hears a few things in his body snap.
“Stop!” Salnys hears a voice yell from near the back of the club, “Damnit Timothy, can you stop doing stuff like this!?”
Dove stops charging, kicking up dust into Salnys’s face and looks over.
“Jonny could you NOT interrupt the fight? The kid was learning!” Salnys hears Timothy yell nearby.
“Well, you could at least-” Jonny continues, but Salnys tunes them out as he gets himself up and dusts himself off.
Salnys watches the two fight for a moment like a married couple before hopping out of the arena. He heads over to a table to take a seat, but he sees Jonny approaching him.
“-and why did YOU have to wander off? Hm?” Jonny speedwalks toward Salnys and begins dragging him by the ear, “You even took the magic focus with you! I mean, I don’t see why you wouldn’t, but that stuff’s expensive you know I mean-”
Jonny continued yelling and complaining, but Salnys was more focused on the bewildered looks of everyone else in the room, Timothy’s upset face, and the pain shooting through his ear.
Salnys sighs to himself, ‘Boy, this is gonna be a long day.’
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Knowledge was being fed directly to my brain, no matter how often I do this, I’ll never get used to its unique sensation. I float and ponder if I should interfere yet, adjustment has gone well, and progress is okay but I’m rather impatient. Hundreds of different minds fire back at me, all of them processing different possibilities and good courses of action. Most say not to interfere in any way, lest it stunt growth. But there are a few which still urge me to do otherwise, they tempt me. Though I have learned to avoid most temptations by now, there are still a few that slip through. Not this time though, I will continue to watch.
At least for now.