Frantically running through the crowd of combatants in the ring, ducking and dodging attacks meant for the people he was running in between, Leone watched as the face of the girl behind him got smaller and smaller. Still, she stayed smiling at him without much expression.
As she watched the young man fumble his way through the fighters, a knight in partial armor carrying a spear and shield charged her, thinking he had caught her off-guard. She turned to him with a raised pointer finger, charging up a golf ball of light before firing at him. He paused his assault, hastily throwing up his shield to block the beam. It smacked into his shield and bounced back, but the young woman leaned out of the way. She threw up her other hand and charged up another shot. The knight, peaking from the top of his shield, was quickly met with embarrassment as the laser reached his now-exposed face and turned him into disqualified light.
After punching a random guy along the way for almost throwing a fireball in his face, Leone turned out to catch the last few seconds of the girl’s interaction with the knight. “Woah,” he mumbled to himself. “I really gotta watch out for that.”
Not noticing who or what was behind him, the young man froze when he heard a deep voice say, “Glad to see you’re back, pipsqueak.”
Leone turned around to see a large hulking figure before him, glaring down at him with a thick-jawed smile. The stranger was a terram, a large one, with glowing purple ore protruding from his arms, shoulders, and knees, and back. And from the moment he laid eyes on him, Leone knew; this was the guy that had punched him.
“What the hell is my luck with big guys?” Leone grumbled to himself as he stood up. “Speed Switch.”
He raced circles around the giant rock man, knowing full well his opponent would not be able otherwise keep up with his movements. After circling him twice, Leone jumped to deliver a speed-boosted punch, only to shudder at the terram’s extra tough abdomen. The jab did nothing, and Leone soon found himself in the wide-handed clutches of the terram berserker. “Nice try, pipsqueak,” chuckled the rocky man before throwing Leone to the ground like a sack of rice.
Leone groaned when he hit the arena floor. “…But speed ain’t everything,” the terram finished.
As the young man looked up at the bioluminescent giant towering over him, he tensed up his muscles. This was it, he thought. He couldn’t beat this guy. His speed had not been enough. His strength properly couldn’t match up to this guy, even if he let it build up a bit. He likely wouldn’t even have the time to let it. Defense, magic power, he had nothing. This guy was just tougher. And now he was going to get disqualified. What would it feel like? If contestants were pulled out at any moral wound, did the person feel the pain of the hit but just not die? Were they pulled just a nanosecond before the mortally wounding attack made contact? Did they feel getting evaporated into sparkles?
His opponent raising both of his rocky hands together in a hammer grip, Leone assessed that he would find out soon enough. He closed his eyes and braced for impact, and then… nothing. Well, not nothing. He had heard a sound. A familiar sound. But that was it. Had he been eliminated? He hadn’t felt any pain. Had he answered his introspective question? Leone slowly opened his eyes, expecting to see some sort of waiting room or secondary location where all the losers end up, where all the others before him already were, waiting for him.
Instead, he saw the last moment of the giant terram, diapering before his very eyes, looking rather flabbergasted. He paused for a moment, still tense. He looked around. He was still in the ring. There were still people fighting. He was still in it!
Looking across the ring, he saw the young woman with the blonde hair again. She was pointing a finger in his general direction. What was with this girl? Leone was bewildered. First, she had attacked him, and then she had saved him? What was her game plan here? The young man didn’t know what to think. Though, when she smiled, he quickly realized he was still sitting on the floor, cowering slightly. Instinctively, he shot back up, looking macho and tough, as if nothing about the past minute had phased him. He was cool, he was rugged. He wasn’t scared of anything. That’s right, he thought to himself, noticing the girl still staring at him. That’s right.
As the match went on, the number of participants wore down more and more. Leone was holding out, and so was the laser-pointing girl. He managed to defeat two other combatants who approached him, leaning into his knife some more while boosting his wave attacks with AP Switch. He took out a gruff, feliome woman wielding a two-handed axe with ease, which helped regain his confidence a bit, before looking over to see the laser-firing girl take out another magic user in one shot.
Shortly after, the young wizard became face to face with a knight. He couldn’t tell what the man looked like, or if he even was a man, for the knight had a fully-covering suit of armor and did not say a word. The knight reminded him of Azim, and what impression the robot often gave others.
As the knight swung his sword and there up his shield, Leone grew a funny feeling in his stomach. A weird, knotting feeling that inexplicably overtook his senses. As he continued to fight, he could not seem to get any clearer of a reason why. He didn’t feel in danger, or wary of losing. If anything, he was winning the fight. Yet, something was gnawing at him.
Swinging his sword in a vertical arc, the knight’s weapon landed firmly into the stadium floor. Taking advantage of the knight’s moment of weakness, Leone kicked the stuck weapon, boosted so much by Strength Switch, that he bent the blade into a nearly 90-degree angle. And then the feeling sank deeper into his gut. What had just happened? It wasn’t until the knight raised his blade back up did he see it.
This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it
The knight, undeterred by the assault, raised the bent blade once more. In that moment, Leone realized. This stranger, covered completely in armor, with a warped, bent blade, reminded him of the knight from Lemaerk. And in that moment, Leone froze. Despite the fact that his opponent was wearing a helmet, all Leone could see was the blond man’s face. His tortured possessed eyes and that hateful, sadistic look on his face as he had glared at him and Azim. And then his vision of the man softened. The eyes cleared up. They became their normal bluish-gray self. And all of a sudden it was a dozen times worse. He saw the man he had tried to save coming toward him, the man he had started to look up to now coming to attack him, and couldn’t move.
And then the knight was gone. Not just Leone’s vision, but his actual opponent. Blown into an array of yellow light. And as his feeling came back to him, his senses returning, Leone saw, once again, the same girl standing behind where the knight had been, more than 10 meters away.
For the second time now, for no understandable reason, and despite initially attaching him, this dark-skinned, blonde-haired stranger had saved him from getting eliminated. Why? For what reason? Leone could not even begin to wager a guess.
She pointed another finger at him, but it wasn’t malicious. It was informative. She was pointing just over his shoulder. He quickly turned around to see a lizardfolk coming at him with hands that were on fire. A rather brazen spell, the young man thought. What do I have active right now? Leone said to himself in his head. Oh yeah, that’s right.
Taking a solid, grounded stance, Leone held firm as the lizardfolk rushed closer. He waited until just the right moment, when he had just the perfect opening. It had been a couple of minutes by now. He knew this would be something satisfying.
As his fist made contact with the lizardfolk’s stomach, Leone made sure not to put so much emphasis into the final force of the punch. Instead, he wanted the force to come from his arm, allowing for more of a throwing effect. Because of this, Leone’s punch, while not his most overtly powerful, still sent the lizard man flying all the way back to the edge of the ring, where the scaly combatant found himself stretching the magic ropes that lined the arena. Reaching the peak of their give, the magic ropes finally threw back all of their built-up resistance, sending the lizardfolk screaming back to Leone. And this time, he was punching for real.
Yellow light and sparkles were filling the air behind Leone before his punch had even finished following through. He held his posture for a moment, hoping that that strange girl had been watching. He had no idea why, and was still aware that she was potentially a very dangerous threat, but for whatever reason, he really wanted to impress her.
Pulling himself together, Leone realized something. Not including himself, there was only one more person left in the ring. Her. Standing several meters across from him, already staring and smiling softly, her. Aw, Viyona, thought Leone. At least with others around there were human shields. What the hell am I supposed to do now? I’m screwed.
As if reading the young man’s mind, the dyed-blonde young woman raised a familiar pointer finger harboring a familiar yellow ball. As it met Leone’s gaze, he unintentionally gulped. But then, the strangest thing happened. She smiled widely before bringing her finger to the side of her head and letting the laser loose. A mere moment later, she was gone, disappearing into the same light as every eliminated participant before her.
Leone stared at the dissipating light, dumbfounded. What the hell had just happened? What had she just done? Leone had no time to process any of it, because, with no one else on stage, he was declared the winner. A final gong sound played, signaling that the match was over, magical confetti lights rained down onto the arena, and the crowd around cheered wildly. All the while, the young man just stared forward in silence. While the announcers started speaking overhead, giving a heads up to the upcoming match in the northeast corner, Leone kept asking himself the same question; Who was that?
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“What do you think the boys are up to right now?” Iman asked Riva, strumming her mandolin.
“Probably getting themselves into trouble, if I had to guess,” Riva replied, exasperated. “Leone for sure, that boy keeps his eyes open for conflict like he needs it to breathe. And that’s after knowing him for just a week. Though if Azim is with him, I know they’ll be fine. I just hope Azim is alright. He doesn’t seem like he would enjoy exploring. I hope he’s able to enjoy himself, and that Leone isn’t just dragging him into things he wants to do.”
“Well, maybe Azim just needs to express what he wants more. He doesn’t seem to talk much, maybe he just has to learn how to open up to people.”
“That’s what I’m worrying isn’t possible…,” Riva mumbled to herself.
Noticing Roman looking up at her, the woman playfully asked while tussling with his moss, “What do you think the boys are doing? Huh? Huh? What do you think they’re doing?”
Iman smiled at the other two, continuing her melody. The two ladies were sitting on the end of the cart, their legs hanging over, while Roman stretched his legs on the ground below them. Iman had been playing songs on her mandolin for a while now, while Riva had been humming along and enjoying. Iman had tried to get Riva to play with her, but she confessed to not having an ounce of musical talent, assuring the nør elf that she did not have the same “magic touch” that Iman had.
Every once in a while, somebody would come by and drop a silver piece or two, maybe even a gold. There were a few who had stopped to listen for a while, actually taking time to enjoy the music. These people usually left a little more. The ladies weren’t making much but they didn’t mind. They were enjoying the time they were spending together, the peacefulness of it. They knew they should be earning some coins for their travels, but they were also taking time to enjoy the tranquility of the moment and the city. For such a bustling place, it wasn’t too loud. It was a nice calm, and it allowed the girls to enjoy their afternoon… with a mosstail companion joining them at their feet, of course.
As Iman strummed along to her song, singing to the open air and pedestrian-filled street, Riva thought about their first meeting. She thought about how Iman had been alone in those woods for months, forgetting what common civilization was like. Sure, there were plenty of tribes or Nomads who preferred seclusion and wilderness, which Riva found nothing wrong with. However, those people tended to favor the more natural lifestyle. From the sound it back when they had met, Iman had just reluctantly accepted it, as if she had forgotten she had a choice.
Riva wondered what the young nør elf’s life had been like before her post in the woods. She wondered how she had ended up there. Had someone told her to stay? Had she done so herself? Iman hadn’t really made it clear. Iman Ifta. She remembered her surname. Was it of significance? There was so much Riva felt she needed to know. She looked up, ready to ask Iman a question, but was interrupted by the presence of a stranger in front of them.