Our names actually appeared in bold designs floating in the air above us as the announcer started the match and vanished just as quickly.

Pinky didn’t waste any time and I heard the crack of cement as a sudden streak of pink came rushing toward me. I dodged to the side, barely getting out of the way as she went slamming into the wall directly behind where I had been standing. The wall noticeably buckled outwards as debris crumbled down to the ground. I scrambled around to the other side of the cell before she could recover without taking my eyes off of the wall.

“Damn, and here I thought I could catch you off guard,” she said, her words coming out slightly garbled past her tusks after she freed them from the wall and knocked away the debris at her feet.

There was a dusting of dirt covering her pink clothing and she had taken damage equal to about 5% of her health bar but that wasn’t what had my attention. Her tusks shone with a silvery gleam and they were far larger than I had seen them so far, curving up around her face and the back out in vicious looking points. She bounced on her toes as she turned her head back and forth as if she was cracking her neck.

“Hell of a charge you got there,” I said and mentally prepared to hit Weighted Clothes. But as I went to click on it, I froze and reconsidered. Though the attack felt like it could be an instant win under a lot of circumstances. That only applied if I didn’t consider the bigger picture.

"Oh, don't worry, I'm just getting warmed up," She replied with a dangerous looking smile.

Maybe I was slow on the uptake with certain things related to the game, I knew that much about myself. But I had seen enough to know that looks could be deceiving when it came to Strength. While I wasn’t necessarily the smartest when it came to the stat system, I hadn’t forgotten that crucial detail, hell it was something I was even taking advantage of.

There was an innately casual way in which she was shrugging off the debris around her that was proof enough of her increased strength and I would have to be foolish to waste the ability without taking more time to examine the situation. I took my mental finger off the trigger and rushed her instead, closing the gap between us in a few seconds.

There was a brief look of surprise that passed through her eyes before a surprisingly eager smile spread over her face. I didn’t think much of it, assuming the thrill of the fight was already reaching her and went to activate Sting Like A Bee. It turned out that wasn’t necessary as I noticed it had two enhanced attacks from my earlier fight with Sal still left to use. I threw a wide swing for her side that she effortlessly caught with a quickly raised forearm.

I expected the attack to at least do something, but I found myself momentarily confused as my strike landed. At this point I was more than familiar with the recoil and feeling of impact when I struck someone, but this was different. It was almost as if my fist had been halted completely the moment it came in contact with her. She gave me an over exaggerated wink before throwing a punch of her own. It hit me center of mass with a force that sent me forcefully stumbling backwards.

Pinky wasted no time following up, charging forward in a sudden burst of speed that surprised me. I instinctively activated Float Like A Butterfly and dodged just as she swung her head as if to gore me with her large tusks. It was close and the glinting sight of silver barely grazed my arm as I tried to find an opening. As she planted her feet I jabbed at her side before she could move to attack me once more, sending Sting Like A Bee on cooldown. Once again, my attack seemed to halt upon impact and I found myself gritting my teeth in frustration.

I quickly skipped backwards before she could react, putting some distance between us as I tried to put together what I had seen so far. I really wished I had either Jon or even Angie in my head to bounce ideas off of, but wishful thinking would only get me so far.

“You’re quick, I’ll give you that, even if you aren’t showing me what the heck you can even do yet,” she practically giggled as she started to bounce back and forth on her feet like she was a prize fighter in a boxing ring. Each time one of her feet landed, little sparks of pink bounced off the pavement, growing with each repetition. “How bout we turn up the speed and see if you can still keep up.”

Before I could respond, she bounced into a low runner’s pose and pushed off. The concrete buckled under the force of her start and she came hurtling toward me. I activated Mirror Image and rushed to the side. For once I felt like I was getting the hang of things as I had thought ahead, having taken a quick minute in my new Training Dojo before coming to the Square to set up the two preset paths for the skill. My afterimage skipped backwards toward the wall and she chased it down, right up until the image disappeared into the wall and she collided directly with it. Instead of simply having her tusks stuck into the wall, she had actually left a rather large crater in it. Pieces of cement practically buried her and it took more than a few seconds for her to push back out from the debris.

Her health had also dropped by nearly 10% from the impact and I started to formulate a plan. From what I could put together, the bouncing she had been doing was building up energy that she released when she did her charge. It didn’t quite explain why my strikes were being halted without any actual resistance but the fact that she took damage from striking the wall seemed to indicate she couldn’t keep herself from getting hurt when she was in motion.

“So you’re some sort of illusionist then? Is that it?” She said, starting to bounce on her toes again as she looked around the room. With my invisibility faded, she found me and stared me down as her tusks shrunk by nearly half. “Well you can’t hide from me forever.”

I was just about to wonder what this meant when she launched her charge again. She was moving even faster this time, rushing in toward me like a homing rocket. This time as I went to dodge, she anticipated it, her body practically drifting as chased after me and threw a wide punch my way. I tried to dodge but was too slow and her attack hit me with enough force to send me tumbling over the ground as my health dipped below 50% almost painfully quickly.

“Okay… that one hurt a bit,” I grunted as I scrambled back to my feet. I went to materialize a health injector when a, Healing Items Not Allowed, warning flashed across my vision.

I was about to try and throw out some more banter to buy some time when she rushed in again, swinging her head as her tusks extended out further to strike me. I activated Fortune’s Shield and the orange barrier materialized out of my jacket just as her tusk scraped across my chest. My jacket probably should have been torn, if that was even possible, but the barrier did its job and left it as a glancing blow. I still took damage of course, the jacket’s ability only provided a 20% reduction after all, and the force of the attack tossed me backwards yet again as I skidded onto the ground.

Before she could chase after me and keep me on my back foot, I finally relented and activated Weighted Clothes. I wasn’t counting on it finishing her, but I hoped it would slow her down enough for me to figure something out. As I returned to my feet, I found her crouched onto the ground, holding herself up on her hands in a frustratingly familiar pose. It was pretty clear she had been preparing to charge again when my skill took effect. Like with my punches, the initial crushing weight did nothing to her health bar and a wide smile spread over her face as she stared at me.

“Oh this- This is good,” she said, barely even struggling to speak. I could tell the weight was holding her in place, but pink sparks were beginning to jump off both her back feet and her hands now that they were in contact with the ground. Her tusks began to grow larger as I backed up, running into the wall behind me.

If the weight couldn’t take her down, I wasn’t even sure what if anything in my repertoire could do it. I wished I had already absorbed one of my new skill books, but even then I’d have to be making up a skill on the fly with a questionable path to success. My hand rested against the wall behind me and something the manager, Schmitt, had said to me sprang back to mind. There was one, and only one way I could think of that might let me come out on top of this fight and I wished I hadn’t already used my Mirror Image. It just relied on getting her to come at me as hard as she possibly could… and a whole lotta luck.

I only had about 10 seconds left on Weighted Clothes duration so I had to work fast and I figured the easiest way to do it would be to just go with an old fashioned taunt.

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

“So you’re fast and got sharp tusks? I don’t mean it as an insult or anything, but that’s kinda a one note powerset, don’tcha think?” I asked and her smile faltered ever so slightly. “Or are you hiding a big reveal? That’s the kinda thing you cheerleaders like to do right? Put on a big show?”

“Yeah, my set might be straightforward, but it does its job very, very well,” She said. Although I had only assumed she was handling the weight better than she actually was, her voice was coming through gritted teeth. The pink sparks grew the longer she stayed pinned and as the shine from the sparks began to become nearly too much to look at, her smile returned as even her eyes seemed to glow. “I gotta say… thanks for the charge up, and like, I’m sorry for how much this is gonna hurt.”

I closed my eyes and let my Area Sense activate just as the timer for my Weighted Clothes ticked over. There was a thunderous CRACK as she pushed off of the ground and I could hear the clattering of cement flying from the ground behind her and clattering around the cell. Time didn’t slow, and it wasn’t like when Angie read a description for me, but even still, with my eyes closed, I felt the moment she cut a path into my area.

She was moving almost impossibly fast, but my eyes opened just as a streak of pink was about to crash into me. Whether thanks to skill, my super luck, or just plain old instinct, I dove out of the way at the last possible moment. I rolled over the ground and scrambled to my feet as Pinky crashed into the wall. I couldn’t linger and had to immediately move to dodge out of the way of the debris that went scattering from the collision. As it all settled to the ground, I crept toward the cratered wall, hearing a string of what I had to assume were angered curses coming from deep within it.

Once I was close enough, I activated my Area Sense again and probed inside of the debris filled crater. I could feel Pinky struggling under a pile of other intrusions within it and I tensed as I waited to see if she would emerge. After nothing happened for a few moments, I stepped closer and tried to look between the gaps in the debris.

“You, uh… okay in there?” I called. I couldn’t find anything within the debris to single her out to highlight, and unlike a fighting game there weren’t any floating health bars for me to check either, but I had to wonder if this counted as her being Captured.

There was another muffled sound of words and I went to open a chat window with her only to find that that function was also blocked. I let out a sigh and looked at the wall again. It wasn't like I was about to start digging her out.

After five minutes passed, there was a flash of light and I suddenly found myself standing atop the platform on the second floor once again. As Silver had promised, I received the Sanctioned Fighter achievement along with an additional 5000 Credits for winning. I walked over to Pinky who was sprawled out with a frustrated pout on her face and offered a hand.

“No hard feelings, right?” I asked, almost unsure.

“Cheap move,” She said, though she let out a sigh and took my offer of help. “But no… No hard feelings. I should have been more suspicious when you were pressed right up against the wall like that, just wasn’t expecting you to be able to get out of the way… Gotta think things through a bit more sometimes…”

“I mean, it was either get you stuck or just give up and lose, I don’t really think I had another option,” I said and pulled. She hopped to her feet as her tusks disappeared back into her mouth and she dusted the dirt from her pink and white gear.

“That so?” She mused and shrugged. “Well not that it matters. You trapped me in that debris like I did with the damn methhead… I thought if I could move my head enough I could break free but I hit the damn wall too hard… I had’t’ve been at least 6 feet deep in there…”

We hopped off the platform and there were a few people who reached out to pat us on the back in congratulations. Though we didn’t draw as big of a crowd as the other platforms had, or perhaps they had gotten bored waiting for the 5 minute capture timer to pass, it was still surprisingly more than I was expecting and the warm reception they offered us was oddly nice.

“You know, it’s not my fault your weakness is apparently a wall,” I said and she lightly pushed me as we unconsciously wandered over toward the nearest other platform.

“Yeah yeah, whatever,” She said with an obvious roll of her eyes. “You got to see me do most of my big tricks and I barely even got to see what you could do! Like, what the hell is your power!? You had the weird illusion thing that disappeared into the wall and then the weight thing was so cool. Like, I got juiced up on all that pressure, I wonder if we can get you over to California so that we could team up, I could hit people so hard with that sorta combo,” she rambled.

“That move was supposed to just take you down, it’s actually one of my bigger moves right now,” I said. It might not have been entirely the truth, but it wasn’t a lie either.

“Well it did basically the exact opposite. But now that I think about it, maybe we shouldn’t reveal our secrets in a crowd of people. We can chat about that later,” she said with a wink as she pushed her way through the crowd. I followed behind and we managed to get up close enough that we could see the entirety of the second platform.

Unlike the blank platform we had been on, this one was practically sunken in and looked to be a miniature city block, with skyscrapers and- I saw an explosion of lightning on one of the small streets and looked over to see a small lady turn into a burst of lightning, rushing down the miniature avenue.

“Is that-” I started and my vision highlighted the platform bringing up a slew of information on the battle. The monotone robotic voice, thankfully, only read out the fighters and a buff that each one of them sported that answered a lot of questions before I could even start asking them.

“Tempest’s Wrath. Level 10 Thunder God.”

“Elastic Menace. Level 23 Rumbling Rubber.”

“Equalizer. Variable Buff/Debuff. For the duration of this match, this Augment’s stats have been dynamically adjusted to bring each fighter to a similar power threshold. Base stats are adjusted to boost or cap to ensure a fair fight.”

“Come on Tempest! I got 50k riding on you!”

“Take down that rubbery asshole!”

There were cheers and hollering coming from all around the ring as the flash of lightning barreled into a man that was stretching himself across the road. I focused on the area and it almost seemed as if the platform responded to my thoughts and my view of it zoomed in on the fight.

“This is so cool,” Pinky whispered as she watched the platform and I looked away from the fight to her. There was a glimmer in her eye as she focused on the platform that I often saw in Jon’s eyes whenever he was on one of his rants about Augments. “Do you think they saw just a small version of the cell for us? I want to fight in a city like that so bad, uggggh why do I have a 12 hour fight cooldown. Can we have a rematch tomorrow? Come on, please? I still gotta figure out what the hell your powerset is about.”

“You talk really fast, you know that right?” I said and she looked over and smacked me on the arm. “What, I’m just saying.... Look, I’ll say maybe but no promises, this is cool and all but I’m still figuring my set out. Why don’t we wait until we are, I don’t know, level 10? Then we’ll each have had some time to break out and really come back hard.”

Pinky visibly lit up at this and she was actively bouncing in excitement when a collective cheer roared around the platform. There was another flash of light before a man whose skin and clothes appeared visibly singed popped back into existence on his back atop the now flat stage. His health rapidly replenished as a girl with raven black hair, amber eyes and a deep scowl appeared looming over him.

Several Augments in dark clothes hopped onto the platform and started patting the girl on her back, leaving her looking between them with a self-assured pride that could only exist in someone who had just kicked the shit out of someone. As she continued to look between her admirers, her eyes met mine and a deep sense of unease washed over me. Her eyes almost seemed to dance with electricity and although I hadn’t meant to, I had enabled my Area Sense. There was a buzzing energy that radiated from where she was within my field and my stomach turned over again at the raw power that seemed to emanate. We only looked at each other for a moment before someone stepped between us and I turned from the platform, breaking off my sense.

“Whoa hey, where’re you going?” Pinky asked as she saw me walking away. “Don’t you wanna probe the current reigning Queen of our Leaderboard for information?”

“Nah, that's far too big of a crowd for me to deal with. And honestly she’s giving me a weird vibe. Can’t really explain it,” I said and then shrugged and tapped the side of my head. “Power thing, yah know?”

“I definitely don’t since I still haven’t figured out that damn power of yours, but also thanks for the insight,” she laughed and then looked back at the crowd. “I’ll message you if I find out anything good.”

“Thanks, I’ll catch yah later,” I said and extended a fist her way. She gave me a warm smile and bumped it with a fist of her own. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I got some extra credits to spend over at the resale shop, since I did just win a fight.”