The middle aged man was Paul, Level 33. He was primarily an archer, with a short-sword as a backup weapon. By the time we were done with the meal and made it to the training grounds for the opening ceremony, three others had joined us. Lina, a short stout white skinned woman in her thirties, Level 33. And a tank, heavily armored as such sans the helmet. Her sword was as big as she was tall, at least it wasn’t a cleaver. Tesyo, but preferred to be called Tes, was a tan skinned woman of average, well, everything really. She was either in her late twenties or early thirties, and at Level 34. Her weapon of choice was a longsword, with light full-plate armor, if there was such a thing. And finally Oki, mid to late twenties tall lean man of tan skin, Level 35. He didn’t have anything on him that could clue me in on what he preferred.
We were in one of the two waiting rooms, with less than a score of us there. Oki was talking about how he had nearly beaten Dawkins in the semifinals of the previous competition.
“If you had been Level 33 then, how come you have only gained two Levels since then?” I asked him in the middle of a very vivid and graphic scene of the fight.
“After the loss, I went into a slumber of kind for six months. By the time I picked up myself, I had already dropped to Level 29. It took me a while before I got myself into the groove of things.”
Note to self: do not neglect training at all costs. It got me thinking, was it possible that all the other competitors degraded so after each round of The Grand Competition? Then again, what about those that made it to the finals at the end of the year? Those would have all that experience carry over to the following year. They might stagnate at the early months but they would pick up growth as the months progressed. Just how high leveled are those people?
“How high can one get? What is the highest Level?” I asked them.
“I don’t know. It gets harder to level the higher up you go,” Tes said.
“Leave alone leveling,” Lina joined in in her husky voice, “Getting to Level 40 is manageable if you are serious enough. It is the staying at Level 40 that is the hard part. I know people who shot right up to past Level 40 and then dropped back to the 30s and were never able to make it back to the 40s.”
“Staying in the competition would help. But that would mean winning nearly all your fights,” Paul added. “As to the highest, I’ve heard there was a Level 60 in the Kingdoms a few years back.”
“Really?” Tes turned to him in wonder and interest.
“Don’t listen to that. Those were just rumors spread by the [Animatronics] trying to sell off their worthless toys,” Oki said.
“I said I heard, not that there actually was,” Paul defended. “But who is to say they didn’t exist.”
“If they did, where are they now?”
“Maybe they decayed like everyone else,” Lina offered.
Any further arguments were silenced by the sound that started vibrating through the whole room, it was unbearably loud and jarring to the teeth. I pitied the poor souls that were exposed directly to it.
“It’s your first time hearing it,” Paul said as he began laughing. “You’ll get used to it soon enough. It is always worse here, but out there it’s good.”
“Don’t worry about it. They are just testing whether the voice enhancers are working properly. Usually happens once or twice a day,” Tes offered more assuring news.
Then the sound passed, and there was silence before someone began speaking so loudly that I could hear them as clearly as if they were standing right next to me. It was very unnerving, especially when I had already been told it’s what I would call a speaker system, or outdoor public address system.
“Helllloooo to you all, and welcome to The Grand Competition’s Baronies. Once again, hopefuls from all over Mesily are beginning there climb onto the ladder of destiny. On it, they will fight tooth and nail, sword and magic, friend and foe, male and female, parent and child, all for one thing, and one thing only. The honor, to be crowned the best fighter, in all of Mesily…”
I tuned them out after that. It was just a rousing speech meant to get the spectators all roused up and cheering as we beat each other bloody and to near death. Wait, I had never actually asked whether deaths did occur. Boni explicitly said death was not the end goal, but Riuki thought that I would get killed fast enough. As I turned to my newly acquired group to ask, Paul spoke before I could.
“Come on, we are being called up.”
“Already? They are done with the introductions?” I asked anxiously, completely forgetting about what I had wanted to say before. I had thought that the speech would last for minutes, maybe even a whole hour. But it had been less than five minutes, two if I were being honest.
“We are the introductions, the meat and the conclusion of everything these people have paid to see. Not to listen to someone who thinks they are funny than they actually are,” Lina deadpanned.
True enough, names had already began being called and people were leaving the waiting room one by one.
“Human Paul. Level 33”
“That’s me,” he said as he walked out into the tunnel that led to the arena.
Slowly but surely, the number of people in the waiting room dwindle down until I was the only one left. That’s when I realized the order in which the names had been called up; our arrival times. I cursed myself for not knowing all the information about how the competition worked, I could have avoided the kind of situations I found myself in. But the announcer of the competition decided to add salt to the wound of my embarrassment.
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“And last but not least, well he is the least leveled of them all. Let’s hope his tardy arrival and his Level aren’t a premonition of how he will perform in The Grand Competition. I give you, Human Hartie. Level 28.”
I literally heard the sounds die out, like completely die out. I was of a mind not to walk out to that arena, but I remembered how it felt every time I remembered getting out of a race in high school just because I was tailing. I gathered whatever courage I could find within myself and walked out as proud as I could ever be.
I heard the murmurs begin almost immediately after I made it out of the tunnel, strolling to join the other competitors in the center of the arena.
What a sight I must have made. Me all puffed out of what little chest I had, holding a stick for a weapon. with no armor at all to offer any protection from my competitors’ sharp, very dangerous looking weapons. I might have stumbled but I’m not sure. All that mattered to me then was claiming my spot at the end of the line.
“Now that we have them all here, it is time for them to choose their starting locations in The Baronies’ ladder of destiny. Come on, don’t be shy. Imbue some of your Mana into the Crystal and see where fate takes you.”
Slowly, we all approached the Crystal and imbued our Mana. I was last again, of course. I wished that wouldn’t be the case for the rest of the competition.
“Now, let’s see what the Crystal has decided. First up, the seeds. Aaaand we have Dawkins at the left most side of the tree, automatically putting Lackey at the right most side.”
At first, I didn’t believe what I had heard. No, not the seed part, the Lackey part. And when I checked the image of the person on the right most side of the tree, it was clearly the lackey, Dawkins’ lackey. His red hair was clear for all to see.
“Let’s fill up the lower ranks of that ladder, see who gets to fight the seeds in Round Two. Beginning on the left, we have…”
Mesily had listened to my pleas and put me near the center of the tree, to the right side. It meant that if I wanted to fight against Dawkins, I would have to make it to the finals. I didn’t want to fight him at all, nor his lackey for that matter. I hoped a quarterfinal finish would be enough to get me a prize, something that could make my life worthwhile for a while. But when we got to the prizes, my hopes were dashed.
“The prizes are not the reason for The Grand Competition but we also need to give them something for their hard work. This year, the prizes are a bit higher than they were last year. For the top finisher, we have one-fifty golds, one hundred for the second, forty for the third and twenty for the fourth. Those who lose at the quarterfinals get nine golds each, at Round Two you get five golds each and a gold at Round One. Everyone goes home with something.
“The arenas. For the Main Arena, we will hold the Finals and both Semifinals. Plus, the group of fights involving the first seed, Dawkins. Group Two fights will be held at the West Arena, Group Three fights at the Junior Arena and Group Four fights, involving the second seed, Lackey, at the East Arena.”
The announcements continued as we stood there and listened. They couldn’t be bothered to release us so we could prepare for fights? I looked around the arena, both at the other competitors and the spectators in the terraces. It was eerie, I was there and not there at the same time. I couldn’t believe that I was about to fight someone, to near death, all for money. I had done it before in the fighting pits for less than even the first person to lose would get, but that had been practice in my head. A form of training. I was finally doing it seriously, and the first mistake I make could be the last mistake I ever make.
“The first fights will begin in an hour. All competitors move to your respective Arenas.”
I breathed a sigh of relief when I heard that, turning to walk away before I realized that not only didn’t I know where my arena, the Junior Arena obviously, was, but I also didn’t know when my fight would be. I turned to look for Paul, but he was nowhere to be found. Oki and his tall frame had somehow disappeared in a sea of thirty people. How was that even possible? As I grew desperate, I finally saw Lina grumbling to herself as she walked towards the tunnel. I hurried up and caught up with her.
“Where are you?” I asked.
“East Arena,” she said dejectedly.
Dammit. I turned to look for any of the others to no avail. I decided to just ask for the directions from Lina. But she looked to be getting grumblier the farther away from the Main Arena we walked. I decided to address that first.
“What’s up? You don’t look your usual self.”
She looked at me with a questioning stare before saying, “We’ve known each other for a few hours.”
I wasn’t deterred by that. “For the few hours I’ve known you, then.”
She just shook her head before answering. “Even if I win my first fight, I’ll meet Lackey right after.”
“You don’t think you can beat him?”
“Think? I’ve seen him train. If I had a few more months, maybe. But as I am now, I don’t stand a chance. I envy you, you know. Other than the Level difference, you have no preconceived notions of whether or not you can win.”
I didn’t know what to say to that, and I nearly forgot what I had wanted to ask. “Make sure he works for it,” I finally got out. I was sure that was a good one, and the smile she gave me proved so. “Do you know where the Junior Arena is?”
She laughed then, a hearty loud thing that made me feel embarrassed to be standing next to her. “You… you are something, you know that. Follow the main street, towards the end, the arena you see will be it.”
I just stared at her dumbly. What kind of directions were those? I was definitely getting lost if I followed them. But she slapped me on the back before pushing me out of the Main Arena.
“Go on already, in case you get lost, you will have enough time to find your way into it.”
And she took off to the side, disappearing into the throng of people passing through the streets. I looked around and couldn’t even figure out which way was towards the gate and which was towards the end of the main street. For all the preparations they had made, they forgot about transportation. What if a competitor got lost, or the people in the streets bogged them down?
I decided not to risk my luck with random selection of which direction to go. I stopped a passing citizen and asked for their directions. I didn’t really believe them though, they seemed shady to me. So I asked two more people. When they all gave me the same direction, I began my trek to the Junior Arena.
It took me close to half an hour before I could make it, and I was glad to see a large sign reading ‘Junior Arena’ on the entrance. I quickly presented my card to the security guards at the entrance to the waiting room and was ushered in. The first place I went was the toilet, and then had myself a few gulps of water before returning to the waiting room proper.
The Junior Arena apparently had just the one waiting room because all eight competitors of Group Three were all there, four other males and three females. They ranged in ages from a graying old man to a boy that looked barely older than sixteen. And I couldn’t afford to underestimate any of them. Of the Level distribution I had seen during the selection process, only four people were Level 32 and one of them was in the waiting room with me. Making all the others Level 33 and above, and my first opponent was at the top of that at Level 35.
I looked around, trying to look for the face I had seen right next to me on the ‘ladder of destiny’. It took a few rounds before I found him. A willowy man, maybe taller than Oki. He had the general appearance of the locals of Yange. He was clad in a dark green leather armor, and had a bow and a dagger on him, plus the quiver of arrows. Can’t forget those, they will be arrowing towards me soon enough.
I hadn’t talked to any of them since I arrived the day before, the few friends I had made had gone to other Arenas. Looking around for someone that looked approachable enough, I saw a glowing screen at the exit of the room, the one that led to the tunnel leading to the arena. And ole and behold, it displayed the names of the first competitors, and guess whose name and face was on it.
Little old me.