When I climbed down the trunk of the tree, it was with a sense of defeat. One of the pathways didn't work right, and one didn't work at all. It was honestly annoying. I was a hundred percent sure that the pathways were exactly how they should have been, but they just didn't work. I had no clue what was going on either.
I jumped to the base of the tree and landed with a thump. It was still early morning, I guessed at about an hour after sunrise when I opened my eyes after the morning of forming pathways. My first fight would be today, though I wasn't sure when because Omnikia didn’t tell me as far as I could remember.
“You are done then?” I heard the voice of Omnikia ring out from beside his hut, and I turned to find him standing patently beside his doorway. “For now, yes!” I shouted back as I jogged towards the hut and Omnikia.
He watched me run towards him intently, and he opened the door when I got close and gestured inside before he walked in. I followed him inside the small cottage, and I could see that he had already set out a bowl of the same Sugar Oats that we had had every day I had been here. I couldn't complain though, as it was actually great stuff. I sat down by the bowl, Omnikia sitting with me though he wasn't eating. This was later than normal for breakfast with Omnikia I guess, he must have eaten already.
“So, young Arnold, how did forming your first pathways go?” Omnikia asked, looking to me with an amused smile as he watched me eat my breakfast from across the table. I had to think about my response for a second before I answered him, thinking it over. “My summon pathway was a success as far as I could tell, but my Nature Ki pathway wasn't working properly and did not allow for me to generate my own supply of Ki, only stored ambient Ki, and my Body Ki pathway didn't work at all. I couldn't figure out what was wrong with them though. I was sure that the pathways were correct.” I finally told him.
I was annoyed by my failed attempt, but Omnikia seemed almost impressed by my explanation. “It is quite impressive that you managed as much as you did on your first attempt.” He told me with a gleam in his eye, showing that he was more impressed then he showed me, which I couldn't understand. ‘Only making one successful pathway was impressive?’ I thought to myself in confusion, ‘And first attempt? Was I supposed to take multiple attempts to form the first three pathways?’
I didn't voice my thoughts, but I guess Omnikia could sense my confusion while I ate my meal as he spoke up. “Young Arnold, you shouldn't let the failure of the Ki pathways get to your head. It is quite enough that you managed to form what you already have. Later this afternoon, after your first match, we will figure out what is wrong with your first attempt and correct it.” He told me seriously, then he smiled.
“For this morning however, you need to prepare yourself. We are leaving in one hour’s time.” He dropped with a smile, causing me to straighten up in surprise. “An hour!?” I said in shock, I had thought I would have more time! Omnikia seemed amused by reaction, as he nodded with a smile. That led to me scarfing down my meal quickly as I could, finishing up in a few minutes. I stood up quickly, and I took care of my bowl and spoon before I walked outside to get some practice in before the fight.
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Omnikia and I walked inside a large stone building an hour after breakfast. The building was large, and rather grand. It was made entirely of carved stone, with decorative stone carvings in the bricks, showing scenes from fights and people I didn't know the name of. Through this building, we walked through large hallways until Omnikia spotted a stone staircase that led to an impressive sight of what was practically an underground amphitheater of stone.
The whole thing was like a cave in its design with rough stone walls and ceiling, but the floor was made smooth by something. It was brightly lit inside as well as bright torches lined the walls that cast a bright orange glow onto the walls with their flame.
There were benches carved from the stone that circled a large pit, just like an amphitheater. The pit itself was a simple thing of dirt as well, but it was massive. About the size of a football field. The whole thing was impressive, especially as it seemed like this world was in the medieval era or round about. No power tools were around to make something this impressive, just normal tools and probably magic.
It was a bit of a shock, seeing how this village had something so impressive just underneath it.
The audience's seats were starting to fill up slowly, all of the different people sitting and waiting for the first fight of the day with eagerness. My fight was the second of the day, and the first was in about a minute, letting me get an idea of how these fights would go before my own fight.
Omnikia led me to the front row, which was probably the best seating in the arena, and together we waited for the first fight of the day.
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It didn't take long, but just before it started I heard something that surprised me quite a bit. “Welcome to the first battle of this year's tournament!” I heard a booming voice ring out, seemingly coming from all around us. It was an announcer. I leaned back a bit, trying to see where the voice was coming from, but I didn't see anything at all. Maybe there was some sort of Body Ki pathway that let someone do that?
My thoughts were interrupted by the cheers of the spectators from throughout the stands, as they shouted in excitement. The environment was infectious, and I started to grin, looking out into the arena expectantly for the fight.
“Please welcome our first two contestants! Kia Everstead, and Wong Leverton!” I heard shouted out above the crowd, and on either end of the stadium a door opened, letting two people step out into the arena to the applause of the stands around me.
“Before we begin, let's go over our rules for this fight!” I hear shouted out, causing me to focus up and pay attention to the voice of the announcer. “This is a one on one fight!” I hear shouted out first, “All contestants are limited to one summon for this fight, and you will be disqualified if you or another summon participate in the battle in any way!”
Ok, that's… not what I expected. I was thinking that we would just fight with all of our summons. I suppose that will change in later matches?
Then the announcer seemed to move on, by telling the contestants to summon their fighter. Now that left me even more confused. Was this a whatever goes situation? Were there no other rules or limitations to the fight?
It seemed like the announcer was not going to be going over any other rules if there were any though, so I watched as the contestants summoned a single summon on either end of the field. On one end of the field, with the shorter beefy guy that I was pretty sure was Wong, there was a black cat that looked quite a bit like a normal house cat but I could see by the way it paced in front of Wong that it was clearly not. It was quick and steady on its feet, and looked like it was ready to pounce at any moment.
On the other side of the arena in front of an older teen with long black hair, there was a large brown and black bird that looked like a cross between a pidgin and a hawk. It was quite large, about up the the girls knees in height and its wingspan was impressive as well, being about as long if not longer as the girl was tall. It had a big curved beak that glinted in the light somehow, as if it was metallic.
‘This is probably going to be a long one if either of these people are smart. The bird should be able to keep circling from above and try to take out the cat from the sky, but when it does it will be in range for a counter attack so it becomes a waiting game to see which lets down their guard first.’ I theorized, thinking as I watched the stair down that was happening in the pit, and listened to the announcer.
“Let's give it a count of ten!” I heard the announcer shout out excitedly, as the crowd shouted their approval. “Ten! Nine! Eight! Seven! Six! Five!” The announcer counted slowly, clearly trying to give the fighters time to get ready and increasing the anticipation of the audience. He continued to count down as I watched the two fighters tense up and their summons give a hiss and a shriek respectively as they stared at their opponents. “One!” The announcer cried out with a yell of excitement as the summons launched into the fight.
The bird took off into the air, just like I had suspected it would do, while the cat started to seem to glide over the landscape like it was shot from a cannon as it sprinted to the bird from across the field. It was surprisingly fast, and it actually nearly made it to the bird before it managed to take off but it was just a little too slow.
Then it did something unexpected. It leaped into the air and shot at the bird with unprecedented height in its leap, and it actually managed to tackle the bird to the ground from its height of ten feet away from the ground!
I wondered if the cat was naturally able to do that, or if there was some sort of pathway inside the cat that let it do all that, but my attention as the bird let out a thunderous squawk and it shifted in the air putting the cat below itself as they tumbled through the air. They fell, the cat scratching and howling as they went as the bird likewise pecked and clawed at the smaller cat with its talons. But the fall came to an unexpected halt, when with a particularly nasty slash of its beak, the bird managed to throw the cat to the ground and spread its wings, taking off into the air once again.
The cat hit the ground on its feet, seeming more injured by the encounter than the bird, as it nearly fell onto the ground but it kept standing. Then the bird took a dive as it circled above the prone figure of the cat, wings wide and talons outstretched. I watched with fascination as the two drew close, and I noticed that the cat seemed to shrug off its injuries as it faced the bigger bird in its dive and prepared to pounce.
Then they clashed with a whirl of talons and claws and the shrieking yells of both summons, the cat diving just above the outstretched talons and into the birds wing, biting it and scratching furiously until the wing was so badly damaged that it fell from its dive in an uncontrollable fall, landing heavily. Then the bird slumped on the ground, with the cat on its back as the summons started to dissolve and disappear back into energy again.
“And our winner is Wong! Let's hear it for the victor!!!” I heard shouting above the crowd, as the people went crazy, applauding and booing as they watched Wong unsummon his cat and also saw the girl, Kia, slump a bit in defeat.
“And now, contestants please exit the arena and lets have our next contestants enter the arena!” I heard shouted from the announcer and Omnikia stood up alongside myself, walking with me to my entrance for the arena. It was my time to fight now, and I just hoped that my fight would be a good one. I would not fail in the first battle damn it!