I learned sometime after the show that at least two thousand people were waiting at the start of the stream. That number jumped to about seventy thousand and something at its peak.

I was really glad I never knew that once things got rolling.

To those who were watching, they would have seen a smirking Emcee, who was already subtly bopping his head to his rhythm. “Let’s get things rolling.” He said, his eyes flashing with his “power”, and sourceless music flooded the area.

It started out as just the drums, a basic beat by all standards, then it quickly filled in with some piano chords and fake-sounding acoustic guitar on a loop.

Emcee then began to snap. One, Two, pause. One, Two, pause. Soon enough when the drone began to fly away from Emcee to face Fiesta that snap had joined the ambient noise.

Fiesta himself was already clapping to the beat, odd and colorful shapes flying off his hands with every impact. His huge smile seemed to be infectious, and now even more so that Actress had only given him a mask that covered the top half of his face. But he more than made up for the missing part.

There was also one more thing, his eyes. They could be seen clearly through the mask, and they were pulsing with light. Fiesta was under Emcee’s influence.

The villain of illusions started to step forward, each piece of footwork causing ripples in the ground itself. Soon enough, more odd shapes and colors weaved themselves into that before sprouting into a field of flowers… Tulips. It felt like I was surrounded by thousands of them, but I couldn’t take my eyes off what was happening in the center.

Fiesta liked to dance normally, but that was mostly in a ‘likes to party’ sense of the word. Extremely tight choreography wasn’t something he kept in his wheelhouse, and yet, here he was. For a minute straight every step and crossover seemed calculated, every little odd shape and shift of the flowers were precise. Even the way he emoted and silently laughed seemed like they were planned.

And I knew Fiesta had never done anything like this before… ever.

Okay not ever, I just know how Emcee works.

Eventually, the music began to slow and swell, and Fiesta reached out to the field of tulips in time. The shapes that made the flora began to break into the air and swirl towards Fiesta, coalescing in a ball of power above his hand.

Then as if from out of frame another hand reached out and took it from him.

Requiem slowly lifted the ball of power into the air, as light and sparkles began to surround her. The music began to pick back up and a glow in her eyes pulsed to the rhythm.

Despite how she normally presents herself, she didn’t do any real ballet. Instead, it was more of a Hip-Hop style, but still far more complex than what Fiesta did. The sparkles in the air turned and followed her every move as if she were in the center of a galaxy, but what the viewer would be drawn to is the pirate/ballerina herself.

About halfway through she started to purposefully spin the sparkles about in a hypnotic manner, but I got distracted when… something reached out to my mind.

Explaining how Emcee’s power feels is… difficult on a good day. For one it’s mainly mental magic, meant to alter how you view things. Fortunately, it gains a karmic power up from consent, and since I had long agreed to this whole thing it only took a moment for my mind to realign to the song and dance. From there I was pulled into the nebulous “plan”. The magic couldn't actually make me do anything, but what it does do is guide whoever is under its sway.

And the only visible indicator of this is how the eyes seem to flash to the rhythm of the song.

The music began to slow and swell again. Requiem did one more spin while gathering the lights around her into a ball of power above her hand.

On instinct I rushed out and caught Requiem in a dip, my hand reaching out and grabbing the ball of power as it floated. Then with a swift move, I pulled the other villain back up and she stepped out of frame.

With a twist of my show magic, I lit the ball on fire. I made sure to give the camera a huge, smug smile before dismissing the ball and summoning a ring of fire around me.

And all that was left to do was let the magic guide me. Step when it thought I should, and flare when the music said so. I even set myself on fire at a few points, my show magic feeling stronger than ever before. It was as if my magic recognized what was going on and gave me better control over the illusions.

I even managed a few smaller versions of the “flame tiger” throughout the performance, on purpose too.

There was also an instance where I managed to weave in a trick with some space magic. I knew at the time that a slower spot in the song was coming along. After all, it was sorta kinda looping with only small adjustments based on who was performing. So I went a bit off script.

I think I was being guided to do a set of backflips or something like that, but I got it through my head to summon a bar of hardened space above my head. All I was gonna do was a one-handed pull-up, but I was lost in the magic.

By the time the bar was up to my chin, I had grabbed it with my other hand.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

By the time the bar was at my waist, I had already tensed my muscles just right to do a handstand.

By the time I was upside down, I remembered that my space magic wasn’t strong enough to hold me up for an extended period.

And I slipped.

I was able to flip back to my feet in time to hit the ground and keep going like nothing had happened, but I could see Emcee and Photographer standing just behind my ring of fire. The Commanding Pulse had a shocked look on his face, just barely holding onto the magic, and the Unseen Eye had her face in her hand.

Eventually, the music began to slow and swell, and I was guided to bring every last drop of fire to condense into a ball of power above my hand. As soon as it was done and I had struck a pose, I could feel a pair of presences to both my right and left.

I stepped back and let Choir grab the ball of power, both of her casually splitting it apart as her eyes flickered to the rhythm. I made sure to get the hells out of dodge, dropping low so that the camera couldn't see me. Fiesta waved me down to join him behind one of the rocks.

It was hard to see the whole show from there, but... Choir. There were at least three of her in the line of sight at all times. Her arms moved in waves and in perfect sync.

Fiesta fist-bumped me, and I laughed along... Then Bouquet rushed over to me and scanned me over with a worried look, only to level an angry look at me once she was satisfied with whatever she saw.

"What?" I whispered out loud.

"What was that with the slip-up?" Bouquet said harshly, struggling to stay quiet.

I grimaced for a second and shrugged, "I was trying to do something cool, and... yeah... the space didn't want to work right..."

Bouquet leveled a "no duh" look at me and I could hear Actress and Requiem quietly laughing nearby. I could feel the skin on my face beginning to heat up so I turned back to watching Choir.

She was at the same slow point in the song that I did my space trick in. She had one of her being tossed into the air in what looked like a cheerleading trick, only for that version to disappear with the landing and seemingly walk in from off-camera.

And eventually, the music began to slow and swell once more, and I watched with bated breath as each version of Choir began to step back into one. A ball of power slowly grew above one of the outstretched hands, and the song... stopped for a second.

Choir slowly set the ball on the ground and walked away, the drums slowly picking back up.

Then PrincesShifter floated up from the sand, the ball of power rising up in her hand. She laughed for the camera and started to dance like the rest of us did.

At this point, Actress showed Fiesta and I the live stream, I didn't know people could freak out that much.

I also didn't know some of the stuff that was being said about me during my segment...

Why did Actress show that to me? I am NEVER going shirtless on a mission ever again. I am already doing enough damage to the image of beastmen...

Nevermind...

There was a hero to watch, and I have to say I was a bit jealous. Half the time PrincesShifter was doing something that caused her hair and skin to change to fun colors and patterns that moved to the beat. The other half...

You know how in the early twenty-tens there were a lot of people who did contortionism in music videos? Always doing that one trick where they put their arm behind their head?

That but on alien steroids. Her whole act was honestly mind-boggling and a testament to her control. I know that my transformation magic can't even achieve half of the stuff she does, but it was hard not to compare.

Then the music began to slow and swell, PrincesShifter picked the ball of power off the ground where she left it and held it up high.

Finally, Firework was in play, and I stopped paying complete attention to survey the surroundings. There were already people on board the ship, having taken seats.

There were only about twenty or so people, half of them cops, but they were all paying attention to Firework.

Okay, there was one cop who wasn't. She looked like she was the highest-ranking out of all of them, and she was starting a heated conversation with PrincesShifter.

I was brought out of my thoughts when Actress tapped me on the shoulder. She then handed me a small note, asking me and Fiesta to go out to the entrance and invite people in. Apparently, we had to get an audience going before any police or heroes could really stop it.

Then Fiesta said, "Race ya!", and the pair of us were bolting off to the entrance. I heard one of the cops yelling at us to stop when we passed by them but between the excitement and the laughs we didn't.

As soon as we burst out of the entrance of the ship, I could tell we were parked just above some kind of central area in the city, a grand staircase leading to the ground.

(And surprisingly a few elevators? I honestly couldn't tell if they were safe but aliens I guess...)

The area beneath was crowded, but it seemed like almost everyone was doing their best to ignore the spaceship. There were a few curious looks, as there are always going to be, especially now that Fiesta and I had burst out into the open.

"COME ONE COME ALL!" I projected, having already half-formed a script in my head. "Come and spend an hour or two watching the infamous battle between villains and heroes on the stage of sound! Admission is free and the sights are magical! So come and inject some chaos into your day, as this is for today and today only!"

I flashed a smile for the cameras that I knew were rolling and nodded to Fiesta. He gave his own spiel in Spanish... Of which I understood None of it...

Look... I speak 'Murican and that's about it... I flunked out of French in high school and that was it for me.

Fortunately, we did manage to convince a band of teenagers to start climbing the stairs. They did get some odd looks, but we let them into the ship with big smiles on our faces.

Then I jumped out of my skin when a big explosion went off in the arena. Firework's performance was done, Emcee's first song was starting soon.

I laughed a bit at myself for the jump as Fiesta shook his head, and then the sound of a quiet crowd drew my attention...

Someone was standing between me and the other villain.

The Boss had arrived.