I left the arena, surprised at the difficulty of the fight. It was far from the difficulty of the fight with Adrian, but plenty difficult compared to what I had seen in other people in the free for all.

I went out through the gate I came in through and was intercepted by the boy that had gotten me from the training room earlier.

“Do you need anything, sir?” he asked me.

“First of all, don’t call me sir. My name is John.”

He nodded in response, asking, “And second of all?”

“Why did I not see my opponent previously during the free for all?” I asked him, “And what is your name, anyway?”

“I’m Tristan, sorry for not introducing myself earlier, si— John,” he answered, “You didn’t see him because he skipped the free for all.”

“You can skip the free for all?” I asked him.

“Yes,” Tristan responded, “The top four in the last two challenges can skip the free for all, though they can only do it once per win. So can any royal family members who participate, in order to protect them from anyone with grudges teaming up against them. High tier military leaders can also skip it, though they rarely do. Garm was one of the top four during the last tournament.”

“Did anyone else skip the free for all this tournament?” I asked as he lead the way back to the practice room.

“Only a few that I know of, there are a couple of people who could have, like Adrian, but they rarely do,” Tristan told him,

“The third prince, Dagon, is participating, though he’s likely to get knocked out early on. I think that one of the previous champions, Sir Elton, is participating as well.”

“Who’s Sir Elton?”

“He has won a tournament twice and been runner-up in several others. He’s part halfling, part gnome, and was a member of the Royal Knights until a few years ago,” he explained, “ He left because he was tired of the politicking, and wanted to invent new things, as gnomes often do. He created a magical device that he calls a ‘table saw’ that helps speed up building in the city.”

The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

At this point, they had already arrived at the training room.

“When is my next fight?” I asked him, hoping to get in a little bit more practice.

“Your next fight is scheduled to be in about two hours, as long as the other fights don’t drag on too much,” Tristan said, before leaving the room.

I got back to punching, actually practicing for another two and a half hours before Tristan returned to bring me to the next fight.

“Why was the fight delayed?” I asked.

“Prince Dagon and Miss Evangeline were being rather flashy as they fought, and it distracted the other fighters enough that they forgot they were supposed to be fighting.”

“Who’s Miss Evangeline?” I asked, curious.

“She’s a pretty Dwarf girl that he’s rumored to have been courting for a few years now,” Tristan said, “She’s the daughter of the Assistant General of the army, Arkon Glaivebreaker. As a result of disrupting the tournament, they were both disqualified.”

We got to the gate and stopped talking as we waited for the fight in the center ring to be over. This time it was a pair of unknown beastkin, a wolfkin, and bearkin, who were fighting. The wolf appeared to have the upper hand, being able to dodge all of the bear’s strikes, but then the bearkin managed to properly land a strike, which was powerful enough that the wolf was knocked out of the ring.

My next fight was actually going to be against a merkin, which was surprising since there wasn’t much water nearby, and the corresponding gate in the Merkin’s world wasn’t open yet, as it was on a small island in the middle of the ocean, which in and of itself wouldn’t have been a problem for merkin, but that area of the ocean was inhabited by a large group of krakens, and there was a pair of lesser water dragons that had made their nest on the island. There was no way they could have come from there. He couldn’t have even been born here, as merkin actually had to lay eggs, and needed a fairly large body of water in order to procreate.

“Where did he come from?” I asked, “There aren’t any large bodies of water nearby.”

“He came through the portal from the dwarves,” Tristan answered, “He lived in a large lake over there.”

Oh, right, the other worlds could have a good place for them to live. There was no reason why they would choose to remain in their original world when they could easily go elsewhere. Then there was no more time for discussion as I was called into the arena for the fight.

The match went by relatively quickly, as did the rest of the fights that day. Before I left, I was told that I would be fighting first thing in the morning, and all but the final match would be fought tomorrow.