"ARGHHHHH" The champion roared in agony at the top of his lungs spinning away from the source of the explosion.
His scream muffled into his scorched skin, his scarred arms covering his irritated eyes.
The explosion had almost completely blinded Bonecrusher, if not for the champion instinctively bracing both his arms toward his face.
His bright arms barely reaching his face in time, close enough to mitigate the damage, before the moment of impact met with Bonecrusher.
The sudden discharge had still managed to graze Bonecrusher's eyes where it slipped, like mist through a ventilation seal, between the small gap between his arms.
Though Bonecrusher was immensely powerful, correctly rumoured a demigod, his eyes were still a weak spot and barley any tougher than a mortals'.
His eye lids shut tight, baring the unbearable pain searing his eyes.
"YOU WILL PAY FOR THIS!" Bonecrusher roared with all his might as he now blindly projected his voice across the sand.
Bonecrusher growled loudly, forcing his eyes to obey his commands and open.
Bonecrusher hesitantly lowered his arms from his eyes, his eyes now red-rimmed and tear streaked, with a blazed red imprint where the explosion had licked his gaze.
Through his blurry vision, the champion found no sight of the cloaked boy.
The massive man looked around, twisting his body despite his screaming wounds brightly scarred over his figure.
The man's vision was a confusing teary mess, one arm blindly outstretched as he stumbled forward.
Each footstep he took thundering against the sand, wandering along the grains with strained grunts.
The sounds heavily noticeable amongst the deathly silent crowd, who had never seen their champion so disgraced.
The champion's steps were now seemingly much slower than before, dragging his heavy feet through the sand.
His breath growing more ragged with each step, whether because the fire or the explosion of the pellets was not evident.
The champion in that moment, had never felt more humiliated in his life.
He snarled a breathy curse to himself as he battered his feet against the sand, sluggishly circling the pit to look around with his weak gaze.
"All the weak bastards I've crushed...and this child...makes me a fool in MY coliseum." The disgraced champion internally monologued with the anger of a man drunk on glory.
"He's lucky I've felt ill since this match started...Luck...He's just one lucky brat...One....lucky..." He assured himself with each thought, reminding himself that victory was still in hand.
All the foes he had vanquished with ease.
All the praise and the glory.
The fans that screamed his name.
Bonecrusher.
The people he made cower at his feet.
All the weak that he made beg for forgiveness.
Just to be made a fool of, by a boy who looked no older than 16, with a sword that could've been mistaken for a children's toy.
The same boy that had now suddenly vanished from the battlefield.
R a g e.
"AAARRRRRRRGHHH!" Bonecrusher raged at the top of his lungs, halting his steps as he bent back to scream a bloodcurdling rage into the air.
His arms sprawled out wide, before he began raising his sword hand and his other fist into the air.
His muscles tensed under his skin, bulging like metal wire wrapped tightly under silk.
His veins pulsed wildly at his neck, flaring with explosiveness from his agitation.
"AAARRGHHH!" He continued with a blaring anger, suddenly dropping to plummet his arms into the ground with all his godly might.
CRASH!
At once the sand blew back, erupting in a cloud of yellow smoke that swam over the surface of the swerving sand.
The impact of such strength making the sand swirl around in the pit, like the slosh of water in a bowl.
"H-Hnngh..." Amidst the chaos of mixing sand, the red sandstone pillars trembled, a small grunt coming from a pillar behind Bonecrusher.
"So that's where you hid..." Bonecrusher realised with a mischievous thought.
His chest still heaving with a mix of anger and excitement before whipping around to face the pillar.
Through his wet vision, Bonecrusher could just about recognise a black silhouette crouching on top of a chunky rock structure, made from red sandstone.
Bonecrusher could faintly perceive this silhouette shifting to keep their hold on the pillar, where the sudden churning of sand had made the pillar shake unsteadily.
"Found you." Bonecrusher breathed to himself, with a curving grin through ragged breaths.
BANG!
Bonecrusher pushed off his feet, jetting down the sand in vast and audibly powerful strides as he charged toward the pillar.
The only thing louder than the champions single-minded charge, was his breath growing furtherly heavier.
The champion's body screeched with fatigue, though Bonecrusher paid no mind.
He did not care.
No.
He did not even process his bodies alarming sense of fatigue, for there was something else much more engraved deeply within the champion's mind.
Anger, rage, revenge and blood.
All these things burned in the champions mind, moulding his consciousness into a tunnel with only one exit in sight.
His opponent's death.
Everything else was blocked out of his perception, his blurry vision turning red as he approached the pillar with his crystal sword in hand.
The single pillar stood tauntingly in front of the turned-berserk champion.
His opponent, the cloaked boy, dragging himself to the almost flat surface at the top of the pillar.
The champion's vision was a mess, further narrowed by the scope that which his angered mind projected.
Too enraged to stop himself from acting.
In too much of a frenzy to control his bloodlust.
Far too angered to notice the slip of his opponent's hand, into his own cloak.
His fury burning too brightly to notice the white trimmed card, thrown subtly in front of where the champion's blade blindly swung into the pillar.
"Shin." The disinterested voice whispered from on top of the pillar, just before diving off the rock, jumping into far too perfect a flip for such a young combatant.
At once, the card burst into a blaze of agonizing light from where the champion's own sword had clipped it into two.
The champion, who had a sliver of vision left, had faced this unfolding of pure white scintillating light.
The boy, who had dived off into the air, pulled his cloak over his eyes to avoid such blinding light.
The young warrior still managed to land perfectly onto his feet, even whilst shielding his vision from the world, managing to land far enough to completely avoid the tumbling of rocks about to come.
The card, now clipped in half, hadn't stopped the trajectory of the champion's blade.
The blade of crimson crystal continued to whip through the card and into the pillar, the power of the blade cutting nicely into the rock.
Though the champion's swordsmanship, equivalent to an ogre with a pen, made the pillar burst where Bonecrusher's strength added to his swing.
The pillar gave way in an instant to such a devastating combo, collapsing onto the blinded champion like a loaded wine shelf suddenly coming loose.
The rocks all washed over the bronze figure, adding just enough weight to catch the blinded figure off guard, sweeping him to the floor with a tidal wave of rocky rubble.
For a moment there was a long silence, dust gently settling over the rocky pile.
The cloaked figure stood unnaturally still, their face still an unshakable calm, the hem of the cloak gently swaying back after the tumble of red rocks an inch in front of their feet.
Then suddenly the rocks shifted.
A bronze arm shot out through the pile of red sandstone on the floor, shifting just enough rock to make the sound of terribly ragged breath audible.
More shift of rock, more struggle.
Bonecrusher had snapped foes harder than this rock, yet he was struggling so visibly in front of the crowd.
His thick arms, swallowed by the piles of sandstone, flailing around like a child in the deep end of a swimming pool.
The cloaked boy hadn't moved an inch since the first arm sprouted from the collection of sandstone.
"Y-You...." A familar voice huffed breathily through the rock, now half emerging through the pile of rubble as the champion crawled to their feet.
"I-I'll...huff....K-Kill...huff...Y...You." The bronze figure proclaimed in a fatigued huff, barely holding himself up by his hands and knees.
Then with a tenuous effort, the disgraced champion hauled himself to his feet.
The boy's expression remained unchanging, continuing in that same infuriating calm.
Bonecrusher saw this, his jaw clenching with visible frustration even as he huffed for air.
Sol had been watching the fight in silence from the top of the coliseum; she too had noticed that same impossible calm.
Her eyes had narrowed with focus as she had absorbed the contents of the two warrior's battle.
Suddenly her orange ringed eyes widened.
Step.
The cloaked boy, had slowly extended his leg and advanced toward the champion by one step.
The act was so unexpected, so simple and yet had such implications that the champion had become stunned.
Rather, the champion for the first time in all his many fights, had hesitated.
His clenched jaw, bound with so much tension, parted for just a second.
Then the champion's simple mind caught up with the situation when he watched the boy advance a second step onto the rock pile.
The tension in his jaw snapped back together again.
Enough was enough.
"No more tricks, no more running." The champion affirmed to himself in thought, too busy huffing for air to use his mouth to speak.
Thump.
A delay.
Instead he raised his sword hand with every last fraction of his might, his body tensing every muscle as if to summon every vestige of strength with him.
Thump.
A longer delay.
Bonecrusher curled forward, wildly swinging down with all his mustered strength.
Then just as the champion curled forward, his body froze in place, his eyes widening with shock.
A small strained noise slithering between the champions lips, suddenly dropping to his knees Infront of the cloaked boy.
The crystal sword loosely fell to the ground, from the champion's hand with a shimmering jingle, where the crystal blade dropped to the rocks.
The champion looked at the boy, now on equal height with him.
His weak gaze, scanned the face of his opponent, catching the faintest hint of amber and brown burning sinisterly into his own faint vision.
Though even without vision, Bonecrusher could feel the cold resignation searing into him from his opponent's gaze.
Sol watched from the tops sets of the coliseum, her lips parted with disbelief.
Her chin subtly lifting from where she rest it on her knuckles, watching the scene unfold.
She watched as something crimson suddenly gurgled from the champion's mouth, his head hanging slowly.
Then she watched as the boy leaned in, his mouth subtly moving beside Bonecrusher's pale ear.
Even among the crowd's stunned silence, the words that the boy whispered could not be heard.
The boy raised his tiny blade, suddenly thrusting it with ease into the champion's eye, like a knife sinking into cake.
The behemoth sat frozen on his knees, now deathly still as his shoulders sunk in on himself.
Then suddenly the light coming from the spherical glass, hanging in the sky like a giant lightbulb, began to shift over and focus onto the boy in one continuous beam.
The light, spread wide and far, now suddenly conglomerated to focus in one beam like a spot light over the boy.
The boy quickly reached behind him, yanking his black hood over his head, just as the announcer boomed from the top of the coliseum in the red box.
"LADIES, ORCS, DWARVES AND GENTLEMEN. WE HAVE A NEW CHAMPION BY VICTORY OF EXTERMINATION. SPAAAAAAARRRRROWWWWWWWWW!" The announcer shrieked in an overly performative voice.
The voice projecting from everywhere around the coliseum, probably with the use of magic as the spotlight likely was too.
The next sound to follow was the hail of the crowds deafening screams, caused by the excitement of the matches conclusion.
Then from seemingly nowhere, a plethora of different coloured bits, no smaller than a finger, began to pour over the pit.
The sound to follow next was the unexpected creak of something heavy dragging across the sound.
One of the massive cardinal red ginormous doors across the pit, with a semi-circle top, began to slowly drag itself open.
Inside the red box above the pit, hanging with diagonal red beams to keep the building attached to the coliseum wall, the announcer had suddenly turned silent.
The announcer paused unusually for an odd moment, something never seen before.
Finally the announcer found his words in an initial stammer.
"W-Well ladies, orcs, thieves and gentlemen! It appears the Empress herself would like to congratulate our new victor." The announcer recovered from his temporary fluster.
Immedtiately the crowd burst into a deafening cry to celebrate the presence of the Empress.
"The Empress herself?! Gracing this warrior?!" Sol flared inside of her mind, her orange ringed eyes widening with fiery disbelief.
Her mind swirled with thoughts, comprehending the sudden defeat of Bonecrusher whilst now processing that Nioavoleir's own leader was making an appearance to announce the winner.
"Have the customs changed since the last time I was here?" Sol wondered quietly to herself as she settled back into her seat.
Something was gnawing at Sol, causing her to drop down to sit in deep contemplation.
She couldn't understand the battle, how such a strong opponent had dropped to their knees Infront of nothing more than a schoolboy.
Not to mention that now this human was being graced with a nation leaders presence, the famous Lady Alexis, leader of a nation as secret as Nioavoleir at that.
Sol sat on the grey slab, with her chin dropping back onto her knuckles, almost missing the figure stepping through the massive red door and into the pit.
The woman that stepped through the door was impossible to ignore.
Her hair was a richer colour of red than the hair on the body of Sol's shade, her ears covered by the fiery swish of hair.
Her complexion was impossibly pale like a ghost, yet smooth and supple, with the face of a woman that made all heads turn.
Her eyes were an enchanting green, with the brightness of an emerald.
Her jaw was sharp, with just as defined cheekbones, with a pair of lips coloured a bright blood red.
Her figure was curvy, dressed in a tight red silky dress that complimented her curves.
A fluffy pink fur scarf sat comfortably over her shoulders as she swayed her hips through the sand.
Her steps surprisingly smooth, even as the stems of her red high heels were swallowed by the sand.
Around her wrist was a collection of glossy black spheres, wrapped tightly around her forearm.
On that same arm, in her hand, she held a golden trimmed disc with runes engraved around the rim.
The centre of the disc was hollow, excluding sturdy metallic wires crossing over each other like the layout of a tic-tac toe game.
When she finally parted her lips to speak, she spoke so in a way that made her lips move barely an inch.
Her voice was deceptively smooth like butter spread, with a regal tone that rivalled Sol's.
Her tone was somehow too sweet, like honey, each word pronounced with the delicacy of eating fresh sourdough.
"Aha, it appears we have a new champion on our hands!" She announced into the disc-shaped item in her hand.
At once her voice boomed just like how the announcers did moments ago, the volume flooding in from around the stadium.
Her steps were elusive like a trail of red silk, if it loosely flailed around in the wind.
Her green eyes narrowed subtly, her pale eye lids focusing on the shadow under the hood of the warrior.
Her gaze dropped lower by an inch, inspecting the collar of the hooded figure with rapt attention.
"I was enthralled to spectate such a stunning match. Your new champion here is very impressive." She spoke into the magical device again, her voice projecting far into the stadium until it reached Sol at the top seats of the coliseum.
Sol sat deathly still, her shoulders hunching with tension as her knuckles stuck to her chin, where she sat leaning heavily forward.
"So Alexis is still around..." She realised to herself, her body still unnaturally still as her eyes aimed onto the Empress.
"I've never seen her congratulate a champion..." Sol thought to herself as she felt an uneasy feeling swirl in her stomach.
The Empress's lips curled into a suspiciously wide grin as her eyes returned back to the shadow under the hood.
"You know, come to think of it, I didn't quite get a good look at you. There was a lot going on, right audience?" She spoke in a purposefully honeyed voice.
The audience screamed in agreement, each voice melding into one blaring "YESSSSS!"
"See? Even the audience don't know who you are. It's only right we know what our new champion looks like." Lady Alexis continued in a soft voice, like when someone drops their head into a pillow, her hand slowly rising with the same grace as her voice toward the cloaked figure.
Her grin widened further somehow, yet still never revealing a hint of her teeth.
The Empress's green eyes glinting as a single giggle escaped her, the hand drawing nearer toward the hood of the young warrior.
"Oop-" Lady Alexis popped with breath as she felt a cold hand wrap around her even colder wrist, finding her movements interrupted.
The cloaked boy holding her wrist in place, as he spoke.
"Lady Alexis..." He began in a voice as ghostly as blowing wind.
A pause.
"I wish to withdraw my status as champion."
End of chapter 6