Morning sunlight pierced through the partially open roof of the Colosseum, creating sharp beams of light that sliced through the dusty arena air.
Thousands of spectators had already packed the rough concrete stands. Illegal gambling was running smoothly in every corner, cheap beer spilled onto the floor, and bloodthirsty screams echoed in the hot, humid air.
In the contestant waiting room—dark, stuffy, and reeking sharply of muscle liniment and rust—Johnny sat silently on a long wooden bench.
He wore his workshop leather jacket, modified to the extreme. The right sleeve had been completely cut off (sleeveless), exposing his trained arm muscles and facilitating the swing of a sword. On his left shoulder, a sturdy salvaged iron pauldron was strapped securely. Thick cargo pants and military boots completed his look.
However, the most striking feature was his face.
Johnny wore a Black Iron Mask.
He had forged it himself in his workshop. Its shape resembled the snout of a wolf grinning savagely, with dark, sharp eye holes. The design was pulled directly from his darkest memory: the Beast of Darkness—the manifestation of rage that once inhabited the Berserker Armor.
Beside him, the Dragon Slayer leaned against the wall. The sword was so massive and unnatural that the other contestants—tattooed thugs and street fighters who were usually fierce—sat far away. They kept a safe distance of two meters, as if afraid the aura of that black iron would swallow them whole.
"Contestant Number 44! Black Wolf!" the arena official called out through a crackling loudspeaker.
Johnny stood up. The floor vibrated slightly as his feet planted.
With one smooth motion, he grabbed the hilt of the 100 kg sword, swung it onto his back, and CLICK—hooked it onto the magnetic chain across his chest.
"Time to work, Boss," Puck whispered from inside the pants pocket (which had been fitted with a special mesh vent so the elf could breathe and peek out).
Johnny stepped out of the dark corridor, heading toward the blindingly bright sand arena.
The crowd's cheers exploded as he appeared, but the tone was mocking.
"Booo! Look at that! Wearing a mask to play swords!" "Hey Idiot! Your sword is bigger than your future!" "That must be styrofoam! No way anyone can carry iron that big!"
Johnny ignored them. He stood in the center of the arena like a tower.
On the other side of the arena, the rusted iron gate ground open with a loud screech.
Out walked a mountain of a man. Nearly 2.5 meters tall, the result of mild genetic mutation from exposure to Mako waste in the Slums. His belly was distended but hard as a truck tire, and his arms were the size of an adult's thighs. He wore a dented yellow construction helmet and carried a Giant Concrete Hammer—a chunk of street concrete impaled on a thick iron pipe.
Round 1 Opponent: "Big Bro" (The Slum Giant).
MC Kotch screamed hysterically into his microphone: "In the red corner! The construction workers' favorite! The Foundation Destroyer! BIIIG... BROOO!"
"And in the blue corner! The mysterious newcomer! The scrap metal carrier... BLACK WOLF!"
Big Bro laughed, his voice a booming bass. He slammed his concrete hammer onto the ground. THUD! Sand scattered.
"Hey, Runt!" Big Bro shouted, pointing at Johnny with his weapon. "Is that toy heavy to carry? Come here, Uncle will help you hold it... right after Uncle breaks your bones into soup!"
Johnny didn't answer. Behind his wolf mask, his eyes stared straight ahead. Flat. Focused.
The referee—a skinny man with a flag—stood trembling between them.
"Rules: No rules! Weapons free! Death is your own responsibility! START!"
Big Bro didn't waste time. He charged forward—the ground shaking with every step.
"DIE, ROACH!"
Big Bro raised his giant concrete hammer high with both hands, intending to flatten Johnny into meat paste with a single deadly vertical strike.
Johnny didn't dodge. He didn't run.
The audience held their breath. "He's crazy! He wants to die!"
Just as the concrete hammer began its descent, Johnny moved.
His right foot stomped the ground as a pivot. His hips rotated with terrifying torque. His right hand gripped the hilt of the Dragon Slayer on his back.
SWOOOSH!
The sound of the air being cleaved was deafening, drowning out the crowd's cheers. Johnny drew the giant sword and executed a full rotational move—"Whirlwind Strike".
However, at the very last second, Johnny twisted his wrist slightly. He didn't strike with the sharp edge. He struck with the wide flat side of the blade.
First, the black blade of the Dragon Slayer met the iron pipe handle of Big Bro's hammer.
CLAAAANG!!!
The sound of metal collision was ear-splitting. The arm-thick iron pipe didn't just bend—it snapped into two pieces like a dry twig.
But the momentum of Johnny's sword wasn't spent.
Johnny's body rotation continued. The remaining momentum of the 100 kg flat-sided swing slammed into Big Bro's now wide-open torso.
THWACK!
The sound of ribs cracking in unison was horrifying, like the sound of stepping on dry branches.
The laws of physics worked brutally. The 150 kg giant body was lifted off the ground, thrown five meters sideways as if hit by a train, and slammed into the concrete wall of the arena.
CRASH!
The arena wall cracked. Dust fell.
Big Bro slid down to the sand. Unconscious instantly. Foam at the mouth, eyes rolled back white. His concrete hammer lay shattered in pieces beside him.
Johnny completed his spin and returned to a standing position. The giant sword was already back resting casually on his shoulder. His breathing hadn't even quickened.
Silence.
One second. Two seconds. Three seconds.
The entire Colosseum was dead silent. The spectators who had been mocking him were now gaping with mouths wide open, cigarettes falling from their lips. They had just watched a teenager swat a giant like a fly.
Then...
"WOOOOOOAAAAHHH!!!"
An explosion of deafening cheers shook the Colosseum roof. This time it wasn't mockery. It was fear mixed with pure awe.
MC Kotch stuttered into his microphone, almost dropping it. "W-What was that?! One hit?! His weapon broke?! THE WINNER IS... BLACK WOLF!!!"
Johnny didn't wave. He didn't celebrate. He simply turned and walked calmly back into the dark corridor.
To him, cutting down a slow human was far easier than cutting down a Shinra Sweeper, let alone an Apostle.
In the VIP box covered by one-way glass, far above the arena, two pairs of eyes watched the event closely.
One was Don Corneo, a fat man in tacky clothes who was laughing uproariously while spilling his wine.
"Hahaha! Amazing! A new beast! I can make a huge profit on the betting for the next round!"
The other stood in the shadowed corner, far from Corneo. A neat man in a dark blue suit, with long red hair tied in a ponytail.
Reno.
Reno wasn't laughing. He held his electric baton casually, but his sharp eyes tracked the Black Wolf's back disappearing into the darkness of the tunnel.
He recognized that posture. He recognized that aura.
"That sword..." Reno murmured softly, his eyes narrowing analytically. "That is definitely not SOLDIER standard. And his fighting style... no military school technique. Pure instinct."
Reno activated the communicator in his ear.
"Tseng. I found something interesting in Sector 6. That kid I told you about before, the one with Aerith... yeah, that Johnny."
A brief silence on the other end.
"He's not just a regular workshop kid," Reno continued, his tone turning serious. "His physical strength is unnatural without Mako. Back then, he fought evenly with me too. His potential... might be Level A. I'll keep watching him."
Down below, the break was short. The crowd was still buzzing about Black Wolf's one-hit victory. However, the cheers turned tense as MC Kotch prepared to announce the next opponent.