The Arena

[Mariana Xiechai]

I've done this before. The feeling was insistent, even as he rushed towards her. The fenki made the wrong move of deflection to the tricky blow, but was able to compensate enough to keep from being mortally wounded. Nevertheless, new blood already leaked from a pre-made hole I her armor. Health potion or no, she was already tired. It was either end this swiftly, or face what lie beyond.

With a cry of rage to give her strength, she moved to plunge one steaming blade down at him, intending to drive it through a shoulder while he still stood close.

[Phantomboy86]

Now the usage of the curious dagger came into play. With a few deft arm movements, he brought it into the path of the blade. But rather than block, it slid between the U of the crossguard and the hard blade, and he gave it a vicious twist to try and yank the blade away from his shoulder while he could still get up and disengage backwards.

[Mariana Xiechai]

That's unfortunate. But fortunately not a technique she'd never encountered before. Unable to check the blow she'd already delivered, she instead compensated by moving her own blade with the motion, to detract from the force left to radiate up her arm. This, unfortunately, left open her side, a fact that she was quite aware of. She was left moving to backpeddle herself, hopefully having bought the time to save from a quick thrust in the gut with her smooth disentanglement.

[Phantomboy86]

Being that both backed away, Droog was not left in a position to attack her in his own retreat. He holds the sword point-up near his face once more.

"Never understood the appeal of two cumbersome swords. Cannot block, and one false swing ends you."

---
Michkel watched in horror as the two began their blade dance. He rose, to intervene, but even his great bulk was not enough to stop himself getting buffeted backwards by the throng of people fleeing the arena. There would be no interference from him for awhile.

[Mariana Xiechai]

She waits, still circling, still struggling with that selfsame knowledge. I've done this before. Seen him before. It was nothing but a faint niggling at the back of her head, but the collar worked to sweep it away before she could latch into it and bring the recollection forth and into the light. His words stirred it again, again she reached for the memory, and again it was whisked away in a slow of subtle and well-placed magicks.

Unaware of the towering ylian's plight in the bleachers, the fenki took the prerogative to rush forward, her jabs fist and powerful as she rushed straight for the man's core, leaving her opposite blade in a sweep for the arm holding the well-kept rapier.

[Phantomboy86]

Droog makes a rather surprising move, in that he makes a dead sprint directly towards her. In a hair splitting maneuver he drops to his knees, skidding like a baseball player as he reaches under the fenki in a plan to take her momentum and throw her over himself.

[Mariana Xiechai]

Unfortunately the fenki hadn't built up too much momentum. The move from the lemur, however, is unexpected enough that she's sent hurtling most of the way over him...only to trip as her foot latches beneath one of his arms in what might be a painful wrench to the other man. She snarls furiously, in a sudden and nearly inexplicable panic, and her paw reaches towards his head, flames writhing.

[Phantomboy86]

Misjudging the speed of the fenki left him without a very graceful option, but an ungraceful one would work all the same, and so he unceremoniously tried to rise and dump her off of him.

[Mariana Xiechai]

The akkaio found her feet swiftly, despite being laden in armor. She stumbled back nevertheless, unhinged somehow, the world in front of her blurring oddly and tilting to the side. Something was leaking through the barrier, borne on the wings of her knowledge of flames. Droog. Yes, that was his name. Droog. He'd just said it, but she knew it from somewhere else. A field. A city in the distance. Want to have a friendly spar? It's been a while since I've had a good challenge.

Disoriented, what was past and present clashed awkwardly, leaving half of history in one side of her vision and the armed, fighting kingslayer in the other. She found herself frozen, The Phoenix stood with her lips slightly parted, her head pounding as though someone was drumming furiously against the sensitive forefront of her mind. It was a piercing pain, morphing into a knifing through her skull. A wheezing sound escaped her lungs.

Locked where she was, the fenki stood without motion, and completely open to attack.

<><><><><><>

“Turn it DOWN. Take more back!” The lemur was darting furiously along the edge of his podium, staring downwards. There was wrath in his words. “Can't you see? You've given her too much, too fast. Block her mind again. Block it, block it off!”

The mages on either side of the ledge were casting, trying to comply. But it was like trying to dam a river without a moment's notice. The strain on their faces was evident, and sparks of light flew into the air, blue and vibrant. But still his fenki, his prized gladiator, his citizen-turned-feral, did not move. He was going to lose her, his number one money-bringer, his filler of stadium seats, his guaranteed vault-stuffing tria mine!

“STOP THE FIGHT!” He shrieked. But his voice was lost amongst the throng, the cheering people, the attendants leaned forward in their seats, eagerly watching. Without the assistance of magical enhancement his protests were nothing but white noise in the middle of the same.

He had lost.

[Phantomboy86]

Droog stopped as the enki seemed to nearly pass out on her feet. Apraising the situation for a trap, but finding none. He shakes his head once, tutting. "Tired or not, our fight has not concluded."

He brings his blade up, holding it sideways in front of him. If any part of the fenki were conscious and able to see, her vision would be of a complex, circular pattern flaring to life at the palm of Droog's gloves. The duelist lightly runs his hand down the length of the blade, which begins to glow a light blue.

"Rapiers are already adept at piercing through armor. But I find a little extra is occasionally needed to really drive home the point."

An audible crackle splits the air between them, though the roar of fleeing patrons makes it harder to detect. It sounds like a snap-freeze. The light on the rapier twists and expands, becoming a spiked crystalline lattice. Droog surges forwards with his enchanted weapon, faster than his previous charges, intent to drive the cruel implement in, and up.

<><><><><><>

Michkel had waded through the crowd in time to see that there was no possible way he was going to be able to intervene for the fenki, the most he could offer was a sad prayer to Talad for her safety in the Realm. If he could not do her any favors immediately, he could certainly manage one for the long term. Quickly he scanned the slowly draining Arena, until he spotted the box seats. With practiced deftness, he carefully equipped his gargantuan caestus.

He took in a mighty breath, his immense chest expanding as he clasped metal hands and raised them above his head, before dropping them in a titanic blow at the stone ledge, shattering a small section of the steps into chunks. No time was wasted to register pain from such a foolhardy action, and he selected the biggest piece he could find, hefting it onto his shoulder and spinning once... twice... thrice... and shotputting the piece of masonry right at the support structure of the box.

[Mariana Xiechai]

It wasn't until he was upon her that the images converged. You should move, her instincts told her. Move. Run. Dodge. But her body wouldn't listen to her mind. And the rapier drove through her gut like molten lava, and it tore through her armor and flesh and out her back in a spray of blood. Before the agony set in she had the brief comedic thought that she looked something like a kabob, staring down as she touched the scarlet dripping through with her fingertips. Slowly her eyes crept up to the lemur's face, solidifying where she'd seen him before just as her eyes flashed azure-blue and the collar fizzled and snapped in two, drifting to the floor. Images flitted through her mind, all vying for attention, and the clamor was almost enough to make her forget the length of steel still stuck inside her bowels. She spoke, but only blood pooled in her mouth, thick, cloying and metallic. “What?” Was the only thing she could muster. She slid off the edge of the man's blade, and to the ground, dying, bleeding out.

<><><><><><><><><>

The section of stone stair hurtled towards him, and the lemur swore. All of his regal front disappeared when he leaped down, grabbing one of the banners and clinging to it desperately as the rest of it collapsed, sending the mages and those watching downwards and to the ground. “No,” he shrieked, his voice hoarse as he watched his enterprise crumbling around him. “NO!”

[Phantomboy86]

As the rapier is withdrawn from her carcass and the lattice evaporates into the aether, he gently flicked off some of the blood, mumbling about needing to clean later. Their duel concluded, Droog gave himself the luxury of surveying the arena. Almost entirely empty. Strange, though, a small cloud of debris had erupted from where the lemur might have sworn box seats once stood.

<><><><><><><><><>

Michkel had not felt so angry in cycles. It was always present within him, the magic of rage and chaos sewn and branded into his flesh until time had fused it into his being. But time had also shown him violence and death enough for anyone sane, and the anger was locked away, deemed insufficient and pointless. An offense to possess after bearing witness to the designs such negative emotions brought about.

But the behemoth felt it now, tempered. Righteous fury as he strode through the cloud of dust and splintered wood, eyes locked onto the last location of the pit boss. Rather than disperse the cloud, his movements only seemed to add to it. Thickening the air and souring it with the smell of burning. And if the boss were still able to look up, he would find the visage countless unwilling and forced opponents had seen last. A mountain of muscle, angry red lines burning to life out from his back, highlighting the cursed body structure.

Coarsely accented words dripped from his mouth like molten lava. Sluggish, but powerful.

"No? We do not say no. Off your throne you are of us, and you have yet to earn 'no'."

[Mariana Xiechai]

The lemur watched in horror as the monstrosity came closer to him. All the chaos around him, but not even dangling by a thread of a tapestry was as terrifying as hearing that thing's feet thud along, nor the sight of it in all its wrath infringing on his territory. There was a terrible ripping sound from above, and he looked up just in time to see the last strands of the fabric fraying away. Before he could from a coherent thought, he found himself shrieking downwards, arms flailing, and finally landing in a broken tangle down on the ground. He had the brief notion that the ylian was looming somewhere over him, before his world went dark, and he departed into the Realm.

<><><><><><><><>

The tumult ended, nothing stood in its wake save for the dust left behind, and a few people moaning in pain amidst the wreckage. Not only had they shattered the tournament, it was questionable if they'd brought the entire business to its very knees. But even as the silence reigned on, someone watched it calmly from the shadows, cloaked and cowled with more than simple fabric. The figure's eyes scanned the remains, and a strange sort of smile twisted its lips, before it turned, and departed through a passage that few were knowledgeable of.

[bloodedIrishman]

Kull sits on a stone ledge overlooking the arena. He begins to play the lute; the music carries around the area. With a mischievous smile, the Akkaio sings a local Enkidukai tune with a merry attitude. The combat and bloodshed does not deter him from a good mood; in fact, if an observer pays close attention, it seems to excite him.