THE COMBAT!!!
The Dome arena was an echo chamber where the screams of sixty thousand spectators blended into a permanent roar. The first duel of the tournament pitted two extremes against each other. On one side, Axel, a monument of flesh and scars. On the other, Blink, a mystery in a gray bodysuit.
Axel entered without haste. Each step echoed heavily on the metal platform. He scanned the stands with a look that appealed to the most primal urge: the thirst to see a body break. He slammed his fists together. THUMP. THUMP. Not a salute, a warning.
Facing him, Blink was already in place. He didn't move. His mirrored-lens glasses were two impassive silver discs. He seemed fragile, almost translucent next to Axel's bulk.
The android referee raised its arm. "Combat with minimal restrictions. K.O., surrender, or judges' decision. Ready?"
Axel answered with a grunt. Blink tilted his head a millimeter.
— FIGHT!
Blink disappeared.
It wasn't acceleration. It was evaporation. One moment he was there, the next, there was only a slight shimmer in the air.
FSSHT—FWAP!
A knife-hand strike hit Axel at the base of his skull. Blink had appeared behind him, his arm still extended, before vanishing again. Axel didn't flinch. The back of his neck, broad as a tree trunk, had barely moved.
The spectacle began. Blink was a vengeful ghost. He sprang from nowhere: to the left for a strike to the ribs, to the right for a kick to the knee, from behind for a slap to the ear. Fwap! Fwap-tac! Fssht! A rain of precise, rapid attacks, but they seemed to slide off Axel's muscular shell.
The crowd, initially excited, began to grumble. "Move, big guy!" "What kind of fly-swatting is this?!" They had come for carnage, not a game of hide-and-seek.
Axel, however, seemed to enter a strange meditation. He didn't charge stupidly. He pivoted slowly, his slitted eyes following the flashes of movement, the micro-distortions in the air that betrayed the teleportation. He was learning. Timing it. Between disappearance and reappearance, there was a delay. Tiny, but constant. Blink had a rhythm.
After nearly a minute of this harassment, Axel closed his eyes.
The gesture seemed insane. A murmur of incomprehension ran through the stands. Blink, taken aback, hesitated for a micro-second. Then, seeing the perfect opening, he decided to finish it. He reappeared directly in front of Axel, his body twisted to concentrate all his force into a punch to the solar plexus.
Axel's eyes opened. But they didn't look forward. They turned toward an empty point, forty-five degrees to his right.
His arm shot out. Not a big swing, but a short, piston-like uppercut from his hips, with breathtaking speed for a man of his build.
He struck the empty air.
At that exact instant, precisely in the space his fist passed through, Blink reappeared. His face materialized directly on the point of impact.
The shock was obscenely brutal. A deep, wet thud, POKTCH!, like an overripe fruit bursting. Blink's head snapped back, his teleportation aborted in a crackle of unstable energy. He didn't vanish. He stood there, legs wobbling, an expression of absolute stupefaction on his face. His mirrored glasses, cracked, fell and shattered on the floor.
Axel didn't let him fall. With his left hand, he grabbed Blink by the collar of his bodysuit and, with demonic ease, lifted him to face level.
— Speed is energy, he growled, his voice a grating of gravel. And energy follows paths. You always take the same one.
He lifted Blink higher, then slammed him into the ground. The teleporter's body crashed with a dry crack and didn't bounce. Inert.
The referee whistled. "K.O.! WINNER: AXEL!"
The silence was brief, then ovations erupted. This wasn't the victory of strength over speed. It was the victory of calculation over instinct, of patience over frenzy. Axel left the arena with the same heavy step, leaving a crowd both enthusiastic and vaguely uneasy. He had just delivered a lesson: here, even ghosts could be hunted.
———
Between matches, the atmosphere relaxed in the contestant aisles. Pinky, followed by Kotobe and the ever-impassive One, was looking for a snack. It was near a stand selling giant skewers that they stumbled upon the involuntary attraction.
Master Karaté was there. Dressed in a dubious white gi, his black belt too wide and tied haphazardly, he was pacing a small open space, his face red with concentrated fury. A dozen onlookers watched him, amused.
— You! he thundered, pointing a finger at One. The profaner! The one who spat on the Karate of the Seven Pains! The hour of redemption is at hand!
One, busy observing the cooking of a skewer with the attention of a food critic, barely looked up.
— You will taste the First Pain! The Pain of Reversed Humiliation! Master Karaté struck a dreadful pose, one foot forward, arms coiled like snakes, and began pushing out shrill "HYAAA!" sounds while making jerky, perfectly ineffective movements. He spun around, struck the air, feinted parries against imaginary opponents.
Pinky stopped, an eyebrow raised. It was grotesque. Pathetic. And yet... there was such a mad conviction in his eyes, so disconnected from reality, that she felt a touch of morbid fascination. He really believes it. In what?
Encouraged by the laughing audience (which he mistook for cheers), Master Karaté decided to finish. "And now... the Striking Eagle's Dive!" He took a running start, charged at One screaming, both arms back like wings, for a double-fisted punch meant to be devastating.
One finished inspecting the skewer. He seemed to notice the charge at the last moment. He took a small step to the side, just enough.
Master Karaté, carried by his momentum and blinded by his own fury, swept past One and rammed his stomach full force into the sharp corner of a sauce display stand. BDOOF! The sound was both hollow and wet. He stood there planted, eyes bulging, mouth wide open in a silent "O" of pain and surprise, before slowly sliding to his knees, hands clutched over his stomach, unable to catch his breath.
One looked at him, nodded.
— Too predictable, he commented, as if to himself. He turned to the vendor. Two skewers. Please.
Pinky let out a small, stifled laugh, a mix of nervousness and hilarity. The morbid attraction she'd felt dissipated in the comical reality of the fall. Kotobe pinched the bridge of his nose, exasperated.
— The dregs of the small-show circuit, he muttered. They pollute the system. This practice is worthless.
Hidden behind a tree, an old man with dark skin and black clothing stared at One.
— "So this is him. One. My files say he is without ether limits. I'd better keep an eye on him."
Back in the belly of the Dome, the atmosphere was at its peak. The screen displayed GRANN vs REX. The perfect opposition.
Rex made his entrance like a storm. He bounded onto the platform, beating his painted chest, brandishing his two glowing red energy hatchets. "GLORY IS MINE!" he bellowed, and the crowd roared in unison. He was their barbarian, their champion of chaos.
Then, silence fell. Grann walked toward the circle. His immaculate white uniform seemed to repel the arena's dirt. He looked at no one. His face was a mask of absolute serenity, troubled only by a faint smile of curiosity, as if visiting a zoo.
The fight began. Rex, true to his reputation for brutal but effective force, held nothing back. He combined his power with tactical aggression. He threw one hatchet spinning to distract, while charging, the second ready to slice. Grann avoided the first with a slight head movement and parried the second with the flat of his hand. CLANG! The impact was real, and Grann retreated a step, a fine mist of bluish energy dissipating the shock around his hand.
The crowd howled. He had touched him! The perfect one wasn't untouchable!
Rex, inflamed, chained his attacks. He was a hurricane. His blows rained down, each powerful enough to break steel. Grann parried, evaded, slid. Sometimes, a strike grazed his tunic, leaving a dust mark. Sometimes, the violence of the impacts forced him back. But he never seemed hurried, never in danger. He observed. His blue eyes, cold as cameras, recorded every detail: Rex's attack angle, his breathing, the minute tremor in his muscles before a heavy strike.
After a minute of frenzied assault, Rex prepared his signature move. He whirled his two hatchets at a mad speed, creating a humming vortex of energy blades, a grinder meant to leave nothing intact. "THE GLADIATOR'S HARVEST!" he roared, projecting the vortex at Grann.
The crowd rose, believing it was the end.
Grann advanced. He walked straight into the vortex. He raised his right hand, palm open.
— Sublimation: Limitation of Effects.
The whirlwind of destruction, upon contact with his sublimated field, came undone. The energy blades didn't extinguish; they lost their structure, disintegrating into a rain of inert sparks, like a failed firework. In less than a second, Rex's ultimate attack was nothing but a cloud of dying glitter.
The stupefaction on Rex's face was total. His weapon, his pride, reduced to nothing.
Grann hadn't stopped walking. He was now within striking distance. He placed his palm on Rex's sternum.
— Sublimation: Amplification of Effect.
And there, the true power was revealed. Grann didn't strike. He redirected. All the kinetic energy, all the force Rex had expended throughout the entire fight—every charge, every blow, every movement—was captured, channeled, and released into a single point, within Rex's own body.
Rex was thrown back, his mouth opening in a silent scream. He collapsed on the spot, as if his bones had suddenly melted, and lay there trembling uncontrollably, conscious but completely paralyzed, defeated by the very weight of his own fury.
The silence was religious. Then, the referee whistled, almost timidly. "Technical K.O. Winner: Grann."
Grann lowered his hand. He cast a final look at Rex's trembling form, the air of a scientist satisfied with an experiment. He turned on his heel and left the arena, without a word, without a gesture for the crowd. His tunic was still white, apart from a few dust marks. He had barely broken a sweat.
In the contestant lounges, Pinky's throat was dry. Kotobe was frantically taking notes: "Power: alteration of local physical/conceptual laws. Range: contact or immediate proximity. Countermeasure: None identified. Threat Level: Catastrophic."
One was finishing his second skewer. "That's strong," he murmured, without stopping chewing.
It was then that the arena lights dimmed, and the announcer's voice, charged with dramatic excitement, blared from the speakers.
— AND NOW... HOLD ONTO YOUR SEATS! THE MOST PERSONAL, THE MOST SCORCHING CLASH OF THIS TOURNAMENT! IN THIS CIRCLE, IT'S NOT JUST A FIGHT... IT'S A SETTLING OF SCORES! THE PRIDE OF A NAME AGAINST THE COLDNESS OF PROFIT! GIVE IT UP FOR... PINKYYYYYY... VERSUS... VIIIIIPERRRR!!!
A spotlight swept the fighter entrances. From his side, Viper materialized like the shadow he was. He lifted his head, searched for Pinky with his eyes in the lounge gloom. When he found her, he smiled. A broad, cruel smile that bared his teeth. He slowly drew his thumb across his throat, then pointed his index finger straight at her. Your turn.
Pinky felt a mix of icy fear and burning determination wash over her. She took a deep breath, tightened the bandages around her wrists.
The time for lessons was over. The time for her fight had just begun.