The afternoon wore on over the Dome, but the fever didn't subside. The giant screens endlessly replayed the first three Round of 16 fights: Orion annihilating Terra, Bo being patient to the point of absurdity, Lena breaking Jet without a shred of emotion.
On Nano-Neko, K2B was riling up the virtual crowds:
"WE GOT OUR EYES FULL, FOLKS! BUT IT'S NOT OVER! FAR FROM IT! BECAUSE THE CROWD... THE CROWD IS LIKE A FEMALE HARPY: IT LICKS YOU WHEN YOU WIN, IT TEARS YOU APART WHEN YOU FALL! AND TODAY, WE'LL SEE IF OUR CHAMPIONS HAVE THICK ENOUGH SKIN!"
In the studio, Lola smiled, but Mecha Sulivan, beside her, had a strange look in his eyes. He had already collected enough donations to fund two prototypes. Now, he was watching the fighters like a child gazing at toys in a shop window.
"Next fight," announced Lola, "pits two completely opposite styles against each other: the huntress of the night, LUNA, versus the radiant optimist, NOVA!"
On social media, the polls exploded:
#TeamLuna: 47%
#TeamNova: 53%
The gap was tiny. Too tiny. The public didn't know which way to turn.
---
LUNA vs NOVA
Luna entered first. Silent. Her eyes swept across the arena, searching for shadows, for corners to strike from. Her pale skin seemed to absorb the light.
Nova, on the other hand, made her entrance under a shower of holographic confetti. She was literally radiant, her golden hair bathed in a solar Ether that made the front rows squint.
"NIGHT AGAINST DAY!" roared K2B. "SHADOW AGAINST LIGHT! BETS ARE OPEN, FOLKS, AND I'M TELLING YOU RIGHT NOW: THE PUBLIC'S GONNA CHANGE THEIR MINDS FASTER THAN A CLASS-C DEMON FACING A CLASS-S HERO!"
— FIGHT!
Nova attacked first. A broad, theatrical gesture, and suddenly the arena was flooded with light. A blinding, burning light that made the cameras scream.
"SOLAR FLASH!" she proclaimed.
Luna disappeared.
Not physically – she was still there, somewhere. But the light was so intense that no one could see her. Not even Nova.
Nova blinked, searching for her opponent. "Show yourself, coward!"
A laugh, light as a breath, came from her left. Nova spun, fired a light beam. Nothing.
Another laugh, to the right this time.
"YOU'RE RUNNING IN CIRCLES, NOVA!" K2B commented. "SHE'S PLAYING WITH HER LIKE A CAT WITH A MOUSE!"
The crowd, initially behind Nova, began to murmur.
"— Can't she find her?
— Where is Luna, damn it?
— It's creepy."
A third laugh. Closer.
Nova, panicking, unleashed all her power. A spherical solar explosion burst from her, sweeping the arena in a ten-meter radius. The light was so violent that the protective screens activated.
When the brightness subsided…
Luna was right behind her.
Her silver claws pressed against Nova's throat.
"Light illuminates everything," Luna whispered. "Except what hides within it."
Nova gulped. Her knees gave way.
— K.O.! VICTOR: LUNA!
Silence.
Then a monster ovation.
The same ones who were applauding Nova ten minutes earlier now chanted:
"LU-NA! LU-NA! LU-NA!"
On Nano-Neko, #TeamLuna jumped from 47% to 89% in less than three minutes.
K2B laughed like a madman.
"I TOLD YOU! THE PUBLIC ARE LIKE GIRLS! THEY LOVE THE WINNER, FULL STOP! POOR NOVA, ALREADY FORGOTTEN!"
In the studio, Lola tried to keep a straight face. "A spectacular turnaround... Mecha, your thoughts?"
Sulivan, who was watching Luna with renewed interest, replied distractedly: "She understood that light is just a tool. Not an end. Very... useful."
---
DURING THE SHORT BREAK, THE NETWORKS GO WILD
While the arena was being cleaned of light residues, Nano-Neko was in turmoil.
#LunaQueenOfShadows: 12M views.
#NovaExtinguished: 8M views (mockery, already).
#PublicTraitor: 5M views.
A montage was looping: the same faces in the crowd, screaming for Nova at the start, then for Luna at the end. The caption: "The loyalty of tournament fans, speedrun version."
Debates raged:
"— Nova did her best!
— Her best was getting caught in her own light?
— Luna played dirty. That's not fighting.
— It is fighting, dude. It's just not YOUR kind."
NO QUARTER, LET'S MOVE ON WITH THE REST OF THE TOURNAMENT!
shouted Lola cheerfully.
CHLOÉ vs SORA
The atmosphere had settled, but the tension remained.
Chloé – the scientist – entered with her holographic tablets, her protective goggles pushed up on her forehead. She was already analyzing the arena, calculating angles and distances.
Sora – the dreamer aesthete – arrived walking slowly, his eyes lifted towards the Dome's rafters as if searching for beauty in the metal beams.
"Reason against art," sighed K2B. "Is this gonna be a headache or a headache?"
— FIGHT!
Sora opened the ball. A graceful sweep of his arm, and a wave of colors surged towards Chloé – not an attack, an illusion. Flowers, stars, shifting forms that disoriented the vision.
Chloé blinked, disoriented for a second. Then she smiled.
"Optical illusion. Flicker frequency: 8 Hz. Limited temporary disorientation."
She tapped on her tablet. A pair of filter-lenses appeared on her face, projected by her Ether.
"Spectral filtering activated."
Sora, surprised, watched her walk through his illusions without flinching. He changed tactics, projecting bursts of colored light in rapid, unpredictable salvos.
Chloé didn't dodge them. She analyzed them.
"Parabolic trajectory. Average speed: 40 km/h. Energy density: low."
It's all show, it has no real effect.
She raised a finger, and a hexagonal shield of pure energy appeared before her. The bursts smashed against it without shaking her.
She had built it herself, her personal tech inspired by the materialization abilities of the hero Angel.
Sora, frustrated, changed again. He began to dance. A slow, graceful, hypnotic dance that drew the eye, captured attention.
The surrounding crowd began to be drawn in.
"— It's beautiful...
— He looks like a living painting...
— He's incredible..."
Chloé felt the effect. Her eyelids drooped for a fraction of a second. But her tablet beeped.
"Alert: hypnotic suggestion detected. Counter-measure: auditory stimulation."
A high-pitched, shrill sound burst from her earbuds. She snapped awake.
Sora, who thought he had her, saw her charge straight at him, an Ether scalpel in hand.
"ANALYSIS COMPLETE. WEAKNESS IDENTIFIED."
She plunged the scalpel... into the ground, an inch from Sora's foot.
"One inch higher, and I'd have severed your tendon. Give up."
Sora looked at her. His eyes, lost in contemplation a minute earlier, were now clear.
"You're right," he said softly. "Beauty is useless against truth."
He raised his hand.
"I give up."
The crowd, which had swung behind Sora during his dance, fell into perplexed silence.
It was ridiculous.
— VICTOR: CHLOÉ!
The applause was polite. No one quite knew what to think. Sora was magnificent, but Chloé had won. Reason had conquered art.
On Nano-Neko, opinions were divided:
"— Chloé cheated with her gadgets.
— They're not gadgets, it's her power, moron.
— Sora was too beautiful for this world of brutes.
— Beauty doesn't fill pockets, folks."
K2B, imperturbable, moved on:
"SCIENCE WINS AGAIN! BUT THE PUBLIC, THEY DON'T KNOW WHO TO VOTE FOR ANYMORE! SORA WAS BEAUTIFUL, CHLOÉ EFFICIENT... AND YOU, WHO DO YOU LIKE? COME ON, ANSWER LIVE, LET ME HAVE A LAUGH!"
Comments exploded. Half defended Chloé. The other half mourned Sora. The public, once again, was divided, fickle, elusive.
---
[SHORT COFFEE BREAK]
During the break, cameras swept through the crowd. Groups discussed passionately, Neko earphones glued to their ears.
"— Luna is so strong, I swear!
— Yeah, but Chloé is smarter.
— Sora made me cry, man.
— You're weird, it's a fight, not a movie.
— So what? A fight can be beautiful!
— No, a fight must be won. Period."
An older woman, a glass of Nano-Banana in hand, summed up the situation for her neighbors:
"I watch for the spectacle. Whoever makes me feel something, I shout for them. After the fight, I forget. That's how it is. The public, we're weathervanes. So what? It's our right."
Her neighbor, a young man in a #TeamKotobe t-shirt, nodded.
"Yeah. Today you're my hero. Tomorrow you're nobody. You just have to accept it."
NEXT FIGHT, LET'S GO! KOTOBE vs ROGAN
Kotobe's entrance was met with a sonic boom. The crowd rose as one. The Adaptor, Dante's conqueror, the kid with the broken face who had humiliated the aristocracy – he was THEIR champion.
His arm was still in a sling, his ribs still fragile. But his eyes burned.
"KO-TO-BE! KO-TO-BE! KO-TO-BE!"
Rogan, opposite, adjusted his tie. Not an ounce of emotion. He had come to work, not to please.
"The crowd loves you," he said calmly. "It doesn't count."
— FIGHT!
Kotobe didn't attack. He knew he couldn't. His body wasn't ready. So he did what he did best.
He observed.
Rogan, for his part, didn't wait. He charged, precise, economical, his strikes aiming for the injured arm, the fragile ribs, the weak points Mika had identified during her speech.
Kotobe dodged. Just barely. No unnecessary movement. He absorbed the pain, analyzed it, filed it away in a corner of his brain.
He always attacks after a feint. His right is faster than his left. He breathes in bursts when he pushes hard.
Rogan, surprised by the resistance, sped up. His fists became a piledriver.
Kotobe stepped back. Then again. Then...
BING.
He had just seen the flaw. Minuscule. At the moment Rogan was re-cocking his right fist, his guard dropped by an inch. Just enough.
Kotobe waited.
Rogan charged one last time, sure of his victory.
Kotobe stepped into it. Not towards the fist. Towards the flaw.
His good knee shot up, striking Rogan square in the solar plexus exactly as his guard dropped.
WHOOOOF.
The air rushed from Rogan's lungs. He collapsed to his knees, eyes wide, unable to breathe.
Kotobe looked down at him, panting, his arm on fire, his ribs in shreds.
"Efficiency," he breathed. "Works both ways."
Rogan tried to get up. He couldn't.
"What's happening... I could have... I should have won, everything was planned..."
The referee counted.
— EIGHT... NINE... TEN! K.O.! VICTOR: KOTOBE!
The Dome exploded.
"KO-TO-BE! KO-TO-BE! KO-TO-BE!"
The same ones who, a week ago, sneered at his face, now screamed his name like a savior. Kotobe raised his good arm to the sky, a tired smile on his lips.
On Nano-Neko, #Kotobe became number 1 worldwide.
K2B screamed into his mic:
"HE DID IT! THE KID WITH THE BROKEN FACE JUST BEAT THE COLD CALCULATOR! WITH ONE ARM IN A SLING! WITH RIBS IN PIECES! AND THE CROWD... LOOK AT THAT CROWD! THEY LOVE HIM! BUT JUST WAIT TILL TOMORROW! IF HE LOSES, THEY'LL FORGET HIM JUST AS FAST! THAT'S THE GAME!"
In the crowd, an old lady wiped away a tear. Her neighbor, a purist who had criticized Kotobe in the first round, was clapping like a madman.
The public had found its new darling. For how long?
---
[BONUS]
Vladimir: "Damn it, Rogan lost. If he knew how much money his father spends to give him advantages... He rested on his laurels."
Thomas: "Calm down, Vladimir. Don't forget he's the only son of Lion. Speaking of him like that could harm you."
Vladimir: "Indeed, Thomas, you're right. Now that Rogan is eliminated, we need to focus on long-term investments. That is to say..."
Vladimir & Thomas in unison:
"—Orion, Grann!!
—Orion, Grann!!"