The First Fight

We were all called to the colosseum earlier. It was pretty big. The Game Master sat in a large, isolated section of the stands, along with the two Cards he had keeping an eye on us before. I'm guessing those were his right hand goons. There was also a separate circle of seats, completely empty and levitating high above us. The Game Master stood and addressed all of us.

"The rules shall  change going forward," he said. "There will be no surrendering. Once a fight has started, it will continue until one fighter has been killed, or has lost consciousness. In the latter case, the loser will be free to return home, or stick around to view the remaining fights. However, knowing some of our finalists, I doubt we'll be seeing much of that occurring."

He chuckled to himself, and I heard a couple people in the stands join him.

"The winners shall move on to the quarter-finals," the Game Master said. "Now, I will decide the first of our fighters."

He conjured up a small deck of cards and shuffled them extravagantly (show-off...) before drawing two of them. He snapped his fingers, and two of us vanished from the stands and appeared in the middle of the colosseum. One of them was the Chinese Enhanced girl I'd seen Henry speaking to before. The other was the Hooded Guy.

"I present our first competitors!" the Game Master said. "He Mizushima!"

The Enhanced girl raised a fist in the air proudly.

"And, her opponent," The Game Master said, and while I couldn't see his face through that mask of his, I could almost feel him grin evilly as he spoke his next words. "Benjamin. Malkator."

I gasped, and I think I heard a few others do so as well.

I've heard that name. Plenty of times. I'm pretty sure most servants and some runners have heard of him. various stories of him get passed around. So many that it's hard to know which of them are true. But they all have an ending in common.

His death.

Benjamin Malkator is said to have died stopping some sort of cataclysmic event. And yet here his was, alive and well, and about to take on an Enhanced.

"Before we begin," the Game Master said, "I believe the stands feel painfully empty for such an event. Let's liven this up a bit."

He snapped his boney fingers, and the stands levitating above us were suddenly filled with panicked faces.

"I present," The Game Master continued, "Your families."

Our families?

I scanned the crowd above us quickly and saw them. My parent. My sister. They were here.

And then Julia caught my eye. Just a few feet from my family, she was there, looking sadly down at her brother in he ring, and I saw mouth the word "Ben",

I looked back at the Hooded Guy. His body had tensed up in... anger doesn't do it justice. This was rage. Pure, unbridled, murderous rage. His sheathed wakizashi appeared in his hand, and he turn to face Mizushima.

"Now," The Game Master said. "Begin!"

Mizushima charged, ready to end Malkator's life. She didn't get a chance. It was a blur of movement as Malkator drew his sword. Next I could see, he was crouched down, back to her, with his blade held in a reverse grip, and plunged into her torso. He pulled it out and rose, beginning to walk away from her.

She fell to her knees for a second, but rose to her feet again, growling at him.

"You think that's enough!?" she demanded. "You can't bring down an Enhanced that easily! Get back here and fight like a fucking man!"

Malkator kept walking, and spoke a single word, an order, that seemed to echo through the stands.

"Burn."

Mizushima froze in place, as a red light glowed from her sword wound. She then screamed in agony as flames rapidly consumed her body from the inside out. She fell to the colosseum floor moments later, as nothing more than a pile out ash.

Some of the families above us cried out in fear, and an Asian man, I'm guessing her father, shouted what I can only assume were Chinese expletives down at Malkator.

Malkator stood there for a few seconds, giving the panic some time to die down. As silence fell over the arena, he turned to the Game Master, and pointed his blade directly t the tall, skeletal sociopath.

"That was only the first," Malkator warned. "I'll cut through every opponent you send my way. And once I'm finished with them, William..."

The Game Master seemed to tense up a bit upon hearing that name.

"I'm coming for you!" Malkator finished.

The Game Master stood quietly for a few moments, before letting out a deep, slow chuckle.

"You sent chills, Benjamin," he said, before snapping his fingers. "Clean up his mess for me, will you?"

A couple of diamond masked people appeared to clear up the ashes.

"You are all free to go until the next match," the Game Master (or William, I guess?) said to us.

So, uh... yeah. That all... happened...

I'm gonna go to the mess hall and see if I can find Malkator there. I need to talk to him...