The Tournament began in earnest now. They were given a simple elimination system; pair off to fight, and whoever won got to fight the next round until the last man standing claimed the title.
"I'm betting on Sora." Lucy said.
"I'm betting on the Soft Snows Mountaineer." Henry mentioned. "He's the most experienced."
"I'm betting on Shinji." Katrin said.
"The Mountaineer from North Hour." Rita pointed. "He's got a freaking {dragon}."
"I think Sora." Alicia glanced at Lucy. They shared a nod.
"Why Sora?" Katrin wanted to know.
"Because he… well…" Alicia scratched her head. "He seems to really understand what's going on here."
"What do you mean?"
"When they challenged those super-Wilds…" Alicia frowned. "I don't know, but I just get that sense from Sora."
Katrin paused. "Aren't you going to bet on Colin? You did come here with him after all."
Alicia shook her head. "Nah. I really can't imagine Colin or Little Tim as the Mountain Prince."
Katrin barked a laugh. "Maybe. But this is a Tournament, after all. In the end, it's going to come down to who wins the fight."
"I'm still betting on the guy with the dragon." Rita said.
***
Meanwhile, someone else encountered a dragon.
"RUUUUUUNNNNN!!!" Jonah screamed, dashing out of the cavern at Crystal Lake. It was gratifying to know that what looked like a pile of jewels from a distance was in fact a pile of jewels, but it was what they didn't see at first that made this innocent looking cavern MOST memorable.
Fire streamed down overhead. Jonah thought of dodging but the idea was laughable. A stream of fire {that} big… bobbing and weaving was impossible. He had to outright leap and dive to get away from it and doing either one would mean he'd get caught in the next instant anyway. There was no choice. Jonah ran.
But the immense shape slammed down in front of them, blocking the exit. The ground didn't 'shake' so much as 'bounce', and Jonah and Larry both knocked clear off it.
Jonah glanced around for their Comrades. There weren't any left, really. Just a lot of barbecued rabbit and some fried horse. Whoever gave that dragon fire-breath simply hadn't been paying any attention to gameplay balance. Especially when one considered the range and spread of that fire.
The dragon peered down from above at the two greedy boys who dared run right into its cave without so much as scouting it out beforehand. They weren't the first, Jonah figured, nor likely the last…
Fire came down and Jonah and Larry both found themselves respawning back at their Home Base.
Jonah turned and gave Larry a flat look.
"Forget the Hoarfrogs. I've had enough of this continent."
"Okay." Larry paused. "Now what?"
Jonah thought about that. "Someplace new. The Hourglass Continent, or the Desert Sun Continent. Maybe the underwater city of Atlantis."
"Our Comrades are not going to do well underwater." Larry pointed out. "Or in the desert."
"Where do we find the toughest poison Wilds?" Jonah questioned.
"Uber Marshes. For sure." Larry said with certainty.
"I asked for Wilds, not Frenzieds." Jonah threw up his hands.
"Are you sure you want poison Wilds?" Larry asked.
"What are you talking about? That's my theme!"
"But that girl said…"
"{Forget} what the girl said! {I} choose my Comrades!"
Larry sighed. "We could always go back to the Crescent Continent's Gloomy Hollow. But how do we get there? Lamico Airport was destroyed."
Jonah thought about it. "There's the seaport, right? We can take a plane from here to Maro Airport, and then take a ship from Port Frichi."
They met Aoi at Maro Airport. "Hie, Jonah, Larry! Where are you going? You can't take a plane to the Tournament!"
"We're not going." Jonah said grouchily. "We're going somewhere warmer, where our Comrades don't suffer so much."
"Comrades aside, we're freezing." Larry added by way of apologetic explanation. "And we keep getting killed."
"Oh dear." Aoi said as Jonah shot Larry a dangerous glare. "What are your themes and average levels?"
What followed next could best be described as a full length discourse on the various Poison-type Wilds on Nakama World and where they could be found, interjected with mention of a few places containing strong rabbit-types. It was an hour before Jonah and Larry managed to fly out of there, and Aoi looked supremely satisfied with herself as she waved goodbye.
"So… where are we really going?" Larry asked, noting that the plane they were on was actually headed to Maro Airport.
"Lamico. Remember?" Jonah said. "That was our plan all along."
"But Aoi said…"
"Forget what Aoi said. {I} decide where we're going."
Larry sighed. A long, long sigh.
***
The break time was over. Casiphia announced the match-ups as they gathered around the center.
"We'll split the participants straight down the middle between east and west side, in the order of extremity."
Colin didn't understand what that meant at first, but then it became clear when Cass started calling out names.
"Malcolm against Colin. Shinji against Sora. Little Tim against Satrox. Benny against Phillip. Makoto against Ian. Ezri against Big Tim."
{I'm the farthest on her right, Malcom's the farthest on her left, so we're facing each other for the first match. Sora was beside me and Shinji was beside Malcolm, so they'll face each other next, and so on.}
Malcolm raised his hand. "I forfeit."
"What?" Colin protested. "But we haven't even started yet!"
"What?!" the outcry was echoed all over the audience.
"He has the power to destroy a continent. I do not. The data is sufficient to calculate a clear outcome. I have zero chance." Malcolm explain. "Thus I will save time and effort."
"Thank you, Malcolm." Casiphia said, looking amused more than anything else. "Sora, Shinji… begin."
{What?! But we haven't even gotten out of the arena yet…} Colin gulped but neither Sora nor Shinji were in any mood to wait. They went at each other head-on without the slightest hesitation, storm swans against eagles, and stray shots were raining down on the other contestants.
"Kirin, get us out of here!" Colin leapt onto her back. "Eclipse, Foxie! Barriers!"
{Wait. Do Eclipse and Foxie even have barriers…?}
He was answered a moment later when what appeared to be a cloak of light and a cloak of wind settled down over the entire group. {Well, I'm not sure we can call these 'barriers', but they're at least some sort of protection.}
Quite effective ones too. Wind-based attacks were blasting everywhere, and at least three prismatic beams shot by close to them from two different angles. But Shinji's storm swans were hammering down with lightning and ice as well, and Sora's birds had fire and earth attacks on top of that. The entire arena had suddenly turned into the most dangerous place on Skycrown mountain.
Up ahead, Colin saw Casiphia casually dodging a rain of ice shards as if taking an easy stroll down a park. Satrox had his Comrades forming an umbrella of various elements, and Little Tim had somehow ended up taking shelter under his opponent's protection. Big Tim and Benny were back to back under heavy rock lean-tos, neither even trying to get away, deciding instead to hunker down and just wait out the storm. Ian was sitting under his dragon's wing, laughing for no reason Colin could think of, Ezri was killed before he finished raising his barriers, and Phillip had disappeared somewhere.
"I calculate that the place least likely to be hit by stray shots…" Malcolm began but a swan-dodged blast from one of Sora's Eagles killed him in midsentence, sending him back to his Home Base or Temporary Respawn Point.
The news was back on broadcast.
"And it's Typhoon Eagles against Storm Swans in an all-out melee between the Mountaineer of Lamico and the Swan of the Wind! Malcolm has forfeited the match against Colin the Destroyer, and Little Tim has forfeited against Satrox on condition of shelter from the storm! Ezri has been killed by an ice lance and respawned back at Skycrown's reception area! Malcolm has also been killed in the crossfire, and… OH!"
A huge bolt of lightning fell from the skies, narrowly missed Sora's Fire Hawk, and somehow zapped into the tiny gap right in between Benny's and Big Tim's lean-to earth barriers. Both Big Tim and Benny vanished with all their Comrades.
"There goes Big Tim and Benny. That's {three} contestants killed by stray shots in the crossfire!"
***
Benny found himself back at the Skycrown reception area with Ezri and Big Tim.
"Aww, great…"
***
Satrox and Colin were scrambling to get out of the battle zone when Casiphia casually told them. "Contestants killed by stray shots do not forfeit, but if you leave deliberately..."
"What?! That means we gotta stay {here}?" Colin spluttered.
"And survive if we can." Satrox said with a big grin, still under his umbrella.
Little Tim gulped and got his Comrades to reinforce Satrox's umbrella. Colin joined them and added Eclipse's and Foxie's sheaths to their shared protections.
Makoto tried to join Ian under his dragon's wing, but Ian casually gave a command and the dragon breathed fire at Makoto.
"But…!" Makoto protested only to get hit by fire on one side, and a stream of ice shards on the other.
"Weren't we {supposed} to be opponents?" Ian asked the empty spot where Makoto had been. "Don't pretend to be all friendly with me to stab me in the back!"
Colin glanced about and found Phillip with Casiphia, her stormcat, and Raiki… and more. There were {five} blue kittens with Casiphia's stormcat, and Colin had a moment to wonder if the others were Phillip's…
Raiki's thoughts clued him in. [Brothers. Sisters. Raika, Raiken, Raiko, Raiku…]
Phillip's own blue comrades were throwing up barriers, surrounding him and Casiphia in a mass of blue.
And then Ian's dragon pounced on them. Literally leapt up and across the arena, and landed with both claws outstretched right on top of Casiphia and Phillip.
"What?!" Colin gaped.
But Cass and Phillip weren't there any more. They were twenty feet away, minus the blue Comrades, but quite alive. They stared at Ian, who smirked, and said, "No restrictions, right? I'm tired of waiting. Let's do everything all at once!"
Phillip stepped forward, touching his badge, but Casiphia grabbed him and disappeared with him entirely just before another dragon dropped down from above where they were a moment ago.
The news announced. "Phillip is out of bounds! One more competitor out of the Tournament!"
Satrox yelled back at it. "That wasn't his doing!"
Phillip himself was doing some fast talking with Casiphia. They looked like they were in polite disagreement and weren't about to agree any time soon.
Meanwhile, Ian turned to Satrox, Colin and Little Tim.
"Uwaa!" Little Tim ran for it on the spot.
"Split up!" Satrox told Colin. "Or he'll get us both in one hit!"
Satrox dodged left. Colin ran right.
The dragon breathed fire and everything went white.
***
Colin found himself and Alicia back at Casiphia's balcony, his Temporary Respawn Point. Casiphia and Phillip were there too, just a few feet away.
"You died?" Alicia winced.
Colin groaned in reply. He took out his half of the leaf and started sniffing.
Casiphia stared when she saw them. "That leaf…"
"Lynn gave it to me." Colin said.
"Then the other half…"
"She has it." Colin nodded towards Alicia.
"Oh." Casiphia seemed satisfied with that answer, though Colin wasn't sure why. Instead, she glanced at Phillip.
Phillip likewise was looking at Colin. "Hey, Colin. Hi, Alicia. It's… been awhile."
"Not since the first night." Alicia mentioned. "At least, not that I recall. Where have you been?"
"I've been… around." Phillip said evasively.
"You've been Katrin's guardian angel or something, haven't you?" Alicia asked.
"Well… she's suffered a great deal at the hands of the Cult. I just wanted to ease her pain a bit."
"And why would you do that?" Alicia asked. "Is she a real-life friend of yours?"
"No. I've never met her in the waking world." Phillip shifted.
"Then why?" Alicia pressed.
"I just… felt responsible." Phillip answered. "You see, the Cult is really after me."
"Wait. What? I thought they were after me." Alicia mused.
Colin frowned at Alicia. This was not a joking matter. "Aren't they after me?"
Casiphia laughed out loud. "You guys…"
"Satrox is out of bounds!" the news announced. Colin spun to see Satrox speeding through the air on Noble, still trying desperately to evade dragon fire, but obviously, he'd crossed the boundaries of the arena in the attempt. "Forfeited!"
Colin ignored Phillip for the moment and concentrated on the Tournament. "Are you going to do anything about Ian? He deliberately went around killing the rest of us waiting our turn." he asked Cass.
"Not really, no." Casiphia said.
"If you can't even survive stray shots or ambushes, how do you expect to survive as Mountain Prince?" Alicia taunted.
Colin turned back to Casiphia.
"Is that what you meant when you said I couldn't…?" he trailed off.
"Not really, no." Casiphia said.
Meanwhile, Ian had settled back to watch the fight between Shinji and Sora. He might have attacked Satrox, Little Tim and Colin, but he would not interfere with the duel itself. {So much for Shinji and his big idea about everyone having their own code of honor. Ian's code practically killed me in a sneak attack. And poor Malcolm…}
"Princess!" Little Tim had arrived on the balcony and gave Casiphia a sad face. "I got killed!"
"You weren't ready." Casiphia said, but it was in a gentle tone.
"I'm so weak." Little Tim cried.
Alicia threw up her hands. "So? That gives you an excuse to run around crying for help all the time?"
"What?" Little Tim stared.
"Grow up already. It's like you don't even bother to grow stronger. Instead, you use your weakness to get others to protect you." Alicia rolled her eyes. "There's no way you'd make it as a prince of anything."
"But… but I'm {cute}." Little Tim said.
Colin and Phillip facepalmed at exactly the same time.
{Still…} Colin thought, {she's right. Ian might have attacked us out of turn, but the fact that I died so easily says something, something important, and I think I should listen. I have to be more careful, keep my guard up. Think ahead. Prepare for ambushes or surprise attacks…}
{Wait. Ambush. Surprise attack. Tournament…}
{Media crews. News.}
"Oh no." Colin gulped.
"What?" Phillip asked.
"We're going to be attacked." Colin said, with certainty.
"Who?" Alicia asked, baffled.
"All of us." Colin said. "Everyone here at Skycrown. But Phillip, Katrin and I in particular."
Those three names clued Alicia in. Her face went pale. "The Green Men."
"The Gaians are coming." Colin nodded, not a trace of doubt in his voice. "The news broadcast had Phillip and I in it, right?"
"It did." Casiphia said in a low voice.
"Then they're coming. They're coming to get us. For sure." Colin said.
Alicia gulped. "We have to get you three out of here. Far, far away…"
"Too late." Casiphia said. "By now they'd be watching this mountain from orbit. Anyone leaving would be noticed and studied at once. They'll find you before you're a minute out. But we know they're coming. We can turn the tables on them."
"An ambush?" Phillip suggested.
"Exactly." Casiphia smiled.
***
As the Tournament raged on and Casiphia went to brief the Lords of the Wilds, Colin found himself watching the proceedings with Phillip and Little Tim.
"You know, Little Tim, if you don't want to fight alone, you can always join hands with others." Phillip told him kindly. "For example, a support role…"
"Yay!" Little Tim beamed. "You'll protect me? You're nice! I'll go with you!"
Colin sighed. "Stop it, Tim. You're not fooling anybody."
"What?" Little Tim protested.
Colin rounded on him and told him straight out. "The truth is, you're not weak at all. So stop pretending to be. It's not funny and it's not cute."
"But I {am} cute!"
"That's got nothing to do with being weak or strong." Colin cut in. "What really ticked Alicia off was that you were lying in order to get others to do things for you. Phillip's solution is fine; take a support role if you want, but you're not weak; nobody weak could have made it past the Tournament Preliminaries. You're actually quite capable or you wouldn't even be a Mountaineer. Quit fooling around and {help} us!"
Little Tim stood speechless, but Phillip nudged him and said, "See? There are people who believe in you. You're strong."
That incited another squeal, at which point, Colin threw up his hands and left the balcony. He went to see Alicia investigating the Heart of the Mountain, having been granted permission by Casiphia before the latter left.
"Sora's going to win, isn't he?" Alicia asked, as she eyed Casiphia's throne from all angles, making a full circle around it.
"It's basically the same fight as the one he had against the Rockatauri." Colin shrugged. "Shinji's storm swans are faster over long distances, but at short range, Sora's eagles accelerate quicker, they're smaller, hit just as hard, and they're just plain more maneuverable. Shinji's Comrades will have a hard time even hitting them while Sora's only difficulty is how long it would take to wear down Shinji's swans."
"Sora will win." Alicia agreed. "No question. In the meantime, the rest of you were killed in the crossfire or by that dragon-boy. Think he'll survive?"
"Probably." Colin sighed. "Unless both of them together make a combined attack on him, which I doubt they would."
Alicia paused. "How long do you think it will be before the Cult gets here?"
"I think they're already here." Colin told her. "But they'll want to gather as much forces as they can before dropping on us. So far, they've waited until the Tournaments ended before making their move. That means the longer they wait, the more forces they can gather, so they'll wait to the very last minute and then hit before anyone leaves."
"Oh. I was wondering about that. I thought they were just being polite, or there was some rule that said they weren't allowed to disrupt events in Nakama World."
"They're already disrupted plenty." Colin pointed out. "They don't seem to care a whit about anything other than catching us, and every saucer they bring is worth an army of us. The longer they wait, the bigger their advantage."
"That makes the most sense, I guess." Alicia conceded.
Colin showed her the tunnel he used to get there, explaining about his journey up. "I had no idea it came this far." He said, and remembered a certain other girl he'd left behind before. "Sorry for leaving you behind. I'd have called but…"
"Actually, you could have." Alicia said. "And so could I. Apparently, Skycrown Mountain has Comms Towers built right into the mountain. I didn't find out until we arrived up here."
"So that means… we have comms?" Colin stared.
"Only on the mountain itself." Alicia cautioned. "But with the weather around here, and the distance to anywhere else… well… let's just say to call anyone far from the mountain, you'd need to use a comms center."
Sora and Shinji's battle was coming to a close. In air force terms, it was a battle between interceptors and armed transports. Shinji's swans were powerful and tough, very tough, but they were built for long distance transportation, not aerial dogfights. That area was Sora's specialty, and he proved it now.
With Little Tim forfeited and Phillip taken out of the tournament by Casiphia, the next match was Makoto against Ian. Makoto was still recovering from being killed earlier, as were Ezri and Big Tim, so Casiphia called a half-hour recess. The audience were a little disappointed, but they applauded her decision in favor of a full-strength duel, and dispersed to buy snacks and souvenirs, to look for washrooms, or something.
"I'm sorry." Colin told Alicia then, as they watched the crowd get up and rustle about. "For leaving you behind. I thought I was exploring a small cave. I didn't know how far the tunnel went."
Alicia said nothing for a while. Then; "You couldn't leave me behind if I didn't let you. All I needed to do was set a temporary respawn point, kill myself and you'd be right in front of me at once."
"Still. I should have left you a message. When you disappeared like that…"
"I told you, remember? I was going to call Larry."
"Sorry. I didn't hear that."
Alicia sniffed. "Deaf and clumsy. No wonder you could never keep up with us."
Colin growled. "Forget it. Just… forget it."
She went back to exploring the tunnels. He decided to take a walk around and explore the route most people took to get there.
So in a huff, Colin and Alicia turned their backs on each other, neither realizing that in doing so, each went about tracing the route the other had taken to get there.