The announcer prepared himself and slicked back his grey hair with his fin before he continued the announcements.
"It's finally time to discuss the rules of the first game! As has been revealed, this is a game consisting of four teams of four. And the game which will be played is..."
He grabbed a lever, and suddenly the rocky field in front of them opened up to reveal an underwater arena which had been set up previously.
'It certainly is impressive that they have such advanced mechanical systems... the humanoid monsters of this world never cease to impress. Well, this is nothing compared to the things that Gary has come up with.', Claire thought.
The arena was in the shape of a plus, and completely filled with water. There was a castle at each of the four ends of the plus sign under the water, and in the center there was a large circular platform.
"A fortress battle!!! Each castle is lined with weaponry and magical items of all sorts, and you are free to use any method you wish so long as you can defend the flag of your fortress!!! The rules are simple- if another team captures your flag and places it in the holders in their base- the team who lost their flag will be eliminated!! Be prepared to die defending your own flag!! However... there is a catch. The game will progress until 2 teams have been eliminated- leaving the other two teams free to advance to the second round, however... in the case that one team captures 2 flags- plus their own, making it a total of 3- that team will automatically be the only one to advance to the next round. In other words, in order to advance, you MUST capture at least 1 enemy flag."
The participants looked back and forth at their teammates and their competition, readying themselves. Kota gave Ploritan a mischievous glare- as if he was declaring war, and Ploritan didn't lose in spirit. He too glared back intensely at Kota.
Each team was assigned a fortress, and then told to dive into the pool and wait for the game to start at a rectangular area in the front of each fortress.
Ploritan gazed at the team members who surrounded him.
His trusted guard- Yuriel the hammerhead had served under him for quite a while now was one of his team members. Despite how nervous he looked right now, Ploritan was certain that Yuriel would be there for him in a pinch, so he was comforted to work with him once more.
The other two.... he was not so certain, however there was no such thing as a player in this tournament who came here with the intent of losing.
No, rather every person who was in the tournament came here with the resolve to die if that is what it took to win.
There were no rules against killing your opponents in any of the games of the tournament, and on average about half of the members each year would die.
That was just how much it meant to become chief. Whether it was for personal gain or to better the village as a whole- each player was here to shape the fishmen village in the way they wanted. If you want something right, you have to do it yourself. The true meaning behind this phrase is 'If you want something done your way, you have to do it yourself.'
And whoever won the competition would gain complete rights to do everything their way.
The blobfish, despite having a rediculous look, was completely ready to fight, and on guard. He swam and moved much faster than one would imagine just by looking at his body. His lips drooped so far that they hung from his face like drool, swaying back and forth, and his round pearly black eyes were staring straight forward toward the center of the arena.
The sea urchin on the other hand, was completely unreadable by any standards. He didn't have any face.... no wait... when Ploritan looked closer at him, two sinister white eyes opened in the darkness that enveloped the creature.
Ploritan decided to take the lead on the conversation.
"Everyone... I understand well that in this competition we are all competitors for the role of chief, however if we do not work together in this first round, we will likely not even make it to the next one. Therefore, even though you all may be wary of disclosing your abilities, it would allow us the best chance to win if we work together to survive this round."
Yuriel nodded stiffly, and Urphar turned to look at Brot, who was staring off into space, before looking back at Ploritan.
"Alright. I'll let you in on my abilities...", he said in a raspy voice.
Brot turned over to the group with vibrating fat, and nodded.
"Okay. Brot will teach.", he said in a slow and deep voice.
"I will go first then. Of course, as a tiger shark, my specialty is simply combat strength- speed and power. I would be better at attacking than defending, and I prefer to use either a pole-arm weapon or my own fangs to tear apart my opponents."
Yuriel then spoke up.
"I suppose I will go next. I prefer not to use normal weapons in the water, and my attack style consists of using the blunt sides of my head to concuss my opponents and consume them while they are disoriented. I also have some talent with magical items."
"As you can see, I am covered in spikes so I would best serve as a defensive player... I suggest that we hide the flag engulfed in my body, so that they will have to make it through my spikes in order to capture it. I will stay back and defend.", Urphar proposed.
"Brot will beat enemies to pulp. Brot is fast. Brot is strong. Brot will become chief.", Brot gloated in the same way a neanderthal would.
"I suppose that's it for strategy... then, me and Brot will be on attack while Yuriel and Urphar will defend."
The four nodded and prepared for the game to start.
'Still... while we do have some interesting players, we don't exactly have an idea as to what the abilities of the enemies are... well, we can take a guess for most of them, but...'
Ploritan became somewhat nervous in the moments before the conch sounded.
----
Claire was waiting in the VIP room for the game to start.
'Ah... it looks like they are almost ready to begin. A fortress battle, eh? Reminds me of playing capture the flag with my friends when I was younger... well, half of those memories were all a facade... sigh... I kinda wish I never learned that all those memories were fake...'
Claire waited for the announcer to continue his rambling.
"It looks like all the competitors are in position to start!!!! Well then, without further ado... let us begin the games!!!!"
The whale took a large conch shell and blew into it, and the sound vibrated all the way into the VIP room- even without needing the microphone to transmit the sound.
At that, the contestants were off.
Claire took a look at Ploritan's group, who all seemed to be heading into their fortresses- no, all of the groups were doing so. That much was obvious, as there were weapons stored inside the buildings. Everyone would want to gear up before heading out and attacking.
Wait.
There was one group in which only a single member made his way back to the fortress.
It was Kota's group.
Kota slowly waltzed back to the fortress, while folding his arms with confidence- while all three of his group members- the gulper eel, the angler fish, and the swordfish- moved out for the same location.
They were heading straight for the fortress controlled by the third introduced group- the flying fish, the jumbo shrimp, the clownfish, and the jellyfish.
"What is this!?!? Three of the members from team number 4 are heading straight for the base of team number 3!?!!? Without even taking up any weapons, they are going straight onto the attack!!! What will happen in these next few moments? It's anybody's guess!!!", the announcer ranted.
----
Before the round had started, Kota walked up to his team members with an arrogant smile.
"Do you all understand what makes someone truly strong?"
"What do you mean, Kota?", Tiwaru the swordfish asked.
The other two stared at Kota intently. They understood just how powerful of a warrior he was, even after losing a lung.
"It is to be strong without the need for silly things like weapons or magic. To be able to crush your opponents, without any need for strategy or planning. To fight in an open field, no rules, like real men, and have the strength to know that you will win regardless of what happens."
Kota made a crushing motion with his fist as he said this.
The others smiled ferociously as Kota said this.
"I completely agree. There is no need to waste precious time gathering weapons and forming strategy. A rush right off the bat- taking the enemy by surprise and overwhelming them with strength- that is what we need to do.", Nerumat, the angler fish, responded.
"Caution is only for the weak. If you are truly strong, you won't have to be cautious. I alone will be enough to take on anyone who tries to collect our flag. You three- by the time 3 minutes have passed, had bettered be back with one flag.", Kota ordered.
"Will do. I'll swallow them whole before they even know what hit em...", Hugior, the gulper eel, announced, chuckling.
Now, these three were on their way- piercing through the water like bolts of lightning, led by Tiwaru the swordfish.
They quickly reached the center circle, and turned right for the nearest base before rushing over.
"They haven't even had time to situate themselves... what are these idiots doing in a game like this?", Nerumat exclaimed, his light dangling back and forth in front of his face.
In front of them, the clownfish was standing ready to fight, however the jumbo shrimp was still running back into the base with the jellyfish. The flying fish was nowhere to be found.
"I got the clown. I'll make a skewer out of him....", Tiwaru claimed, speeding through the water.
He was headed straight for the clownfish... however, right when he was close enough to skewer him, the clownfish raised his fins up and shouted [Anemone Entanglement!]
From the ground burst a load of tentacle like strings which wrapped themselves around Tiwaru in an instant, causing electrical stinging and shock.
"Agh!! What is this!?!", Tiwaru shouted in pain, enduring the voltage while using his nose, trying to cut himself loose.
Meanwhile, the jumbo shrimp was in a brawl with the gulper eel, in the form of a boxer leaning back and forth in order to dodge and then punch his opponent using a hit and run tactic. His footwork was that of a professional fighter who had trained in many spars.
The gulper eel tried many times to engulf the shrimp whole however each time he tried to he was met with a well timed punch from the shrimp's oversized right arm. However, the jellyfish was still caught in a trance unsure what to do.
The angler fish quickly swam behind the jumbo shrimp while he was caught up in dodging the gulper eel, and took a bite out of the back of the shrimp with a swift movement, continuing to swim with the chunk of flesh in his mouth. He turned around once more to attack, only to notice that the jumbo shrimp had fallen back as a result of the piece being taken out of him, and the gulper eel was able to completely engulf the shrimp inside his mouth.
"Heh... one down....", Nerumat whispered before heading over to help out Tiwaru.
At this point, however- Tiwaru had managed to cut himself free from the anemones and floated above the trap ready to lunge at the clownfish who was holding his fins curled like fists. He was ready to fight.
Tiwaru swam forward at an unbelievable speed, slamming his nose straight through the heart of the clownfish, who had tried to dodge but failed. Even so, he managed to shift the stab so that it didn't directly pierce his heart.
"Grr.... I won't... blegh... go down so easily... [High Voltage Anemone Net]"
Once more, tentacles wrapped around, however this time it was around both the clownfish and the swordfish who was attacking him.
It was a suicidal attack.
"Heh heh... with that sword in me I too will suffer from the electric shock, however...that's better than dying without putting up a fight!!!"
The voltage emitted by the tentacles ran through the bodies of the two, causing them to fry with a huge blaze of shock.
Water is a good conductor of electricity, so even Nerumat could feel the tingling from where he was.
The two fell to the ground with a large buzzing sound and the tentacles retracted into the earth. They were both fried to a crisp, and foam formed at their mouths.
They were dead.
"Two on two eh?! That's one less competitor for next round when we win this!!", Nerumat shouted, looking over to the Jellyfish who had caught his bearings and was floating towards him with an angry expression.
Could a jellyfish even have an expression? This one did.
His dreadlocks swayed as his feet flapped back and forth, paddling him over to where Nerumat was.
"I'll show you not to mess with our team", a high pitched voice shouted.
Despite the fact that this jellyfish was in a large and buff body, he spoke with a voice that matched his face.
The angler fish swam straight at the approaching jellyman, with a bloodthirsty look.
He swam by with an unmatchable speed, taking a chunk out of the hip of Joruk.
However, just as he sped by, his bony leg was grabbed by something.
It was one of the dreadlocks of Joruk.
"Heh!! I am 90% bone, and my nerves exist within insulation!!! Electrical shocks will do nothing to harm me aside from a light sting!!!"
Electric shocks flew around the leg of the angler fish, however due to some sort of odd biology that didn't match up with the science of the earthly world, it didn't phase him in the least.
He then threw his leg down to the ground, dragging the jellyfish with it, sliding him along until he was underneath the anglerfish's foot.
"Now it's time to feast..."
However, right as he was about to take a bite out of the mushroom like head on top of this jellyfishman, he felt a blade in his heart.
Was this a throwing knife!?! Did it come at him through the water, despite the thick density and inefficiency of performing such a maneuver!?
He looked up at the top of the fortress to see the young flying fish holding three more throwing knives in his arms.
"Heh heh... too slow..."
He threw three more of them, in the forehead, eye, and right lung of the angler fish.
At that moment, he felt his leg being pulled from underneath him, as the jellyfish tripped him from below, dragging him to the ground as well.
Nerumat was losing consciousness. He couldn't take much more.
"Keh... looks like this is as far as I go eh?! Shit!!!"
Suddenly, the body of the anglerfish froze.
Nerumat passed on with anger in his eyes. If he didn't freeze so suddenly, as if he had a heart attack, one wouldn't even believe that he was dead.
However, the last thing he saw was the gulper eel completely engulf that fishman who had thrown the knives at him and was laughing arrogantly from that perch.
"Serves you right scum...."
----
Druka, the flying fish was confident in his speed more than anyone, so he immediately headed inside the castle to grab some weapons before anyone else.
However, when he arrived with some throwing knives- he saw that two of his team members had been eliminated and one was about to be killed.
'Shit... these guys weren't fast enough to react... looks like I need to carry the team from here...', he thought before accelerating the throwing knives with such a speed that shouldn't have been possible underwater, into the vitals of the angler fish.
However, now after using all his knives to finish off the angler fish, he found everything black around him.
What was going on?
Soon, his skin began to burn.
"Is this digestive fluid?!! Have I been eaten!?!"
Druka was never seen again.
----
After seeing even that overconfident flying fish, who could swim at a speed much faster than he could hope to match, be consumed by that eel, Joruk found himself in a predicament.
"I... I might die here... if things go on like this... I'm the only one left on my team... surviving with just me is unlikely... and managing to take another teams flag is impossible!! I have to give up or I will be killed!"
"Wait!!! You can have our flag!!! I surrender!!!"
He saw the gulper eel grin, his mouth completely covering the flying fish. It was disturbing and horrible.
At that moment, an exit opened underneath Joruk, acknowledging his surrender and leading him down a path to exit the arena.
"There is no need to rush to my death so quickly... I just got unlucky with some bad teammates... yeah... that's it... my teammates were bad... I got unlucky... it wasn't because I am a coward... it wasn't because I was weak... it was just out of my control..."
Joruk murmured these things to himself as he swam down the exit pathway.
----
"And already it looks like team 3 has been reduced to only one member, who has surrendered!!!! What a trifling game so far!!!! With that, team 4 is reduced to only 2 members however they have now collected two flags!!! Let's turn to the other side of the arena now and see how the other teams are doing!!!"
Claire had been watching the game so far, however it was hard to keep her eyes on the action. There was too much going on at once. She had been paying complete attention to the attack on team 3's base, however she hadn't noticed what was going on over with team 2.
"Oh my!!! It seems that the second team's flag has been stolen by team 1!!!! Will they be able to retrieve it before it is placed in the holder, or will the game end here and now!?!?!"