"Are you ready to ru~~umble~~e?!" Donatella asked the already excited audience.
Predictably, they responded with wild cheering that made even Leo's eardrums rattle.
The marching band also resumed their playing, and the music was very uplifting, the kind one would hear in a heroic battle filled with blood and death.
Leo, now dressed as Maestro, gave a recap of the rules before the second game could begin.
"You'll each enter the prison based on your placement in the last round, and you'll slay as many of the shadow beasts inside it as you can," Maestro raised one finger to emphasis the first rule. "Death will result in disqualification. Verbally surrendering will end your turn, and your points will be tallied afterward. Unless you defeat all the monsters, in which case, you automatically take the top spot in the rankings."
After he said this, Maestro actually laughed out loud. He was joined by a very captive audience.
"The top sixteen challengers in the ranking will move on to the third and final stage of the Deathly Challenger's Cup," he added. "And on that note, I'll ask Donatella to take it away!"
"Give a warm round of applause for our first challenger," Donatella pointed upward, and the portrait of Cyborg Ninja appeared on the screens floating in the air. "Cyborg~~g Ninja~~a!"
[Cyborg Ninja Lv 2 Shadow] was written on the screens.
Since her victory in the Dungeon Run, Cyborg Ninja had gained quite a large following among the audience, and it was obvious now just how many were rooting for her as many in the audience clapped enthusiastically while chanting, "Ninja! Ninja! Ninja!"
Maestro watched along with everyone else as she stepped into the round pool of darkness at the center of the arena and plunged into it.
"She's a brave one," Donatella noted.
The screens above showed Cyborg Ninja falling down a dark waterway before landing on her feet in front of a large square structure made entirely of obsidian.
"Oo~oh," the audience said in unison.
Wasting no time, Cyborg Ninja climbed up the steps and crossed into the prison through the iron bars that served as its entrance. No sooner had she stepped inside when she was attacked by the first of the prison's inhabitants.
The creature had the shape of a black-shelled scorpion with a red tail, but unlike regular scorpions, this one was the size of a Mini-Cooper.
"And her first catch is…" Donatella paused for effect, "A Death Stinger!"
"Wow," Maestro added as he joined her in the announcer's box. "That's not a shadow beast you can find in the Abyssal Plains."
"Indeed," Donatella added. "Its home is far to the south, in the endless sands of the Black Desert… Oh my, it nearly stung her to death, didn't it?"
"She just barely parried that stinger with her katana," Maestro reported. "A good thing too as a Death Stinger's poison means instant death for most level twos."
Maestro and Donatella continued their commentary as Cyborg Ninja dodged and then countered the Death Stinger's attacks. She eventually managed to deal it a nasty blow to the head, and as it wobbled she jumped its back and plunged her katana down on its head.
"Wow, she didn't even use an ability to slay that one, did she?" Donatella asked.
"Nope, that was all pure skill," Maestro explained.
Enthusiastic cheering ensued.
As the Death Stinger's body gasped its final breath, its form shattered into a thousand shards of glass but didn't coalesce into a soul stone. Instead, these shards were sucked up into tubes on the ceiling.
This prompted Donatella to explain, "All soul stones earned during this stage will become part of the war chest provided to the ten chosen reapers who triumph in the Deathly Challenger's Cup."
This earned some scattered applause from the audience.
Cyborg Ninja would go on to slay five more Death Stingers while managing to use only a single ability in her arsenal, "Shadow Step!" which allowed her to blend in with the shadows and avoid the Death Stinger's attacks.
"It's clear that she's looking ahead to the next round and hiding the rest of her abilities from her rivals," Maestro noted.
"I don't think holding back will work on her next opponent, however," Donatella piped in. "Saberfang's are known to be quite violent."
Cyborg Ninja's seventh opponent was much like a tiger but with blue fur. It had two tails sprouting from its hind quarters, and each one glowed with what appeared to be arcs of electricity. It fangs, however, remained its most deadly feature, Two curved blades jutting out of its upper lip in a wide angle.
Their fight was long and hard, and Cyborg Ninja did manage to slay the beast using just her katana and [Shadow Step]. But this also cost the use of her left arm and right leg which were both badly mangled from the battle. With such serious injuries, Cyborg Ninja had no choice but to retire.
She was quickly teleported back into the arena to booming applause from her fans in the audience. Then she was taken away to the infirmary below, although she refused the stretcher the hobgoblin healers had brought with them, and instead opted to limp to the gate with her head held high and her fist raised to the sky. This show of guts earned her an even greater applause from the audience.
"Cyborg Ninja managed seven kills, earning herself seven points!" Donatella announced.
"And for those in the audience who think that's too small a number, guess again," Maestro added. "We estimated an average of four to five points per challenger, and she went past that."
The screens changed to showcase the portrait of Bully the Kid next. His tag soon followed, [Bully the Kid Lv 2 Bowslinger].
True to his moniker, Bully the Kid did wear a cowboy hat and duster coat that was all the rage during the Wild West era. However, his long, pointy ears and the golden hair that trailed down his back made him look more like an elf than an outlaw.
Bully didn't receive as much applause as Cyborg Ninja at first, but that quickly changed after the audience watched him dispatch one, two, and then three Saberfangs in succession with very little difficulty.
The two crossbows in his hand were set to [Rapid Fire], a Bowslinger ability that tripled the speed of his attacks. He inter-switched it with a second ability, [Strafe Fire], which allowed him to dive out of the saberfang's way while also firing a hail of arrows at it while he escaped. This one-two combination helped him come out of his first three fights relatively unscathed.
Bully the kid continued on through the dark passages and empty cells until he found himself into a large room with a broken chandelier hanging from the ceiling. Hanging on its iron rails were three large spiders similar to the ones at the last obstacle of the Dungeon Run.
"And Bully's run into some Fel Arachnids," Donatella reported. "Nasty giant spiders with a penchant for binding their victims in their thick webs."
Fortunately for Bully the Kid, he'd already experienced fighting these shadow beasts before, and so instead of his first combination of abilities, he opted to stay far away from the arachnids webs and switched to a sniping approach.
"Make my aim hard and true," he whispered as he set his sights on the first spider, "Archer's Lance."
His first arrow was an immediate deathblow to the first arachnid. But by the time he fired his second shot, the other two arachnids were already crawling toward him. Still, he managed a critical hit on one arachnid that required a few more shot of [Rapid Fire].
And with only one arachnid left, Bully the kid made short work of it too, causing the audience to marvel at his skills.
"Bowslinger isn't a very popular evolution," Maestro noted. "But I doubt that'll be the case after this tournament is over."
Bully the Kid's easy battles would end quickly however as he would encounter three shadow beasts whose thick hides and nasty tempers made a bad match for his quick draw talents.
They were the size of minivans with thick red hides and large twin horns jutting out of their nose and a third larger horn jutting out of the forehead. Leo likened them to a cross between a rhino and a triceratops, but these Bloodhorns were no herbivores.
Still, Bully the kid managed to slay two of the beasts before the third one skewered him in the gut with its largest horn.
The audience gasped collectively while beside him, Leo heard Morgana say, "This is amazing!"
But while everyone thought Bully the Kid had died, he stirred to life right before the end and peppered the Bloodhorn in its eyes with bolts while screaming, "Die, die, die, you sh*t face!"
The Bloodhorn fell, and Bully managed a weak surrender which allowed him to be returned to the arena while on the brink of death.
"As he's still breathing, his kills count," Donatella announced while Bully the Kid was being carted away on a stretcher. "Bully the Kid earns nine points placing him over Cyborg Ninja!"
"What a show so far," Maestro commented. "Our challengers are really showing their worth today!"
"Indeed, and it'll be no less certain for our third challenger, an individual who has showed off remarkable talent in the previous round," Donatella announced. "I give you… Argonaut~~t!
[Argonaut Lv 2 Eldritch Champion] appeared on the screens.
This was the challenger Leo was most eager to watch, the man the forums claimed was closest to Black Howler in terms of raw power that also had the intellect to rival Ath3na, goddess of gaming wisdom.
"Here he comes," Morgana whispered excitedly. "My pick to win this Challenger's Cup."
With baited breath, Leo, Morgana, and the rest of the audience watched as Argonaut stepped into the dark pool.