Korva announced the beginning of the fight and Vahl dashed from the side of the pit, heading towards the kasathas to deal with the biggest threat first. Vahl was very fast for his size, moving across half of the pit in only a few blinks but the kasathas did not falter in surprise. It pointed towards Vahl and turned his large head toward the two humans in front of him.
{Get him!}
The two humans jolted to life, and the look on their face changed as they lost all senses of fear that they once had. The humans moved to meet Vahl before he could threaten the kasathas, preventing him from attacking it. Vahl was surprised as he had never seen someone command others during a pit fight like that, he especially didn't expect it to work so well.
The humans swung their knives, slashing at Vahl, his arms lifted in defense. The dulled knives bounced off the thick and resistant scales like they hit steel, but they still didn't let down, they stabbed at his tough hide. Before their stab connected, Vahl jabbed out to the human on his right side, bloodying his nose like a river as he loses consciousness. Before the human fell, Vahl grabbed the unconscious man by his arm, he swung him like a bat against the other human, knocking them both down and putting the other one out of the fight. Vahl rotated his head towards where the kasathas once was, but he had disappeared from the spot. On his right side opposite from where the humans lay sleeping, he heard a scuffle, quickly turning his head and preparing to defend himself against whatever attack came. No attack came and the area was also empty, suddenly Vahl's thick scales were scratched from behind. Vahl turned his massive body on a dime and guarded against the higher quality knife the kasathas held, blocking it on the thicker scales on his arm. The kasathas had snuck around and even feinted him to make Vahl turn his back to him, which was a pretty impressive skill to find in this planet, and a skill that Vahl never fought against. The kasathas held three knives after picking up the two the humans dropped, slashing over and over, only dealing damage when the higher quality knife was used and causing scratches to cover Vahl's scales. Every hit was fast paced but Vahl could tell that he wasn't very experienced with using knives. Vahl pushed and opened the guard of the man forcefully, pushing his arms back and throwing a punch towards his face. The kasathas looked surprised at the strength of Vahl but dropped all his knives and met the incoming fist with his four open palms, barely able to push it back with all the strength he had. Vahl put more of his weight behind the fist and pushed the kasathas over, who fell on its back but quickly scrambled up and moved to the side of Vahl and picked the sharper knife back up, trying to stab at his side. Vahl reached down to the feet of the sleeping human next to him and grabbed the man by the ankle, swinging his body like a bat for the second time and smashing him into the kasathas who was knocked across the pit. The kasathas once again got up but was haggard, he looked towards Vahl but only saw the body of the other man flying towards him, knocking him out after hitting him in the head.
The crowd cheered at the top of their lungs for the climax of the fight, they have never seen Vahl pushed like that, and he even managed to take damage. Korva watched with a smile as she could tell the people around her really enjoyed the fight, giving two thumbs up towards Vahl for giving them a good show. After the crowd calmed down a bit, Vahl made his way out to the bar where he had talked to Korva.
"I told you Korva, I don't need a partner to win against multiple people, including that kasathas guy." Vahl said with a proud look on his face.
"Oh? But that kasathas girl managed to push you back, if she got another shot and had a friend she could have won."
"Girl? Shit, my bad."
"Ha-ha, don't worry about it, I made the same mistake, she didn't seem to mind the mistake. Here is your money, go home and rest for tomorrow but remember, look for a partner to fight with. Not everybody will stab you in the back." Korva said while patting him on his side as she couldn't reach his shoulder.
In a slightly regretful tone, Vahl spoke, "Sure, that might be true for you Korva, but you are the only person who hasn't done so to me yet."
Korva handed Vahl a large credit stick, a widely used item that is worth certain amounts of money based on how much credits are put in. The stick was bigger than most of the ones she gives to the losers and even most winners of a fight, probably because the crowd enjoyed the show. Vahl held the stick in his large hand and held it tight to avoid it being stolen, walking outside the bar & arena into the city outside.
The city was a stark contrast to the inside of the bar. The bar was mostly clean, and the low lighting made the shoddy and dirty walls and floor looking cleaner than they really are, additionally the good vibes and characters in the bar made the place feel nice to others who visit. However, the city outside was only describable as sad and depressing, very few star ships flew across the sky and if there was one, they would usually be ships owned by pirates and other criminals. On the ground it was just hardened dirt, covered in dirty tar and oil, with some puddles forming that splash when someone walks in them. The people on the street were either sitting there as still as a statue to avoid wasting energy or selling food and imported goods to make enough money to get by. The buildings seemed just as ugly and dirty as the roads, they were all cubic shaped and densely packed together, most reached two stories tall and were covered in scrap metal coverings to hopefully avoid tipping over. The bar was no exception, but it was cleaner than most and didn't look like it would fall over with a breeze. The entire rest of the city was just as run down, ugly, and poor. Most of the city consisted of humans, but some other races could be found on the streets which didn't tend to be native to the city though.
Vahl moved down the street, towards his run-down shack that he managed to claim by fighting against another person that previously owned it. Everyone he passed by looked sick or a criminal that was here to hide from the law of another planet, no guards or rich men walked the streets, only pirates, fighters, and criminals. When Vahl walked his way into a small open market area used by plenty of the slightly better off cooks, he saw two groups of armed men walk into the market. The two groups were wearing the same golemforged plating Mk.1 armor. This armor was the type to be mass produced in a robot factory in a far-off planet with the cheapest and most pathetic metals to be sold for a few days work worth of credits, 250 credits to be specific but that was only if it was standard factory quality. Most retailers and factories that had the rights to produce it mark down the price and the quality drops quite a lot. The one they wore was shoddy and didn't look like it was all that much tougher than Vahl's scales, but any protection is still protection and the symmetrical plates of grey metal covered enough of the human body to count for something, though they did not even have shoulder pads or anything covering their joints. The two groups also carried the same cheap laser weapon, which was probably also just as bad as the armor they wore but it did enough damage to kill a normal person and pierce though cheap armor with enough hits. The only difference between the two groups was a different marking of face paint, telling those around them that they are apart of different pirate organizations that want to take control of the city. There were so many of these 'gangs' of pirates that nobody cared to even learn any of the names.
The two groups saw each other and immediately opened fire on each other without warning, those that were caught in the crossfire either ran or accidentally got hit, but nobody seemed surprised enough to run far away or scream. Vahl turned and chose to take a different route to his house instead, he didn't have any weapons and those laser weapons would still hurt his scales, besides, fights like these are happening all around the city constantly.
Vahl moved his big body through the large alley ways that he had trouble fitting through but managed to squeeze through and get into another main street that didn't involve any pirates. Beside him a small green star ship prepared to land in the port, he recognized it as a veskarium tiny fighter ship, a ship designed and built on the vesk home planet he was born on. The ship grabbed his attention, but it was landing in the neutrally owned space port, no pirate gang fought over it or 'owned' it but the only ones who used it were the pirate gangs or wandering merchants so Vahl didn't think about the ship any longer as it was probably 'owned' by pirates.
Vahl looked up at the darkening sky, dotted with lots of stars that shone through between large pieces of rock floating through space far from the planet. Out there he would be able to find a higher meaning, something he can achieve, something he can want. Something better than the life he currently had, but he is stuck in this run down and ugly city on the ugliest planet he has ever heard of.
Vahl turned away from the space port before he got too emotional and headed directly to his house. The house was detached from the other houses around it and Vahl was lucky enough to live in it alone. It was a single story and consisted of just two slightly large rooms, the outside of the house was reinforced with a larger amount of scrap metal plates to insulate more heat. The first room you walk into was large but looked small from clutter inside, a large desk along the wall and large weights that looked bigger than a human in fetal position scattered around the floor. On top of the desk was multiple holopads that contained writing on different engineering research that Vahl read when he was bored, beside the holopads were tools that could be used to shape and form metals. On the other side of the room was a door leading to his resting room, where another desk with bandages and dried blood cover the counter top, which he thankfully did not need to add any blood to as he didn't take much damage during the fight. In the past, he would accidentally add more blood to the table, but he has grown enough that taking damage was rare.
For the rest of the night before Vahl slept he worked out, lifting the metal weights in the other room, training his muscles in every way he can to pass the time while getting as strong as possible. While he lifts and trains, his mind wanders to the female kasathas that he fought against, she had used her commanding skills to make the fearful humans fight with a weird vigor that nobody had fought against Vahl with before. They seemed like they would have died if she asked them to. Vahl had once been told by Korva about people outside the planet in the same star system that are stronger than the humans on this planet by leaps and bounds. Ones that use the powers of stars and black holes, technomancers that bend physics to their will to achieve amazing things, mechanics that can build and hack into anything, and soldiers that could use different fighting styles to massacre others while wearing a set of powered armor. Vahl himself knew he could qualify as one of them, he wanted to fight on the same field as those mystics and technomancers and other soldiers. Vahl chose to be a soldier and trained in a way to learn these fighting styles, he had no guidance other than the stories that Korva told him, but he still trained his hardest to reach their level. Vahl never heard of any type of person who could inspire such courage through just their words though, he would have to ask Korva about that the next morning.