"No, I don't want to kill. Please don't make me fight. I don't want to be here. Please let me out! Let me go out!" Sofia begged all the people outside of the wide ring but they all looked coldly at her. Some were even gambling as to who would win at the end of the game.
"Mom! Mom! Please help me out. I don't like it here." She cried and cried but nobody listened to her weeping. Children of varying age was sent inside the ring. Some of them looked dull while some looked so fierce. Sofia felt like she was about to go crazy. She didn't want to have anything to do with them.
Three hours ago, she was sitting under the tree, counting the money that she had saved up from pickpocketing when two men in black showed up. She thought that they'd kill her so she ran as fast as she can. But her two little feet was slower compared the two adult men.
One of them grabbed her by the collar and gagged her with a cloth. In less than five minutes, she was knocked out and was placed inside a black van which was waiting for them. When she regained consciousness, she was already inside the ring with a knife lying on the cold floor beside her.
"If you want to get out of that place, kill your enemy. It's either you get killed or you kill. Which one you choose?" the man standing on the gate, watching the kids with dull eyes, told Sofia these words. "Only one of you can live."
"But I don't want to kill! I was living happily with my life outside! Just send me back to that place!" Sofia retorted angrily. Many people were looking at her now, including the other children who were going to fight with each other. "Please! I'm begging you. Send me out now."
"As I said, you can only go out after the fight. It's either you come out dead or you come out alive. Stop begging, it won't work." The man turned around, leaving Sofia at her wit's end. Some stronger children were looking at her with wickedness, eyeing her as if she was their prey. Truthfully, she was indeed a prey if she won't fight for her life. They were all preys made to fight with each other.
"Ladies and gentlemen!" the announcer's loud voice startled Sofia and sent her shivering in fear. "Tonight is the selection of the new members. Who will win? Who are those people with tenacity to live? Who are the stronger? Who will become the future King of the Underworld?!"
His voice earned lots of cheers from the people. At this point, Sofia realized that she was brought to an illegal organization. It was a place where all illegal things happen.
"To our new fighters, let me give them an instruction." The announcer turned his attention to the children inside the ring. "You will fight in clusters. Those who win will move up to the next stage until only four people remains. These four people will be trained to join our organization. If you don't make it, well, you don't make it."
They all laughed as if they weren't talking about lives. There were at least hundreds of children inside the ring and only four will remain standing. This information alone brought chill down to Sofia's spine.
"Good luck to all our participants! The fight starts now."
The huge screen hovering above the ring displayed the name of the players. They were both females. Sofia wanted to look away but something was telling her to watch. Perhaps it was the devil, telling her to watch with focus on how the children take each other's life away.
After ten rounds of fighting, Sofia's little face showed up on the screen and her opponent was a male. Among the other female fighters, she was the first one to have a male opponent. Her limbs went numb and she couldn't move an inch from where she was sitting. Her tears kept falling on her face as she begged people to let her out of the ring.
"Little sister, since you don't want to fight. How about you give me your life?" The little kid looked ferocious while holding a knife in hand. Every step he took towards Sofia was like a stab in her heart. She dumbfounded and scared.
"Go away! I don't want to kill anyone! Just go away." She was still crying, shouting at the top of her lungs when the boy lunged an attack on her.
She reacted rather fast as she rolled on the ground, avoiding the fatal attack against her. "Please, I'm-" She moved to the other side while dodging the attack from the boy.
"Boo! Boo!"
"This is boring! Just kill that wimpy kid!"
"Tsk! Why did you even take this little girl? Such a crybaby."
Many people expressed their distaste in this fight but Sofia didn't care. All she could do was avoid the attack aimed at her.
"Live or die. These are the only choice you have." Someone from the crowd said these words out loud which stunned Sofia for a moment. In that moment, she remembered the words that the little boy stated not long ago. "Fighting. No matter what happens, just keep fighting and live."
Sofia was smaller than her opponent and she knew that if she gave the man a roundhouse kick, she couldn't reach his temple. Thus, she aimed for his legs and kicked him with all her might. When he fell to the ground, she stepped on his hands holding the knife and kicked the blade away.
Left with no weapon, Sofia sat on top of him and strangled him to death. "Live or die. I'm not given any other choice. I'll live my life with the thought of you. May you rest in peace." After saying those words, Sofia stood up and went back to the corner where she sat earlier. She was the only one who fought with no blood spilled. At the age of ten, she killed for the very first time in her life.