As Ivy walked down the long hallway toward her locker room, she heard the feint echo of two voices through the cracked door as she approached.
Entering, she saw Tobi talking to someone familiar.
"Oh, there you are," The man turned, smiling. "We…Especially I, have been very impressed by your performance over the past few days."
"Machita?" Ivy blinked in surprise. "I- thank you."
"I usually don't do this…Come down here that is, but I think you're one of the few in this tournament who have a real chance against the Three Kings." Held under his arm was a bright blue rectangular box. "Nike…y'know, the goddess of victory and the owner of the NFC has a present for you. Here."
Inside the box lay a pair of dazzling white boxing shorts adorned with glittering diamond-like accents. The name "IVY" was elegantly stitched along the seam. As Ivy lifted the shorts, she noticed a tag on the inside: "Crafted by Arachne, the Weaver." The shorts shimmered with an almost magical quality.
"Nice," Tobi raised his eyebrows.
"Wow!" Ivy held them to the light, watching them gleam.
"Also," Machita said, "Right now, they want to get some footage of you for promotional stuff for tomorrow, and I also wanna interview you."
"Okay, sure!"
Machita led Tobi and Ivy to a small boxing gym, where a camera crew waited. Machita had them film her sparring, running on the treadmill and violently attacking a punching bag, which she broke, spilling its intestines everywhere.
Ivy tried to apologize, but Machita said, "Nah, that's gonna be good for promo!"
Afterward, he led them to a soundproof room with lighting and cameras all pointed at a table.
Ivy stood, looking around the room with wide-eyed curiosity.
"Is this some kinda podcast?" Tobi asked.
"Yup," Machita beamed, pointing to the neon sign that floated above the table reading, 'Machita: Uncensored.'
"Goodness," Tobi mumbled, rolling his eyes.
"I'm gonna be on TV?" Ivy asked.
"Basically, yeah." Machita said.
After setting up, Ivy wore large headphones and sat in front of a microphone across from Machita, who wore the same thing.
"So, we should say right away, off the bat," Machita said once he started recording, "Ivy, so far, you've been running through every fighter you've gone up against! You're a very unusual person…"
"I am?"
"Yeah. I mean, usually the people who enter these things have some kind of name for themselves, or they're known in the fighting community, but you just show up outta nowhere."
"Well," Ivy swiveled back and forth in her chair, "I'm not really here to make a career out of this like they probably are."
"What was your training like prior to showing up here?"
"Tobi and I would go down to this forest area, and would spend like hours exercising and stuff like that."
"And how were those first fights you had?"
"Oh, yeah!" Ivy pointed across the table, "You were watching me. I don't know if anyone was recording those, but I basically won all of 'em with one hit."
"Were you ever worried about any of the fights so far?"
Ivy smiled, "Eh, not really."
"Cap."
"What?"
"You weren't even a bit scared when you faced Karbur? I assume you'd seen some of his fights prior, right?"
"Yeah," she pointed out of frame, "Tobi was showing me that, but I dunno. I just wasn't scared. I mean, he's not the most dangerous person I've ever fought. For example: There was this one guy who literally turned into a massive werewolf, right? And so, me and my friends were in this village trying to save them or whatever, but then he almost killed me…" She trailed off, seeing Machita's confused face, "Anyway, no one's scared me yet."
"What about the fight you've got coming up? The Three Kings!" Machita said, a shadow passing over his face, "You haven't even chosen, have you?"
"I have to pay for NFC+ to watch any of their fights, and I'm just not gonna do that. I don't know who would waste their money on-"
"Ivy!" Machita snapped.
"Huh? What?" Ivy blinked.
Tobi bit his tongue, trying not to laugh.
"The whole point of this, is to promote the fight, and by proxy promoting NFC+."
"Okay." Ivy said blankly.
"Well, I'm going to have to edit that out…but your job is to promote your upcoming fight, okay?"
Ivy looked at Tobi, who stood in the corner of the room, watching. She mouthed, "When can I leave?"
Tobi shook his head, pointing at Machita.
"Alright," Machita cleared his throat. Continuing, he said, "Well, if you were to choose one, who would it be?"
"To fight? Byron, probably. He has the best record, doesn't he? I want to fight the best."
"Yeah, I mean, on paper, he's the best."
Ivy squinted inquisitively, "What does that mean?"
"Since this is more of an 'interview,' I wanna remain somewhat unbiased, but I'll put it this way: Records don't always represent the fighter's skill. When judging a fighter, you should look at each individual match and the context surrounding it. But, I think Byron is a good choice."
"Okay," Ivy nodded.
"I know you aren't necessarily scared to fight him, but are you at the very least scared to lose?"
"I've already thought about the worst case scenario in every fight. They're going to have to kill me, because I'm not just going to give up and lose. I will win because I have to win."
It was the final day of the tournament, and each stadium was over-capacity, and crowds gathered outside the buildings, many trying to break in, but security was quadrupled on a day like this. It had to be. This was the day when the Three Kings were fighting. Roads had to be shut down. Businesses were closed.