'This is the stupidest idea a person could genuinely ever make, Damon! Can you at least take a second to hear me out?'
I had already muted Hadeons nagging and turned my attention over to the crowd in front of me. My eyes scanned around the room, searching. Once they had finally settled on a person, a smile curled up on my face. I quickly navigated my way through the ocean of people and found myself standing next to a short man surrounded by men in suits.
Being rude or assuming based on physical appearance was something that I despised, especially since I had always been on the receiving end of the hate. But when the man stood beside me was the definition of small.
Every single time I had seen him, he planted the idea in my head that there was a possibility of dwarves being real.
The man stood, and I'm very much being generous, at a nice 4 foot 6. His brown hair slicked back and revealed a nasty scar that ran along his forehead.
His beard, dark and fluffy, made him look even more like a little kid, and his little suit almost made me lose my composure entirely. But every time I was about to laugh, my eyes drifted back to his scar and I calmed down.
"You got about 5 more seconds of staring before I cut you up and toss you out back. Or maybe I'll let Ken take you. And trust me, the cutting up is the better of the two."
As he spoke, his voice was oddly deep and commanding. I tried to speak up, but just as the words were about to leave my mouth, the men surrounding him stood in between us, pushing me back.
"Sir. Sir! I'm Robert Ewell's kid!" I yelled as the distance between us grew.
The few moments in which he stayed silent, led me to believe he quite simply didn't care.
But just as he was exiting my line of sight, I saw him raise his hand and then flick it, beckoning for me to walk back over to him.
I fixed up my sweater and pants, tried to fix up my hair, but to no avail, and walked back over. Once I had arrived next to him again, he turned to look at me. His gaze was more threatening than Ken's, but it scared me for very different reasons.
His eyes stayed glued to my face for a few seconds before he let out a long sigh. He turned to walk and motioned for his guards to bring me along.
We walked through the crowd, before finally arriving in front of two large doors. As we walked inside, the sound of cheering erupted around the stadium.
I turned to see the man in the clown's mask laid out on the floor with his hands clutching onto his chest, and the man in the superhero mask raising his hand high in victory.
Wish I could've seen what happened.
When inside the room, the plainness of it struck me as odd. There were two white couches, a coffee table in between them, a desk accompanied by a rolly chair, and two bookshelves on either side of the walls. If I'm being honest, the fact that there wasn't at least one animal head in the room was a tad bit disappointing.
He motioned for me to take a seat as approached his desk and opened one of the drawers. From inside of it he pulled out two glass bottles and two small glass cups. They were adorned with matching symbols of white swans.
'What is this guy anyway? Some kind of mob boss? Gangster?' Hadeon chimed in between my thoughts.
'Not exactly. It's difficult to explain, but he isn't exactly liked by people that are on the other side of the law'
The man walked over to me, placing a bottle and glass in front of me, before doing the same on the other side of the table, and then hoisting himself up onto the couch.
Seeing how he was able to fit perfectly on the couch without having his feet dangle over whatsoever, had me holding back unprecedented amounts of laughter.
"I'm sorry to hear about your parents' kid, especially your father. He was a good man."
"Yeah… he was," I mumbled under my breath.
Having lived on my own for so long, I wasn't used to hearing about either of my parents. Other than on special occasions, I tried my best to never think about my parents, as in my head they were still alive and we were still one big happy family.
It took me a few seconds to catch onto the fact that I said my father 'was' a good man, and not 'is', but something in me made it so that I didn't even attempt to try and correct myself.
Instead, my attention turned to the glasses in front of me, as I twisted off the cap on the bottle and poured it into the cup.
Looking at the weird clear liquid in the cup, I realized that it was not water like I had thought. Nonetheless, the liquid was out of the glass and down my throat in a matter of seconds.
Something I immediately regretted.
"Ah, fuck! That's not water." I yelled as whatever was left of the liquid in my mouth was spat out.
"Haha! Of course not kid! It's an alcohol I had exported from the planet Cahun. It's called Unsuk, very rare and very expensive. But, based on your sudden appearance here, I'm assuming you didn't come to drink all my alcohol. So what can I do for you?"
Putting down the alien drink, and also making a personal vow to never drink something without asking what it is first, I wiped my mouth and cleared my throat.
"Mr.White, I'd uh, I'd like to be a fighter here."
In the next moment, like it was magic, the Unsuk had teleported from his mouth onto my face.
"I'm sorry, I probably misheard you." He paused to pour another drink and held it close to his mouth. "You said you wanted what?"
Expecting what was to come, I put on my hood and covered my face.
"I want to be a fighter here, sir".
The immediate moistness that secreted through the sleeves and hood of my sweater, almost made me throw it off and then chuck it at him like it was some kind of spider. But looking at the crime boss dwarf sitting across from me, I decided to take the high road.
"Look kid, I know with your parents and you not getting a contractor, making a living is hard, but-"
"How'd you know about me not being a chosen?"
"I know everything, now hear me out without interrupting."
'Told you. You have a problem' Hadeon chimed in once again.'
'Shut up.'
"As I was saying, I know it's hard to try and make a living in today's day and age, but there are other ways than fighting. Here, how about I get you a job upstairs? You can replace Ken, I've been trying to get that weirdo out of here for a while." He joked.
However, not only was I adamant about fighting, but I was about 90 percent sure that it was working alone up there in that disgusting and lonely laundromat that turned him into what he was. And that tattoo on his head gave me nightmares for a week as a kid.
"Please, sir. I want to do this for myself. One fight, just give me one fight to prove myself."
He paused to what seemed to be him considering his words. He stroked his beard for a few minutes before hopping off the couch and walking back to his desk. He opened the drawer underneath the alcohol one, and from it, he pulled out a mask.
Walking back over to the couch once again, he threw me the mask. Seeing it close up, I could see that it was some kind of animal. Tusks protruded from the mouth of the mask, and weirdly shaped eyes curled up towards the forehead. The mask also featured whiskers, a mane, and pointy ears.
"Can I ask what this is?"
"A Linerid. Guardians of the earth and the patron beast of the Bankole family." He paused to take a swig from his glass. "The beast represents courage and an unwavering spirit, or at least that's what your day used to say."
"Wait so-"
"You get one fight kid." He interjected. "One fight to prove to me you're ready for this kind of life."
I stood up beaming and bent into a small bow.
"Thank you, Mr.White, I promise you won't regret this!"
"Yeah, yeah whatever. Follow Jim over there, he'll guide you to the changing room." He took another swig as he made a shooing gesture.
My smile instantly dropped.
"I'm sorry. Do you want me to fight today? As in right now?" The joy had quickly transformed into immense worry, as I prayed he was just offering me a tour.
"You want this job kid?"
"Yes sir!" I responded instinctively, not even thinking about what I was agreeing to.
"Then get out there and fight!"
"Y-yes Sir!" I decided to ask no more follow-up questions and turned to follow after my bald-headed guide.
Once he had led me into a strong sweat-smelling room, littered with lockers and dirty clothes on the floor, he left the way he came and left me alone. I took a seat on the nearest bench and stared down at the weird animal mask in my hands.
'You have a lot of explaining to do, especially about your relationship with that man, but that can wait for after you get your ass kicked. Right now you need to focus on surviving.'
'Really? You got any more wisdom to rain down on me?' I scoffed
Of course, I knew it was a bad idea, but it was still my best and quite frankly only option. My only goal at the moment was to get stronger. And to get stronger I needed experience, both literally and figuratively. The best possible way to do that? It was to fight. It was to get my entire body broken, and then stand up and do it.
I threw off my sweater, revealing my weak upper body underneath. Keeping my sweats on, I slicked back my hair and placed the mask on my face.
Physcing myself up, I grabbed what I was desperately hoping was a hand wrap and wrapped it around my knuckles and palm.
My bald-headed guide, Jim, had returned, and upon seeing my appearance, he let out a small chuckle.
"You look ridiculous. Anyways, you're up. Also, you didn't give us a nickname, so we chose one based on how the boss described you."
Without even giving me the chance to speak up and say that I was never given the opportunity to choose my name, he turned and left.
'Hopefully, it's not a shitty nickname'
'You know it will be.' Hadeon responded, all snarky.
He seemed to be much more petty and annoying since we'd entered the place. Not that I didn't understand, but he didn't feel any pain when I did, nor would I die from a fight. Hopefully. So there was no reason for him to be so full of attitude.
I walked to the other end of the locked room, arriving in front of the tunnel entrance that led to the octagon ring, and waited for my nickname to be called. I knew that I would be walking out next as I watched my opponent 'The Crazy Ape' run out from the other tunnel and was currently jumping around the ring.
Then it was my turn.
"Ladies and gentlemen, fighting out of the black corner, our first, first-time challenger in months, please put your hands together for The Cowardly King!"
As I ran out to the sound of heavy boo's, my mind was focused on my nickname. With the announcer's charismatic voice, it sounded cool enough, but when I took a moment to think about it, the name 'The Cowardly King', was not something I wanted to be stuck with.
Inside the octagon, the realization that I was about to fight the man in front of me, finally hit.
He seemed to be batshit crazy, yelling and making monkey noises while banging his chest. As I tried to calm down, my second main quest had arrived.
< Defeat 'The Crazy Ape'>
Seeing my reward allowed me to completely disregard the penalty upon failure. My body had newfound vigor, and I was now fully ready to take on my opponent and win.
We touched gloves, and when the referee had backed off, the fight had begun.
I quickly sidestepped his first punch, counter-attacking with my own, failing to connect. He ducked and sent a fist towards my chin.
Phwark!
In the next moment, the whole world went dark. My jaw felt like it had been taken off my face, and my whole body froze up.
As my body dribbled off the ground, the last thing I saw was a grown man in a monkey mask banging his chest and dancing over me.
'I told you so.' Hadeon spoke up.
'Shut up.' I responded, and then the world went quiet.