[ROUND ONE] Draconic Fear VS Eep Opp Ork Ah-Ah

Fireworks exploded in a burst of fire and light overhead the arena, as the screams of the crowd grew instantly louder, the moment all of those die-hard fight-fans had been waiting for had finally arrived. Spectators rushed about in the stands as they try to place their final bets and desperately search for their seats, impatient for the upcoming carnage to unfold.

**"Welcome humans and demons alike to the glorious Hanging Neck Island! Now let the Dark Tournament begin! Ladies and Gentlemen, my name is Koto! I'll be your cute host for this tournament, and it's gonna be a messy one!"** a foxgirl yelled into her microphone, dripping with enthusiasm. She seemed just as anxious to see the fights start as the bloodthirsty fans in the stands.

"Now here's the introduction you've all been waiting for! On my left, Team Draconic Fear!"she shouted with a showy wave of her arm as she pointed in that direction, and the door on the west side of the arena opened to welcome Vincentius, Mordecai, Yujiro, and Zen.

"And on my right, Team Eep Opp Ork Ah-Ah!" Koto beamed, letting the doors on the east side of the arena cast themselves open to make way for Gold, Vivi, Moosh, and Roen.

"Both teams, please enter the arena!" the foxgirl called into the microphone, beckoning both teams over to the ring so the captains could decide the terms.

"As usual, the terms of the fight for each match can be decided by the leaders of the two teams! Of course, if the leader's can't agree, we default to one-on-one fights, determining the winner by the most individual wins. Makes sense?"Koto asked, clarifying with the approaching captains. "When you're ready, we can get this fight started!"

Vincey would not have to wait too long, for at that very moment the other team captain was approaching the stadium. All the armored man had to do was turn his head and squint hard in the direction of the other entrance to catch a glimpse at his counterpart. For Gold was coming down that tunnel, in all his awe inspiring glory or lack there of.

Gold was noticiable less intimidating than Vince as he was clad in folds of cloth instead of plates steel. His garments consisted of several layers of black, a shirt, pants, shoes and glove all of that dark color. The only thing that broke up the darkness of his attire was his silver buckle and the green jacket that rested on his shoulder. That and the golden locks of hair from which his name was derived or vice versa.

Gold made a slow and steady beeline from the entrance to stage, the sight of a large brute in the ring giving him little pause. Physically atleast, mentally his mind was racing as it scrambled for ideas of how this brute came to be and how this brute would come to un-be. And once there in the middle of the arena with the announcer and the other captain, with the beauty and the beast, he would stand his ground and give Vince a good grillin.

Intro

After tightening the straps of his leather cuirass and it's respective fauld and spaulders, Roen would place his face within the palms of his hands and take in a deep breath of the leather. Not only did he enjoy the smell, but it was comforting to have the cold material pressed against his flushed face. Why flushed? He blamed it all on anxiety. It was the beginning of the Dark Tournament, who wouldn't be anxious? The dull roar of the roar outside, that fox-girl's whiny voice, the anticipation of battle? It was exhilarating. Removing his hands away from his face and tightening the cords that held the gauntlets to his wrists, Roen pursed his lips to regard the shaking in his left hand. Adrenaline to be sure. Chest rising and falling with the appropriate motions of one who drew in a deep breath and released it, Roen would lean over to grab the wire wrapped hilt of his World Splitter. After testing it's weight in his hand, the Devil would then sheath the weapon on his back and lift his head to regard the east side door as it swung open to reveal the arena and it's roaring spectators. Setting his jaw and furrowing his eyebrows, Roen put on his most intimidating expression before stepping out and into the light.

____

By the time he walked into the ring alongside Gold, the shaking had only intensified. Even a pit of unease began to grow in his stomach. Grumbling under his breath, Roen raised his left hand and cupped it in the other, sword-calloused fingertips massaging the flesh there in an attempt to quell the shakes. He didn't even bother looking up at Vincent, nor did he give much acknowledgment to Gold as he stood beside him. All the Devil did was mind himself and his hand as he continuously rubbed and caressed it. However, that was soon to change as Roen caught wind of Vincent's preferences. To say the Devil was quirky would have been the grossest of understatements, because Vincent's profanity and choice of words not only stopped the shakes completely, but removed the growing pit in his stomach.

It even gave him a sense of peace. As if everything had fallen into place. That was all he needed to set him straight - some hostile words. Rolling his shoulder blades and straightening up, Roen lifted his eyes to look at Vincent. If he was afraid of the man's stature or armor, he made no inclination of it. He instead pursed his lips and put out a dramatic whistle followed suite by a half-hearted chuckle. He was going to say something, but he remembered his place. This wasn't Heaven or Hell, and he wasn't commanding Team Cannon Fodder. Gold would be calling the shots, but Roen wouldn't mind taking Vincent on himself.

.:Reputation is what other people know about you...

He wished it had been sunny.

If it had been a clear day, a few puffy clouds stretching lazily across a blue sky. If the sun had been out, then Mordecai would feel the warm arms of his King's rays enveloping the arena this morning. Instead, the sky was overcast, a clear sign that the Morninglord, Mordecai's sovereign King, was not accompanying them today. He would watch, an outside observer, to judge his willing servant and view his performance.

The young angel boy, dwarfed by his taller, more intimidating captain, would let out a small sigh as he made his way to the arena's center. Without having to move his gaze, he could see the entire arena, he could feel the roar of the crowd. There were no individuals in the stands that day; only a massive, single entity that radiated bloodlust from every pore. The white-skinned boy looked unconcerned with the promise of violence, the possibility that he could be injured or killed. He looked, in fact, like he were part of a large game, or a play, something staged and unreal. He had an almost bored look in his eyes, saddened slightly because of how serious everyone seemed to take the iminent bloodshed.

As the captain's conversed, Mordecai's faintly glowing body flared slightly, brightening and illuminating both teams. The Devil caught his attention; a moment ago, nervous and fidgety, but now calm and controlled. Angels, being beings of a detached nature, found such strong emotions unusual. Perhaps, however, this was a gift from Lathander the Morninglord. In his first match he was given a Devil.

Still standing plainly, dressed in a white tunic, white pants tucked into white boots, he was looking straight ahead, apparently at nothing in particular. His eyes, blank and lacking any iris or pupil, were vacant of attention. When he spoke, his voice was soft and lofty, "I would not mind fighting this one," Without changing expression or the direction of his gaze, one hand lifted to motion towards Roen, "In a private battle." He did not address either captain, or Roen directly. It was as if he were speaking to the arena itself. It was, he decided, not a bad day to shed blood, in the name of his King.

Still.

Some sun would have been nice.

...Honor is what you know about yourself:.

Life had a funny way of throwing some nasty curve balls at the most unexpected of times, but it seemed like the hunter hasn't struck out yet. The details weren't really important of how he ended up from team to team, all that really mattered was that the overcast skies were waiting along with a rather disgruntle crowd of nasty critters for the entirety of all the teams to arrive, and judging from the introduction Koto gave it was probably even going to be a shocker for her to see this guy trotting out to the field for a second swing at the championship. Come to think of it... nobody probably knew much about this character aside from a name listed on the roster.

Zen

What a silly name, but it was the one he held as his own for better or worse. So with the roll of thunder booming in the distance, the man would begin his walk through the corridor that led to the fiendish world around.

The first thing anyone might notice about this figure would be the array of tattoos lining the entirety of his body, much like a tribal painting or set of cave drawings which seemed to hold a tale of some kind. And since this man bore nothing more than the braids in his dark mane, a pair of rather worn leather leggings, and some leathery fabric that covered the missing space between his upper-calf and hips, practically the entirety of this mural could be seen. Though this came to a truth on its own, deciphering the meaning behind each mark would take some time, and that was probably more than anyone was really welling to deal with in terms of the tattoos.

So dark skin, lean build, the man was a regular ol' shining example of some random American Indian who just hasn't caught up with the times quite yet. About the only thing that was really strange beyond this was the fact that he carried around a katana at his side rather than some sort of axe or spear or whatever the hell someone would expect to see with this guy. What the hell was up with this? It'd probably get him a few weird looks, but aside from that there wasn't much noteworthy of the guy. He just seemed... human.

So he'd take his first steps into the ring where the rest of the team seemed to gather, eying the entirety of everyone on the field with his discolored eyes, before simply letting out a sigh. He was here, some random soldier on the field, and he didn't know a single face that was in this 300 ft span. It would be a wonder if he even got a single name right within his time inside this ring, much less the name of this team. But rather than bring anything up or make any notions of acknowledgment, the man would simply stand there quietly, minding his own business as he watched the scene unfold.

"It looks like Gold has agreed to one-on-one matches, the winner to be claimed by the best two out of three!" Koto said into her mic, raising her arm above her head dramatically as the crowd cheered.

"I must ask all competitors other than the first fighter from each team to leave the ring now, and wait on your respective sides," she said to the fighters that had gathered in the ring. Koto's tail swished gleefully behind her, she was just as anxious to let the bloodbath begin as all those fans in the stands were.

.:Reputation is what other people know about you...

Mordecai nodded, not looking at Koto to acknowledge her request. Instead, he kept looking straight ahead - he had the same, vacant ocular expression of a blind individual, though that was rather not the case. It was just that, like one who did not use their eyes, Mordecai's eyes did not turn to whom he was addressing, making it more obvious through small gestures or his speech who he was talking to. Calmly and without looking at Roen, he said, "I shall pray for a good fight." and, turning away, started walking towards the waiting area. Once there, he would sit on the ground, shins resting on the floor with him sitting on his heels, and eyes closed being a session of prayer, of divine commune with Lathander. He would pray for Vince's victory, and for good fortune for his own match to come.

...Honor is what you know about yourself:.

A deep rumble of contemplation emanated from deep within Roen's chest as he looked from Koto, Vincent, Gold, and back to her once again. Gold was going to fight Vincent? It wasn't like Roen didn't trust the stranger to the task, but he would have felt better if it was himself taking on the big brute. "If you say so," he would say while stepping back, his torso twisting and following suite. "Have at'em, Gold. Don't disappoint." As for the angel who spoke of prayer..

Well..

He was creepy. Despite well bred manners, Roen ignored him completely as he stalked off of the arena to stand at the newly arrived box's side.

"Well, people, looks like our first competitors have stepped up to the plate and are ready to get this party started!" Koto shouted into her mic, taking a few steps back to remain well out of the fighters' way. "The team captains are both going to square off in the first round of the Dark Tournament! Gold Alexander versus Vincentius Alphare!" Her voice boomed over the speakers as the crowd roared even louder, almost drowning the foxgirl's magnified voice out.

"Both of you take your places," she instructed, noting that both had started getting into fighting stances. "Ready?"

*"FIGHT!"*

Vincent would say no more; not to Gold, anyway. He nodded a quiet understanding to Koto, who had announced that the two could start the bashing and ripping of one another. That was fine, however, as Vincent watched Gold step away, and then take a fighting stance ten feet or so away, he didn't bother to rush him. The armor made him slow, made his movements ungraceful, and so, rushing the other opponent would likely be a foolish choice, but he was more than sure that Gold would come to him after he did what he planned.

Vincent bent his knees, and with his right hand on his sword, his left hand moved down and picked up a small amount of the sand that was on the arena floor. Of course, it was not enough of an amount to throw in someone's eye, nor was it an entire handful of sand. It was just a small amount that he would use to demonstrate what he was doing, without actually saying a whole lot. Of course, Vincent loved to run his mouth, but he thought it would be an interesting surprise for Gold to find out himself what Vincent really was. So all he said as he raised his left hand level with his face was, "So.. This is how it will start.."

That was of course, what he spoke aloud to the point that Gold could hear him. However, as he dropped the sand by allowing his long fingers to open, he whispered quickly to himself in some strange language, and the sand began to float around Vince's form. That was not all. The small amount of sand that was floating around Vince's form was soon joined by a bit more sand, to the point of where it looked as if Vincent had a few handfuls of sand whipped at him, and they froze in their tracks, floating around him. This of course, though no one except for the swordsman of Team CDs+Bosley would know, was the amassing of Vince's magical prowess.

Again, that magical prowess would prove to be what undid people in this tournament, and funnily enough, the magical energy that was building now, would not be used for attack spells. Vincent would give some of his own energy for those, but the spell that he had planned took too much energy to use right off the bat, and so, it required preparation. If Gold gave Vincent another few seconds, Vincent would be doing what he wanted, and basically leaving Gold with hell.

After a second of watching Gold, Vincent yanked the sword from his back and held it in his right hand, the tip pointed down at the ground.

Vincent chuckled as he watched his opponent rush, and as he watched, he brought his right foot off the ground, his knee moving outwards slightly. Even as he did this, he calculated a small amount of math in his head, math that was more common sense than anything. He payed attention to the beginning, knowing that Gold was about ten feet, and as he rushed, he noticed that Gold had ran about six feet, putting him in more than enough range for his sword. The sword, of course, was a bit over six and a half feet long, and the blade itself was five feet, but Vincent had something else to do before he lashed out with the sword.

The foot that rose off the ground would smash itself back into the ground with a loud bang, and directly in Gold's path, something would happen. A wall of rock and ground that was the stage itself erupted forth, coming up to about Vince's hip, which would likely be a little higher up on Gold's body. The rock was meant to trip him up, or rather, for him to run head first into it. It was likely with the momentum that Gold had caused by rushing head first into Vince, he would likely not be able to change direction right away. Unfortunately for Gold, Vincent had something else planned.

When the wall shot up, and based on the assumption that Gold would be running head first into it, Vincent followed through with the magically amplified right foot stomping into the ground, swinging the sword horizontally from right to left, aiming to slash right across Gold's chest. Of course, Vincent would have rather aimed for the head, but he knew that the chest was wider, and that killing his opponent in this tournament was illegal play, so, he would rather take it safe. As the sword came across, Vincent moved his left hand up so that the clawed gauntlet was facing Gold, preparing himself in-case he needed to fend off a possible attack.

One would also notice two things as Vince attacked. The magic that he had placed within the stomp to raise the earth caused a sweat to break out on Vince's face, as well as the rest of his body, a sure sign of the energy it took to use a spell. The second thing was that the sand still followed him, moving as he moved, though not bringing up any more sand off the ground. That would happen later if Vincent was allowed the time..

Vincent wasn't completely aware of how Gold had managed to leap over the rock, which was probably about oh.. three feet high, and then leap over a five foot long blade, over Vince's already long arm, and still be about seven feet in the air. So, it wasn't that it was impossible, but Vincent knew that this movement that Gold was pulling, the fact that he would have to leap up and over the rock, and then from there push off, and travel a five foot or more distance before he even reached Vincent's head, that he had some time to counter-act the movements. So, when Vince watched Gold go over the rock wall, Vincent quickly finished the movement of swinging the sword, and as he started coming up and over the sword in it's side-ways motion, Vincent reacted accordingly.

Quickly twisting the sword in his hand, while his right foot took a step back behind his left foot. This accordingly twisted Vince's body back and to the left, his right shoulder moving backwards as his left shoulder turned towards where the rock wall had been. This meant that the sword, as he turned it in his hand, was now held so that the sharp sides where facing the ground and the sky, and that the flat sides faced out. However, Vince's arm was now crossed infront of his body, but, when he stepped backwards and twisted his hand at the same time, he quickly pulled the right arm up and back towards his right side.

What Vince was aiming to do was to hit Gold as he flew past him. The kick that Gold had aimed to hit Vincent would fail, simply because he seen it coming, and stepped backwards and to the side, so that his body would be facing Gold as he moved on his path. Of course, Gold now had to worry about the massive sword as he moved mid-air.

The box still loomed near the stage. It sounded like something was eating within it. Well, if you were close enough to hear.

After seeing the golden glow basking over Gold's arms the hunter's right eye would begin to change. The pale blue tint within his iris would begin to shift out into the whites of his eyes which, themselves, seemed to bleed into the space which the color just left. Not that anyone would notice or anything with the fight going on, but it was there none the less. So with this sudden change in eye color the man would gaze through the textures of the fighters on the stage, seeming to hold some level of interest in Gold as he performed his flaming punch. The man wouldn't smile or chuckle or any of that mundane crap, but he did c**k his head a bit in contemplation of what was going on.

Since there was no interrupting fights and probably no need, the man would turn his eyes over to his team mates for a bit. With a look or two over the two individuals he felt little need to actually speak any words to them. After all, one was sitting there chanting a prayer, or something to that nature, while the other just sorta stood around seeming rather bored with the scenery. In the end the hunter decided to simply shrug it off and turned his attention back to the fight at hand. Though with Vincent taking a good brunt of the blows so far his faith wavered a moment, he didn't really know anything about his team after all. But with all the grinning and chuckling the man did he wasn't sure to think of him as crazy, cocky, or just humored by this whole thing. Regardless the man seemed to have a plan of some kind, so Zen would simply keep back and watch as everything fell into place.

Gold was quite expecting the reaction he got from his attack. He was expecting to rattle Vince up inside his tin can but instead it seemed as if he called down the wrath of god. The ground began to rumble and break up, swirling around to join the sandy swirls around the lower part of his opponent's form. And then to add it all up, Vincent began to shake like a mad genius about to unfold his master plan. What in the world was going on?

Whatever it was, Gold wasn't just about to sit around and let it happen. He pivoted on his right foot such that even as the brute stepped back, he was still to his rear and struck out with both hands. His fists tightened around the only hand holds he had, the spikes on his shoulders, and heaved to lift himself over the debris that accumulated while he kicked with both of his legs for the back of both of Vince's knees.

The weight on his back and the forcing of his knees outward would compromise Vince's balance and most likely force him to fall on his back. If this did occur and Vince ended up falling on his back, Gold would release his hand holds and push off so he was not squashed in the process.

Post Number: 5

Gold had made a serious mistake. This, was where things turned. The straps burned themselves free, which then released Vince's front-plate armor, which caused it to fall it forward. Even though it was being held in-place by the shoulder armor, it still tilted forward, and when Gold grabbed Vincent, and kicked at the backs of his armored legs, this is what happened. Instead of Vince's knees giving out and him falling backwards, his weight was directed more towards the front of his body, causing Vince to fall forward instead.

Not only was it due to the fact that Vincent was more top-heavy, but due to the fact that his chest muscles, and his armor tipping forward worked in his favor, and even as his knees buckled forward, Vince's boots slipped backwards, causing him to fall face-first towards the ground, just as.. yes. The motion of Vincent moving forward caused the iron plate that was protecting Vince's back to fall out from underneath the shoulder plates, falling clear of Vince's form. When this happened, there was a wet tearing sound, and the muscles on Vince's neck suddenly bulged, as did the muscles that could be seen on his back, on the exposed part of his under-arm, and his lower back.

The ripping sound, is what, would most likely prevent Gold from pursuing his attack on the fallen Vince. From his back, two large, leathered wings burst outwards from his back, both of them about nine feet in length if he were to spread them. At the same time this happened, Vincent's muscles bulged outwards, his skin quickly changed from the deep tan to a mixture of light and dark green scales, which were essentially draconic scales that showed through as Vincent gave the magical essence he had gathered its true cause and form. The scales which grew over-top of Vince's skin would now form a natural armor which was a bit resistant to hot, cold, and other forms of magic. The only way that Gold would do major damage to Vince's exposed skin would be to pierce it with a weapon.

That, or do extreme blunt damage, but with the expanded muscles, that would be crazy. Not to mention.. along with Vince's wings exploding backwards and his scales covering his body, claws burst forth from the finger pieces of his gauntlets and from the toes of his boots. The claws were massive, talon-shaped weapons that would slice as easily as Vince's sword did. Then, as crazy as it seemed, Vince's face expanded outward, turning into more of a snout. Jagged teeth grew from Vince's mouth even as his eyes turned into serpentine slits, growing sharp.

All of this occurred as Vincent slammed his hands into the ground to catch his fall, the rocks and sand that had been floating throwing itself to the ground after Vincent had pulled all the magic back from the air. All of this happened, and two more things also happened. From Vince's lower back a massive tail burst forth, whipping around violently, powerfully. It was almost as if someone were flailing around a giant arm. That.. and.. Vince's throat swelled.

Gold was in for it now.

"Timber!!!"

Gold wasn't one to talk but when Vince actually began to fall...he just couldn't help himself. And since Vince ended up falling forward instead of back, he decided to keep his hold, pulling himself up instead of letting go since there was no longer a fear of being crushed. But suffice it to say, he got way more than he bargained for.

Gold was hoping for an easy coast to ground but what he got was more like riding a bull at the rodeo with all the moving in shaking that vince's body was doing. Muscles bulging, armor falling away, wings shoving him the chest, causing him to bounce up and down on his ride like a boy fresh out the hood. All to find out that when everything was said and done, he was prone on top of a dragon or rather the wings of said dragon. He got popped a good one in the chest when these bad boys had popped out, but he offered no resistance was simply sent soaring up into a superman posiiton as his hands kept him firmly secured to Vince. Yeah, this was so like riding in the rodeo so much so that Gold was chuckling to himself as he remembered good times long gone.

Not one to let some bruising keep him down, or rather up in this situation, for too long, Gold Alexander would go to work. Instead of dwelling too long on his present situation, he'd treat Vince like any another combatant who he had a good hold on...he'd make it better. As his knees gave him support, Gold reached forward and wrapped both his arms around Vince's neck in a fashion that was commonly referred to as a rear naked choke. His left arm wrapping around to grab onto his right bicep while his right arm curled right up to rest behind the dragon's head.

Now while this hold was effective enough, Gold was upping its potential by using his own brand of fire. Dragon maybe be resistant to the heat of the flames but not to the physical nature of Gold's flames. So as he secured the hold, he'd begin to feed more power into his arms, causing the flames to grow and the pressure to increase. The final result that Gold's hold would be working Vince towards unconsciousness much faster than normal.

"Aww...s**t...."

Like most men, Gold like to be on top and he didn't take kindly to being flipped over. But in his situation there wasn't much he could to prevent that, so he just tightened his hold as much and he could and kicked his legs, more specifically his knees, out. His torso was going to be trapped underneath but there was no reason for his lower body to be as well.

"Hughhh..."

He'd softly groan as he was crushed under almost all of Vince's weight. Almost because Gold was neither bulky nor wearing much armor and wouldn't suspend his opponent too far off the ground. So anything that had protruded out of his back to some extent would feel the impact and bear some of the weight. Which included at least his tail, seeing as it was so massive, and his 9ft wings as well. Gold may save his back from pain but his legs were of to his size and thus his tail was afforded no cushioning. So all in all it was a sacrificial move to some extent, something that Gold could respect. After all falling on your back usually shot pain up one's tail bone, even more so when there is a tail attached.

The pain Gold feeling mounted on that he had been dealt before, causing his otherwise tight grip to loosen. Vince was not free per say but he could a bit more air and blood to his brain. Or at least he would have had he not decided to claw at the arms around his neck. His claws would indeed pierce to flesh but not too far or too easily. Gold's flames may not be the hardest metal known to man but they were solid enough to resist against the claws advances especially with all that energy Gold was feeding into him.

Although the previous decision to amp up his levels of energy was a purely offensive move, the increase of his flames had also served to fortify his defenses. So it would be slow going for a bit but the claws would eventually prevail, drawing blood from the skin and muscle of his forearms. But they wouldn't go all the way through or be able to move around much so far as 'shredding' went, instead they just get stuck inside and would have just as hard a time coming out as they did going in.

"Grr...."

Gold bit back at screams as his arms were pierced, tears welling up in his eyes. And for a moment there he thought that he grip was going to slack, that he was reaching the end of the rope with which he was attempting to strangle Vince.

But then came a blessing in disguise. The piercing of this flesh was followed by an electrocution, which of course brought more pain but that was not all. His body was flooding with electricity not only setting his nervous system on fire but also caused his muscles to contract all at once. This would not only restore but redouble the efforts of his arms as every last ounce of man power was squeezed out of them by the shock.

As for Senior Massive Tail, he'd have a hard time getting to his target. Gold's kidneys seeing were stuck under Vince like the rest of his body with his knees poking out from from the end of the wings. And besides that thing was either pinned to ground under Vince's body weight just as Gold was, or it was trailing out the bottom. Either way it take some real ingenuity to get at the parts of Gold that were buried under dragon flesh.

"GRRAAAAAHHHHHHAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!"

Vince may be the dragon but Gold was the one roaring his heart out as the pain rocked his fully clenched body.

Despite the fact that Gold's grip tightened again, Vincent had felt the loosening, and as quickly as he felt it, his nostrils flared and he quickly sucked in a breath of air, though it was short. It would keep him in this game a bit more momentarily, but it didn't matter, all it needed to do was keep him in the fight for a moment longer. Just a few moments longer, that was all, because Vince was winning now, and he knew it, he knew that he was winning based on the fact that he felt all of the muscles tighten in Gold's body.

The only reason he felt it, was simply due to the fact that he had willingly given Gold's muscles an extra push, and it was due to that extra push that Vince was confident that he would win his fight because of it. The small breath had sufficed to keep him concious for a bit longer, and, it gave Vince the chance to score one more solid hit. While he knew it took him a while to dig the claws into Gold's arm, it didn't take long enough, it only took a moment or two, and he knew that pulling the claws back out was going to be tough, but almost instantly after he felt Gold's muscles tighten, he pulled his arms outwards as hard as possible.

This would help out tremendously, because once the claws were removed, the electricity would stop, and Gold's muscles would unclench. This would also leave his muscles weak, stretched, and some of them possibly torn, depending on how his body reacted to the spasming of his muscles. Vincent knew that it wouldn't take long, because, just like a person who was shocked by an electric fence, or anything with high voltage of electricity, their muscles tightened, yes, but as soon as the electricity stopped flowing, their muscles untightened, and having close to no control, they fell over.

When that would happen to Gold, he knew that Gold would let go of him, and that would give him more than enough time to get up. So, Vince was busy yanking his claws from Gold's arm, as hard and fast as he could, even as his tail decided to go for a new target. True enough, it and the wings took a major bruising from being hit so hard, it didn't matter. Vince was ignoring pain as he made every attempt to injure Gold as much as possible, so, the tail gave up on aiming for the kidneys. They were against the ground, however, Vince's tail was between Gold's body and the ground, elevated a little bit, so, it slid out to the side, and then lashed backwards.

It was aiming to strike Gold directly in the ribs, to shatter a few ribs if possible.

Vincent was starting to sweat as the lack of oxygen was getting to him, but he knew, just knew, that he still had a little bit of fight left before he lost conciousness.

"All you fans watching at home, I hope you've got the DVR's set! You're going to want to watch this fantastic stalemate over and over again!" the foxgirl cheered, "These two are going to duke it out to the very end! Gold is relentlessly strangling Vince even as he's being crushed by all of the dragon's massive weight! Just look at that expression of pain on his face! Can we get a close-up of that?" Her tail wagged happily behind her, staying cautiously out of the way while getting her fill of Gold's agonized expression.

"C'mon, Gold!" Koto shouted through her mic, **"Give us a scream! Let us hear that chorus of breaking bones! I don't know how much longer I can take it, people! I want to hear those beautiful sounds of pure, excruciating agony, don't you?!"** The crowd's hollers and cries for blood echoed within the open stadium, egging on the fighters further.

Gold knew what was going on in his own body better than anyone else, so he could feel the stretching and straining, creaking and groaning of muscles pushed passed their limits. He also could feel the subsequent loss of energy as his source of artificial strength was released along with the flesh and blood that sprayed across his chest as those claws were released. And he knew what the final outcome would be if he did nothing. The beast would be loosed and with his muscles in such disrepair, Gold was not sure he could muster the strength to go toe to toe with it much longer.

However Gold was not quite ready to call it quits, no quite ready to let his team down. Sure he was captain, but only in name for he had yet to gain the respect and admiration of his team. Respect and admiration was not easily gained amongst this group, a team which consisted of fighters of several famous fighters. For him, a newcomer this fighting stage, to be a captain? Such a thing was unheard of, and unless he proved his was up to the task...he was afraid he would be nothing more than a burden. And at this time nor at anything was he willing to let this happen, not when he could do something about it at least. So with nothing left to loose and a lot to gain, Gold did the only thing he could in this situation to not only keep himself in the game but assure himself a win at the same time.

Twin flames erupted from the end of Gold's fists, their pointed ends both of sufficient strength and sharpness to pierce flesh. Probably weren't good enough to pierce a dragon's hide, not without putting more energy into them, but they would do for their purpose. And just what was their purpose? Well considering the fact that both of his fist were aimed at his own shoulders, it was safe to say that he was trying to do something crazy.

His hardened flames would pierce through his shoulders and their ends would billow out to prevent them from sliding out. This coupled with the flames already around his arms would serve to ensure that even as the electric energy escaped from his body and his muscles went limp, his hold would still hold. The flames keeping his arms rigid, and unable to unfurl and thus prevent the release of his sleeper hold.

And the only price was...

"GRAAAAAAAAAA----"

That s**t hurt like hell.

Not to mention the fact that just about that time he could hear the cracking in his ribs as the tail did its toll, his bruised and battered chest. At this point he would have normal released both his arms and legs as he felt the pain of ribs being on their last legs, but with his arms stuck in their current position only his legs would kick out.

----AAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH"

Seems Koto was getting exactly what she wanted.

His opponent was on his last legs and he could feel it.

The way that he had released his hidden card in a rush, pointing his secret weapon in the air in efforts to extinguish Gold's fiery techniques. A crafty method that would do half of what it planned, as the flames around Gold's arms would begin to die down, to levels a bit lower than when they had first flared up to protect him from the blade. It wouldn't do much to stop the force on Vince's throat but make it less painful on the neck area but still sending him into a slumber. Because even though those flames died down, Gold's latest bout of magical prowess, the flames that he had shot through his shoulders were relatively safe from the freezing rain. His fists had been buried against his shoulders the whole time and thus these flames were not only out of Vince's sight but everyone else's as well. The clothes he wore and his body had shielding those flames from snuffing Vince's latest assault. What little trickled down would do nothing little to snuff these bad boys out.

As for the tail and its attempts to blindside them, he would suffer them no more. When he realized Vince still wasn't out, the struggling was big sign of this, he figured it would be coming for a return trip. He had felt the first blow to his side and pain it caused him made him fear the damage, a second occurrence could do. He rocked to the side, reinforcing the ballooned section of one for blades through his shoulder blades to torque their bodies slightly to one side. The result was an increase in pressure on one side of his and relieved pressure on the other, causing a narrowing of the room in which the tail could "slide back in". Even if it did manage to pierce his side, it wasn't going to get at the goodies.

Thus the struggle of Vince versus Gold down to one decisive moment, a test of strength between the two combatants. On one side there was Gold, his one arm tethered to his ground by both a flaming blade through his shoulder and his tethered other arm. On the other there was Vince with two larger arms at his side but with the onset of muscle fatigue from lack of oxygen, his strength would be only a fraction of what it usually was. Who would be victorious? And who leave their team with a handicap? It wall a matter of time. It was all down to this moment...

.:Reputation is what other people know about you...

In the stands, the bear continued to cheer. He had seen this before! Vince was just playing dead! A tactic that he himself had used to try to gain an advantage. Soon, he would get up....

...why wasn't he getting up?...

Furry shoulders slumping, Tai rose from his seat, a mix of anger and a strange sadness welling up in him. This wasn't even a fight; how could the dragon succumb so easily? Shaking his large head, the bear shouldered his way past the crowd in the stands, and left the spectators. It was a sad day.

Mordecai looked up from his prayer, seeing the sparks of electricity play about the two fighters. The angel shook his head, and went back to his prayer, "And may the folly of our comrades be forgiven..." and soon concluded his holy communion. He rose, waiting for the announcement to be made, and for the next match to soon begin. Would it be his turn, or one of his comrades?

Staring straight ahead with his blank, void eyes, Mordecai waited. Was Lathander pleased at the dragon's performance, or disappointed? Was this all part of the Morninglord's plan? He did not know the divine purpose of this fight; that whole ineffability thing. So he would move forward, driven by faith and purpose, and await his turn in the arena.

...Honor is what you know about yourself:.

He feel as Vince finally begin to drift away, the lack of resistance showing that the dragon was going, going, gon--

CRACK!

His raised and therefore exposed side had been pierced leading to more cracked ribs and another bout of excruciating pain for Gold. How much pain and punishment could one man take, until his throat was too raw to scream and his body too broken to move? Gold was testing such limits right now, as Vince one more brutal attack to his body. A body which had groaned for too long to groan any longer, and thus only a wail could be heard as the electricity that roared through his body forced the muscles of his voice box to spasm.

Electricity that forced worn muscles to contract one more, tightening his grip in a way that did more damage than was necessary with Vince no longer awake to feel the pressure. And as the electric buzz left his body once more, he relinquished his flames allowing his arms to finally release their hold and fall away limply to his sides. He had obtained some sort of victory but a small victory it was with his broken ribs only serving to make the weight on top of him all the more unbearable. He just wanted to sleep, or rather he needed sleep, his body wasn't really able to take more of this pain. It was better to just...

II_Koto_II Wrote:

> "...Six! ...Seven! ...Eight! ...Nine!"

Oh, that's right. He needed to get up, he'd couldn't really sleep on the stadium floor. Other people had to fight on it after all. Just one problem...he'd couldn't really move right now.

*Aww....s**t.*

No worries, he'd used up most of his power in the fight but he had a little bit of power left. He just needed to scramble the power too...

Thwack!

A mini pillar of flame erupted from Gold's raised, inward facing knee which would both twist Vincent over slightly and shove Gold out and away. It wouldn't send him far but it would have enough umph to slide Gold far enough away from Vincent to relief the pressure.

Ahh, that's better.

He stared straight at Koto and whispered as loud as he could in his coarse broken voice.

"Good night and good luck."

His head rolled to the side and took a good long nap. As far as getting off the stage and off to the hospital, that was all up to somebody else.

((Posted this earlier, but decided to wait on Gold to respond before doing anything in the end. So just imagine this took place before Vince's post))

His words didn't seem to reach the angel, not that it really mattered. He was pretty sure that his words would've been dismissed in one manner or another anyways. That being said, it was likely the Dragon's fall that gave wind to the rest of the team's sails, as they likely had a stronger connection to this creature than the hunter himself. Still, he wasn't without compassion, as he'd await for the countdown to commence and for the arena to be given leeway to pass upon to take a stand atop its surface. No, he wasn't up to take the next stand for a fight, but rather after the ten count was done he'd crouch down before the figure of his comrade, examining the nearby unconscious Gold for a moment or so. His eye still held that strange glow about it, the pale blue color swirling within the whites of his eye as the eerie white took refuge within his pupil, and perhaps to those who could sense it they'd feel a spiritual aura swirling lightly across his toned body.

"Well fought." He'd say simply to the man as he gnashed out a rather half-hearted smile to the figure below just before taking a grip upon the fallen dragon's wrist. He'd hoist him up slowly but surely like a fallen soldier on the battlefield, a slight sense of understanding swirling within his grip as he did so. Soon after he'd take that arm and swipe it tightly around his neck, dragging the massive weight of the two-hundred-something-odd pound body back to the sidelines where he hoped a stretcher was waiting. If not he'd simply take a little journey to the medical tent to ensure the companion was well taken care of. It didn't really matter to the man, as it wasn't really his fight at this time, but rather that of the other two who would likely place higher stakes in these matches than he ever would.

Cameron strolled down the stadium isle to the front most row. He had just finished with his own catastrophically disastrous match, and was in the mood take his mind off the failure. He had arrived just in time to see the ending of Gold’s fight; smiling, amused by the dragons fall.

When reaching the first row, he squeezed his way into a spot between the cheering aberrations, much to their dismay. The demon’s moshpit rowdiness simply wouldn’t do however if Cameron was to enjoy himself, he needed some air.

Without thinking, the Thief’s daggers would slip from his sleeves. A few short seconds of swift stabbing, and bloody death screams later… Cameron took a seat down on his freshly made pile of dead monsters. The other aberrations quickly learning kept a good ten foot diameter around the man.

Content with his situation, he kicked back resting his hands behind his head, ready to enjoy the up coming fight. But of course, it started raining shortly after.

…

Shouldn't he say something? A few choice words of classy villainy? Oh, how the Devil wanted to say something overtly dramatic to the members of Draconic Fear right then and there to announce his impeccable presence, but he couldn't think of anything remotely close to the level of epic grandeur he desired. It was shame to say the very least, but no matter. Actions spoke louder than words, and the act of him coming up from behind Draconic Fear from their entrance should be startling to say the very least.

This was all by convenient accident of course. Roen didn't have the mind to pay attention to the layout of the stadium, and got lost on his way to his team's arena. Luckily, the hooting and hollering of demons was very easy to follow. So there he was, making his way past the lot of them, even Yujiro, as he made his way to the fallen Gold. Instead of kneeling and grabbing his fallen comrade, the Devil instead stepped past to allow the leathery hide of his tail to wrap about the ankle of the man, effectively dragging Gold with him on his way out of the ring again. Someone had to do it, so why not him?

Leaving Gold in the care of the hopefully capable medical staff, it wasn't too long until the Devil was approaching and stepping into the ring again, his stride never broken until he came to rest a good twenty feet or so away from his would be opponent. Only now did he find it odd that he was facing this man and not the other from earlier. Cocking his head and furrowing his eyebrows at the angel, Roen pursed his lips in..well, blatant disapproval. He wanted to have alittle spice of irony this round, but it looks like someone got second thoughts. The Devil held the Angel in contempt for discovering the wisdom to lengthen his lifespan. Sniffling and righting his head, Roen then looked up towards the sky to take careful note of the rain falling ontop of them all. Deep set garnet eyes then darted down to the floor beneath to regard the thin coat of now wet sand, stone flooring, a few destroyed tiles.

It was always nice to take the environment into consideration before doing battle. Now, to pay mind to Yujiro...

Here was a man that dwarfed the Devil (most people did anyway) and consisted of more muscle mass than should be possible. Not to mention he was uglier to look at than Ebris. Roen could not ignore the sense of foreboding that came with Yujiro Hanma's presence, but no matter. Courage was not the absence of fear, but the mastery of it. Taking in a deep breath, his chest rose and fell with the dramatic motions before he pushed his right foot behind him, the thick and leathery hide of his tail rising off of the ground for extended balance.

Roen was armed just as he was before his departure. Leather breastplate, mail, plate gauntlets, a gambeson, the works. The World Splitter was as always present as well, but though he was armed to the teeth, there was something missing. Something crucial - something he would, nor could, go into the tournament without. This important element was a prayer on his lips. Not a prayer to Christ, Buddha, or any God or Goddess any of these people might have heard of, but rather his personal deity. There were no boons to be granted with this prayer - No gifts of agility, strength, or greatness of mind - but only a tribute. He owed this supreme being his life, and it would please her to no end that blood would be shed in her name. A Devil's, or the poor fool brave enough to oppose it.

The lifted hide of his tail would slam down and crack the tiles beneath while his arm flew out in a simultaneous and dramatic gesture. To say he was looking for attention would have been the grossest of understatements; The Devil demanded it.

"I am not an innocent bystander - I am a threat to my enemies!"

"I am powerful and cunning - I am strategic and bold - I will not stand idly by!"

"I will take ground - I will advance -I will tear through my enemies, and my enemies will hate me!"

"I will not avoid the difficult fight!"

"I will fight! - I will be wounded! - I will be targeted, and I will bleed!

"I will not tire! My wounds will heal!"

"I will see tragedy! - I will feel pain! - But I will be restored, and my feet will not stumble!"

"My hands will hold fast! I will not-- be-- intimidated--! Nrrraaah!!" Raising his left hand and grabbing the wire-wrapped hilt of The World Splitter, The Devil twisted his torso and unsheathed the weapon in leveled slash, his entire body shifting and moving and following suite with in one giant spin while he angled the tip towards the ground, effectively ripping up small chunks and pieces of the tile beneath. At the end, Roen was facing Yujiro once more while hefting his massively long weapon onto the junction between his shoulder and neck. If the prayer up until this point was for the audience, the last portion of it was most certainly for Hanma. Brows furrowed, nose scrunched, and teeth bared in malice, Roen finished the chant beaten into the depths of his mind during initiation.

"I cannot be stopped! I will stand by my brothers in arms! I will fight until my last breath! I will push the limits! I scale the mountains! My enemy will cower, for I serve The Bloody Seere! Let she have mercy on my enemy, because I certainly will not!"

All that was left until the promise of war was kept was Koto's go-ahead.

.:Reputation is what other people know about you...

Mordecai was about to step forward when his teammate stepped past him, apparently intent on fighting the next match. Very well. He turned to go back to his spot when he heard the Devil speak. Half turned away, he listened, his fingers curling into a fist. Such talk, such blasphemy. Turning abruptly back towards the arena, Mordecai raised his hands and traced the sigil of Lathander the Morninglord. He closed his eyes and recited a short prayer, a wish for good luck and good fortune for his teammate in the fight to come..

"Whosoever shed last blood. By man shall his blood be shed. For immunity of god make he the man. Destroy all that which is evil. So that which is good may flourish. And I shall count thee amoung my favoured sheep. And you shall have the protection of all the angels in heaven."

His voice was serious, resonating with faith, with the utmost belief of his Lord. As interference was not allowed, this prayer would have no tangible effect on the coming match. But his voice would be just audible for both contestants to hear, just as Koto was counting down to begin the fight. Perhaps his comrade would hear it, and take comfort in the thought. Or perhaps the Devil would hear it, and understand what precisely he would be up against. Either way, after he was done he would go back to the waiting area, and sit. His turn would come soon enough.

...Honor is what you know about yourself:.

"I'll try not to kill you."

Yujiro didn't bat an eyelash at the rain that began to pitter-patter down, or at his opponent's speech. Words too often spoken were often for the weak of heart.

The shirtless Hanma began to make his way towards Roen, but he wasn't in any hurry. He just walked - one foot in front of the other. Rainwater poured down in rivulets over his upper body, and his red mane was matted against his skull now that the rain began in earnest.

All the while, he could only peel his lips back into a grin that seemed more like an animal bearing its teeth. The woman had given them the go-ahead, but he did nothing to quicken his pace. And here he was, with his hands still in his pockets.

He was content to walk.

The red-haired man didn't slow down or speed up when his opponent shifted the position of his sword, nor did he change anything when Roen decided to start his own approach.

In fact, unless something drastic happened, Yujiro wouldn't do anything, quite literally as if he were intending to bump into, and then walk right over his Devil opponent.

Of course, if they were to come chest to chest, that'd be worse for Roen than it would be for Yujiro - a sword couldn't do very much with no room to maneuver it.

So he only continued to walk, hands still in pockets.

Grinning all the while.

Roen and Yujiro seemed to share some good sense between them, as they stopped in front of each other, narrowly avoiding bumping into each other by a scant few inches that hung between them. His sneer held for a moment, before it twisted and darkened into a different expression - something bordering indignance, if such a base man as Yujiro could feel it.

Now that the two men were closer, Roen could get a good look at his opponent - and find that, in those features, there was truly nothing human beyond the anatomy. No compassion could be found in the bloody crimson of his eyes, or any other common emotion that would have contributed to the better portions of humanity such as kindness, or mercy. Nothing behind those eyes could even be considered animal-like: more like a wild, rabid beast, something that just killed because it could.

Bloodlust was the only emotion one could ever read from Yujiro Hanma; bloodlust, and the desire to dominate all around him and prove his strength.

And now, the Devil was challenging that dominance. The only response could be violence, unbridled and swift. Like two wolves, by meeting each other's gaze, they had already committed themselves to the brooding clash.

The Devil was staring up into Yujiro's face, and the man met his stare evenly. Without a single shift in his body language, the red-haired man's left leg pumped up hard. Aimed squarely for the space between Roen Jaeger's legs - the crotch. Armor would be nice, but it could only do so much to slow down the immense striking power that someone like Yujiro could summon.

His hands also slipped out of their pockets, but he didn't do anything with them.

Yet. He was content to wait.

Roen Jaeger.

Yujiro Hanma.

Toe-to-toe and staring each other down, every moment seemed an eternity until either one of them made a move on the other, and the Devil was determined to not be on the receiving end of the blow. But what in DeSeer's name could he do against a foe so massive and close? Reaching up to strike the man's face was folly unto itself - Roen would never over-extend himself like that - and a torso shot just looked stupid in his mind when he looked upon Hanma's massive muscularity. Knowing better than to look away, he continued to look into the crimson eyes of his opponent while he devised an attack. The man's lower torso and legs were the most accessible, but how best to capitalize on that? Instinct dictated the use of the Peskett, and shank the poor b*****d until he stopped moving, but that wasn't very original.

It also didn't make him look all that accomplished when he started Heaven Or Hell: Legend last year. No, Roen needed to employ something different to start The Dark Tournament. It was then that it hit him. No, not Yujiro's knee, but the idea to do the same. It was the only thing that came to him. It was perfect for handling the man who dwarfed him, easy to finish a flight quickly, and completely original. With the same amount of ease and display of unwavering balance, Roen lifted his right leg up to the groin of his opponent.

!!!

With a resounding and painful crack, both his and Yujiro's leg collided with one another, Roen's face immediately going shock-eyed with surprise. *You dirty ********> The Devil's mind roared, that same leg pulling away as he reeled from Yujiro in an effort to put some distance between them.

3*

There was a faint crack as knee jolted against knee. If Yujiro felt surprise, he didn't show it. Instead, his lips only split into a broad grin of glee.

He wants to win..

The crimson-haired man let out a bark of laughter, and almost matching Roen's movements in a sort of mirror image, began to advance, refusing to let the Devil have a moment's repose or a second's breath. His standing leg pushed off with the ball of the foot, and the raised leg pumped down to push off the ground while both his arms raised up at his sides as if he were being crucified.

LET HIM TRY!

His legs, long and every bit as muscular as the rest of his body, were more than strong enough for the task, and the one-two push off would propel him more than enough to keep up with his opponent. The force of the second leg coming down to practically stomp the ground spoke of the physical prowess of the man who was more of a demon than a human - it left small, spider-web fissures around an indented footprint in the stone.

And like a bear-trap, those grossly over-defined arms would try to snap close around Roen's upper body and possibly catch his arms in the process, pinning them to his sides. Roen had gotten to start moving first, and that gave him a few inches' advantage, but with the 6'8'' opponent's long reach, could the Devil truly escape Hanma's grasp?

Only if Fortune smiled on him.

The Devil might have well just signed a contract in blood - it was the same damning sort of action as letting Yujiro Hanma get his arms around him. To say that Yujiro was strong was somewhat of an understatement - he was monumentally powerful in terms of the physical fields of combat. His strikes and hand grip - which used mostly the wrist and forearm flexors for squeezing power - could crack and crumble stone.

What could his entire body do, when turned to the task of crushing a fellow human(oid)? His entire torso and arms seemed to flex, striations of hardcut definition etched out into his musculature just beneath the skin as his body became taut and hard as steel.

Roen Jaeger Wrote:

> I will push the limits!

And Yujiro squeezed. For Roen, it was going to be like he had just been put into a vice and squeezed in on all sides by steel, ground against a massive wall that was Yujiro's chest and crushed between his arms. It would only take a split second for Roen to feel the extreme compression of his rib-cage and his arm being pressed against it. Armor or no armor, it didn't do a whole lot to slow down the sort of raw, physical power that the Hanma warrior was putting out.

Unless he got out in the next couple of seconds, there were going to start being bones and the like cracking and making all the awful noises that peaceful, normal beings hated to hear. But Yujiro Hanma loved the sound - it spoke of victory.

To add further injury (as if such a thing were ever needed) the monstrosity of a human lowered his mouth and--

--CRUNCH--

--bit down on Roen's right clavicle, a scant few inches from the neck. He seemed to be trying his damnedest to bring his bottom and top teeth together - as if he were literally going to bite right through muscle, cloth, leather(?), and bone, and take a bite out of the trapped Devil.

That was all under the assumption that Roen was stuck where he was, though. Yujiro had no doubts that his opponent was a clever man, but a sharp wit only penetrated so far before brute force snapped it like a twig in the storm.

There was a faint crinkling sound of teeth gnashing against chainmail. That was a disappointment, but one Yujiro could deal with, given his situation with his opponent. He reared his head back, since his bite was futile, and the knife came straight down, close enough that it gouged a red line right down the length of Yujiro's face, before the tip dug a little into the flesh of his pectoral muscle.

This only made the man grin all the wider, though the look in his eyes was alight with rage. His opponent had very closely managed to kill the red-haired man, but he had done close enough - he had managed to wound Hanma, blood washing over the side of his face and covering one eye, while a gouge had been cut into the flesh of his chest. Perhaps out of some malign arrogance, this infuriated Yujiro.

And he squeezed even tighter. Whatever armor the Devil wore, it wasn't really going to stop Yujiro. The man could, without too much trouble, crush a chunk of cement in his hand, then crumble the remains even further between his fingers. The human's - if he could even still be called that - strength was beyond anything that should have been possible. Leather? Cloth? Roen would have been safer encased in steel.

If only for a little while. With the strength of most of Hanma's upper-body brought to bear, Roen was going to feel ribs give and snap with painful, sickening sounds. The Devil's whole rib-cage was quite literally being put under bone-breaking stress. Even Roen's spine was going to be giving out beneath the sort of squeeze going on. This wasn't a gentle bear-hug, it wasn't even the sort of crushing pain other fighters could impose - this was on an entirely different level.

But now, Roen was going to find himself in a position much like Baki's mother. The worst position you could ever put yourself in, with someone like Yujiro.

With his spine and ribs giving way beneath the monstrous pressure of that only the inhuman Yujiro Hanma could fashion, something stemming from the very depths of hell. It was very likely that, unless he passed out or otherwise gave in, he was going to die, or be left in a wheelchair.

Of course, he still had the knife. But at this point, with his upperbody being crushed into dust, there wasn't a whole lot that stabbing Yujiro would do, other than bloody him up. The pressure was already exerted, all he had to do was continue pulling his arms to his chest and folding them at the elbow - stab away at his chest and shoulders; delay the inevitability that came with Hanma's iron grip.

Roen, at least, had the claim to fame that he had managed to make Yujiro bleed. That much was an accomplishment very few had ever managed.

The idea that Roen had any manner of strength approaching Yujiro's was laughable, at best. The size difference should have been a big warning sign to anyone standing toe to toe with the likes of him.

The idea that Yujiro was anything remotely human was ludicrous.

He was a human in name only. Just as the wolf stalked its prey in sheep's clothing, so to did Yujiro - he was birthed of human life, and looked human, but he might as well have been a mountain, or a running river. He was a malign force of nature bent solely on dominance. Was he human? In a sense, yes. But at the same time, he was truly beyond humanity, something wholly different in the level of physical capabilities he had attained.

Roen was a Devil. But he still didn't have the same muscle mass as Yujiro, nor did he appear to have any inkling of a notion as to what sort of man he was fighting - Yujiro wasn't just strong, he was a monster in human form. Physical strength was the only weapon Yujiro had, and he had it in Spades. To try and match someone of Yujiro's sheer mass in a contest of physical strength was sheer folly. If Roen was supernaturally strong for his size - and he seemed to be - and Yujiro was supernaturally strong for his size, then it was fairly obvious who had the upper hand in strength. Still, the bigger man.

If Yujiro wanted to move his head back, then Gods be damned, because he would.

And he did - but, there was something to Roen that the monster of a man hadn't anticipated.

And that was magic. Surely, Yujiro was leaps and bounds beyond Roen in physical strength, but magic was supposedly the great equalizer. And it certainly helped Roen here. But if he thought he could kill the likes of Yujiro Hanma so easily, he was wrong.

SSWKTSCHT

The knife sliced right through Yujiro's cheek, punching deep into the flesh of his face. He had tried to rear his head back - that his, twisting and yanking away like an animal - but had met some foreign resistance. In that movement, he had seemed to save himself from death, instead only getting a knife through the flesh of his cheek, the blade sunk to the handle in his mouth.

Somehow or another, Roen had developed a phantom arm, or amazing abilities with his joints, as Yujiro had been biting his right shoulder (which is where the clavicle is), and yet the man had tried to stab him in the face with that same arm, which was pretty much physically impossible because you can't start a stab with a knife from behind the origin point of the same shoulder of the arm you're stabbing with. The arm simply doesn't bend like that.

But, apparently Roen had did it through some impossible, limber means, but he hadn't quite hit where he had wanted. Instead, he got the face - which didn't do a whole lot other than piss Yujiro off.

And thus continued the body crushing. Since Roen had apparently done nothing at all to stop it other than stab an unknown quantity of sharp metal into Yujiro's mouth, he would now be suffering from a handful of shattered ribs plus a crushed sternum to boot, and a spine that was pretty much disjointed and broken in several locations along the vertebrae. There was also some suffocation somewhere in that medley of pain.

Such was life.

Yujiro did have to give the Devil some credit - he was made out of sterner stuff than those he had faced before. This was probably attributed to the fact that he wasn't quite human - a fact that Yujiro had never really had to deal with, except when killing animals for sport. But Roen was clearly no wild animal.

There was a crack of knuckle on bone as Roen slammed his fist home into Yujiro's face. There was a double click of the jawbone popping out of place and back in, and the man's upper-body twisted aside with the blow. Most other people would have been crippled or dead by now, and the fact that Roen wasn't intrigued the red-haired Hamna.

Fortune smiled on Roen, but not only because of the blow he dealt - when he tried to get his legs between the two of them, Yujiro loosened his hold for some reason, and when the Devil extended his legs, the two were forcefully thrown apart, with Roen rebounding off of Yujiro's body like a coiled spring, and Yujiro forced two steps back.

The crowd wouldn't be any wiser - had Roen truly escaped, or had, for unknown reasons, the massive martial artist let the Devil escape his grasp. Probably a mixture of both. Roen was the first non-human that Yujiro had ever faced, in the sense of being a humanoid and not an animal or normal human. He was something otherworldly. Not something Yujiro had ever encountered.

Unfortunately, this was probably worse, because instead of just wanting to crush him and gain dominance, Yujiro wanted to understand what made an entity like Roen Jaeger tick.

And that usually required tearing the opponent apart to watch them suffer and go through the pain of defeat to truly understand what made them into who they were.

Yujiro smiled widely, but the mirth didn't reach his eyes. The knife dangled in the wound for a second, until Yujiro forced it out with his tongue, letting it fall down to the ground with a clank. He stood a good twelve or fifteen feet from Roen, his arms thrown up and out from when the man had rebounded off his body.

The strange musculature in his back was clear for all to see - the Grinning Demon. The muscles were contorted, not of human anatomy, and imitated the face of an olden demon with a gleeful sneer. Very few men ever attained it - it came when a man stopped killing for survival, and started killing for the sake of killing itself.

The Demon didn't smile for long though, as his arms fell back to his sides. Even from afar, it would have seemed as though he were looming over the Devil, blood running down in rivulets off his cheek and dripping to the stone floor of the arena.

"You're an interesting opponent - but our fight isn't over. Get up! Get up and fight me," Yujiro goaded, sneering all the while. It was clear that he held the advantage here - both of Roen's weapons were out of reach, and the man had suffered some pretty clear damage after the exchange. So had Yujiro though - at least, he was uglier. It didn't slow him down in the least, though. Pain was a customary feeling for the warrior, and he had long since found ways to blot it from his mind.

(P-P-P-PARADOX TIME!)

"The final match of the first round of the Dark Tournament is about to begin!"Koto announced with her arm raised dramatically over her head. The demons were roaring and screaming for more blood, anxiously awaiting the start of the next fight.

"Will the last two fighters please approach the ring!" the foxgirl requested.

Koto looked at the two sides of the arena, gathering the last two fighters together. "The last competitor for Team Draconic Fear will be Mordecai Keller!" she announced, and peered over at the other side. However, the only two people present were those who already fought.

"Huh? Who's fighting for Eep Opp Ork Ah-Ah?" she inquired, puzzled. Somehow, she felt a little awkward after having to say their team's uncanny name for the umpteenth time.

From the eastern side of entrance, poured forth two burly demons servants hired on the behalf of Team Eep Opp Ork Ah-Ah. These muscle bound nastiest were some of the ugliest sons of bitches that the demon world had to offer, two mishapen piles of skin and muscle. The pair quickly made their way towards the platform upon which the fighting had and would take place, their long strides putting him at their destination in no time at all.

Once this out of place pair arrived, they would turn towards the shaking box on Eep Opp Ork Ah-Ah's side of the field. A key was produced and the lock was quickly undone, leaving nothing but the two fortified doors to protect the outside world from the beast held within. Each demon approached one of the doors, took it tightly in their grip and pulled, causing the door to begin to creak open. Their actions releasing whatever had been locked up inside to the outside world.

The only question left, was the outside world ready to met the box's contents?

One particular figure in the stands sat on the edge of her seat since the fighters, Roen and Yujiro, had both entered the arena. She was covered from the rain in a dark green cloak, shadowing all but the tan skin of the lower half of her face. Her bottom lip quivered every so often, watching as the battle progressed in the arena below. She seemed concerned about the participants of the battle... one in particular.

There came a sharp gasp from the cloaked spectator, the high tone of the voice sounding female and particularly youthful. The fighter with the spaded tail had been thrown onto the ground, causing her to jump from her seat and jolt to the aisle, taking the steps down two at a time. She couldn't reach that wall fast enough, the final barrier between the stands and the arena, sitting about six feet above the arena floor.

The rain came down harder, the thunder crashing overhead and the wind from the skies blew the hood away from her face. Drenched in the downpour, the Djinn Raelin did not tear her eyes away from the fight.

"My master is in danger..." she thought, frozen where she stood, "... Is this... Is this what he would willingly throw himself into? He could die... he could..." Raelin's mind was running wild, as she looked at her hands. She couldn't use her magic... she'd been forbidden. Without a wish to guide her cosmic abilities, she was powerless to help. Raelin wasn't allowed to interfere... besides the fact that it was illegal in the tournament rules to do so, Roen's pride would not allow her to give him any form of reprieve.

But... wasn't the life of her master worth saving, even in exchange for a loss of the battle?

Her voice was frozen as her caramel-colored eyes did not stray for a moment from the fighter's current positions, her hands clutching the stone wall that she was peering over so tightly that it made her hands tingle from the hard rock against her soft skin.

What could she do?

"Roen!" her voice cried out, the ring of her innocent plea carrying across the arena, even without the use of amplification. Raelin took her duty as a genie seriously, and always used the title 'Master' before calling the name of the one in possession of her lamp. She knew Roen had always disliked it, but in her honest terror of losing the Devil from a staged match against Yujiro, she'd completely forgotten it.

Her eyes were wide, unable to move from where she stood. She wanted to see her treasured Master live long enough to let her grant his two remaining wishes...

The side was being moved. Light escaping the confinements of the perpetual dark. This caused a low growl to emit from within the contents and anger to truly begin to burst forth. That side went flying across the area, the two burly demons probably going along for the ride as a giant of an ugly a b*d stepped out of it. It was ****** hungry, and it had a gut that said...it liked to eat.

Moosh came forth and stepped onto the ring. Weapons being dropped to the ground with a crash that would shake the platform. A multiple ton warhammer, and a giant "cleaver" of metal. The beast itself was over twelve feet tall, and the gut itself was bigger than his opponent was tall. Across it was strapped a piece of metal that shaped around his gut and had stylised teeth on it. A sign to the Great Maw.

"Great Maw hungers," Moosh said. The voice low and more along the lines of a growl.

It would merely stand there as the man armed himself and spoke. It was a pasty thing, but the Ogre didn't care in the very least. He was waiting and would continue to wait. Yet, the look the ogre gave was one of complete and utter stupidity. It didn't change. The beast was one of violence. Hell, it would be able to take on a Black Orc and easily stand its ground. Sure, the ogre looked fat as ********, but hey, there's a reason why they ate so much. It was pretty much slabs of muscle beneath the fat.

Thus, it continued to wait until the thing came towards him. The weapons on the ground, but could a thing with such...puny weapons truly hurt something of such bulk? The thing probably weighed over five times the weights of his opponent.

Am I...being defeated?

Rolling over and onto his side, Roen pressed his gauntlet encased hand on the slick tiles beneath and shut his eyes, closing himself off to the world around him, not wanting to pay attention to whatever boos may come after the failure he had just gone through. His pride was wounded, his morale was all but gone, and he had lost all resolve to get up from the spot he called his own little slice of Heaven. Never minding the fact that he was certain that he didn't have the required strength to rise up and face a person who imposed more intimidation than anyone the Devil had fought in Gaia before; the goading of said individual only serving to demoralize him further. Chin dropping to his chest and his eyebrows scrunching together, Roen had a face that could only be described as the epitome of self-loathing and humiliation. He only massaged his back through the thick leather of his armor, tuned himself out from the world around him, and waited for it all to be over on Koto's tenth and final count.

But then something happened that he could have never predicted - two voices so familiar that they split through his forced ignorance of the crowd around him. How his stomach rolled at the familiarity, the knowledge that people he knew on a personal level were watching his a** getting handed to him. Stilll...Opening his eyes and pushing his palm into the ground, Roen lifted his torso away from the floor and looked around. To think he could find any one of the two in the dense crowds was absurd, but he had to try. Nothing but the faceless mass, until his eyes finally landed on the grotesque and towering form of one Yujiro Hanma. Suddenly, this didn't seem right. Suddenly, Roen found it more humiliating to be on the floor feeling sorry for himself than to be on his feet. Suddenly, he found the most curious desire to fight. To fight, be fought, and fight some more. Pulling his legs underneath his body and sliding his other hand onto the tiles, The Devil went about the tedium of gathering himself up and onto his feet.

All he had were his little dukes now, and it wasn't long before he was defying the painful pressure in his back to square his shoulders and rise to his full stature. His fingers curled, fists tightened, and Roen slid his throbbing right leg behind him while letting his arms dangle. The Devil's little dukes - all he needed to keep fighting, he realized. The World Splitter might not be in his hands, but he was still linked to the fallen and dirty blade, and that link gave him what he needed to swing those little dukes. It didn't make him stronger than Yujiro, nor would it ever...but by the Bloody Seer, he would make them hurt the b*****d. This was going to be another push of another limit for the untrained Roen - a lengthened exposure to the depths of Hræðilegr's power. Power being the blade that made its housing into a toy. Strangely enough though, no side effects were manifesting themselves. Yet. He counted his blessings in this, praised the Bloody Seer, and set his jaw at Yujiro. Confidence was restored to the Devil and it shown in his eyes as well as his posture.

"Have at you, Yujiro." He would saying, knowing in his bones that this was just the beginning. There was more brutality and pain to come, and everyone would remember today as the day that Yujiro Hanma and Roen Jaeger entered the ring. Who won wouldn't be the question asked by those unfortunate enough to not have seen this match - who left alive..yes, that was the more appropriate question to be asked. Bracing his body and lifting his left fist, Roen beckoned the monster of a man to come at him.

(Moosh vs. Mordecai)

"Eeek!" Koto yelped as the huge ogre burst out from the box, losing her balance as the stone arena floor shook, catching herself before falling over.

"Oh... Oh my! Is this the last member of Team Eep Opp Ork Ah-Ah?" Koto asked, taking a few steps backward to remain out of the massive ogre's way. "I don't remember seeing anything like that in the roster..."

A small pinging noise sounded over the arena, and brought Koto's attention to the large LCD screen mounted up in the stands. The screen displayed the name MOOSH, as well as a small green 'X', giving Koto the okay to go.

"Uhhh... Moosh? What a name! Hopefully he'll give us a fight to remember!" Koto shouted, and the demon fans began to roar again. Everyone in the stadium was soaked in the rain, and it didn't look like it was letting up.

"The final fight of the round is ready to begin! Mordecai Keller of Team Draconic Fear vs... Moosh of Team Eep Opp-- you know what? I'm not saying that ridiculously long name again! Just start the blasted battle already!" she grunted, before swinging her hand down for the start.

"FIGHT!"

By now the rain had stopped, and Cameron despite his jaded tastes was more than interested in the Roen v Yuiro fight, nerviously chewing on a nail. Something as gruesome as Yujiro was rare to come across, he wouldn’t wish fighting him on anyone… well, anyone except Sokoya.

“Gee Soak! Let’s hope for your sake Roan wins!” He teased… or did he?

II_Koto_II Wrote:

> > > "FIGHT!"

1

.:Reputation is what other people know about you...

Nothing happened.

Not right away, anyway. Moosh was content in waiting, the mound of muscle and, largely, fat standing idle as the crowd eagerly awaited the fight. But nothing happened immediately. Mordecai did not rush forward, did not charge ahead blades bared. Instead, he observed his opponent. He considered the battle ahead.

Mordecai relied on wits and agility to avoid most physical harm; he had the angelic resistance to hold his ground against most non-physical means of attack such as magic. However, Moosh didn't look the type that needed to rely on spells to rip someone apart. The problem that presented is that Moosh played entirely towards Mordecai's weaknesses. Mordecai's blows landed a little softer than most opponents' - a point often made moot by the sharpness of his blades - and he could not take the same degree of physical punishment. Moosh was several times his size. What all this meant was that Mordecai would have to fight defensively, remain mobile, and avoid almost every major blow that Moosh sent his way. This would leave little opportunity for himself to remain on the offensive.

Further, how would the crowds react, if Mordecai avoided harm? While he did not doubt it would be perfectly plausible to remain relatively unscathed with smart movements, the crowd wanted blood, they wanted a show, so he might be deemed a worthless competitor if he walked away with anything to show for it.

All of this circled his head behind blank eyes. Somewhere in there, a plan was beginning to form, but for now he merely stood his ground. He gathered up the energies that rested in his soul, storing for later use. Granted, Mordecai did not have much by way of his abilities, but he had a few old tricks.

Then, as the crowd began to grow weary, Mordecai took a step to the side. He began to walk in a wide circle, taking carefully calculated steps as he circled Moosh.

Charge: 1

Edited - post number

...Honor is what you know about yourself:.

2

.:Reputation is what other people know about you...

So it had begun. The massive ogre had hefted the warhammer and headed towards the circling Mordecai. It wouldn't take long but hefting a weapon that big couldn't be easy - the strength it must take. Mordecai began to doubt his odds in this match.

However, it was a straight-forward enough maneuver, and as Mordecai was already circling around Moosh, all the angel had to do was pick up the pace with a few faster steps, gathering momentum as the ogre approached. Even not knowing what exactly Moosh had in mind, the point of his movement was to make a moving target, circling to force Moosh to follow his movements. When the weapon came down from above, a monolith of death that could grind him faster than he could say a prayer, Mordecai would dive out of the way. However, diving in the same clockwise direction as he had been already circling was opening himself to an easy counter, so instead he would at the last moment plant his foot and launch off in the opposite direction. His arms would remain tucked close to his body, in case he had to ward off an unexpected assault.

While a normal man's dive might be able to clear the head of the gigantic weapon, Mordecai's angelic nature meant that even small movements sent him floating much further than expected. As if gravity had a weaker hold on his divine form, Mordecai's evasive dive would take him several times the distance it normally would have, clearing the weapon and Moosh's immediate vicinity. Sailing just above the ground, he would land on his shins, the metal of his shin guards screeching against the ground as he slid across the arena floor, taking him a good twenty feet total away from Moosh. His dive was angled back, towards the edge of the arena, where he would find his footing, awaiting the next move.

Edited - post number

...Honor is what you know about yourself:.

Yujiro completed his spinning heel kick, feeling his foot slice through nothing but air. That fact disappointed him, and at the same time made him feel a keener desire to continue the fight - if he had struck Roen, it would have felt as if there were no real challenge to the battle. His opponent's resourcefulness, and clearly inhuman traits (such as the tail) were something Yujiro Hanma had rarely found in opponents. It had been a long time since he had found an opponent who he hadn't outright killed in the first or second exchange of combat.

The red-haired warrior landed on the balls of his feet, facing his Devil of an opponent with a broad grin. The rain had begun to die down, and his hair clung to his shoulders and face limply, while the hole in his face still dribbled out blood from the wound, the occasional glimpse of teeth visible in the gash. But what did Hanma care? He had an opponent, a challenge. That was the only thing that mattered.

Without much pause or deliberation, he began to advance again, his hands brought up in something similar to a boxer's guard, but with the hands open and facing Roen like claws. He wasn't charging quickly, nor was he walking - he was moving at a steady "combat pace" to cover distance quickly without getting ahead of himself.

For all intents and purposes, it looked like he was going to get well within the Devil's range again and try to grab him. But looks could be deceiving - with someone as strong and physically capable as Yujiro Hanma, those curled fingers could act as claws as surely as a tiger's could. Perhaps not tearing flesh with the same fatal elegance, but with the same striking potential all the same.

Roen might have been slowing down, but the bigger man seemed to only be getting started in their bout of brutality. Did he feel pain? Did he tire? The Devil could only hope.

A loud buzzer sounded across the stadium, causing Koto to wince momentarily before turning her attention towards the large mounted screen in the stands.

"Already?" she asked herself, looking mildly disappointed. "But things were getting good..." the foxgirl muttered, shuffling her foot back and forth stubbornly a few times before clearing her throat and getting back into her pro-announcer groove.

"What do you know, folks! Looks like the tournament committee says we're out of time! Have to keep a schedule, you know..." she said, receiving an array of screams and boos for having to stop the fight. Koto's ears pointed downward, looking a little distressed. "Don't worry, fight fans! I promise they're be plenty of blood in the next round, too!"

Koto glanced up at the screen, enthusiastically presenting it with a dramatic wave of her arm. "If everyone will please turn your attentions to the screen, we'll find out who our victors are! Tournament Committee, please display the winners of the round!" The foxgirl watched the massive LCD screen as closely as all the rest of the fans on the edge of their seats were, their breath taken away as they waited in anticipation to see how the match was called.

Who would be going home? And who would have to fight for their lives again?