Hawk and Vidu, brothers once upon a time... now at each other’s throats.

Hawk kicked him in the chest, a front kick jammed with power to throw him away. Vidu was no longer able to compete against him.

His body eventually boomed against the layered barriers, creating a recoiling blast that reverberated across the arena.

The VVIPs above looked again, their eyes refilled with excitement, staying on the fallen figure.

Vidu gradually straightened himself. None of the two had yet shown their blessings, it was a raw exchange of skills.

Fortunately, Hawk had an extreme upper hand.

"The Fiend, indeed. That was what he was called back in those days," said Ildiem as he nodded at the man in the golden mask.

The guy in silver chuckled. "The Fiend! A bit excessive for someone who never stepped on the battlefield."

Another man spoke, a man who wore a green mask, one of those who had yet to speak. "That is exactly the reason he has that moniker.

Wars don’t demand fancy names for hype, fighting organizations do."

"My opinion differs." Another man spoke, he had a soft voice, belonging to a calm aged man.

If compassion and wisdom had any voice, it would be that one. He wore a mask of orange color.

"Care to explain, Mr. Orange?" asked the green masked man.

A strange elderly giggle abruptly came out. "Mr. Orange! Haw Haw Haw!" he wheezed.

The fellow masked men chuckled, though a few of them didn’t react.

"What else should I say between unfamiliar guests? Perhaps, you want me to call you by your actual name. I surely can do that."

"Haw Haw. No need, I may be old but not leery. It just feels awkward, orange is not even my favourite color.

But well, someone picked the colors for us without caring for consent." He looked at the man in the golden mask, who gave him a side look before focusing on the fight again.

Others barely chuckled at that joke, only the man in orange somehow looked careless around the golden masked man. 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝒆𝒘𝙚𝓫𝙣𝙤𝒗𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝙤𝙢

Mr. Orange continued. "Monikers and such fancy names are a requirement, they put you at a psychological advantage."

"Do they?" The man in green inquired.

The orange masked man leaned forward and whispered. "If not, then why do we have Titled Generals?"

The voice was heard by everyone regardless.

The man in green nodded and turned his head.

"You should have said that out loud, why such useless whispering?" The man in a silver mask retorted.

"No fun in that, Mr. Siiilllveerr." He dragged the last word long before cackling, his laughter looked like a gamble with life.

Every breath looked like his last, he wheezed and coughed yet his laughter only got louder.

"Such a dramatic thespian, throw him back to the peninsula," the silver masked man uttered.

Thane and the rest felt suffocated, they couldn’t talk, as if they unintentionally believed that they did not belong here.

They should have been somewhere around those stands like the other thousands of people, or so they thought.

Until the door was knocked on again and a new man stepped forward, a tall man with wide shoulders.

Max and John looked in disbelief, Thane, on the other hand, was slow to process. However, he eventually understood the shock.

The man wore a familiar mask, it looked like one of the three statues in Den of Legends.

"Hey." He hit Max with an elbow. "Doesn’t that mask resemble the one you gave to your father?"

"It’s the same mask," said Max weakly.

"It’s the same." Thane looked at the man in confusion until he realised. "Oh!"

The gasps of the audience grasped the attention of everyone.

"Time to witness why he is called The Fiend," Ildiem said with a proud grin, he wished he could see their faces.

Ildiem himself was also unaware of the guests’ identities.

Reginald merely told him that the guests were extremely important and must be handled with utmost care and respect.

A few moments earlier.

Vidu was slammed against the barrier.

Hawk slowly walked. "Don’t weaken yourself. Transform."

Vidu gritted his bloodied fangs. "Why did you do that, Hawk?"

"Morris killed my mother," Hawk stated.

Vidu snapped. "Not him, me. Why did you poison me? Why did you tell our father to arrange our fight?"

"Not our, yours," Hawk uttered, his face was cold as an ancient glacier.

"I adored you, unlike Teo, I always considered you my brother. But... you betrayed me." Anger surged and so did his blessing.

Vidu breathed. Once, twice and then the change appeared.

A deep crack echoed through the arena as his back shifted.

Muscles swelled beneath his skin, expanding with monstrous force until his veins bulged across his arms and neck, dark like the roots of an old tree.

The floor beneath his feet fractured from the sheer pressure. Some of the audience fell silent, while others gasped in terror.

Bones snapped and reformed with sickening sounds. His shoulders broadened unnaturally, rising higher and higher until the man who stood there moments ago was gone entirely.

Thick reddish fur erupted across his body like wildfire spreading through a forest.

Vidu Morris was now ten feet tall, a massive ferocious fiend.

He looked like a bear but his posture was that of a man. In other words, a monstrous fusion of both.

His hands twisted into gigantic claws capable of ripping steel apart, while his jaw extended into the savage maw of a predator that chews on sindhium.

The braided beard remained beneath the monstrous features, hanging against a chest now broad as a fortress gate.

The arena barriers trembled as a shockwave burst from his transformed body, scattering dust and rattling the VVIP glass chambers above.

Some spectators instinctively stepped backward despite the distance between them.

And when Vidu lifted his head, the roar that exploded from him no longer sounded human.

Hawk watched that, not a single drop of sweat nor a wrinkle of worry could be seen on his face.

He paid no heed and immediately used his blessing, both of his arms turned into diamond.

Royal blue in color, the gleam they gave made him look more like an antique than a fighter.

"Now that is a fight worth watching, a bestial transformation against an elemental transformation," said the man in a silver mask.

"How did that fool Morris get his hands on such talents? This is insanity, they are rare geniuses. We must enlist them in the army," commented the man in a black mask.

"Forcefully?" questioned the gentleman in an orange mask.

"If necessary!" answered the black masked man.

"I gave him several offers. He rejected every single one of them," the orange masked man said with a sigh.

"Nobles who dally around brothels without considering the possibility of offspring disgust me.

Any one of those two could be a potential general," said the man in black mask.

"Shh." The person wearing a golden mask hushed, placing a finger on the lips of his mask.

The chatter stopped. He then looked at the black masked man. "There are hundreds of them, bastards and ousted, lying around the slums like pups.

How many of them have you found? Tell me one name. Who knows the slums better than you?"

The man in the black mask lowered his head in embarrassment.

"Morris, despite his flaws, was a man of calibre. He possessed an eye for people, just like me," he said as he turned his eyes to the newcomer who wore a frog-faced mask.