Prologue: The Rumors At Rolin

Before you ask, I was given permission by the previous author to continue this fanfic.

It took me several minutes to finish the large application to sign him up for ''The Struggle''. There were many pages of information needed, and many bits of the information that were asked for made no difference in the games. I walked over the huge platform set up for The Struggle Tournament that was going to go on tomorrow, in the courtyard in front of the Memory Skyscraper Hotel. I walked over to the skinny man wearing a suit in the corner, with a large brown moustache. Around him were several other teenagers, handing in their applications. I handed him the paper and went to see who else was going to be in the tournament. There was Thiago, Pedro, Anthony, Ahmed, Logan, Jesse, and the former winner of The Struggle Tournament, some kid named Eald'Narche.

Many people were expecting this to be a great fight, with many competitors, most of them quite active, joining the Struggle. There are tens of thousands of people living in the city of Rolin, and life is not easy. However, an inventor seeks to make life easier with a rediculous invention known as an 'automobile'. Its supposed to run on gas and transport people, but walking works just as well! Many people told me 'Good luck tomorrow, Marcello. Hope you win.' as a sign of reassurance. Still, I couldn't get it off my mind, and I knew that as soon as I get back home, I'd have to train. I glanced down at my watch- 7:15 pm. I had to get home for dinner and training. I walked for half an hour through the twisting alleyways and streets of Rolin, as usual. When I got home, I found that a plate of excellent lasagna was waiting for me.

I thanked my mother for the food, and ate it hungrily. I ate quickly, impatiently, so I could get to my room and train against my punching bag. In a mere 10 minutes, I was finished, and sprinted to my room. It was still almost 8:00, so I had four hours. Of course I wouldn't use those 4 hours for training, only two. I knocked the bag back and forth, dodging its returning blows. By the time I was done, I was sweating all over my chest, and I took a hot shower. It was nearly 10:20 pm by the time I finished my shower, and I went to play some games. Then, I heard my doorbell ring, and I went to answer the door. It was Anthony, along with Jesse.

'Hey Marcello, want to come out and do what we were planning to do last week?' Jesse asked.

'What was that?' I wondered, my memories of last week clouded by more important things.

'We were going to go check out mysterious spots. Y'know, weird crap. There are three- one behind your house in the big circle park at the fountain, another about sounds of laughing and screaming under the abandoned house across from Memory Scyscraper, and a last one about a locked door in the basement of the Memory Skyscraper. Did you know that nobody has ever, ever managed to open that door? No one knows its origins, hopefully we can find out.' Anthony said, a tone of excitement in his voice.

'Those are only rumors, and I intend to prove that to you! I just need to go get my jacket first, since its cold.' I said, finally remembering our activities. I returned in a few moments with my jacket and we set off.

We didn't even need to use any map to find our way, we had lived here all our lives. First stop was the park. I entered the huge park, spanning a half-mile, which featured loads of trees and a few large ponds. It was originally a set of mansions, but was destroyed in a fire, reconstructed into a park. The city urgently needed one. There were many routes through the park, and there were barely any people around as we walked through the path. At the center of the park was a gorgeous fountain. It was in the shape of a fireman, in honor of those who saved the lives of the hundreds trapped amidst the fire long ago. It spat out water into its bowl surrounding it, through one of those hoses firemen carry around. Of course, the pressure of the water was only a fraction of the full strength of a fireman's hose.

'So, you say there have been… black inky creatures showing up around here?' I asked, looking around.

'That's what I heard.' Anthony said, scratching his head. 'This place is busted, I think.'

I dipped my head in the water, and noticed nothing. In seconds, I had seen enough, and tried to tug my head out of the water. It wasn't moving! I felt my head dip farther inside against my will. Instantly, I saw 2 glowing yellow lights deep in the water, bobbing up and down but always remaining parallel. I tried to pull my head out, but something was stopping me. I could move my arms, just not my head. I began to struggle, as I exhaled into the water. I had to find a way out, and quickly. At last, after a few moments, the eyes got closer, and I saw an oval head, pitch-black, looking at me from deep within the water. It had no mouth, only two lidless yellow eyes, and two thick zig-zagging tentacles on its bald head.

Then, I felt the invisible force release me, and I threw myself out of the water, gasping for air. I fell down on the floor, inhaling, Jesse and Anthony having no idea what had just occurred. They pulled me up quickly, as I coughed, enjoying oxygen once more.

'Marcello, what happened? We were trying to talk to you, but your head was in the water. You stayed there for almost half a minute, and we thought you were going to drown soon. Turns out you almost did.' Anthony said, shrugging his shoulders.

'I saw it, I saw something.' I said, coughing. 'I saw a creature, yellow eyes and a black head, no mouth.' I said. Suddenly, I remembered exactly what had happened.'Hey, did any of you two hold me in there!?' I asked.

'No, we wouldn't do that. Anyway, you say you saw something in there? Well, time to check' Jesse asked. He walked over to the fountain, and dipped his head in. After a few seconds, he removed his face from the water. 'I saw nothing. Nothing yellow glowing or anything.'

'Strange. Anyway, we'll just say the mystery is busted, since Jesse didn't see anything. Sorry man, I think you're going insane.' Anthony said, chuckling.

I wondered, as we walked out of the park and toward the memory skyscraper, what had happened at the fountain. I decided to keep it out of my mind as I focused on what was happening now. Once we reached it, we walked up one of the slopes leading to the lobby. We asked the secretary if we could be lead to the basement, and uncover the mystery. She warned me not to touch anything, and allowed us entry. It was dim, with only one light, and was a large room with many cabinets, covered by tarps. At the end, stood a large, tall white door. It had 2 handles, fancy objects, and with the color of gold. In-between them was a large keyhole, like those on typical door handles, except much larger. A line ran vertically across the door, through the keyhole.

I walked up to it, in awe at the beauty and size of this door, Anthony and Jesse responding to the shiny door similarly. Anthony pulled the handles back, but nothing happened. We stuck our hands a foot into the depths of the heyhole but felt nothing. This was a thick door. Jesse glanced around the room and noticed a small hammer at the corner of the basement. He ran up to it and picked it up, dragging the huge thing to the door and then swinging it at the large door. Even with all his strength, the hammer simply bounced off the door, not even leaving a scratch.

'So, the rumors of the door existing are true then.' Jesse said, speaking to himself. He looked towards us, and put the hammer down. 'Lets get going, this mystery cannot be solved, the door won't open.' Jesse said, sighing in defeat, and walked towards the stair leading up to the corridor, which in turn, leads to the lobby.

Anthony followed, and I pondered the possible relation between these two events for a second. I quickly became absorbed in my thoughts, and by the time I looked up, the two were already up on the stair and had left the basement. I suddenly heard a loud click behind me, and turned around. It came from the keyhole, and I walked up to it, pulling the door handles. The door easily opened, and after pulling it a few inches, I saw an immensely bright light emitting from within. I opened it fully, and the light bathed the entire room in warmth. Then, I felt a strong wind from within the room, pushing me away from it. It threw me onto the ground, and small objects in the basement began floating towards the far end of the room.

I quickly grabbed the side of one of the cabinets, and tried pulling myself up to no avail. I then noticed one of the small purple objects fly out of the door towards me. This was the fictional shape of a heart, you know, with the two curves. Yeah. I couldn't believe it, and I was too deep in thought to pay further attention to it. I felt a small pop, like a bubble disappearing, and the heart was gone. Unexpectedly, hundreds of other hearts started to pour out of the door, until the whole room was filled with hearts, and the unnatural wind ended.. I dropped to the ground and started moving through what felt like a pool of hearts. Each one felt like a small bubble, and once I touched one of the 'hearts', it popped. Once I reached the door, I quickly slammed it shut. I looked back, and saw every one of the hundreds of hearts in the room began to float towards me.

I didn't know what was happening, and I suddenly felt an immense feeling of energy as I absorbed the heart-shaped bubbles. In about a minute, the hearts had been absorbed, although I felt an odd feeling. I suddenly felt energetic, like I've never felt before, my body pulsing with strength! I leaped up, and felt myself be propelled by an unknown force, easily touching the ceiling. Honestly, that had to be at least 10 feet high. I felt my body limbs be augmented, and felt like I had no match. Nobody could conquer me! Then, I suddenly snapped out of my thoughts- where have Jesse and Anthony gone? Ah yes, they have left. Wasting no time, I ran towards the stair, which was slightly more difficult with the now-dim light.

Then, I heard footsteps, and stopped. Both Anthony and Jesse were walking down the stairs, stopping a moment to get used to the darkness. They looked around, and noticed me as I walked towards them. They frowned, motioning for me to get to the stairs. I walked up to it and slowly stepped from one step to the other, amazed by what had just happened, in so little time.

'Marcello, what were you doing? I got all the way to the arena and waited for you and Anthony. When he got there, you were still off. We waited for you, and then gave up. You were gone for, like, five minutes. What was wrong with you?' Jacob asked, leaning on the wall.

'There is no need to tell you, you wouldn't believe me.' I said, nodding my head. 'It's about 11:00 pm, we'll have to check out the other rumor tomorrow. After the odd murders going on, the police will be swarming the city after that time. We should go.' And simply looked away, turning and beginning to walk towards the street leading all the way to my house.

'I guess. Well, turns out you are crazy, Marcello. That's something else we will have to investigate tomorrow. Remember, we can investigate it after 7:00 am, the curfew officially ends. Meet up here at 8:00, okay? We'll investigate both cases.' He said, laughing. 'Well, g'night, man.'

'Good night' I said, as we all went our separate ways. We live about half an hour of walking from eachother, a perfect triangle. Now, after I returned outside, the immense amount of energy I had absorbed seems to have disappeared. As a result, I'm now twice as tired as I should be at this time. The curfew had ended last night, but they didn't know that, so I had the perfect excuse to go to bed. Mmm, bed…