"Damn it! Stand still and fight!" the braided archer seated atop a semi-headless giant unleashed a hail of arrows in a vain attempt to land a hit on a light-footed man who was sharply dressed for a pirate. Pirate Lord Green Hideo l'Ollonais moved without sound. Each movement was just a flawless transition from one stance of swordsmanship into the next. While the elegant Pirate Lord clasped a long blade with a round, golden, dome-shaped guard, he never once had to use it and merely danced around the attempts to hit him with unmatched fluidity in his poetic motion.
"Why would I do that, girl? Just stand in place and get skewered with arrows, I mean…" the Pirate Lord wondered with a stern expression. L'Ollonais was a thin man, medium size, rather pale, wrinkly skin for a pirate that spent most of his days on a deck of a ship and weathered the conditions of the adventurous oceans. Dressed sharply in a black jacket with golden buttons and decorations over a neat white frilly dress shirt and a flashy eggplant-colored gemstone framed in gold for a broach, holding his frilly tie and collar together.
"I guess precision won't cut it!" the archer mercenary stomped the drooling and loose tongue of her semi-headless giant platform and braced for when her walking fortress would get rowdy. Releasing a bubbly and rather pathetic wail that soon turned to a wet spat from the frothing shower of spit shooting wildly in all directions from the severed glands, the colossal mercenary under Fennec's employ began thrashing about with mad stomps and swings of a colossal sword that would've wiped any lesser arena clean at once.
Instead, the sword halted in place, catching something firm yet subtle. The endless stream of dust and rubble blinded the archer from being able of seeing much of what was happening below the giant's knee level but once the dust settled, the shocking sight of Pirate Lord Green having thrust his blade into the balance center of the giant's own mountain-splitting scimitar and stopping it in place without as much as bending the rapier-like toothpick made the archer nearly lose her footing atop of her mountainous pet friend.
"That's impossible!" she grunted. "Are you planning on doing something?" the braided archer turned to her less than useful fellow black-haired female mercenary who had been resting after her own grueling battles.
"Not against that guy. You need to pick better fights, kid," the sassy mercenary clapped her exposed rear with the flat side of her polearm blade as a mocking gesture.
"Your walking goliath is an impressive specimen, though he isn't much of a swordsman I'd wager," Hideo l'Ollonais pulled the tip of his sword and released the morbidly obese giant from the clash that his insect-like opponent didn't seem to put any effort at all into.
"I wouldn't say that, he's never lost a fight!" the archer sent a couple of chakra-infused arrows buzzing and punching through the arena's tiles while l'Ollonais shuffled his feet, letting the buzzards miss him just narrowly though that was merely an estimate of distance for the Pirate Lord's stoic face suggested he wasn't sweating one iota in avoiding the archer's punishment.
"Is that so? If he hadn't learned the lesson of swordsmanship being all about balance and the firmness of one's sword being all about the sharpness of their will, his opponents must not have been particularly impressive…" Hideo l'Ollonais saluted the archer with his sword before pulling the blade away from his face and to the side. The arrow-slinging mercenary was getting increasingly frustrated by how her opponent wouldn't move a muscle in attacking her or her walking fort. He merely defended himself and was exceedingly successful in that venture.
"What kind of pirate are you?" the archer rolled over the wall of chompers she's been walling herself off behind until that moment. She's decided that standing up high and moving around, shifting the angles and elevation of her arrows would give her a chance at better success though she continued to miss as l'Ollonais leaned his head and allowed the arrows to brush past his shoulder-long, slick black hair even though once again, while the arrows cut close, they barely disturbed or alarmed the Pirate Lord which suggested that was exactly how he wanted them.
"One that knows the fruitlessness of engaging a mercenary that hasn't been paid yet," L'Ollonais replied with a bitter scowl. While the ceaseless attempts at casual and gruesome murder didn't get to the Pirate Lord, the verbal jabs that questioned his honor and fortitude as a pirate clearly had some effect on the façade of his pride. "I hope that soon someone subscribing themselves to the ruffian ogre mentality will take you and your walking fortification of lard off my hands and deal with you without me having to spoil my hands. That is the principle to which I subscribe in life."
"Heh, a regular wuss, huh?" the arrow-slinging mercenary hopped into the extended hand of her oversized fellow with a mean grin on her face. Despite the shouted and gestured warnings of the polearm-wielding mercenary partner of hers, the braided archer had invested too much time and too many arrows in trying to nail this posh douche. Pirate Lord or not, he was going down even if it was the last thing that the sassy archery girl would accomplish in this battle royale.
"That is all you've taken from my way of life? How shallow can one get?" Pirate Lord Green's stiff and wrinkled lips twitched in bitterness. He raised the tip of his sword and pointed it at the lively braided mercenary of tanned skin and a red dress she fortified with light brass armor that protected only the vital points. By now, the female mercenary had fought plenty of both sniping wars against long-range opponents and engagements against swordsmen to know the most popular targets of both. While these two categories of warriors differed in a great many things, in their desired targets to hit, they were alike.
L'Ollonais hopped back with elegant grace and precision. The archer hadn't made a single move, so there was nothing to dodge. Nothing but the instinctual bite at the back of the neck of the experienced buccaneer that told him that if he didn't move, he'd die. Something heavy thudded against the ground. L'Ollonais didn't waste the precious milliseconds to check what it was. He'd decided that he'd rather spend the time defending himself from more uncalled-for attacks.
"What's that!? The Wind Country mercenary Tutaka has attacked the man outside of his element–Pirate Lord Hideo l'Ollonais, also known as the Pirate Lord Green! She hadn't flung a single arrow yet, though something hefty nearly hit the back of l'Ollonais' head. It hit the tiles beneath his feet, but there's nothing but a pile of sand down there!" the announcer recounted to the audience, directing their attention as following over a hundred and fifty spectacular warriors at the top of their field of the art of war was a chaotic enough affair already.
"Sand, is that correct?" Pirate Lord Green mumbled. The expression of perpetual disappointment never once vanished from his face. "You seem to be armed with quite the weapon there, girl. In the middle of a desert, I'd be dancing the whole day against a quiver of arrows constructed of sand."
"That's right! Just like that geek said–you're outside of your element. You pirates prefer to fight in ships, in the middle of the ocean, or in archipelagos where land is an occasional treasure to stumble into. Well, this is my ocean, old man. You never should've stepped on the shore and out of your comfort zone!" the mercenary made a finger gun, and l'Ollonais turned his body to the side, avoiding a pair of arrow-shaped sand constructs that simply became existent out of thin air. With perpetual sandstorms of varied intensity plaguing the Land of Wind, it would've been nigh impossible to see such attacks coming unless one was a swordsman of ironclad experience, skill, and discipline like Hideo l'Ollonais.
"I could not agree more!" Hideo l'Ollonais saluted the female archer of the sand. "However, with booty this sweet, even I had to walk on land and claim it."
"Huh? I thought you pirates had a code or something… Weren't you meant to control no land and live in perpetual freedom and adventure and whatever?" the mercenary Tutaka scratched her head. Until now, the only attacks that seemed to scrape her opponent had been attacks aimed at his sense of pride and verbal jabs. Where physical attacks couldn't hurt, perhaps she could throw the man's skillful and elegant movements off-balance by targeting his pride as a pirate.
"I do not intend to own Agbarah. I intend to sell it, my dear. I would be a fool to miss its immense value. Look around at all the different warriors putting everything on the line. Where you see danger and war, hear grunts and clangs of swords, I see the greed that sent them here. I smell the grease slathered on the faces of their masters. When you imagine what this land is worth to them–a booty like that is worth treading on land for a little while and visiting a desert even," Pirate Lord Green explained. "This comes back in reverse as well, girl. I've never seen mercenaries betting their lives as your crew does. You lot are the closest to the lifestyle of most pirates, so what stands behind your devotion?"
"It is like you said…" Tataka scanned the raging battlefield around them. Amongst the bubbling chaos, there were some of her own comrades but also a handful of others that would call themselves mercenaries. Even some other breeds of warriors, while they would scoff at being labeled mercenaries, operated much like their unscrupulous peers. "Mercenaries live a life of killing or risking getting killed for a payday. As much as we like to distance ourselves from the danger and the bloodshed, this changes nothing about how things are. Fennec has offered us true freedom from that life. He will claim his land and grant it to us to live in and work as we please. Instead of hitmen, we'll be governors. At long last, we'll have something to call our own."
"Some people say pirates are a lot like mercenaries. Hearing about what you have to say, I must admit I cannot see it," the esteemed buccaneer closed his eyes in dismissal of the young woman's dream to have something penned under her name instead of having a gold sash that'll last the night of debauchery, that helps forget the deviancy that awarded it, at best. "Either way, do not fret, young lady. If you kill enough people and gather enough coin, maybe it'll be you I'll be selling this patch of land to. Maybe it'll be your master?"
"You cocky prick!" the archer sneered at her opponent, who seemed to view her with complete disregard based on the scoffing look on his face. "You can dance, sure, but the entire desert is my quiver. You can't run away from that!"
A tremendous quake began throwing the unaware fighters all around like ready pancakes flopping around in a heated pan. Somehow, the Pirate Lord remained immovable and simply turned his gaze up to the sky, where a shifting mass of sand began forming a circle with branched segments. Each segment seemed like yet another tunneling channel to spew more and more arrows while the ring held the impressive "desert quiver" in the air.
"Not even you can dodge the entire desert raining down upon you!" the sand-slinging mercenary attempted an intimidation play by extending her hand. The segmented tunnels began spilling alarming masses of sand that, while airborne, shaped themselves like bolts that became coated with chakra and hurled toward the arena in a crashing downpour.
"This is incredible!" the announcer leaned forward. "The mercenary Tataka has employed the desert itself in producing a vast quantity of arrows to dispatch her opponent! Even with the excellent fighting form of the infamous Pirate Lord, nobody can dodge an entire sandstorm of arrows coming at them at once!"
Tataka fell to her knees, clutching her chest. She had to loosen the plate protecting her heart and her upper core to breathe. This was no showcase of her strength, this was a full-on main course. An attack such as this cost her almost half of her total chakra. Despite the caliber of the attack she had just launched, the extent of her exhaustion and collapse seemed to terrify Tataka. She turned back to the clueless giant that thrashed and stomped about. She wanted to call out and ask for it to raise her back on top where she was safe, but… It was like not a single word could escape her mouth.
She was all alone.
So alone… In a battlefield bustling with vigor, power, and ambition!
When the drizzling sand particles moved out of the way, l'Ollonais stepped out from the desert shroud. The Pirate Lord seemed completely untouched by the peril as if hundreds of thousands of sand constructs had missed him somehow. This made no sense, this couldn't have been! And yet, Tataka felt so short of breath after her own attack that she couldn't really demand an answer from the veteran buccaneer. Possibly the strongest pirate in the tournament, since Captain Flint couldn't have cared less about some patch of desert land etched deep into the continent.
"My, my… It must be my lucky day. So many arrows and all of them missed…" Hideo l'Ollonais chortled in mockery, patting the sandy shoulders of his black jacket. "I must admit you were right, young lady. The human body simply can't dodge a field of arrows as dense as sand particles in a sandstorm."
It was then that it occurred to Tataka. L'Ollonais truly didn't dodge a single bolt of the Desert Quiver, she missed him. Rather, her body acted all by itself and missed him on purpose. Her subconscious directed the attack to miss in the split-instant when their eyes connected just before the downpour crashed onto the battlefield, prompting everyone to tend to their own devices and stick it up for themselves. But why? Why would her own body betray her on purpose like that? Just because of a mere meeting of the eyes…
"Hmm… What a folly this turned out to be," L'Ollonais yawned playfully. "In my line of work, when I fight, I fight to win. My line of work is messy, it is gruesome, and it is dirty. That is why I avoid fighting whenever possible. I nearly snapped that one time, but you seem to have seen reason and pulled your attack away. I am glad. Still, as hard as I try to make you an appealing target for someone to take you off my hands, no one does. Shall I make you a more appealing target then?"
"Make me… More appealing?" Tataka wheezed, despite having ample time to get her second wind and catch her breath, shorter of oxygen in her lungs than ever. It was like an entire frigate had been placed over on her chest, crushed under its terrifying weight. It wasn't even the look of Hideo l'Ollonais that terrified her so, it was just a mere memory of an instance when their eyes met.
"Aye, haven't you noticed? I've been disarming you all this time to make you too alluring of a target to ignore, in fact…" l'Ollonais moved to a wide-open, almost inviting sword stance. His blade moved with the flawless grace of a needle in the hand of a masterful dressmaker. Still, just like that time he stopped the giant's scimitar with a meek poke, one would've been foolish to accuse the swordsman of decrepitude. "I've disarmed you of your walking fort, in case it scared potential enemies away. Though I see now that perhaps this armor of yours is troublesome too…"
Before the sentence finished, a loud chink made Tataka's stare dull. Then a much louder clang made her gaze race down to see her entire suit of light battle armor disassembled and lying in front of her. Each of the steel chords holding the suit together had been severed in a few key areas. Severed by invisible thrusts she never saw l'Ollonais make.
"Ah, not a moment too soon. I'm glad I didn't need to resort to cutting your dress up. That'd be awfully ungentlemanly of me…" l'Ollonais sheathed his sword and flapped the long rear of his jacket while playfully placing his shiny pine-colored captain's hat on his head. This was the reaction that a surging handful of combatants invited. Each of them looked scorned by Tataka's earlier display of theatrics that affected more than her opponent and therefore interfered in so many battles at once, causing the front lines to undergo a drastic shift.
A glass tube with metallic bottom and lid rolled in on the floor, flashing with an intense light that was as radiant as shoving an entire star inside that rolling lamp. Tataka grabbed her watery eyes and fall on her back. Her walking fort giant couldn't hear the screams. By the time that Kanoka, the mohawked mercenary behind its figurative driver's seat, heard it and directed the semi-headless behemoth to turn to aid its comrade, a warrior clad in a black metallic suit of armor with a beige-colored plain uniform on top of it rolled in with a light-stick and thwacked the stunned mercenary clean out bounds.
"One of the Exterminator team stole the bout from the Pirate Lord Hideo l'Ollonais, eliminating Fennec's mercenary Tataka from the competition! Though Pirate Lord Green doesn't seem at all worked up about it. Things are about to heat up as the ambitious Exterminator must face the ire of Tataka's massive friend! Things are bound to get more heated with 154 competitors left duking it out!" the announcer pointed out the obvious while the stamping mass of destruction loomed above the plainly dressed yet flashy Exterminator.
"You'll pay for getting up in our business!" Kanoka threatened the Exterminator from up above the obese giant clad in leather strings.
"That woman wasn't my type of enemy, but she had to go. Way too noisy. This guy, however… I'm taking it out," the flashy, walking Exterminator light show turned to his allies who weren't too far behind him.
"Yep, it's a regular monster alright…" another steampunk robot-like Exterminator dressed in a plain beige bodysuit uniform rich in belts and pouches stretched out before nodding to himself and turning away. "Leave it for later though, you're an irreplaceable stunner, but this guy's bad news for you. Can't you see it has no eyes for you to flash and he's too big for your bat? We'll take care of it later for sure. Based on how half its head is already lopped off, someone did half the work for us."