"Nathan. Nathan, look at it. Isn't it a beauty?"
Nathaniel William Adams did not look. He had been avoiding the sight of it. It scared him. It wasn't just its scary appearance; it was its very existence that was frightening to him. Hearing others talk about it, or even just the thought of it chilled him to the bone. Nathaniel couldn't explain why he was so terrified of it, not to others, not even to himself. And not being able to explain something only makes humans more scared of it.
"This is it. This is what daddy has been looking for, all these years. Go on, take a look."
Nathaniel finally looked up.
"Soul Edge."
The weapon known as 'Soul Edge' was actually two swords - it was a mystery why Soul Edge was two blades, and not one, since all of the legends described the weapon as a single blade. Still, no one gazing upon the two swords could have a doubt in their mind that they were Soul Edge.
The two swords were large, and one would have to be of considerable strength to wield both at the same time. Nathaniel's father held both at once, but he could never wield them as weapons. He lacked the strength, and, besides that, he was no warrior. He ran a curio store specializing in rare weapons, and was always taken with strange antiquities - the exact reason that the prospect of acquiring Soul Edge had been so mesmerizing to him.
One of the swords was wavy, and one was straight, but their morbid design was similar, and there was no doubt that they were sister swords. Or, some said, brother and sister - at some point, someone had proposed the idea of one sword being the male of the pair, and the other being the female, and the idea stuck. Collectors of antique items did tend to have rather romantic minds and favor such ideas.
"...Soul Edge, the hero's sword..."
Nathaniel's father muttered such thoughts to himself as he examined every inch of the swords, over and over. The more Nathaniel observed, the more it seemed like his father had some kind of sick obsession with it. The look in his eyes as he examined it seemed...hungry.
Nathaniel didn't think that there was anything 'heroic' about the sword, either. It had an impressive appearance, but it looked like the type of weapon that a villain would wield, not a hero.
Still, there was one thing that was good about Soul Edge. Concentrating on it took Nathaniel's mind off of the storm. The storm that buffeted the ship had scared the young boy nearly to the point of tears. His father didn't even seem to notice the rocking of the ship and the loud thunderclaps. He just stayed in his cabin, looking at Soul Edge, inviting Nathaniel for a look, and then looking some more...
Just as Nathaniel was beginning to have enough of the depressing spectacle of his father's obsession, he heard a loud sound. He noticed it because it was as loud as the thunderclaps that he'd been hearing all night, but it didn't sound like thunder. It sounded somewhat like an explosion.
CRUNCHAnd now, a much louder sound, on the ship itself. It sounded like wood was splintering violently, like something was ripping the ship apart. The ship rocked at the same time as the sound, and Nathaniel was tossed from the bed he was sitting upon, against a wall of the cabin.
It didn't take very long at all for crew of the ship to cry out:
"Pirates!"
Nathaniel realized what the loud sound had been in a moment. Canon fire. And the ship had taken a direct hit.
"...No, no! This can't be!" Nathaniel's father cried. And, indeed, it shouldn't have been. He had taken a very long route, arcing halfway out into the Atlantic Ocean, just to avoid the waters that were scoured by pirates. How could it be? How could pirates have found them? No pirates sailed the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, because nobody else sailed there. It was almost as if those pirates knew exactly where they'd be. As if they were following them. It was as if...
"...Vercci."
Nathaniel's father spat the name like a curse, and he would, indeed, have cursed Vercci, if his young son's ears had not been so nearby. Vercci, the Italian "Merchant of Death," had enormous wealth was almost as famous as his legendary greed - he had, on many occasions, ordered assassinations just to obtain some item or other. It was a well-known fact that Vercci and the dreaded pirate Cervantes de Leon had a loose business partnership - he was often the one who carried out Vercci's assassinations, for a cut of the bounty. There was no doubt at all that Cervantes had tracked Soul Edge to the auction, and had followed him out to sea with the intention of eventually ambushing him, and-
Another loud explosion that rocked ship and caused the man and his son to slam against the walls of the cabin.
"Nathan! Go find your mother!"
Nathaniel's father ran past his confused son to the ship's storeroom to hide Soul Edge.
Nathaniel ran from the cabin to find his mother, who found him first.
"Nathan! Where is your father?"
He tried to speak, but his words came out as a whimper. He pointed in the direction of the storeroom.
His mother began to run off to the storeroom, herself. Before he left her son, she cried, "Nathan, stay here until we return!"
But they never did.
That was the last time that Nathaniel saw his parents.
Nathan does not have a clear memory of the events that occurred next. There were a lot more explosions, and pieces of the ship were ripped off by cannon fire until, from where he stood in the middle of the ship, Nathan could see out of the ship. He was thrown to and fro, and eventually he was in the water - the freezing water. His arms and legs flailed wildly, and his hand hit something - wood. He grabbed onto it, and hoisted himself aboard it. It was only slightly bigger than he was, but it kept him afloat. Everything after that point was a mixture of thunder, explosions, screaming, violent rocking, cold air and water blasting his face, and flashes of gruesome scenes as lightning periodically provided enough light for Nathan to see the horrifying sight of pirates boarding the ship and killing everyone aboard it, but the scene was smaller every time he beheld it, for he was drifting away, drifting further and further away...
---
The ultimate form of stimulation has long been sought by men of wealth and power who have already exhausted all other luxuries the world has to offer. The Lakeside Coliseum is a secret arena built in search of that ultimate stimulation.
The rules are simple. After signing up, the participants play each other in individual matches. After each match, the loser is dropped from the tournament, and the winner advances to play a new opponent in the next round. The rounds of the tournament lead up to the 'finals', in which the only remaining participants play, and the winner of the finals is the winner of the entire tournament. The winner of a match receives money as a reward, and the amount of the reward rises with each consecutive win.
At the end of a fight, when one participant acknowledges defeat by raising a finger, the audience could decide whether or not the loser should live or die. The audience pointed their thumbs upwards if they wanted the loser to live, and downwards if they wanted him to die. A participant did not have to die after every match - if the audience felt that both fighters fought admirably, they would likely want both to live and fight for their amusement in the future.
Warriors come here for various reasons - for the money, for the thrill of battle, or because fighting is the only life they know, and they must constantly endanger their own lives in order to give themselves a reason to fight for their own existence.
But, whatever their reason or reasons for participating in the Coliseum, each warrior is a human being. A person who was born, lived a childhood, had memories of both good and bad times in the past, and has hopes and dreams for the future. Each person has knowledge in their mind that they have gathered over their lifetime, knowledge of many things, but, dominantly, knowledge battles and fighting styles and weapons.
And it was this very sort knowledge that Siegfried, Tira, and Ivy sought as they entered this realm of fighting...
---
Nathaniel awoke on a beach. He was alone.
The first thing that the young boy did, of course, was to call out for his mother and father and search for them. But he did not find them.
He was hungry. But there was no one around to feed him. Slowly, he realized that he would have to feed himself.
But, where to find food? He would just have to go looking for it.
There were some berry bushes a short distance away. Nathaniel slowly stood up, and began walking towards them.
This was the day that Nathaniel began to change.
---
The Lakeside Coliseum was true to its name. The landscape that surrounded the arena was pleasant and peaceful - the surface of the lake itself was almost as still as a rock as it reflected moonlight onto the gently swaying trees of the nearby forest. The only time it stirred was when small boats ferried spectators to and from the arena, and there was a dock next to the arena for this purpose.
The overall appearance of the arena was impressive, but not over-decorated. The ring where the battles took place was not actually circular, as the word 'ring' would imply, but shaped like a square. It was surrounded by water. One of the conditions for losing was falling out of the ring and landing in the water.
However, despite the calm and inviting appearance of the arena, things were not as easy as Siegfried thought that they would be. As it turned out, one could not simply walk into this secret arena merely to go from warrior to warrior asking them about legendary weapons. You were a paying spectator, you were a warrior, or you were ushered out.
Siegfried, Tira, and Ivy refused to be spectators, and refused to be ushered out.
They signed themselves up - under alternate names, of course. Siegfried was a hunted man, and Ivy wasn't completely unheard of. Tira had much less to worry about, but chose an alias, anyway.
The early battles were easy for them, and the later battles simply were more challenging, but nothing too hard for the trio. Years of nearly perpetual fighting as Nightmare had honed Siegfried's skills to a point at which there was scarcely an opponent that could challenge him. Few warriors knew exactly what to do when Ivy's blade transformed back and forth from a sword to a whip, and the confusion alone allowed her easy victories. Killing was something Tira was most comfortable doing than anything else, except, perhaps, laying in her Master's embrace, and fighting was little different. Siegfried had given her strict orders not to kill anyone, even if the audience demanded it. It made Tira slightly unpopular, not to mention made her feel as if she had an itch that she could not scratch when her weapon hovered less than an inch from her opponent's neck, but she obeyed him. As a result of meetings like the one with the swordsman in the burning inn, Siegfried had mastered ways to quickly take an enemy down without doing any permanent harm to anything other than his ego, and his matches were, to the disappointment of his audiences, short. Ivy, on the other hand, did not care what Siegfried or the audience commanded her to do. Her opponents seemed to usually end up maimed, or even killed. Although she put on an innocent look and said it was an accident when Siegfried confronted her about the deaths, it was obviously that she had done it on purpose - and had enjoyed it.
Between battles, sometimes even with defeated opponents, the trio always inquired to everyone they could about powerful weapons - the must powerful weapon they had ever heard of, the weapon with the must destructive force. Some warriors mentioned legendary weapons, but none that sounded like they could destroy Soul Edge. Others simply recommended gunpowder if you wanted destructive force. However, as an experiment in Ivy's lab had proven, Soul Edge was invulnerable to any form of combustion, no matter what the intensity of the explosion.
---
Nathaniel was no longer a young boy; he was a man now. But he was also a completely different person. Since he'd washed ashore in this strange land, every day had been a struggle to live. He was forced to live off the land to survive. He discarded his former habits, and even his former language. He had all but completely forgotten his past life. No one who saw him now would imagine him as the son of a merchant living an idyllic childhood, as he once had been. Anyone who saw him now would think that he was a savage.
It was at this point that he first came upon other living people, a tribe native to the area. However, they would not approach Nathaniel. Nathaniel had to battle wild beasts from time to time in order to protect himself. After he had killed them, he wore their fur out of respect for them. He had grown in size and strength from these battles, as well, and, as a result of his giant muscles and the fur he wore his appearance was that of a monster. The tribal natives referred to him with names such as the "White Giant," and "He who makes the Earth tremble." Nathaniel did not understand their words at first, although he came to learn their language, but from the beginning, he disliked the words they used to refer to him. Only one of their names for him struck him as appropriate, and therefore acceptable.
Rock.
---
Eventually, the three of them had reached the finals. There were only six warriors left. These were the strongest in the tournament. Two of them were unremarkable. They had already been questioned, and the trio knew their weak points after observing their matches. However, the third was an enigma. He was a hulking giant of a man, and wore the skin of an animal that looked like a mix between a polar bear and a saber-toothed tiger. He carried with him a giant mace with several spikes protruding from it. None of the trio had spoken to him yet. He kept to himself - sitting cross-legged in a corner, his hands on his knees, looking down with his eyes closed. No one wanted to walk over to a man with his appearance and disturb him from what seemed like a deep meditation. For some reason, he reminded Siegfried and Ivy of Astaroth, but they did not know why - and were not interested in thinking about that golem.
It was announced that Siegfried and Ivy were to do battle with the two opponents who wouldn't pose a challenge...
...And that Tira was to do battle with the giant.
---
Eventually, Rock did have one friend. A child had been orphaned by tribal warfare. His name was 'Bangoo'. Rock felt sympathetic to the boy, because he had once been in the same situation - an orphan in a strange land - and became the boy's guardian. Rock cared for him greatly.
From the natives, Rock re-learnt about the "people across the ocean." Faded memories of his parents slowly began to return to him...and these memories triggered memories of something else -
Soul Edge.
The words "Soul Edge" were closely connected with memories of his parents. It was a name he had heard often as a child. At bedtime, mealtime, while being held in someone's arms...a hazy image formed in his mind.
...If I could find Soul Edge...perhaps I might recover my own past. I might even find my parents!
With the giant ax he used for a weapon in hand, Rock set out for the land across the sea.
This was Rock's first adventure.
---
Rock was sitting in the middle of the ring. Sitting - and doing so in the position that he had been observed in all day. He seemed to be very fond of the cross-legged position, with his eyes closed in thought, and his hands resting on either knee.
Tira entered the ring, and stood holding her ring blade behind her back. Rock, like many of Tira's opponents that day, did not know how to face such a weapon or stance, but he did not let it phase him.
Rock simply gripped his mace, which lay beside him, stood up, lunged forward, and swung the mace over and over again. He continually attacked, never letting up, and simply swinging the giant mace around aggressively without stopping. Although it never connected with the lithe Tira, who dodged every swing, sometimes it connected with the floor of the ring, smashing the ground, and causing the floor to crack or break up from the mighty blows.
He actually had a wide variety of ways to swing the mace, such as spinning the mace around by gyrating his wrist. However, none of his attacks landed on Tira - who, by this time, was tired of perpetually dodging.
The match was about to take a drastic turn.
---
Rock crossed the great ocean to find his past. With no memories of his parents, he searched for Soul Edge, what he believed to be the only possible cure, and continued his quest. Eventually, he came to realize something. In searching for the family of his past, he had left behind his only other family - his true family - Bangoo. By leaving Bangoo alone, he was subjecting Bangoo to the same loneliness that he had suffered as a child.
After due consideration, Rock chose not past, but present. His quest was over. Rock returned to the west. As he set sail, he saw the light rising into the sky above the continent, as if it were bidding farewell to him. When the light faded, the earth was hidden by the darkness of night.
Rock returned to Bangoo nearly a year after he left him. He knew he had made the right choice in returning, because he never wanted Bangoo to experience the loneliness of not having a family. He decided to stay with Bangoo until Bangoo had become a fully independent man.
---
Tira gripped her blade and swung around it in a wide circle, ending the swing by thrusting it forward like it was a sword, and this was the first time in this match that Rock was forced to use his mace to defend instead of attack She spun it around her body, twirled it around on her wrist, and passed it from hand to hand, creating a vortex around herself that served as both a shield and as a zone of danger. Then, she leapt forward and spun around in circles, spinning her blade as she went, becoming a deadly whirlwind. The tables had turned, and now Rock was the one perpetually blocking and dodging.
She placed the blade over her own head and brang it down around her body. In this new 'stance', she charged at Rock, twirling around and gyrating the blade in many directions around herself, turning her own body into the center of her attack. She spun the blade off of her body and onto her arms and then back onto her body again quite frequently, disorienting Rock. Eventually, she had moved herself past Rock's mace. She jumped onto him, forcing him down to the ground, sitting on top of his chest, swung the ring blade up, and then brought it down in an arc at Rock's throat...
---
Rock's life had been very peaceful, but one day, a rumor that mysterious lizard-like humanoids were wandering the land disturbed Rock's peaceful life. Rock tried to avoid the matter, and focus on keeping peace with Bangoo, but, one moonless night, the monsters suddenly attacked Rock without warning. Rock mowed down every single lizardman with his giant battle-axe. Once aware that their proud hard scales were powerless against Rock's axe, the lizardmen disappeared into the darkness. As the silence grew, Rock returned home - only to find his home destroyed, and Bangoo missing! When the lizardmen realized that they could never capture Rock, they kidnapped Bangoo to lure him into a trap! Even though he knew it was a trap, he couldn't avoid losing Bangoo. He left on another quest, following the trail of the lizardmen, but, once he reached the European continent, he lost their trail. Rock now wandered Europe trying to find Bangoo.
This was Rock's second adventure.
---
Tira's ring blade completed its arc, cutting a slice in Rock's neck. It was only a quarter of an inch long, but it went deep. This width of the cut caused the blood to exit the neck not as liquid, but as a fine red mist; Tira could even hear the satisfying sound of a slight hiss. That hiss was the sound of Rock's life escaping his body. Soon, he would not even have enough life left in him to keep his eyes open. Tira lifted her hand and placed it in the path of the spray, and smiled with glee as her hand was immediately bathed in red-
No.
A quarter of an inch is not the size of the slice that Tira's weapon cut into Rock's neck, but the distance that Tira's weapon stopped above Rock's neck. Rock was defeated, but he would live yet. He raised his finger, and the crowd cheered. Tira got off of him and walked away. She did not look to see the response of the crowd; she'd let him live no matter what they wanted.
Let him live.
The thought lingered in Tira's mind.
Let him live.
The power to hold someone's life in the palm of your hand, poke a hole in them, and watch their life slowly seep out of them, but, instead of killing them, letting them live. They'd continue to live only because Tira let them do so.
They'd practically belong to her.
Tira smirked at these thoughts. They were the most delicious thoughts that she'd had in quite a while...
...but she quickly suppressed them.
What if Master could hear those thoughts? He'd think I was a bad person.
Tira's shoulders sagged. It had been so nice...so nice...for a moment. But, it could not be.
I'm trying my best, Master, really, I am.
---
After many bloody battles, Rock successfully rescued Bangoo. The cost of that battle was his trusty axe, but he did not regret it for a moment.
The two of them were once again free, but they did not immediately return to the New World. Rock decided that, if Bangoo was not strong enough to defend himself, then he should not return home until he is strong enough to do so.
The two of them headed north along the coast and settled in northern Europe. There, they were greeted by fierce winters and a different environment from that of the New World.
Rock had long believed that, "Nature is the best teacher. It holds limitless knowledge, and there is always something one can learn if one approaches in good faith. And, if necessary, nature will grant harsh, but accurate, lessons." Rock wished for Bangoo to learn and strength himself amidst Mother Nature's world.
And so Bangoo's training began. Bangoo's young body could not always handle the frigid cold or fierce storms, but during those times, Rock gently supported Bangoo. Occasionally interacting with hunters and fishermen, the two of them continued their life in this land.
"Some things are strong and reliable; others, fragile and dangerous. An important part of life is learning to recognize the true nature of things that cannot be observed through sight alone."
During one stormy winter night, Bangoo fell through some thin ice while crossing the snowy valley. He fell into a crevice, and spent the night with no way to warm himself. When the sun rose and he was rescued by Rock, he was exhausted. Acting on a gut feeling, Rock asked Bangoo,
"Bangoo, are you afraid of nature?"
Bangoo replied,
"I respect nature too much to hate it. And if I cannot hate something, then I fear it."
Upon hearing this answer, Rock felt that Bangoo had reached a high level of maturity, and was ready to become a man. For his rite of passage into manhood, Bangoo chose an act that Rock had accomplished before - crossing the sea on his own. Rock saw Bangoo off on his solitary journey with a multitude of emotions in his heart. Bangoo had become like his own son.
Alone once more, Rock closed his eyes in thought. Bangoo was returning to the land of his birth. But, as for Rock...Rock's true homeland was not the wide plains across the great ocean before him. It was somewhere in this land upon which he now tread. The only clue he had connecting him to his parents was Soul Edge. He had traveled before in search of its whereabouts, but had never successfully reached it.
He stopped his thoughts at that point and lightly shook his head. Now that he and Bangoo had separated, had old regrets and attachments resurfaced? No, that wasn't it...His insecurity was something else. He wanted to become a man that Bangoo could be proud of.
He once again laid a task upon himself. He had stopped in the middle of his search for Soul Edge, but now he would continue that search. Only when his search was complete could he proudly call himself Bangoo's father.
He was not like he used to be, back when he had searched for Soul Edge with doubt in his heart about who he really was. Rock had matured, as well, during the time they had spent in this harsh northern country. This journey would be one in which he reaffirmed his own strength and will. And, this time, he had a home to go back to.
The image of a boy floating in his heard, Rock looked one last time across the great sea before him, and then quietly turned to leave.
This was Rock's third adventure.
---
The semifinals were over. Siegfried, Tira, and Ivy were the only warriors left in the tournament. They had wondered what they would do if they were set against each other during the tournament, and even wondered what would happen if they were the only three remaining, but had never come to a conclusion.
"So." Ivy said, breaking the silence as the three of them pondered this issue. "I wonder who's going to be the winner?"
"None of us are." Siegfried replied. "We're not fighting any more. We're leaving now."
"...What?" Ivy demanded, and leapt up from where she sat. Tira, who had found a release from the withdrawal of killing in this tournament, felt a little disappointment from Siegfried's words, herself.
"There is no need to stay here any longer."
"The tournament isn't over yet!"
"We didn't come here to fight in a tournament. We came here to question the warriors, and that is exactly what we've done."
"But the finalists can't just leave the tournament!"
"They can. There is no rule against it. In fact, the rules state that, at any point, a participant withdraw from the tournament if he so desires."
"That's not what I meant! I mean, it's unheard of for three finalists to just leave!"
"I know it's unconventional. But we don't have all the time in the world. We've already spent too much time in one spot. Every moment we spend - waste - not searching for a way to destroy Soul Edge, is a moment that someone comes closer to obtaining it. I am sure that I don't have to remind you, Ivy, that it is a bad idea it is to let Soul Edge fall into someone's hands."
"What about the money? We'll receive a huge sum after one of us wins the tournament."
"We've already accumulated a lot of money from this tournament so far. We don't need any more."
"You don't know that for sure! What if we happen to need a lot of money in the future? Think of this as gaining funds for our quest!"
"Every moment we spend arguing is another moment that someone comes closer to obtaining-"
"You're full of the same damn arguments! Don't you ever say anything new?"
"Hey!" This voice had come from Tira. Siegfried and Ivy turned to her, surprised. "You shouldn't argue with Master!"
"Oh, no you don't." Ivy hissed at Tira. "Don't speak. Don't say anything. You don't have a right to talk. You're just some mindless puppet that follows whatever he says. Your opinion means nothing; it's just an echo of whatever Siegfried wants!"
"...That's not true! What he's saying makes a lot of sense! Master is right!"
"Of course he's right. He's always right, to you. But I'm not going to agree with everything and anything he says, because, unlike you, I've got a mind of my own, and I'm not just some pathetic sex slave!"
At this, Tira leapt up from her seat, and gripped her weapon. Ivy, an amused look on her face, grabbed her weapon, as well. Tira trembled slightly as she restrained herself from lunging forward and slashing a gash across Ivy's smug face, and her eyes darted back and forth from Ivy to her Master, hoping that he'd give her a command to put the situation at ease.
"...You know what? I've changed my mind."
Siegfried said these words in voice he rarely spoke in. Ivy and Tira had heard him speak in this voice only one or two times, and it had been under times of intense stress and frustration. They instantly knew that had angered him beyond acceptability, and each of them felt a pang of guilt for angering a man who was normally so calm and serious - but their guilt did not rise above their anger towards one another.
"If it would make you two feel better to jump into a ring and rip each other's throats out, then who am I to stop you?" Siegfried said.
Tira chose to interpret Siegfried's words as an order, and bounded off towards the ring. Ivy followed close behind.