Chapter 17
You're using a sharp weapon! That's against the rules!


"Nice to see that none of those guys have changed a single bit," Roy said while reclining on his throne. "It's good to see them still as tough as ever in fighting."

"Mario and Kirby losing were a surprise however," Lilina brought up.

"Yeah, but asides from that, Falcon and Marth still haven't changed a single bit. They're still as strong as ever."

-

"Sorry for the wait, everyone!" Talko said to the audience. "Now we show proceed on with the tournament! For the next round, we have Negi Springfield versus Metaboss!"

Immediately, most of the girls from 3-A jumped up from the seat and cheered loudly for their teacher. "Negi sensei! We're rooting for you!! You're the best teacher in the world!"

Negi came out from the waiting room waving to all the people who were rooting for him and took his spot on the far side of the stage. "Thank you everyone for your support!" he said cheerfully. "I won't disappoint you all, especially my beloved students!" The girls went squealing wildly when they heard that they were his beloved students.

Metaboss then walked out of the waiting room and stepped onto the side of the stage opposite of Negi's and grunted as he got into fighting stance. "I hope we will have a memorable match, Mr. Metaboss!" Negi said to him.

"We will have one indeed, bweheh!" he said with a devious smile.

"And now if both sides are ready," Talko said out loud. "Let us begin the next round! Begin!"

The moment the fight begun, Metaboss whipped out a chained whip and the tip of it grew a large metal ball from which spikes protruded out of. Winding it in air like a lasso, he swung it at Negi and the chain extended, allowing the spike ball to go farther. Negi gasped in shock and quickly leaped out of the way as the spike ball smashed into the stage, tearing a large hole in it. "That thing is spiked!" he said.

"Wait a minute! You're not supposed to use spiked weapons!" Talko said to Metaboss. "That's against the rules! You will…"

"Shut up!" Metaboss yelled, and he spun the spike ball around his top again before hurling it at Negi who jumped away to avoid it the second time.

"Are you listening to me?!" Talko yelled in frustration. "That does it! You're disqualified!"

"Like I care!" Metaboss said as he continued to try and hit Negi with the spike ball.

"What are you doing?!" Negi asked. "You're not going with the rules! Whoa!" He quickly leaped from the direction of the incoming spike ball. "You shouldn't use weapons like those!"

"How else am I going to make you bleed?" Metaboss asked, winding up the spike ball once again. "Just stand still and let me hit you!" Metaboss swung the spike ball at him again and Negi was starting to have enough of this. He jumped over the spike ball to avoid it and went soaring to Metaboss and landed a flying kick into his face before bouncing into the air and landing behind him. "Oink!"

"Why are you doing that? You sound like you want to kill me!" Negi said.

"That's what the boss said, to take an ounce of your blood!" Metaboss said as he spun around and threw a punch at him. Negi quickly used his hands to block the punch but was blown back by the immense power of the fist.

The way Metaboss was acting in the fight was a shock to everyone. "What is that pig doing?! He's like trying to kill Negi!" Asuna said.

"Eat this!" Metaboss yelled as he slammed the spike ball down over Negi, but he stepped aside in time.

"I get it now!" Negi said. "You want my blood because your boss ordered you to do so right? You're trying to revive the Cruncher, aren't you?"

"Bweheh! It is as you say!" Metaboss replied. "Our new boss is continuing where the previous boss left off! We will need your blood in order to free the spirit from its container! I have been sent to hunt you down, and it so happened that I saw you signing up for this tournament, so I thought I would sign up for this tournament also and try to fight you and get your blood!"

"I knew it!" Captain Falcon said. "Those villains still haven't given up on this yet!"

"Looks like we have no more reason to stand around now," Marth said. "Let's help him!"

"Hey, are you guys looking down Negi?" Kotaro said to him. "Just stand back and watch him own that swine!"

"What is happening?! It looks like Metaboss has evil intentions in this tournament all along!" Talko said. "That would explain why he is using sharp weapons! His target is the boy genius Negi! What will we do now?!"

Metaboss swung his spike ball at Negi again who ducked down to avoid it this time. Pulling back his right arm and forming a ball of wind around his fist, Negi ran up to Metaboss before he had the chance to counterattack and threw a punch at him that created a burst of wind that blew him away, and the spike ball was knocked out of his hand as well. "Fist of the South Wind!"

POW!

"BWEH!!!" Despite his size, Metaboss flew quite a bit of a distance and landed just short of the stage's edge, but he got back up again. "I'm not going down like this so easily, brat!" He jumped forward with his limbs spread out and fell onto the floor on his belly but then bounced back up into the air where he curled up into a ball and fell towards Negi.

Negi got out of the way and then Metaboss started rolling around in his curled up form and went after Negi at a fast speed. Negi once again sidestepped the rolling attack but when Metaboss did a u-turn, he was caught off guard and smacked to the side by the impact. Luckily it wasn't a direct hit, otherwise…

"I've got to get my staff first!" Negi thought.

Metaboss turned to him for another attempt to hit him but once again Negi dodged it. While Metaboss was trying to come to a brake and turn around, Negi quickly pointed his arm in the direction of the waiting room and closed his eyes and concentrated on thinking about his staff. Metaboss managed to turn around again and was charging at him. "Bro! Watch out! He's going to hit you!" Chamo cried out to him.

-

"Uh… What happened…?" Dedede asked as he sat up from the bed. Suddenly, a staff flew in from behind and bonked him in the back of the head. "Yeow!" And the staff continued flying out of the waiting room and towards the stage and right into Negi's hand.

"Got it!" he exclaimed. He quickly turned around and pointed one hand at the incoming 'pig boulder' and shouted, "Flans Exclamatio!" A burst of wind came out from his hands and blew Metaboss backwards, knocking him out of his curled up form.

"Bweh?!"

Note: Flans Exclamatio always dissolves the clothing of people, and in the manga, Negi almost always uses it on women, so you know what happens next…

Negi then pointed his staff at him while chanting an incantation before saying out loud, "14 Arrows of Light!" 14 arrow-shaped beams were formed out of the atmosphere around his body and shot forward at Metaboss who was trying to recover from the previous attack, but he was unable to make it in time and was blasted by the light arrows.

BANG!!!

"BWEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEH!!!!!!!"

After this attack was done, Negi ran up the dazed pig and placed his hand against his chest and shouted, "White Thunder!"

ZAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAP!!!!!!!

Electricity surged throughout the body of the pig and Metaboss finally could take it no longer and thus fell onto his back all burned up.

Talko ran up to the fallen Metaboss and said to him, "For the usage of sharp weapon and the intention to kill someone, you're disqualified from the tournament! Therefore the winner of this round goes to Negi!"

"Yes! Negi sensei won!!!" the students exclaimed happily.

"That was a shocker…" Meta-Knight said. "To think that the people who were intending to revive the Cruncher would chase him all the way here..."

"See? I told you that he would win!" Kotaro said to the Smashers. "We didn't need to step in to help at all!"

"Yeah, that's good to see," CF said.

"But what do we do about that guy now?" Marth asked.

Negi continued staring at Metaboss, who started to get back up again. "Curses… The boss never said how tough you are…" he growled. "But no matter what, I'm not going back without bringing him anything!"

"Where is your boss hiding?" Negi asked him sternly. "Tell me now so I can go stop him from carrying on his evil plans! I will not allow any of you to revive the Cruncher! You're not taking an ounce of my blood!"

"Like I'm going to spill to you anything! Don't think that this is the end! I still have one last trick up my sleeves!" Metaboss claimed. He saw his spike ball lying on the side of the stage and quickly ran up to it and picked up by the handle.

"Hey! What are you doing? You should get out of here right now!" Talko said to him. "Guards, get him!"

Metaboss quickly opened a cap that was hidden underneath the handle to reveal a button before pressing it. At first, there was nothing at all and the guards were coming over to get him. Metaboss looked up in the air which made the guards curious, and when they all looked up, they could see something descending.

"What is that?" they wondered. The thing started to fall closer and closer to the ground and its size was also getting bigger, so the guards quickly got away as not to get stepped on.

The thing fell down and it was revealed to be a towering robot about 10 meters tall and it was built in the likeliness of Metaboss himself. "What is that?!" Pit gasped.

"It's a giant robot!" Pichu said.

"I find the design disturbing," ROB said for some reason.

"Bweheh! I'm going to crush you into mince meat with this and then gather all the blood I want from you!" Metaboss said to Negi. The cockpit on the head of the robot opened and Metaboss performed an amazing leap all the way up there and took his seat. "Now it's time to show you the power of Metabot!"

Negi got into fighting stance as steam came out from the joints of the robot to signify that it was ready to move. The Smashers and his students who were standing at the waiting room instantly ran over to Negi to accompany him. "Nobody hurts our teacher-aru!" Ku Fei said.

"Listen," Eva said, "If you want to kill my pupil, you'll have to try and kill me first, which is definitely impossible!"

"We're fighting alongside-a him!" Mario said.

"If you're messing with him, you're also messing with us!" CF said to Metaboss in a threatening voice. "Don't think you can do whatever you want here!"

"It doesn't matter how many of you there are!" Metaboss said. "You're all going down! I shall show you the destructiveness of Metabot first!" The robot spread both its arms to the side and the hands opened to reveal missiles hidden underneath, and the missiles were immediately shot out at the audience who were all shocked.

"Oh no! He's aiming for the audience!!!" Talko gasped. "Everybody run!!!"

"It's heading for us!!!" Luigi cried. "RUN!!!"

Everyone screamed and quickly made a run for it, but ROB whipped out his missile pack and countered the incoming missiles using his own. MK flew towards the missiles and swung his sword as he went past them and all the missiles were sliced into pieces without exploding. Some of the missiles still managed to went past them and blast down the seats, though nobody was hurt.

On the other side however, there was no one to stop the missiles and thus the seats were all blown apart. Luckily, the people managed to escape in time and there were only minor injuries done.

BANG!!!

"Damn that guy!" Roy said angrily. "I'm going to teach him a lesson!"

"What are you doing?!" Negi shouted to Metaboss. "If you are targeting me, then don't drag the innocents into this!"

"Then submit yourself to me quietly!" Metaboss told him. "If you don't, I will go ahead and wreck havoc to the entire amusement park and kill everyone!"

"Don't you dare?!" CF said.

"Then like I said earlier: Hand over the boy to me at once or else you will die!" Metaboss said angrily. The right leg of the robot lifted up to take a step forward, but suddenly a white beam shot in from behind the Smashers and pierced through the knee. The right leg was instantly torn off from the body and Metabot had problem trying to stand still using only one leg and therefore wobbled back and forth in place. "What the?! What happened?!"

"Huh? What was that?" Kirby wondered. Everyone turned around and saw the same castle-like structure that was mentioned a few chapters ago pointing what looked like its hand at the robot.

"Hey, did that thing just fired at the robot?" Kotaro asked.

Then to their surprise, the castle-like structure started moving forward. It didn't seem to have legs at all, so it looked like it was sliding across the ground without anyone pushing it. Luigi saw that thing and said, "It's that castle-like thing that was there the whole time! Is it a remote-controlled robot or something?"

MK, however, had a shocked expression on his face. "I had a feeling that thing wasn't just an ordinary structure in the first place… If I remember the descriptions said to me once…" he said in a horrified voice, "That thing is actually…"

The moving castle made its way up the stage and stopped in front of the surprised Smashers and said to Metaboss, "You have gone for enough. In the name of justice, I shall bring down punishment onto you!"

"What-a eez theez thing…?" Mario asked.

"Oh my god!!!" Talko gasped with his eyes bulged out in shock. "This guy! It can't be! But it really is him!"

"You know what this is?" Kirby asked him.

"Of course! His name spreads throughout the whole world and strikes fear into the hearts of everyone, especially criminals!" Talko said. "This guy… He is one of the Great Powers… The Espers of Justice… Admiral Alexander!!!"

The mentioning of the name was like a huge shockwave being spread throughout the whole place. Everyone instantly fell back and chills went down each of their spines and their heartbeats increased greatly from the shock. "ADMIRAL ALEXANDER?!?!?!" they all gasped.

"Esper of Justice?!" Roy said in shock. "How come I never noticed that he was standing there the whole time?!"

"What is an admiral doing here?!" said a random guy in shock.

"On the bright side, he can get rid of that giant robot for us!" said another guy. "We should be glad that he's here!"

The Smashers standing in front of Alexander took several steps back when they realized who he was. "Alexander… One of the Espers of Justice…" CF said in shock. "To think that we would meet one of the Great Powers in this place…"

"I can sense a large amount of power coming from him…" Marth said.

"Admiral… Alexander?!" Metaboss said while trembling from head to toe violently. "This is terrible! To encounter an Esper here… There's no way I can ever defeat him…" He shook his head and then said to himself, "No, get a hold of yourself! I have the size advantage here right now! He can't be as powerful as the people make him to be! If I can defeat an Esper here, I will become famous overnight!" He looked down at Alexander and said, "Don't be too proud of yourself! I'm much larger than you, so there's no way you can defeat me!"

"I'm surprised that you can stand for so long using only one leg," Alexander commented.

"Hey! Are you listening to me?! Do not underestimate the Metabot! Die!" The robot tried to retain its balance on one leg and pointed both its arms at Alexander and got ready to fire missiles.

"Watch outta!" Mario gasped.

"You lot get out of here right now," Alexander told them. "I'll handle this." The Smashers did as he said and got out of the way fast. The large amount of missiles was fired at Alexander and they exploded all around him.

BANG POW BOOOOOOOOOOOM!!!!!

"Bwahahahaha! It looks like the Esper is not as powerful as they say after all!" Metaboss laughed.

"Then you are very wrong in saying that," said the voice of Alexander through the smoke of the explosion. Metaboss was shocked to see Alexander totally unharmed and unscratched underneath the smoke.

"What?! Impossible!"

"Whoa… There's not a single scratch on him…" Kotaro said.

"Did you know that among the three Espers," Alexander said, "I am known to have the ultimate armor? My armor has the hardness equivalent to that of diamond. It is not something scum like you can even hope to make a scratch on!" He lifted his massive pillar-like arm into the air and light started to come out from the hand. "Agios Analipsi!"

Note: Greek for "Holy Ascension".

A glowing circle appeared underneath Metabot and blinding white light came out from it. "What is happening?!" Metaboss gasped. And suddenly, a devastating white beam was shot out from the circle, shooting straight up into the air and totally engulfing the robot within it. "BWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!!!!!!"

And the robot exploded.

KAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAABOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!!!!!!!!!!

The force explosion blew everyone on the stage except Alexander backwards and pieces of the robot were sent flying in every direction too. Metaboss himself could be seen shooting out of the explosion and soaring all way over the horizon.

Setsuna got back up and said, "Such power…"

"Whoa man… I can't believe it… He took out that giant robot with no problem at all…" Kotaro said in awe.

"So this is the power of an Esper…" Negi said. "I've never seen one face to face much less see one perform an attack…"

Back among the row of seats, the other Smashers and the students were just as shocked as they witnessed everything.

"Whoa… Even though he is supposed to be on our side," Asuna said, "It still gave me chills down the spine to see a big shot like him here."

"Me too… I almost wet myself when I heard his name…" Konoka said.

"Wow! This is going to make a headline on the school newsletter for sure!" Kazumi said excitedly while taking snapshots of Alexander over and over. "Meeting with an Esper this up close isn't something you can experience every day!"

"Amazing power…" ROB commented. "To say that his power level is over 9000 would be a huge underestimation…"

"The light just now... It is so pure and holy…" Pit said.

"The ultimate defense… Surely it fits with his epithet well," MK said. "The Stronghold of Justice…"

TO BE CONTINUED

And the special guest of this chapter goes to Alexander, one of the Espers of Justice which is one of the organizations within the Great Powers of Tooneria. I wasn't kidding when I said way back in the reviews that the Smashers will have a close encounter with the Great Power.

Actually, Alexander made his debut in Rise of the Negativities, but only in one chapter and very briefly, so he is easily forgotten. As for the origin of Alexander, he is an Esper that you can summon in Final Fantasy 6. We know that the other one is Bahamut, and if the two Espers of Justice are both Final Fantasy characters, you can safely assume that the third one will be someone from Final Fantasy too. As for who it is, maybe I'll tell you someday.