Mana's slick opponent leaped forward without wasting any time, right after the announcer declared the beginning of the battle. He weaved around and jumped like some exotic animal or someone trying to keep as little contact with the ground as he could. It looked similar to some of the larger desert animals that Mana has seen, there was this rather peaceful species of desert foxes that leaped around much like this man did so that they did not injure their flesh covered feet pads during the peak of the day on the scolding desert sand. It only made sense that an inhabitant of the desert would fight similarly to the animals he saw around him.
That being said, his style was sloppy, he wasted so many movements that Mana found the man's hopping and weaving style absolutely useless. She knew what he was doing – trying to intimidate Mana, try to dodge blows that weren't even coming yet, trying to show her how fast and experienced he supposedly was when in reality he must've been pretty shaken up himself. If Mana just stood calmly she'd have winded the man out without flicking her finger. Gaffu jumped around her, running and leaping, flipping even. By the time he tried his first punch, his body was already strained and winded.
Mana's body moved instantly, as far as human standards were concerned at least, she ducked under the man's punch and shot her leg backward hitting the man in his shin. The showy fighter fell down nose first into the rocky tiles breaking his nose in a rather painful upwards direction. Breaking one's nose like that made one's eyes water making further fighting quite impossible, the fight was over as far as Mana was concerned, not that it had ever begun. This man was not a fighter, he looked built more for thieving, he was slick, acrobatic, could certainly move around and lean his body in flexible ways.
"What is this!?" someone in the public screamed out in anger.
"This is pathetic, Sheikh-sama, execute this fool, getting beaten by a young woman, of all things! He always loses, he has no honor or skill!" Another one screamed out.
"You're a shame to the Sun Disc, Gaffu!" Countless more yelled in perfect sync as if they were actually rehearsing this shaming process.
Mana turned at the Sheikh, he sat under colossal constructions of palm tree leaves that gave him ample shade and he was surrounded by strangely dressed women that wore revealing outfits on the lower parts of their bodies and yet shrouded their faces and wore turbans despite their long dark hair slipping down through them. These oddly dressed women used large fans to cool the large man.
The Sheikh looked quite impressed and surprised, the thing that scared the magician most of all was that he was staring right at her like she was his long-lost niece or something. Mana's sight quickly shifted back at the face-planted enemy who continued to writhe in pain on the ground and try to get back in fighting shape, that is to say, restrain his wild nosebleed and to make his eyes stop watering like he had just been slapped in the face with the spiciest chili.
The girl would've been a fool not to notice the hatred and utter disgust that the Sheikh had while staring at Gaffu, his eyes appeared to spit flames of hell while the man's arms were shaking. The Sheikh was a well-built but quite elderly gentleman so his emotions were easily noticed even by Mana, someone who was giving him glances from several meters below. The Sheikh wore a very fancy desert cloak that had multiple gold and gem pieces attached to it around the man's neck, on his belt and the middle section of his arms.
"Get back up and continue the fight or give up, Gaffu!" The Sheikh declared after raising his hand covered in rings with gems larger than a man's eyeball. Rubies, emeralds, and sapphires shined in all the various colors as the famished desert sunlight danced inside them, devouring all of them in its all covering and scorching light.
"Damn it, I won't lose this one, not with my life and honor at stake..." Gaffu yelled out powering through his broken nose and wiping his tears, while a momentary solution it impressed Mana that the man had the sheer willpower to go on where most men would have given up.
Gaffu leaped forward, jumping back and forth, trying to blitz around Mana only to leap back to his initial position, he kept on trying to confuse Mana with his speedy movements but the girl's eye, that was trained to track superhuman ninja, kept up. Not only that, to Mana this fight seemed quite hopeless. She merely wanted to test her opponent's skill with that last kick and she ended up almost taking him out, now she'll take him out for sure.
The man screamed angrily telegraphing his attack, a pity since he tried to hit Mana from behind, kicking her right at the back of her head, a connecting kick like that could have killed a person. Mana's body turned around lightning fast, her body was trained by her friends, ready to survive the superhuman attacks of ninja, knowing the best counters and redirection maneuvers. The brunt of the girl's foot connected to Gaffu's leg stopping the blow and with a strong push shoving it backward, opening his body.
A barrage of kicks overwhelmed Gaffu's body making the man quiver and shake, his body twitched without a halt as if it was bombarded by automated fire. For a human, it was as fast as attacks went. The magician was sure that she broke ribs, left internal bleeding wound and kicked him in the head a couple of times, finishing with a jumping stomp at the man's solar plexus that not only crushed his body to the floor but also drove all the oxygen out from his body making him overcome by pain and winded. Attacks like this caused pain and shock strong enough to stop hearts of weaker people and for a moment the magician wondered if this was overdoing it, she expected the man to deal with some attacks at the very least.
This was bad, usually, Mana just went with all of her skills, all of her abilities and didn't hold back unless she fully meant to. Her opponents deal with some if not all of her offensive barrages making them get hurt but never too bad, this man was so unskilled in terms of hand to hand that he just got crushed and tired himself out too much by his own attacks before having to defend. Mana was beginning to feel bad...
"Stop the fight," she asked the announcer looking at the pathetic ball of pain and misery that was down on the floor in front of her. Some people in the public were beginning to cheer for her, once again, the Sheikh's look was absolutely overblown, the man was on the edge of his seat licking his lips and enjoying the show. Everything that she was told of this place was true – it loved combat and martial arts skill most of all.
There was no money, no fame or glory other than that earned through one's fists and that disgusted the magician to no end. There were people in this world that weren't bad people per se, people that found pleasure and self-discovery through combat and while the girl could begin to understand them she despised such a way of life herself and felt disgusted by the fact it was forced on people who may not have wanted it.
Gaffu stood up, slowly, peeling his ruined body off the ground he took the fighting stance.
"I cannot stop the fight if the contestant wishes to continue," the announcer shrugged. His filthy and smug face covered with makeup disgusted Mana, he was almost smiling while stroking his beard, he was taking pleasure in all of this, seeing a man getting ruined.
"Stay down!" Mana screamed at her opponent angrily. "If I kick you in the face once more – you'll die. If I kick you in the body once more your ribs will skewer your body from inside. Stay down!"
"I can't, this is the only way to achieve anything in this place... If I lose now I may as well place my head on the chopping block..." Gaffu's messed up face somehow spat out. Mana angrily lifted her hand up she was not going to take part in any of this.
Gaffu leaped up to her, she could've punched him, kicked him, elbowed him right in his almost blinded from all the blood running down it and unprotected face but that may have killed him in the state that he was in. She let him hit her but to her surprise, he didn't – he placed his bloody hand to her lips.
"Don't you dare surrender..." He declared. Mana's eyes shot wide in surprise but then she understood – that was not the way that pride was earned in this place. If she surrendered like this everyone would know that she did so out of pity and there was nothing that asked for execution or the Descent Gauntlet more than being pitied by a woman in a battlefield.
"Pride... Rituals that are made by humans to be followed by other humans... So stupid, all of it..." Mana thought to herself as she lowered her head, Gaffu must've understood that she got it, she got his point but now the girl was wondering what exactly was there for her to do.
She couldn't fight him further, this man was hesitant to rise above the ordinary folk, he wished to make something of his life and the only way to do that was to succeed in the Sun Disc. The only way to enter the high layers of society was to win the Ascension Gauntlet and this man wanted it, hell, even Mana wanted the Gauntlet for her own freedom.
She couldn't fight him nor could she surrender. If she fought him he wouldn't surrender until she either killed him or made him pass out, while entirely possible, Mana didn't want to make the man get knocked out either. If she won right now the man's only options would've been the Descent Gauntlet, execution or a lethal match and if he got messed up by Mana his hopes of surviving either would've been next to none. This man was only living in the here and now, his future mattered little to him.
"Can I kill him?" Mana asked the announcer giving the man an angry glare.
"Well, not really, not in a warm-up match but... In this case... He is a very reckless and foolish one and also a trash, feel free if you can, woman... If he loses he'll probably get thrown out like a trash which he is anyway..." The announcer shrugged looking at the Sheikh for confirmation, the Sheikh just nodded. He kept staring at Mana, she must've revealed some degree of skill in her taijutsu to him. Even as a human she could've bested even master martial artists due to her lifelong training and experience fighting on the higher level, she trained her body to avoid or redirect any blow opening even the most powerful martial artists for finishing blows. The Sheikh must've noticed her exceptional skill...
"Come at me, trash... I'll kill you where you stand," Mana declared looking him in the eyes angrily, "I'll save you the embarrassment from getting killed in a lethal match or the Gauntlet and end you right now, it'll probably also give me some public points too".
Gaffu quivered, he hesitated for a moment seeing Mana's newly discovered and, to be honest quite faked and bluffing, bloodthirst. Still, he took a fighting stance and forced his body to run at her, he no longer hopped around – his legs were busted up, he didn't flip or roll around as his brain was shaken up inside his tough skull making him move pretty pathetically and stumble over endlessly. A single tap from her elbow to his nose would've put him to sleep...
Gaffu punched Mana straight in the face making her fall down on the ground. It appeared like the feeble man couldn't believe his own luck, this young lady continuously and effortlessly dodged even his most confusing and fastest patterns and yet she got hit by his desperate stumbling and pathetic hit? The man looked at Mana who didn't move, the girl just kept on laying on the ground with her eyes closed and her head turned to the side, her body looked completely lifeless. The announcer crept up to her and felt Mana's pulse.
"She's... Alive but... Her breathing is slow and pretty faint. The fight is over, Gaffu wins!" The chubby gent declared loudly making the crowd cheer but not in joy but in confusion. None of them could understand what was going on, why did this loser pull out a win despite getting absolutely trounced the entire time? How could this have been?
"I can't believe it. A loser like Gaffu pulled a win like that?" One man in the public spoke to his fellow to the left.
"Yeah... This woman appeared to be quite good, her moves were so fluid and quite unlike any other martial arts I've ever seen... I wonder where she's from?" His friend replied just as confused.
"Who cares, she's a dumb woman who got taught a lesson, she may have trained her entire life but she lost even to the weakest of men! What a disgrace, if I was the Sheikh I'd hack her head off right about now." Another man in the public laughed out.
"Or maybe this Gaffu guy is better than we all thought, he overcame so much in this battle and won it with a single punch..." Yet another person wondered butting into the conversation.
"Oh, come on! We all know women can't compete with men, how hard could it have been to knock her out!?" A response came from somewhere in the public.
All of the conversants laughed out to themselves wildly. They were planning to have quite the day and even this first battle proved to be much more entertaining than they thought. Who could've thought that a hatchling woman facing off against the underdog of the entire roster of fighters could've made for such an entertaining and controversial fight? Maybe this Gaffu deserved to be given another shot?
"You're an idiot!" Bult yelled out shaking Mana violently after her body was taken back to the waiting area, "Who did you think you were fooling?"
"I couldn't keep it up, that man wouldn't have quit, he'd have died before giving up and if I knocked him out I'd have sentenced him to death as well, whether it'd have been by an executioner or someone in the Gauntlet matters very little..." Mana replied "miraculously" recovering from her incapacitation and wiping the several drops of blood that the man's puny punch drew from her nose. The man barely even packed a punch, just wildly swinging his arm and using his shoulder as the delivering force of the punch instead of transferring it from his feet like a proper fighter.
"So you did it to buy this man some time? How long do you think it'll be before he'll once again fall to the bottom of the list? What do you think your own standing is right now!? I'd be surprised if your next match wasn't a Slaughterfest match." The fighter veteran scratched the back of his head giving Mana a troubled look, similar to a look of a father of a kid who did bad but didn't understand just how bad her behavior was.
"Slaughterfest?" Mana wondered looking at her blood covered hands and using the washing bucket to clean it up. She looked at the side to a bunch of fighters carrying Gaffu around and swinging him around like a hero, he must've looked like one to them.
"It's not an actual match, it's a term we use, sometimes the Sheikh sets up his matches so that the odds are so uneven that it's basically a de facto execution, that's what we call a "Slaughterfest"..." The man sighed and stroke his forehead.
Mana looked at the other fighters who were pointing fingers at her, acting out her fainting act and laughing at her. She couldn't even begin to imagine how much they must've hated her now, before they just hated her for her assumed uselessness, now she lost to one of the weakest fighters in the roster. She actually expected to be placed in a lethal match against someone amazing next even if she didn't quite know the term of such a match while she was planning it.
"Hey? Aren't you next?" A bulky man with a strange rubber helmet yelled out at his friend.
"Oh, it seems so!" The friend replied in a tone that suggested mockery and a playful act.
"Watch out and don't walk into a wall..." The first one warned his friend playfully. "Those are known to kill hundreds of weakling women per year!"
"Oh no, the wind is so strong... I can't take it!" The other sarcastically yelled out in a mocking and feminine voice before pathetically acting a falling down act. Mana lowered her head and then looked away.
"This is just the beginning... You've earned this, this is your place now." Bult said with a hint of sadness and a little care behind his voice.
"I know, I've made a conscious decision, I couldn't give up or hurt him too badly, either way, it'd have been the death sentence for that man. I wanted to buy him some time, to give him some hope." Mana exclaimed sadly, grinding her teeth in pain.
She couldn't really do it, great heroes she read about in stories could just take hatred, they didn't care when they were being made fun of and hated everywhere. When they were abused and mistrusted. Mana wasn't like that. Still, Bult was right to some extent – it was an unavoidable part of her decision and she knew it. She now embodied the label of a weak young woman that everyone had already stuck to her before they even saw her fight.
"Time? Hope? What for? What does that weakling need time or hope for?" Bult still tried to talk Mana out of her stupid thoughts and strange decision making.
"Just enough time before I beat the Ascension Gauntlet and free him, free everyone," Mana answered. Bult turned around and walked away, he said nothing but his silence already told Mana everything – he left her alone to her own stupidity. The gesture was clear – Bult did everything in his power to help Mana but she refused his aid, again and again, choosing to stick to her ideals instead. She was now beyond the man's help so he left her alone, it was the equivalent of him washing his hands.
For a moment Mana herself started to believe that she may have simply been wrong, that there was no more hope or time left to buy. Her next following match would quite likely be a lethal match, she would need to kill someone to leave the arena. How could she possibly do something like that? She was destined for death now so she needed to somehow outsmart the system. If she played by the rules she'd burn...
Mana needed to do something desperate and really cool. Cool enough to impress the Sheikh.
