A confident power man strutted across the arena, glancing and sizing up potential opponents but smugly turning away from each one. The bald martial artist with a lone, ground-reaching braid who measured himself several times the size and width of most competitors around him found no value in those he weighed with his scouting eye.
Just as the martial artist was about to turn and walk his way to a different wing of the arena, a buzzing foam ball with a handful of fluffy feathers on the other end, it wasn't as if the towering mound of muscle felt the sting of a small foam marble flicking at his eyelid. It was more the offense of being bothered, the mere fact that this childish game piece dared touch him and disturb his tranquility.
A young man almost equally as tall as the martial arts giant but several times slimmer and with a skin tone far paler than the braided colossus of flesh whom he had disturbed approached the giant with a leisurely paced strut. The athlete had messy black hair spiked up and hanging low over a white forehead sweatband and wore a red uniform with a Gohangakure insignia on it.
The tall and slender Gohangakure athlete froze in place, staring at the sinewy titan in front of him, who picked up the feathered ball and pinched it in between his fingers at his eye level. The athlete held a long plastic net pressed to his chest. Based on the athlete's expression, he may have been at least to some extent embarrassed to face this mountain of a man with his bug-catching net while the man pinched his feathered toy in between his tree-branch-thick fingers.
"What is this?" he asked, pulling up the foamy ball closer to get a better gaze at it.
"This is a shuttlecock, Sir," the athlete answered with honesty and politeness in his tone. Based on those qualities of his voice, the sportsman must've felt like an antelope speaking to a Smilodon.
"Hmph…" the martial artist smirked with the left side of his face. Based on his cheerful reaction to something that bothered him initially, he must have found something in the name of this game piece amusing.
"It is used in a few sports, this one is a bronze shuttlecock used in swarm-ball," the net-holding athlete elaborated on his answer, hoping to keep this mountain's interest long enough to escape with his life. Despite his good intentions, a decent handful of hundreds of shuttlecocks swarmed buzzing into the area surrounding the pair.
The sudden influx of buzzards shocked even the surrounding fighters and interrupted a handful of sworn bouts, as well as quick and meaningless engagements. The braided martial artist froze in place. Although such a sizeable swarm assault would've warranted one to close their eyes and shiver, at the very least, the giant stood still with his eyes wide open, even though they didn't move on bit nor did they show even the slightest attempt at tracing the shuffling shuttlecocks of different colors.
"E-Excuse me! These shuttlecocks… They follow the game, you see!" the swarm-baller gasped and stumbled forward. Within the swarm, his cool and levelheaded reaction matched even that of the hardened martial artist, however, the trained and raised swarm-baller couldn't help but shuffle his gaze through the swarm, scanning it for the most valuable shuttlecocks.
"Impudent… How do you win this game of yours?" the martial artist wondered, still pinching the shuttlecock that shook its feathers to whirl them around it like a tiny marble helicopter with feathery blades.
"Erm… Your team must have the highest number of points by the end of the game. I'm not sure if you've noticed but… Each shuttlecock has a different marble at the core: wood, brass, bronze, silver, gold, platinum, and jewel. Each of them has different value to the team netting them," the swarm-baller elaborated, appearing somewhat relieved that the titan seemed entertained when pestered by the rushing swarm.
The martial artist thrust his hand forward in a lightning flash, petrifying the athlete in place. The bronze shuttlecock that the fighter had caught earlier took off and buzzed away, uniting with the swarm. Instead, the bruiser tilted his hand to point up and opened it partly, revealing a handful of shuttlecocks with different cores from wood to gold. A cocky smirk colored the martial artist's sinewy face.
"How many points did I earn?" he asked.
"Umm… Well… Zero…" the swarm-baller scratched his head, thinking he may have signed his own death warrant. "You see… You need to use one of these to net the shuttlecocks…"
The martial artist breathed in, inflating his chest a few times. He breathed out a grunt while letting the shuttlecocks merge with the swarm before cracking his neck to the sides and his knuckles and adopting a one-legged fighting position while putting up the dukes.
"So, you think you deserve to be called the greatest warrior just because you can catch some cock-things?" the flexing martial artist made a mean grimace that sought to intimidate the already frightened athlete.
"This isn't a matter of pride for us!" the swarm-baller gulped with a sick mixture of determination and terror pumping through his pale face. "None of us care to be called the greatest warriors, the Sun Disc arena is all that any of us wants. The greatest venue in the world to perform and play our best games."
"Ridiculous…" the brawler dismissed the idea of fighting prideless. "What would you say to a cock-catcher like you who said that they don't want to be the best cock-catcher there is when they play?"
"Sports don't have to be played to become the best!" the swarm-baller answered with a passionate swipe of adjournment. "You can play just to have fun, to stay healthy, to build up your own body, to fight trauma or forget dark memories, or just to pass the time. Whatever reason you have to play, sports welcome people of any skill level. It's an experience we all share and that which elevates us above our basic, most primitive selves! I am no martial artist, but… I believe martial arts can be the same way."
"What does a sausage-man like you know about martial arts!?" the bruiser bawled out, taking off in a dash at his opponent. The swarm-baller took a bold step back just mere centimeters away from the martial artist's grasp and disappeared into the swarm of shuttlecocks. Within a synapse blink, the titan of muscle began scanning the swarm for a location where his chosen opponent had vanished.
A cracking ring with a nasty crunch made the fearsome martial artist black out for a bit while he stumbled forward. Some little pinch-sized bullet smacked the back of his head and hit him hard enough to draw a trickle of blood. Feeling up the warm droplets behind him and staring at them blankly, the martial artist couldn't help but wonder how some shuttlecocks drew blood from him, a man that could push or crumble mountains with bare hands based on his own judgments he cast on these god-made natural wonders.
"What you also should know about swarm-ball is… The shuttlecocks travel at different speeds, based on what worth they are to winning the game and how many points they earn for the team that nets them. Shuttlecocks ranking at around gold and above are hardly perceivable to the untrained eye, so getting hit by one point-blank would kill most men. I am relieved that you can survive such a shot unscathed. I don't want the burden of being a murderer for just wanting to elevate my beloved sport!" the swarm baller pumped his fist that clenched the net in his hand. Once again, the athlete mingled into the swarm and swiped his net hastily to send more and more gold, platinum, and diamond bullets to the martial artist.
The sinewy colossus took one in between the eye, rocking his head back, a handful more in a synchronized barrage tested the mettle of his chest and bounced off of it with meaty thuds. The jewel shuttlecocks made of solid diamond carvings felt like adamantine bullets traveling at light speed. They ripped and blew into one's skin, brutally drilling through it, though even they barely cracked into the flesh of the martial artist. Inhaling and crossing his arms up, the brawler declared his intent on weathering the storm until his body was littered with skin-deep grazes and shallow wounds trickling with blood.
At about the exact point that the fleshy martial artist felt sick of the ceaseless barrage of shuttlecocks pelting him from the swarm in the direction of the swarm-baller, the braided bruiser tilted his head from behind the block with the expression of a mad dog. Before he could put together a counterattack, the other end of the net slammed at the hell of his feet while the sweeping net caught the bulky head of the fighter. With a single trained motion, the swarm-baller slammed the net down, taking down his opponent in the process. He then pulled the net off of the head and drove the other end into the solar plexus of the fallen brawler before vanishing into the swarm again before the musclebound warrior could drag him down to his level and take him out with one good blow.
The blizzard of shuttlecocks shifted from an all-encompassing swarm into a singular downward wash as the airborne swarm-baller scooped as many shuttlecocks as he could and sent all of them crashing down at his fallen opponent. The fallen martial artist gargled from pain as every second of persevering this offensive felt like standing underneath a massive, intense waterfall. Except all the droplets were made from diamonds and solid metal cores buzzing at a blinding speed that made them as fast and devastating as bullets.
Twitch by twitch, the fallen martial artist began moving through the pain and the pelting metal and diamond blizzard. In a show of iron will, he stood tall, straightening his back, and even looked up at the aerial net-sweeper, despite a cruel diamond shuttlecock ripping his lower eyelid with a nasty scrape and making his cut eye spit blood down his cheek.
Tightening all of his muscles at once, the martial artist clapped his arms, creating a concussive shockwave of sound and compressed air around him. It deflected the shuttlecocks homing in on his general direction by forming a protective aerial bubble. Not feeling content with just this limited success, the shockwave ripped on, expanding until it propelled the athlete and sent him flying. With a soaring fist, the martial artist blew past the raining shuttlecocks and pursued the airborne athlete. His ripping fist punched through the net, but the net's frame locked a solid grip on him.
With a twist, while plummeting from where the martial artist's shockwave had propelled him to, the sportsman forced the warrior's arm to bend halfway by the elbow and sock his own face. This appeared to stun the martial artist for a bit. By utilizing a similar tactic, scooping the limbs of the stunned martial artist by the joints and guiding his own kicks and fists to find his face, the swarm-baller made his opponent who had tempered his body to peak physical condition finally take real damage then, by securing the rim of the busted net around the thick throat of the dazed martial artist, the swarm-baller flipped him over and directed him to slam face-first into the area outside the ring while the swarm baller scrambled off of his own busted net and fell flat on his back inside the ring.
He panted, staring with a blank expression into the sky until the familiar buzz of shuttlecocks swarming all around where the game was welcomed him and brought him back to reality. It also dissuaded any other bruisers who thought themselves superior to the athletes fighting for their favorite sport from seeking the man's elimination after a grueling fight for his survival.
"In an unexpected turn of events, Rinden, the swarm-baller from the professional athlete faction, eliminated Sweets Jin, the master of the Eight Fist fighting style and a respected and feared martial artist! Many of us have thought little of the odds of a professional athlete winning when faced against trained warriors, killers, and hitmen, but the passionate swarm-baller Rinden proved how dedicated and ferocious the pro athletes can be when fighting for the sake of their sport!" the announcer turned to the audience, explaining what had just happened at the southern edge of the ring and directing their attention at the aftermath. "This cloud around Rinden is a cloud of tiny game pieces called "shuttlecocks", that use sealing glyphs that direct them to swarm around the area of the game. It's a handy tool when Rinden is the only swarm-baller in the arena, making all shuttlecocks rotate around him! And this leaves 147 contestants left in the arena!"
A thick, slightly rusted hook etched into the mountainous ridge of a stone ridge that had emerged after the hectic battle royale fights. A hand slipped into a thick sheepskin leather glove reached atop the ridge's peak and pulled up a gigantic and muscular, square-shaped man in dull, depressingly grey skin with black eyes and murky bone-colored rings for irises, also a bulky body covered in the skin of different breeds of animal, man included. The conqueror placed his glove over his browless skull to scan the arena, searching for new enemies to conquer.
A featherless, half-dead-looking yet incredibly lively for its bony state, vulture sat perched on the man's shoulder, previously having grabbed on to his back by digging its bony claws into the furs and skin keeping the man safe from extreme weather of the north-westmost corners of the continent where the fearsome conqueror had come from. The balding conqueror with greasy hair that seemed forever wet and gritty like seaweed pressed his right foot on a taller rock, striking a picturesque pose. After the conqueror pointed at the distance, the vulture took off to seek new patches of the arena for him to conquer and new weaklings for him to eliminate.
The landmark might have changed, but the game did not. This arena was just like a different kind of globe, just like the ambition of every conqueror was to claim the world as theirs, it was now his ambition to conquer this arena as well. A tap of sandals to his left made the conqueror turn and peer through the clouds at the resident man in a standard ninja monk attire of the Stone Temple. The structure was well known to the conqueror since he had left it ruined himself on his way through the rocky pass to the Feudal Lord's palace. The fact that it was he who had sacked the Stone Temple suggested that this ninja monk must not have been there at the time and that he was away on a pilgrimage. Despite that, the man clenched a rosary in his hand that had "Ishi" carved into it, symbolizing the small ninja village of Ishigakure.
The Ishigakure ninja had been meditating and praying atop of the tower all along. He turned his head in the conqueror's direction, though the square-shaped and fur-covered warrior sneered in disgust at the sight of a man whose eyes had been covered up by a headband, signaling the man was blind.
"Had I known that there was someone here, I wouldn't have sent my scout away to seek one out for me," the conqueror said, wondering if the boom of his voice would frighten the blind man. His black eyes focused on a retreating stone pillar atop of the ridge, signaling that the Ishigakure ninja had erected his own stone seat to meditate on.
"A bird of prey can't find challengers. A predator is naturally predisposed to seek prey. The life of one only catching prey is a life of perpetual disappointment," the short yet square-shouldered Ishigakure monk-ninja pointed out.
"A philosopher? It's a common trait amongst those who cannot claim their own fate to contemplate why fate is so cruel. It doesn't matter to me whether I find prey or challenge, I crush helms and heads underneath my feet all the same," the conqueror peered into the terrific sight of an arena where warriors were duking out and far below stands of bedazzled spectators and observed their favorite breed of entertainment. In that way, the conqueror felt a connection with the audience. He too often found enjoyment in the carnage.
"I see, yet you allowed this boundless pride of yours to be crushed by the weight of gold. Is this what they call the circle of life, I wonder?" the ninja monk's words carved into the conqueror's thick neck and made the square-shouldered man tuck his grey-skinned chin. The man wearing thick furs and leather drew his jagged sword that appeared to be made of brass, bone, and steel alike and swung it, intending to cut the monk in half, utterly eviscerating him.
Spikes of black steel shot out from the ground, passing through a gap in between the sword's blade and its brass and ivory decorations and stopping it in place. A handful more spikes emerged from the underground, forcing the sizeable conqueror to run up their side and vault away from the peril they brought with them until he could free his sword.
"You know who I am?" the conqueror hissed, feeling fixed on the fact that the monk's insult felt highly personal to him.
"I do. The Nightmare of Dream Country. The Bane of Dreams. The Cold Dream. The Sandman… Hanmong the Conqueror, who led his people away from the isle of grim of the north-west on the greatest conquest that not even a warrior from Yumegakure may have dreamed of–to conquer the Land of Earth. Defying the prognoses of most, you've brought your people across the Blackstone Sea and even nearly covered the Rocky Pass–the only natural wall fending off the Feudal Lord's palace from the north-west, yet also one that leaves no need for any other structures because of its size and width. And yet, after all that trouble, coin slayed the giant that no sea, mountain, or blade could," the ninja monk turned to face Hanmong the Conqueror with his blind eyes.
"The Sandman? I haven't heard that one. Though I suppose I would doom those on my way to eternal sleep, so it's oddly fitting. What an interesting guy. You seem almost hurt that I took the Feudal Lord's offer to settle my people in his backyard for the price of carving this sandy itch for the eyes for him. You'd think a ninja would be glad to hear their precious gold cow, the Feudal Lord, wasn't beheaded," a wicked smile stretched across Hanmong's face, stretching and turning the horseshoe-shaped mustache diagonally up.
"The legacy and integrity of a man also concern the memory of those he had slain. By accepting the Feudal Lord's gold and land, you've soiled the memory of the ninja monks you've stepped over to get over the Rocky Pass," the ninja monk declared, raising his right hand, and pointing his empty palm at the conqueror while his left still clenched the cherry-colored rosary beads to his chest. "I intend to slay you here and now and clean the spit you left on the gravestones of the ninja monks of Stone Temple."