Book Three – Chapter Nine – Part Three – Who Guards the Guards?

“Fine. Go ahead and ask,” the Koena begrudgingly murmured. He asked for permission to approach the metal arena, and Servi nodded. She kept a close eye on the two swords hanging from his hip. And like she expected, he drew them both and charged forward when he was only two meters away.

He grinned, thinking he would kill her then and there, but Servi maneuvered Fledge in front of her. And when that grin twisted into a look of horror, Servi laughed.

“Good job, dick head. You stabbed your friend.” She ripped off Fledge’s head and threw his body behind her while using Telekinesis. He wasn’t small or tiny in the slightest, either, and the cries of pain from behind stopped any would-be attempt at being a hero. Servi canceled Telekinesis and tossed Fledge’s head from hand to hand. “And now that your swords aren’t with you anymore, you don’t have a single way to attack me. Sure, you could use skills. And that goes for all of you!” Servi suddenly shouted. “But the results would be the same. Now, answer my goddamn questions.”

She didn’t wait for him to answer. “I’ve been here only a few short days, and no one ever helps anyone else. There’s been a few rare cases, but— no. You know what? It doesn’t matter. I don’t need to know why everyone in this fucking city is a shit bag. I don’t. I don’t fucking need to know. It could be they’re fucking heartless. It could be the Monotonia poisoning their sympathy and empathy. It could be a mix of every goddamn thing in the universe. But look at me!” Servi screamed and slammed Fledge’s head into the cold metal she stood on. It exploded into a gory mess, coating her and the Koena in a thin blanket of red.

“I’m just a fucking killer! I kill! And I kill! I slaughter and eat my foes’ souls! I grow stronger by taking lives!!! I’m the Mad fucking Dog, and I want to hunt! I want to kill! I want to experience the thrill of fucking combat!! Go! Go back to the fucking wall!” Itarr shuddered at Servi’s current state as she had no choice but to watch the Koena cower in fear.

“What’s wrong?!” Servi grinned, forcing her mouth to be as wide as possible. “You don’t want to follow my directions?! Are you volunteering to be the first fucking victim?! Here! ITARR, BRING OUT EVERY GODDAMN NADRIUM WEAPON I HAVE AND LINE THEM UP!!!!” Itarr refused to go against Servi, so she followed her commands like a common slave. It was like an armory floated around her, listening and patiently waiting for an order. The Lux Spheres, so high in the air, illuminated the blue lines of energy that pulsed like a beating heart. They were the trademark sign of an authentic weapon crafted from nadrium.

Contrary to her current emotional state, which hinged on madness and delirium, the many floating weapons slowly moved into formation a few meters to her left. “Take one. Choose one! Use it to kill me! Use it to give me the fight I fucking want! If you have drugs that enhance your physical and fighting abilities, take them!” Servi grabbed the Koena’s armored arms and dragged him to the floating weapons.

“Pick and choose! Take one or take all! You can use anything you want if you think it will help you kill me!!! Oh, that’s not all! Every one of you fucking pathetic worms will have an opportunity to fight me!!!!” Servi raised her voice and shouted at the top of her lungs.

The Koena remained paralyzed by fear. In only a few short minutes, he experienced everything he thought impossible. His hands shook, sweat poured down his softly-colored scales, and his two lungs slowly rotated around his body in an attempt to stabilize his erratic breathing. When that didn’t work, his body even activated Pulmoni Oxygeni. In addition to giving the user a burst of power and strength, it also flooded their body with adrenaline. In the best-case scenario, it forced a wandering mind to stabilize while giving the user the ability to defeat whatever foe stood between them and their goal.

It was a Koena’s trump card, something that allowed them to rival the sheer strength that came naturally to a Kobold. But in the face of such overwhelming power, like what Servi displayed, Pulmoni Oxygeni was nothing more than a minor boost that had all of the downsides and none of the positives.

If he wanted to live, he had to move. If he wanted to experience the moon and the sun, he had to move. If he wanted to find a wife and father children, he had to move. If he wanted to eat, drink, and sleep, he had to move. But his fear and sense of self-preservation, backed by Pulmoni Oxygeni, fought against each other in brutal combat. Even as Servi counted down from ten, the internal battle continued.

When she said seven, fear had the upper hand. When the word four escaped her crazed lips, self-preservation had despair on the ropes. When the number before zero reached the Koena's ears, he started to move his hand to grab the nearest floating weapon.

But he was too slow.

“Sorry, but you took too long. You only had to grab a weapon and fight me. Even a fucking toddler could have done that.” She reached out, stopping his arm with her left hand. Her right hand reached up to grab his plumed helmet. She spun it around, taking in the feather's beauty. The bird it came from was unknown to her. “It’s a shame such a beautiful white feather is about to turn red.”

“Wai—”

Servi gripped the inside of the helmet tight and slammed it into the Koena’s softly-colored head with just enough force to knock him down. She purposely held back because she wanted to enjoy it.

And that was what she did. She used the Koena's helmet as a crude hammer, slamming it down and smashing his head over and over until his skull’s fragments were about as big as grains of sand.

And then she continued, traveling down his back, tracing his spinal cord, and increasing her strength until the helmet bent like paper. It lasted the entirety of thirty seconds, yet to the audience full of petrified onlookers, it felt like an eternity had passed.

“You! Come up here, grab a fucking weapon, AND FUCKING FIGHT ME!!!!” Servi kicked away the Koena’s corpse, which had lost all shape, and pointed to a random guard wearing only panties and a breastplate. She was of Elven descent, but the cropped ears made her look somewhat Human. Her bald head, littered with scars and black warts, didn’t seem Elven in the slightest. She almost looked like a diseased Human cosplaying an Elf, but failing spectacularly.

The thought of succumbing to the same fate as her captain never crossed her mind for even a second. Servi had to give her props for not wasting any time at all. She rushed across the ground, now completely covered with hardened steel, and chose the first weapon she saw. It was a one-handed axe. The pitter-patter of her footsteps echoed as she stomped backwards and took on a somewhat comprehensible stance.

“Good! I didn’t even have to tell you to back up! You’re a lot fucking braver than that pathetic shit bag. Now, I’ll give you a fucking handicap! I won’t use a weapon. I won’t use a single goddamn thing other than my two hands. I won’t use a skill, either. To win and escape with your lives, you have to kill me. Do that, and you all can take every fucking thing I have. Oh, but there is a time limit. Do be sure to kill me by the time the sun comes up.

“And one more thing! If you think you can kill me when I’m distracted by fighting, think again. It won’t work. You’re all more than welcome to try. Hell, you can all come at me at the same fucking time!!! But I gotta warn you. If you do that, it’s only fair for me to use skills. And you all don’t want that. You all have a higher chance of winning one-on-one when I’m purposely restricting myself to no weapons! Now then! Let’s fucking fight!!!”

Servi roared and dashed forward down low. Her sudden leap caught everyone off guard. Before her Elven opponent knew it, Servi had grasped both wrists and squeezed with enough force to break stone.

“NOOOOOOO—” As the pain traveled up her nervous system and escaped in the form of a scream, Servi yanked her foe’s arms down while raising her left knee.

A second later, a bald head went soaring to the top of the metal-enclosed building while leaving its body behind. Because of the sudden force transferring and suddenly stopping, Servi inadvertently ripped off both of the Elf’s arms. Crimson pooled around the headless, armless corpse as Servi proceeded to beat the body with its own arms. Each impact sent heavy vibrations throughout the enclosed metal area. By the time the Elf's bald, warted head fell back down, both of his severed arms had been thoroughly smashed.

Servi caught it with both hands and proceeded to squeeze until the skull hidden within popped out. The blood inside was warm and hot, and the consistency was similar to that of a watery paste. She tossed the ruined head behind her and kicked the corpse’s mushy remains. The weapon the Elf chose ascended into the air. It flew back to where the remaining arsenal of armaments was faithfully waiting like it had a mind of its own.

“Learn from her fucking mistakes! Use that to give me the fucking fight I want! You, get the fuck up here!” Servi pointed a bloody finger towards someone at random, and a heavy-set man, whose only equipment consisted of a pair of rusty greaves and moldy pants, approached the floating weapons. He was tall, taller than the Koena, who claimed to be a captain by at least two meters. The bulging veins popping over his muscles were supposed to be an intimidation tactic designed to instill fear into his opponents, but it did the opposite for Servi.

“Those bad boys aren’t natural, are they? I bet you’re even stronger than a Kobold, and you’re only Human.” She assumed a boxing stance and relaxed her body. Resting on the tips of her feet, she lightly jumped up and down to loosen her core.

Her opponent didn’t respond as he chose a heavy broadsword nearly as thick as his tree trunk-like arms. The two pulsing blue lines reflected off of a tiny glass bottle he pulled from somewhere as he rested the tremendous blade on his shoulders using a single hand.

Servi’s remaining eye stared at the one red pill hiding within. Her foe crushed the glass bottle and tossed it all, shards and tablets both included, into his mouth. Even from the three or four meters Servi was away, she heard the sound of bone and teeth scratching the jagged fragments. She imagined his mouth filled with blood from the countless cuts, but not once did he change his stoic expression. It was like he didn’t react to anything at all.

When Servi killed Fledge, the Koena, and the Elven challenger, the beast of a man didn’t react. Even when he fell from the third floor when Servi sent her sword up to cut the area directly above her, he acted as if it was only a minor inconvenience. But when he swallowed the bloody mess in his mouth, glass and all, something inside changed. She realized the red pill inside could’ve been a Red Monotonia.

He then proved her right not even a second later. She didn’t know how, but the visible veins became more pronounced and exaggerated. If he had gotten his current muscular appearance by working out under the Monotonia’s influence, it would stand to gather that his strength would be enhanced after swallowing one. And if that was the case, it would answer why he could lift the hefty sword with a single hand.

He opened his mouth, allowing shards, teeth, bone, and tissue to flow out in a river of blood. Crimson fell from his eyes and squirted out his ears. The raging look of a demonic being hell-bent on satisfying his rage stared at Servi’s one eye. She didn’t think it possible, but the veins constricted, growing bigger and becoming more pronounced and ghastly than she ever thought possible.

But it wasn’t fear she felt. No, she lost the ability to experience that when she became acutely aware of just how much destructive potential she had. Who would someone with the powers of a Goddess ever be afraid of a mere mortal?

She actually felt happiness mixed with eagerness. She couldn’t deny the part of her that wished and thrilled for a life-or-death fight that actually challenged her. It was when she first challenged the juncea as part of Fisher Jin’s graduation assignment. Dodging and cutting through its body, spilling its lifeblood on the dirty ground where it would become fuel for a new life, gave her a feeling she couldn’t describe. Even if Servi knew every word in every language, the euphoria she felt couldn’t be explained.

It was a feeling she didn’t experience when she took on a quest to slay rats with Momo. When she killed the slavers during the raid on the slave markets, she felt something similar, but it wasn’t the same. It was like waking up out of a pleasant dream and being unable to fall back asleep to finish, but it took the form of an annoying, gnawing feeling.

But as the days and weeks passed from the Warden Tournament to the life-or-death metal arena Servi created, the gnawing couldn’t be ignored anymore. She was a fighter. A killer. A Mad Dog, whose only wish was to experience the thrill of ending lives.

Her foe raised his weapon, holding it to the numerous balls of light above him, and slammed it down. Its tip pierced and sliced the metal arena as easy as poking a knife through softened butter. His two eyes stared up, meeting Servi’s gaze as they became bloodshot. The crimson overtook his white sclera, and his eyes looked like two yellow jewels floating in blood. His facial veins tightened up, becoming a sort of fault line that nearly divided his face into three parts. With how tensed he was, Servi didn’t know how he didn’t pass out or die from circulatory problems.

It was only then that he stomped the ground and charged towards his foe. Servi held her ground and continued to bounce on her feet. Her weight shifted from left to right, front to back. With her body and muscles relaxed, she allowed the thousands of souls living in her ring to guide her.

Her left foot kicked off the metal ground, pushing her out of the way of an incoming vertical slice. The floor nearly exploded from such a powerful attack, and his weapon became stuck. Without missing a beat, he immediately slung his greatsword sideways even though a quarter of its blade rested in the ground. Instead of shattering, his great strength  uprooted some of the metal. Perhaps it was the sweat dripping down his bare skin, but his weapon slipped out of his hands.

She responded after carefully watching his movements. After he picked up his blade, he chopped the raised metal into equal-sized balls. “Don’t tell me you think you can hit me with those?” Servi taunted.

Her foe only grinned, showing off even more of his bloodied mouth while raising his free hand. One piece of the metal he cut rested within it. Servi took out a worthless dagger and threw it on the ground. It dissolved into the floor, and the destroyed floor repaired itself.

Somehow, Servi’s actions to fix the floor only served to anger him even more. He charged forward, stomping on the newly regenerated floor, and held his thick sword by his side. His left hand still carried one of the metal pieces, and he launched it at a surprising speed when he closed the distance.

Servi hopped back on one foot, pivoted her body, and kicked the projectile away. He had tossed it with such force, which became multiplied by her deflection, and the sap who stood in the path it traveled died.

Her foe swung his blade in a wide arc. Servi ducked under it, balanced herself on her hands, spun, and kicked out his legs. Even with his incredible resistance to pain and ridiculous power, Servi’s strength easily outmatched him. He fell to the ground while swinging it towards her. And with how she held herself using her hands, she could’ve easily pushed herself up or rolled backwards.

She didn’t do that.

She considered herself to be a Mad Dog, and she knew dogs fought with teeth and claws.

She caught the incoming nadrium blade with her teeth, biting down on the edge of the blade and stopping it in its tracks. For the first time, her opponent gripped the sword with his second hand and used every bit of strength in his arms, but her teeth wouldn’t give.

The blade didn’t bend, give, or snap, but it absolutely refused to budge. It was almost like Servi's foe was trying to remove a sword stuck in stone that only a hero could pluck out.  But Servi wasn't free of the damage. Her chin shattered from the sudden bite, her cervical spine fractured countless times from the amount of force being pushed on it,  and her teeth regenerated over 294 times. When one of her pearly whites showed even a hint of damage, True Immortality kicked in.

He pushed against, trying to slice the top half of her head off, and Servi struggled back with the same amount of force. A disgusting noise penetrated their ears when her teeth slide across one of the two glowing lines. Instead of feeling something different, like something soft, dense, or entirely different, she didn’t notice anything odd as her teeth scraped over it.

Servi may have accomplished the impossible thanks to Itarr, but she was still Human. Her bones were Human. Her flesh was Human. She had all of the characteristics that came with being a Human. Even though she spoke and went to such lengths to convince herself that she was a Mad Dog, she was still Human. And while her opponent also belonged to the Human race, his strength was assisted by drugs. They limited his ability to feel pain while increasing the vital chemicals his body needed to sustain his bulging muscles.

With a yell that rivaled the screams of a thousand civilians being burned alive, he used everything he had until there wasn’t anything left.

And it wasn’t enough.

Servi jerked her head back and forth, eventually lifting the weapon in the air, and since her foe held onto its handle, he came along for the ride. Then she spun in circles to pick up speed. The grip he had on his blade weakened, and when Servi suddenly fell backwards and opened her mouth, both her foe and the sword went flying high in the sky. He slammed into the top of the building, some seven stories up.

From the bottom floor, Servi grinned as she felt True Immortality healed her injuries. Blood dripped down, flowing onto her cheeks as she laughed. After waiting a few seconds and realizing he wasn’t coming down, she did the next best thing.

She jumped up after him, leaving behind two holes in the shapes of her feet. The force she unleashed traveled through the metal floor, forcing nearly everyone to lose their balance.  The distance between her and her shirtless opponent closed nearly instantaneously, and she saw why he didn’t come back down.

The sword's blade had somehow rotated, and it impaled him to the metal behind him. Blood traveled down parallel to the pulsing blue lines as if it was forbidden to cross. His face roared with anger, but the wound was too great. Years of overexertion, drugs, and an overall violent outlook on life had caused his body more stress than it could handle. It was a miracle that he lasted this long in his current state.

As Servi became gravity’s latest victim, she grabbed both his hand and the sword. Throwing the latter down first, Servi punched through her foe’s chest and grabbed onto his spine. She gripped it hard enough to maintain a solid grasp and held him towards the ground. The approach was fast and rapid, and the onlookers were defeated by the superhuman feats they witnessed.

When Servi slammed her opponent’s body into the metal-covered floor, it exploded. Thousands of fleshy chunks flew every which way, covering more than 95% of the onlookers with a crimson shower. The impact sent a massive vibration up and down the metal arena she constructed, but not a single person cried out in fear.

Mentally, they were dead. When Servi, covered in her opponent’s blood by the sheer impact, stood up with his spine, she threw it as hard as she could using every ounce of strength. The head of the Singi it landed on exploded, and nobody reacted. Servi leaned back, roared, shook her head, and sent crimson flying in every direction.