284: Choice of Weapon

With the mysterious ‘miss Ruby’ nowhere to be seen, Number Four had plenty of time to pick his weapon. The shirtless men opened the massive chests they brought which contained a heap of sharp blades and pointy sticks.

The old man took skimmed over the surface contents of the chests, but instead of rummaging through each one, he knelt at one chest, placed his hand on the chest's back wall, and gently nudged it forward. But instead of staying in place, like a some-three-hundred-pound object should have, the chest skid forward, sliding several feet across the rocks before the friction stopped it and it toppled over, spilling its contents across the ground.

“Agh!” one of the masked staff barely jumped out of the way from the chest that landed right where he stood a second ago.

Many, including Beatrice, were understandably surprised at the ease with which this old man emptied the chest with only as much effort as it would take to push forward a half-open door. The countless medieval weapons that scattered across the ground were even more numerous than what the chest’s maximum volume suggested it could fit. And considering the dimensions of several weapons which looked to match the Cleaver that Number Seven carried around, it indeed seemed likely that this was no ordinary chest.

But while many onlookers studied the weapons that spilled out, Number Four already threw over the second chest, filling the surrounding ground with weapons, though several slid right into a nearby pillar of fire that swallowed those weapons whole but did not let even the charred remains slide out on the other side of the pillar.

The scrawny skeletal masked man looked up to the announcer’s platform. His ribcage of a chest rose and fell rapidly, the man was fuming with anger. Yet the announcer simply ever-so-slightly shook her head, and the man turned back, remaining in place, watching Number Four with even greater rage, by which time Number Four had already walked toward the weapon of his choice.

“My my, not messing around, our little old niece-fucker, is he?” the announcer seemed amused. “Knocking our previous equipment around… I sure hope it’s not because of something I said. Perhaps Number Four was hoping for a different opponent?”

Ignoring the announcer’s chatter, Number Four wasted no time in picking a weapon and sat down on his knees next to a giant spiked metal ball that was lucky enough to roll past the nearby devouring pillar, covering some distance away from its original place of rest.

Bigger than the old man’s balding head, the ball was attached to no chains or handles like a regular flail or morning star would be. A solitary object, it rested on the ground on the support of several long, sharp, pointy spikes. Not a single pointy end looked bent or blunted, despite the serious misuse they suffered, casually rolling across the uneven terrain.

Sitting in his knees, Number Four carefully put the palms of his hands on the ball, putting his fingers between the pointy ends and muttered something inaudibly.

“This is bullshit! How were we supposed to know there’d be someone else participating!?” someone in the crowds complained.

“Hey, that’s right! What about this round’s predictions, ‘Thelicia’?” another man added. “And does that masked bitch plan to participate to the end of the games? What if she ends up winning the whole thing?”

“Concerning the ‘Special Rules’ of this round, miss Ruby is not officially competing in the games!” ‘Thelicia’ quickly explained, seeing and feeling more rising frustrations with the unexpected developments. “Think of miss Ruby as just another special obstacle for our participants to pass in order to advance. If they fail, they will die just as they would in a fight against anyone else: unworthy and forgotten.

“There are a few more ‘special’ balls among those with the other participants. Will anyone else be unlucky like Number Four? Or perhaps lucky? Our resident old niece-fucker might turn out to be stronger than he first seemed. Perhaps after a hard-fought, grueling brawl, miss Ruby will be easy pickings should she be drawn a second time? Oh, and speak of the devil!”

With everyone’s attention on Number Four or the announcer, nobody noticed the masked girl appear on a narrow winding path leading to the arena proper until the giant sphere’s screen changed to show the approaching robed, hooded female figure with a white mask obscuring her face.