The Great

Evay Maver: Shock. It was all that I was feeling after witnessing the massacre that had happened before me. Geon, Savian, and Aurora were some of the most skilled warriors in the world, and this kid had just soloed all of them. The craziest part however, was his technique…..I’d been forced to watch hundreds of hours of Professor Vylen demonstrating proper technique for all kinds of hand-to-hand combat moves. At the time I had thought that no one on this Earth was better than him in terms of pure skill in hand-to-hand combat, but as I watched Yudra fight I realized how wrong I was. He wasn’t just perfect, he was something more….It was as if he had fully mastered the art of hand-to-hand combat…..even more than the symbols themselves. He stood up and marched towards me. I couldn’t move a muscle as he crouched down and looked at me with a smile. “Hey, I know you’re hiding something. Let me see it, that other side of yours.” He kept grinning at me as I tried my hardest to get up and he let out a little laugh, “you’re really interesting, Evay Maver. How do you become so strong in just an instant? You’re weak one moment and then overbearingly strong the next. What’s your secret?” I grit my teeth and went for a desperate slap at his face. He simply pushed my hand aside and kept smiling. “It’s quite difficult isn’t it? Your bones feel like they’re all cracked and broken, your muscles feel like they’re being torn from your bones, your head feels like it’s going to explode, and your body screams for help every second it gets the chance. You see, I feel like you and I are pretty similar. We were both born into a world, where being special was the norm, and being normal was the exception. Right?”

I spoke through gritted teeth, “what are you trying to say?” For the first time in this fight, he stopped grinning.

“I have no liquor abilities. My abilities are simply my hand-to-hand combat skills which I have acquired throughout my life. I’m fragile, weak, and can not summon dragons of fire, oceans of water, or manipulate space and minds. I only have these fists and legs to help me in this cruel world, and for some reason, I feel that you are similar to me. Someone who’s nothing special, thrust into the life of someone that is supposed to be.”

I clenched my teeth, “yeah? What do you know about me?”

But that sad truth was that he was right. He didn’t know the full story, but he was piecing it all together. I wasn’t anyone special, but I was chosen by someone that was…I was chosen by a literal god to be his vessel. I didn’t deserve this, I didn’t deserve any of this. But at the same time… None of that really mattered.

“I’m not into the past, I don’t like it. It doesn’t matter anymore and it will never matter in the future. I’m not special, I will never be Evay, the great but I don't really give a shit. I’m here, and I’m here now. Whether I deserve to be or not, all that matters is that I do something with all of this.” I felt a rush of power come over me as my hair turned into a brilliant and unnaturally bright-white color. My golden eyes pierced into Yudra’s soul as beautiful white and golden robes adorned my body.

Yudra smiled and instantly dashed back as I began to float into the air. The familiar confident, arrogant, and godly feeling seeped into my soul as a smile crept across my face. I heard Heim speak in the back of my head.

“I’ll take it from here.”

My words boomed over the stadium as a confident and regal voice—much different from my own—rang out into Yudra’s ears.

“Lower your head mortal boy, don’t you dare defy me.”

Yudra smiled widely as he let out a booming laugh. “YES! YES! I’ve been waiting so long! There you are! Show me that power of yours!” He looked at me with a face filled with excitement and anticipation as he put his hands up. After everything that he had just done I should have felt afraid. That smile should have haunted my dreams, that laugh should have turned my blood to ice. If I lost right here, we would all be going home. I should have felt the pressure, the fear, the nerves…. But right now I felt nothing but disgust. This world, this air, this color, all of it felt so beneath me. It all felt like a cheap imitation of something else, something much greater…..Nothing in this world felt at all beautiful. The normally beautiful blue-crystal sky looked dull and bland, while the glistening sea surrounding us looked like a pud of muddy water. Finally Yudra, the most dangerous man I had ever met, looked like nothing more than a bug. I spoke in an eerily cold and merciless voice. “Shut your mouth,” I flicked my fingers down and an immense downward force of gravity pinned Yudra to the ground. His smile disappeared and his face filled with struggle and panic as he grit his teeth and tensed his body in order to resist being crushed. I kept speaking, “You dare challenge me? Do you have no shame? Perhaps I underestimated the rudeness of mankind. Perhaps it is because I am in this boy’s body…I do not understand, however, how you expect to beat me?” Yudra let out groans of pain as he clenched his teeth and started to push himself up. “You’re right about most of the things you said about yourself, boy,” I flicked my fingers down again and the crushing force raining onto Yudra got even heavier, “it’s rude to ignore me when I am speaking.” Yudra let out a painful scream as I heard his bones break and crack. “My goodness, floating is very uncomfortable. Pardon me.” The crushing force being put onto Yudra went away as I flicked my fingers again. A giant golden throne, the one that I had seen in my dream, appeared out of thin air and rested itself on the air. The crowd gasped as the inhumanly beautiful throne seemed to shine with immense golden glory. Most people covered their eyes and looked away in fear of being blinded and the throne itself seemed to suck the very color out of the air. I took a seat on the throne and let out a laugh. Yudra coughed up blood on all fours as he tried to get onto his feet. He got to his feet and started to hobble towards me.

I let out another laugh, “you’re fearless, I can respect that. You have made the most out of that pitiful life fate has given you. But I will say this one thing, boy,” I jumped down onto the floor and came face to face with Yudra, “you will never be able to reach the level of the gods, no matter how much you dream or hope, you will always just be a mortal man. You will never be the strongest human in this world.” Yudra grit his teeth and flashed his eyes in anger as he threw a perfectly executed left hook. I smiled psychotically as I exploded into a brilliant flash of light and reappeared behind him. He reacted quickly as he threw a back kick at my solar plexus.

I gently flicked his foot and smiled, “very good.” His foot touched my finger and a flash of purple lightning and golden fire erupted as Yudra was blasted back. His blood spattered onto my robe and immediately vaporized. He landed with a thud and tried his best to get up. He grit his teeth and got to his feet only to come to the realization that his entire right leg was charred and gone. He grit his teeth and started to walk towards me. His entire leg was covered with purple symbols and markings, some images of cats, eagles, and lions, some images of golden spears, and some images of golden pots. Thick, runic, lines of text wrapped around his legs so that cursed, purple bands of death wrapped around his thighs and calves. I felt myself grin. “That leg now belongs to me.” I flicked my fingers down and Yudra suddenly took an involuntary knee. He tried to get up but I flicked my finger again. His leg started to involuntarily spasm and pull his body towards the ground. Yudra clenched his teeth and desperately tried to crawl towards me. I felt myself let out a quiet laugh which progressively got louder, and louder, and louder, until I heard myself howling psychotically. “Really? Really? Why do you humans still try? I mean, your will to win, survive, and succeed is so desperate. None of you will ever amount to anything by yourselves. Yet you still try, and try, and try to do something that you can never achieve. Why? Do you think you will become a fearsome warrior, boy? With your futile combat skills?” Yudra kept crawling and spoke through pain and gritted teeth.

“These hands just beat the very best of your warriors. I live and try because I can, I will, and I’ll kill you too.” I kept on laughing as I dashed towards Yudra and kicked him in the face. He was slapped back all the way to the outer wall. I floated towards his body.

“Do you really believe that? You humans live and die so quickly. Do you think that you can become someone great in that little amount of time? Do you think you can become greater than us? You? There is no hope.” Yudra stood up, blood dripping down his clothes and pants.

“Yeah–yeah,” he coughed up blood and fell onto the floor. “You’re–you’re not some god. I don’t care who you are. I’m not sure if you’re still Evay, or someone else, but I don’t care. Humans like me, my brothers and sisters, my parents, and friends have one thing in common–we can grow. You know nothing about me, about my birth, my expectations, my–my destiny. It’s not fair….nothing is fair. But I’m grateful for what I do have. If I can get here, with nothing but my fists and the clothes on my back….then I can do whatever I want.” He stood up and closed the distance between us in a flash. I smiled as he let his hands fly. This time, everything came in slow motion. I parried his left hook and slipped his cross and I ducked under his jab as I threw an uppercut. He pulled his head back to avoid it and I aimed a strong right at his chest. He shifted his body towards the left and spun around the strike. He aimed an elbow right at my face which I blocked. He spun back around with another elbow which I ducked. I immediately threw a left hook to the body which he blocked with his elbow. He threw a right-left hook combination which I parried and I immediately threw a strong left jab at his face. He slipped it and ducked under my second jab to his lowered head. I threw a knee which he immediately dodged and threw a jab so quick that even I–in this form–couldn’t react to it. I parried it with my shoulder and I threw a cross to his face. He ducked under the cross and I anticipated a body shot. He immediately crouched down on his left leg and threw an uppercut so fast that it seemed to tear the very air itself. I felt the uppercut land squarely on my chin and I stumbled back. His eyes went wide and he tried to follow up on his opportunity but his body seemed to give out on him. He fell to his knees and I gingerly touched my chin. It was hard to describe how I felt…..it was a mix of complex emotions but the best way to describe it was that I was confused.

He hit me? A god, hit by a man? I looked at the boy, bruised and battered on the ground, and a wide smile crept across my face. I summoned my ivory and golden spear in my hand and walked towards the helpless Yudra. “Boy, for your accomplishments and feats of strength you shall have a graceful defeat,” I summoned my spear and prepared to strike, “maybe we have all underestimated the power of mankind, but perhaps I should be the only one–out of all my brethren–to realize that. I congratulate you.” I struck my spear down onto Yudra’s shoulder and fully expected to hear his liquor screen shatter. But suddenly, my vision went dark. My bones all cracked in unison and my muscles screamed in pain as they seemed to burn away. A terrible and immense force of pain overcame my body as I dropped to the ground. Gold’s Veil evaporated off of my body as I felt everything inside my body burn away. I let out a massive cough of blood that splattered onto the marble floor. I heard my liquor screen shatter and a massive shower of golden light exploded out of my body as my eyes, mouth, and ears filled with golden light. I heard Hiem speak in the back of my mind.

“Brace yourself.”

An extremely loud and bright explosion of light erupted out of my body as I was consumed by the heat and energy of the blast. I heard the screams of the audience members as the protective barrier separating us and the crowd shattered. Giant marble boulders landed in the audience and crushed thousands of people. Massive splatters of blood appeared under the giant, flying boulders and men, women, and children were vaporized by the ensuing heat and energy. I closed my eyes and felt the golden explosion of light erupt into a massive blast. The stadium itself seemed to evaporate as the whole arena began to tear away. I used all of my remaining energy in order to put barriers on everyone currently on the battlefield, and I finally felt every fiber of my being shut down. I closed my eyes and everything went dark.