Ch. 5: Battle Royale

The 8 heroes go head to head in a 4 v. 4 battle.

Chapter 5: Battle Royale
Brenden, John, Scarlett, Seth, Anna, Tara, Drew, and Frank went to the room Tanaka was in. Tanaka told them to follow him. He led them into the room with the words "TEAM BATTLE" on it. The inside was painted red on one side and blue on the other with a black line separating the two sides.
"Drew and I saw this room when we were heading to the long-ranged place." Brenden recalled.
"This is where you do team battling." Tanaka explained. "Team battling is where I split you into two separate teams. You then fight until you can't fight anymore. If you get injured, you can go to the room that is to the right of here and get healed."
"Sounds interesting." Tara said. "Who is going to be on what team?"
"Team red is..." Tanaka said. "Brenden, Seth, John, and Drew."
Brenden, Seth, John, and Drew went to the end of the red side and readied their weapons.
"Team blue is..." Tanaka said. "Scarlett, Tara, Frank, and Anna."
Scarlett, Tara, Frank, and Anna went to the end of the blue side and readied their weapons.
"Are you ready?" Tanaka announced. "Three...two...one...GO!"
Frank, John, Scarlett, Tara, and Seth charged forward while Brenden, Drew, and Anna stayed in the back.
"Tara!" John shouted. "Don't think I'm going to go easy on you!"
"Same here!" Tara said. "Bring it!"
Tara and John dashed towards each other, but tumbled to the ground.
"Ow..." John groaned.
"C'mon John." Brenden said. "Get up!"
"Sorry." John said. "These swords are quite heavy!"
"So?" Brenden reputed. "Seth's weapon weighs a literal ton and he seems to be doing fine!"
Over on the red side Frank and Seth were stand across from each other.
"You're cornered." Seth said. "I can hit you whenever I want."
"I can too y'know." Frank said.
"Oh yeah." Seth said. "Nice move."
"I haven't made a move yet." Frank said. "Geez. Sometimes I think you don't have anything in that head of yours."
As he said that, Seth tried to hit Frank's stomach with his cudgel, but Frank quickly dodged it and wrapped Seth's ankles in a vine, causing him to fall on his chin.
"What're you gonna do now?" Frank mocked.
"I don't know." Seth said. "Probably... this!"
Frank tried to dodge the incoming attack, but realized that Seth didn't do anything.
"Really." Frank said. "If you're going to try to trick me, you going to have to do bett-"
Before Frank could finish his thought, Seth pushed himself up with his arms and kicked Frank in the knee, causing him to fall from pain.
"Owww..." Frank moaned. "It feels like you... bumped my knee cap out of place."
"Ha!" Seth mocked. "How's that for trickery?"
Seth ripped off the vine around his legs with his cudgel and began to walk away until he felt pain on his back. He fell to the ground and saw Frank with his whip in his hand.
"I'm..." Frank silently said, shaking from pain. "Stronger than you."
Frank tumbled to the ground with his fractured knee.
"Seth and Frank are out." Tanaka said. "So that means the red team and the blue team have three people left."
"I'm sorry Frank!" Anna said. "I would've healed you... but... I couldn't."
Frank looked at Anna and saw she was trapped in a corner by John. John stood there with his swords pointed at her stomach. Anna tried creating a wall of ice to stop his swords, but as soon as they were made, they were cut through and melted by the swords' poison.
"Okay!" Anna cried. "I give up! Count me out Tanaka!"
"Alright." Tanaka said. "Anna is out. So now there are three on the red team and two on the blue team."
"Yeah!" John cheered.
John was to busy cheering that he didn't hear Tara sneak up behind him. With great force, she hit him in the back with the wood end of her scythe, which made him fall on his face. She continued to hit the same spot on his stomach over and over.
"Um... Tara?" Anna asked. "That's a bit harsh, don't you think?"
Tara turned to Anna.
"What? Do you want me to just let him eliminate my teammates?" Tara said. "The only reason I didn't use the blade end on him is because he's my friend."
John tried to grab his sword, but Tara stepped on his hand.
"Oww..." John moaned.
"Okay Anna, I'll stop." Tara said. "Just one more hit though."
Tara held her scythe above her head and was about to swing it when Brenden, with lightning speed, pulled John out of the way.
"Are you okay?" Brenden asked.
"No..." John said. "Can't... fight... anymore."
John fell to the ground.
"John is out." Tanaka said. "Now there are two on both teams."
"Th-thanks Brenden." John said.
"Brenden! Behind you!" Drew yelled.
Brenden turned around and saw Scarlett rushing toward him. He quickly dodged the incoming attack, causing Scarlett to run into the wall.
"Ow!" Scarlett said.
Brenden, taking no chances of her tricking him, stunned Scarlett with a quick lightning bolt. He then dashed towards her and hit her in the back with his staff which left a giant reddish-purple mark
"Ow!" Scarlett said. "...Geez!"
Scarlett tumbled to the ground.
"Scarlett is ou-" Tanaka tried to say.
"No!" Scarlett shouted. "I'm... not done yet!"
Scarlett, with her last bit of energy, got up and shot a small blade of wind towards Brenden, but it blew by him.
"Whew." Brenden said. "That was clo-"
Brenden was interrupted by a yelp of pain from behind him. He turned around and saw that the blade of wind hit Drew in the chest.
"Ngh!" Drew gasped as he fell to the ground.
Scarlett shot another wind blade at Drew. Brenden tried to jump in front of it to save his injured friend, but the wind was too fast. Another one sliced Drew in the chest.
"There..." Scarlett said right before she tumbled to the ground. "That's... out of the... way..."
"Scarlett and Drew are out." Tanaka said. "It's all up to Brenden versus Tara."
Tara looked at Brenden with an intense stare. The red eyes made it even worse.
"Uhh..." Brenden whispered. "This isn't good."
Tara charged at Brenden and swung her massive blade. He dodged it and bonked her on the head from behind. Tara didn't say anything but Brenden knew she was angry.
Tara turned around. She focused her energy on her scythe until it caught on fire. She swung at Brenden again. She missed but the intense heat of her weapon gave Brenden a burn mark on his arm.
"Ow." Brenden said, trying not to get angry. "That kinda hurt."
Tara charged once more. Before she could hit, Brenden stunned her with a lightning bolt. Tara fell to the ground, but quickly got back up, not even with a scratch. She swung her scythe, sending a blaze of intense heat at Brenden. This time it burned off his right sleeve and a little bit of skin on his arm.
"If only Drew was still here." Brenden thought to himself while holding his arm. "His water could put out these flames. Let's see... I am the faster one here... Ooh! Idea!"
Brenden circled around Tara over and over with great speed. While he was doing it, he shot her with lightning bolts that were bigger than last time. He kept on doing it for about a minute. Tara fell to the ground but wasn't out of strength yet. She threw her scythe where Brenden was about to run and it cut his legs and caused him to trip and fall.
"Oww..." Brenden said. "My legs..."
"There." Tara said. "Got that fini-"
Before she could finish her sentence, Brenden extended his arm and hit Tara on the head with his staff as hard as he could which knocked her out. Brenden, shaking, stood up and saw that he was the last one left.
"Tara is out." Tanaka said. "The red team wins!"
"Yay..." Brenden said. "Can we... go to the healing room now?"
"Alright." Tanaka said. Who all is conscious?"
"Me." Anna said.
"I... am." John mumbled.
"Me." Frank said. "But I can't walk."
"I am!" Seth said enthusiastically despite his serious back injury.
"Okay." Tanaka said. "Follow me."
Brenden, Seth, Anna, and John carried Scarlett, Frank, Drew, and Tara over to where Tanaka was leading them. It was a small room with nine chairs, eight of which were colored and had symbols on them. There was a blue lightning bolt, a purple scorpion tail, a red fire, a light-blue snowflake, a green leaf, a dark-blue water drop, a grey tornado, and a brown mountain. They all sat down(or got set down if they were unconscious) and their wounds quickly healed. Also, the unconscious people quickly woke up.
"Wow!" Seth said. "That works really good!"
"You all did well." Tanaka said. "I think it's time to head back to the other dimension."
Everyone started to walk out of the room except for John.
"Wait!" John exclaimed. "I just thought of something."
"Well, what is it?" Tanaka asked.
"If the Sun Relic is so important, why did you scatter the pieces all over the world?" John asked. "It doesn't make sense."
"Well, I guess I can't lie anymore." Tanaka said. "The Sun Relic has a completely different use."
"What is it?" Seth begged. "Tell us tell us tell us tell us tell us tell-"
"Okay!" Tanaka interrupted. "This is a long story, so bear with me."

I was in a group with two other people named Hansuke and Tadashi. Together, we sealed a great evil in the Underworld using the Sun Relic. The Sun Relic is an Interdimensional Gate Key to the Underworld. An Interdimensional Gate Key is a device that can open a portal to a different dimension. I only own two: The one that leads here and the one that leads to your guys' dimension. We thought nothing could escape the Underworld, but if the dreams you had came true, then... your dimension may be doomed. To stop the evil from somehow getting the Sun Relic, Tadashi used his Blitz Cannon to split up the Sun Relic and scatter it all across the dimensions. Now that the first dream came true, we need the Sun Relic so you eight can go to the Underworld and defeat the great evil. Now, another thing I need to explain. You guys said that several "beams" were draining the Sun of its power. Well that's wrong. Before Tadashi shot the Sun Relic pieces into the air, Hansuke attached a Dimension Tracker to each of the pieces. A Dimension Tracker shoots a purple beam at the center of the dimension it was placed on if it leaves that dimension. He did that to easily find the pieces incase we needed them, and yes, the center of your dimension is your sun. The great evil must've been sending you guys false information to trick you. There, did that answer a few questions?

"Okay..." Scarlett said. "That was a LOT of info."
"So, everything we learned a few days ago was false?" John asked.
"Pretty much." Tanaka said.
"So, the snow, it being dark out, and the Sun exploding..." Brenden said.
"All in your heads." Tanaka said. "All an illusion made by Daku."
"Who?" Drew asked.
"That is the great evil's name." Tanaka said.
"So, how strong is Daku?" Tara asked.
"I... don't know." Tanaka sighed. "Probably stronger than all of you combined."
"Wait." Drew said. "What do you mean you don't know?"
"Well..." Tanaka said. "We didn't fight him, but we could see the destruction he was capable of."
Anna stood still with her head down.
"Anna?" Frank asked. "Everything okay?"
Anna shot her head up with an excited smile.
"We have to get that Sun Relic piece!" Anna shouted.
"Anna..." Tara whispered.
"If we don't act soon, it'll be too late!" Anna shouted.
"Anna..." Brenden whispered.
"There's got to be something we can do!" Anna shouted.
"Anna..." Drew whispered.
"We're not that strong now..." Anna shouted.
"Anna..." Frank whispered.
"But we can get stronger!" Anna shouted.
"That's the spirit!" Seth said. "Let's train some more!"
"Okay, okay." Tanaka said. "I was planning on the team battling being best of three."
"Then let's do round two!" Seth shouted.
"This time, we should plan out our attack." Tara said.
"Okay." Tanaka said. "Everyone go back to the team battle room and go to your side."
Brenden, John, Tara, Seth, Scarlett, Anna, Drew, Frank, and Tanaka went back to the room that said "TEAM BATTLE" on it and went to their respective sides. They then discussed a plan for about five minutes. Once they were done, Tanaka stood in the center at the back wall.
"Ready?" Tanaka said. "Three... two... one... go!"
John dashed toward Scarlett since he thought she was the strongest on the blue team other than Tara. Scarlett also ran towards John and delivered a flurry of jabs which all got deflected by John's swords.
"Hmm!" John sighed. "Too eas-"
Before he could finish, Scarlett pushed John with her wind, causing him to fly all the way back to the red team's back wall. Before he hit the wall, he caught himself by pointing his swords forward and stabbing into the wall. John pulled his swords out, taking a chunk of the wall with them. He pulled his wakizashi out of the piece of wall and then started to spin.
"Ha!" Scarlett chuckled.
Scarlett dashed towards him to prevent his next attack. John threw the chunk of wall towards Scarlett, but she slid underneath it, jumped over him, and wind pushed him to the entrance wall. This time, he didn't stop himself and he smacked into the wall, pushing him through it and knocking him out.
"John is out." Tanaka said. "There is three on red and four on blue."
Anna ran over to Scarlett.
"Are you okay?" Anna asked.
"Yeah." Scarlett puffed. "Didn't get hurt at all actually!"
"Okay." Anna said. "I'll stay by you. I have an idea."
Over on the blue side, Frank and Brenden were at an impasse. They both were standing with their weapons drawn, intensely staring at each other.
"Ha!" Brenden laughed. "You blinked!"
"Ughh." Frank said. "Really?"
Frank tried to shoot a vine at Brenden, but he quickly dodged it and hit Frank in the legs with his bo staff, causing him to trip and fall.
"Ow." Frank moaned.
"Y'know when you and Drew were jerks to us?" Brenden asked Frank. "Yeah, this is for that."
Brenden charged up his bo staff and slammed it onto Frank's back, hurting and electrifying him.
"Urgg!" Frank moaned. "My back..."
Frank tried to get up, but Brenden charged up his bo staff, put it against Frank's back, and shot it, causing Frank to slide across the room on his face. Smoke was coming from his face from the intense scraping of the floor. He kept sliding until he hit his head on the wall, knocking him out.
"Frank is out." Tanaka said. "There is three on red and three on blue."
"Ooh!" Anna said. "That had to hurt."
Anna ran over to Frank to heal him, but got blocked by Drew.
"Going to heal your teammate, eh?" Drew smirked. "I don't think so."
"Aww." Anna sighed. "I wanted to save this idea for later, but oh well."
Anna ran towards Frank created a ball of ice around the two.
"Hey, Tara!" Drew shouted. "Get rid of this ice ball...Tara?"
Drew turned around and saw Tara facing against Seth in a distant corner.
"I'm not on your team!" Tara said, rudely. "Besides, I have to deal with this pest."
"Hey!" Seth said. "Rude!"
"Whatever." Drew said. "I think I can handle this."
Drew pulled back his bow and shot the ice sphere, but the sphere turned the bow's water into ice instantly.
"Okay... " Drew sighed. "Maybe not."
Tara jumped in the air and slammed her scythe's blade into the ground, creating a heat wave. The heat burned parts of Seth's shoes.
"Hey!" Seth shouted. "I just got these!"
Seth swung his immensely heavy weapon and knocked Tara scythe out of her hands and to where Drew was at. Drew looked down and to the right and saw that the scythe was melting the ice ball very quickly.
"Drew! Hand me that scythe." Tara demanded. "Do so now!"
"Hmm..." Drew mocked. "No."
Tara's arms and hands caught on fire from the anger. However, she didn't notice Seth sneaking up behind her and delivering a massive kick, sending her flying towards Drew.
"No!" Drew yelled at Seth. "I don't need more blue team over here!"
"Well it's not like I'm not going to help you." Seth said, running towards Drew. "By the way, you may want to look behind you."
Drew turned around and saw Tara about to swing her scythe, but Drew caught it by the long handle and put out her flames.
"There's no need for that intense heat." Drew said, acting cocky. "It's starting to make me sweat."
"Rrrgh!" Tara yelled.
This time her flame grew even bigger with anger, but she put too much energy into it and passed out.
"Tara is out." Tanaka said. "There are now three on red and two on blue."
"Make that three on blue." Frank said. "Oh wait, never mind."
Drew turned around and saw that the ice ball had melted and that Frank was perfectly fine, but for some reason Anna was passed out on the floor.
"I guess Anna used too much of her energy." Frank said. "Oh well. Want to do this Drew?"
"Is that even a question?" Drew asked.
"Is that even an answer?" Frank laughed.
Seth ran behind Frank and hit him in the back really hard, causing him to fly across the room and hit the wall.
"Are you even trying?" Seth mocked.
"Frank and Anna are out." Tanaka said. "There are now three on red and only one on blue."
"This should be easy." Seth said. "It's one versus thr-"
Before he could finish, Seth saw Brenden slide on the floor beside him with cuts across his chest.
"Owww..." Brenden moaned.
"Brenden is out." Tanaka said. "There are now two on red and one one blue."
"You just had to jinx it." Drew sighed.
"Well..." Seth coughed. "Odds are still in our favor."
"Are you guys not trying or something?" Scarlett asked. "I guess it goes to show that girls are better that boys!"
Drew pulled back his bow and Seth readied his weapon.
"Uhh..." Scarlett said. "Uh oh."
Drew shot an arrow at Scarlett, trapping her in a strong bubble. Once it popped, Seth went around her and kicked her across the room.
"Scarlett is out." Tanaka said. "Red team wins again!"
"Woohoo!" Seth and Drew celebrated.
"Alright, Seth, Drew, and anyone who's conscious help get everyone to the healing room." Tanaka instructed.
After a quick healing session, everyone headed back to the dummy training room.
"What should we do now?" Anna asked.
"Train." Tanaka said. "You still have a long time until you can fight in REAL combat against REAL enemies in REAL life and death situations. Maybe after a while I will give you something that'll help you fight."
There was a pause of silence.
"You heard the man!" Tara exclaimed. "Let's get training!"
"Shouldn't we go eat or something?" Brenden asked.
"Nope." Tanaka explained. "Everything in this dimension is faster, but things like eating, sleeping, hygiene, and aging are all locked at your dimension's speed. It's been probably less that a second on your dimension."
"Oh." Brenden said.
"Like I said!" Tara stated. "Back to training!"
Brenden, John, Tara, Seth, Scarlett, Anna, Drew, and Frank trained for what would normally be about twenty minutes, but for them it was just over four-hundred days.

Reviews

[Marcel Darrow]

I thought something important was going to be shared right away, instead we dive into a battle royale, which I’m down for always. But like why? Why would these kids be willing to jump right into a fight with each other? Like it makes sense that some of the more impulsive kids would jump right in, but why did Anna not protest sooner or Tara mention that this was a bad idea? Why is it that you have to be substantially injured to be deemed unable to fight, by that I mean why are kids being encouraged to hurt each other and doing so willingly? Is it because they are guaranteed to heal? The sudden rivalry between Frank and Seth seems interesting but has disturbingly violent outcomes (nice action by the by).
Poison doesn’t melt ice??? Is the poison warm or does it react with water molecules in an exothermic way that encourages melting? That one line really took me out of the story.
When did Tara become so coldhearted? She was such a mom a few chapters ago where she gave everyone water and seemed to be concerned when Seth did dangerous things.
How did lightning as an element converted to lightning speed for Brenden? Could there have been foreshadowing to this revelation earlier so that it doesn’t seem like a random power gain here? Tara’s and Brenden’s fight was interesting and I enjoyed the certain level of back and forth to the fight.
Why did John bring up the sun relics now? Tanaka already said he had something important to share so why not preface the backstory with that? This backstory seems to be a bit of a brief exposition dump- there are two main points, so can you break this into two parts, one now and one later when they begin to track down the other sun relics?
Why is Anna of all people so hyped to go find the sun relics? She’s the healer and she doesn’t like to fight (the reader knows that the “first” sun relic is with pirates, which will lead to a fight), so why is she the enthused one? What does it mean that people are whispering her names, are they expressing concern or surprise or chanting?
The second battle has a lot of good action. How is John not dead though, being sent through a wall that must be somewhat hard? Why is Frank’s and Drew’s past of bullying suddenly relevant to the plot, especially since they are all friends now? How is Frank not dead when he’s literally smoking? How come Tara and Anna can just burn herself out by overusing her element? Do the kids also have super strength since they seem to be able to throw each other across the room?
I think their interactions during the fight are entertaining and the right amount of competitive. There is also a sense of progress as the kids form strategies and try them out. It’s wild to conceptualize that they trained for four-hundred days, but now the reader has high expectations of their skill in the upcoming chapters. This was a really good chapter, so I’m sorry that it brought up so many questions.

[Brenden Brown]

Thanks a lot for the very in-depth reviews. I know the first several chapters need much improvement, and I'm bound to rewrite chapters 1-8 eventually. If you want to know how my current writing prowess is, I'll be posting chapter 22 in a couple of days, and it will definitely be my best chapter yet. Thanks again.
- Brenden

[The Heimerdonger]

Four hundred days? That's like a whole year without their parents XD

[Brenden Brown]

10000 hours man

[Brenden Brown]

Let me know what you think! :)

[Dankpurpledino]

This book has been intriguing so far, and the fact of the recent addition to this chapter. Keep up the good work I know you can do it bud.