Writer’s spot: Greetings friends! No fights today, but some groundworks for the next chapters!

SO, I ended up making the arc a bit more complex than what I initially expected, I hope I can keep this up and not make any silly mistake here… Oh well…

BESIDES, tomorrow is Insania day and we shall see Yuu soon! Hooray! But back to Reinstall, I’m thinking on making the next arc be either the twin’s or the troll’s backstory… I wonder which one would be more interesting right now…

Beep, and enjoy your story!

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“And that’s it guys! Stop your bots because the damage is already done!” The male announcer said with an exaggerated manner so as to rile up the crowd.

“And what a wreck was this!” The girl said cheerfully. “I can barely recognize the remains of most robots! Is that a Clork there? I can’t tell!”

“I have no idea. But we can at least see who’s left!” The lynnian said while pointing at some robots “Look, that’s the Breaker, pretty much intact from all of that. There is… What are we calling him? Horf? It seems that he went fairly well in that fight too!”

“But look at Calamity! I doubt he can survive the next rounds with that kind of damage!” The girl said while running her eyes through the arena, before suddenly stopping. “Yohn… Where’s the favorite? I can’t find the Scavenger anywhere!”

“Are? What do you… Oh! There he is! At the corner of the arena!” The male announcer shouted while pointing to a corner of the room.

For a brief moment, the whole arena went quiet as they followed the guy’s finger, and what they saw only made the crowd become even more surprised for a moment.

In a quiet corner of the arena, far from where all the chaos was happening, stood three robots. One was a leaper with one of its treads crunched in such a way that would probably leave it unable to participate in the following matches. The other one was the large excavator-legs boar, whose both shotgun shell boxes had been yanked off and had one of its legs twisted in a weird shape. Both robots were squirming around while trying to move, yet unable due to the damage dealt to them.

Besides the two robots was a surprisingly realistic robot wolf, laying on the ground lazily and surprisingly intact, except for the lack of an ear and a small dent on his tail. Noticing the attention, the robot lifted his head from his leg and looked around, before turning to the two broken robots behind him.

“Wha… WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED? THE FAVORITE OF THIS FIGHT HAVE BEEN TAKEN OUT?” Yohn, the announcer said surprised. “What the hell happened here? How did we miss this? Did someone see what the hell happened in this place?”

At his words, the whole crowd started looking around for someone who could explain the happening, and the first one to actually move was a dwarf, who jumped into the arena and ran towards the boar.

“Scavenger! What happened to ya? How could the strongest die like that?” The dwarf said in an overly dramatic manner.

“Err… I don’t think he’s dead... Can’t you see he’s moving?” The female announcer said with a wry smile.

[So, I had an epic battle against two robots, and no one saw a thing?] Gaz complained.

[Well, The main area was much more chaotic, so it got people’s attention.] Ruby explained while looking around. [And you managed to at least leave two more alive… So it’s a beginning, I guess…] She said with a sigh. [Come… I… Don’t want to stay here longer than the necessary…] Ruby said sadly.

Gaz nodded to himself while lifting his body. The dwarf near him flinched in surprise, almost as if waiting for the wolf to attack him, but once he noticed it was barely paying any attention to him, he calmed down, and instead began frowning.

But right before passing the dwarf, the wolf suddenly made a full turn and approached him. Just as the dwarf was about to jump back in worry, the wolf bit one of the gun-boxes he had ripped out of the boar and went back to his way out of the arena. The dwarf started shouting at him to give back the part. Gaz once again turned to him, making the dwarf flinch as the robot stared right at him.

“Beep!” Was all what he said.

Then he turned back to his way, ignoring the shocked dwarf while leaping out of the arena with his tail wagging happily.

…

“What was that, guys? It seems like our favorite was beaten by a dark horse?” Gaz heard as the announcer said.

“And what kind of robot was it? I’ve never seen anything like that before! And I don’t think I’ve seen any mod on him either!” The female announcer said.

“Truly a mistery, Luri! Just what is happening here? How come I’ve never heard about him before?” The man asked.

However, by the time they had started discussing this, Gaz was already long gone from the pit, as well as with Ruby and Lunn, whom he was following. Dodging through the crowd until they reached the exit of the place, Gaz felt as Ruby eyed him accusingly.

Gaz gave her a confused and innocent look back to her, which only made her sigh loudly while they searched for a place to sit. From what they got, there was still the other three class two battle-royales to happen. After that, came the class one tournament. Class three wouldn’t have a battle-royale as there were only eight of them, and they wouldn’t all fit into the arena at the same time anyway.

The finals would be left for later, so that they could all be witnessed in a row, and it would be then that the boss would appear to witness. This basically meant that Gaz would have to survive until the finals either way.

But they would also have to think of a way to manage all these people around, since it could end up getting dangerous once they made their move onto the boss of this place.

None of that even passed on Gaz’s head, though.

[You seem to be enjoying yourself…] Ruby said coldly.

[Well… It’s fairly fun to fight, I must say…] He said with a mental shrug. [And maybe we can use this to get me some upgrade.]

[An upgrade, huh?] She said with a sigh.

[Hmm… You didn’t seem all that unhappy with the whole drone thingy, why are you so unhappy this time?] Gaz asked after some time.

[Well… It’s one thing to kill them in self-defense or in a true hunt. I understand that… But…] She gave a quick look back to the arena. [Here they are killing them for fun, and no other reason whatsoever. I hate it…] She said sadly.

[Yeah…] Ekis said in agreement. [Besides… some of them seems to be… Hurting…]

[Hurting?] Gaz asked confused, and he felt as Ruby also had the same reaction.

[Yes.] She replied. [Those modifications… If the robot isn’t willing nor ready for them, it can be painful. Really painful…] At her words, Ruby’s eyes widened in worry as she looked around the room. [Mirage is fine, she willingly let you modify her, and it also fit her.] Ekis said, calming the young morfian.

[Let me guess… It doesn’t hurt me because I’m special?] Gaz said in a playful tone.

[Pretty much…] Ekis said in a wry tone.

[Okay, jokes aside…] Gaz said while taking a look around. [What did the other two think of the plan of freeing the robots?]

[They liked the idea.] Ruby said. [But since the tournament will be at its end, there probably won’t be many robots left, so Yllivia is looking for something else we can use together with it.] Ruby said with a quick nod. [I also took a good look at the cages they use here. I think I can break them easily if I get the chance.]

Gaz nodded satisfied.

After looking around for some more time, they found a place to rest while they waited for their turn to come. From what they saw, it should take around one or two hours before it was time to go back to the arena. During this time, Yllivia came back and reported her findings.

From what she said, it seems that the area have a very basic fire extinguishing system that they could cause to activate easily. They could use that at the same time as they freed the robots to increase the chaos a bit, besides that, she also found a few guarded areas that she couldn’t enter without gathering attention, however, she was almost sure that she could hear the sounds of motors from inside. This could mean that they probably keep some other robots in store for when they are needed.

“But… I also heard about this tournament being rigged.” She said lowering her voice. “Some of the spectators said this, just like the troll.”

“Rigged? How so?” Lunn asked confused, but Yllivia simply shook her head.

“I don’t know, but I also heard that the Athlian seems to have bribed the boss so that he can win his tournament.” She said lowly, to which Lunn nodded. “There may be some of them on our too.” As she said that, she took a quick look at Gaz, who listened everything attentively. “If they do something to beepy… I won’t stand still.” She said briefly. She was affirming, not asking.

Ruby and Lunn nodded at her words, both agreeing with her.

Yllivia immediately left once again to take a look around after getting an idea of when it was beepy’s next fight, Ruby and Lunn stayed where they were so as to not arouse too much suspicion as if they were looking around. Some minutes later, there was an announcement on the speakers around the room.

“Greetings, my guests.” Said a charismatic voice. “With this last battle royale, we have brought an end to the preliminary phase of this tournament!” He said cheerfully.

“That must be the boss…” Lunn said shortly, and Ruby nodded.

“We had some surprising results, other not so much. But in the end, the most important is, by now only the strongest robots are left to fight in the arena!” The voice said. “So, we can be sure that from now on, only the most bloody, or should I say oily? Fights will go on! We will have metal clashing, blades slashing and guns shooting in our little arena! But, as it was promised, the survivor will receive a secret prize that we have been hiding up to now!”

The boss stopped to give some time for the message to sink in and to also build up some expectation.

“Firstly, the first places will receive a hefty sum of two thousand credits! That’s two times the usual prize!” With those words alone the crowd began to get even more agitated. “And that’s not all, we also have a prize for individual category! Class one will receive a rare Locklead motor!” The crowd once again riled up, but Gaz could only tilt his head confused. “Class two will get a brand new Orsian Gyroscope pump!” Ruby’s eyes widened slightly at this mention. “And class three will get a Throvehorn generator!”

[So… What does that means?] Gaz asked when the announcement stopped for a moment.

[Those prizes… They are quite rare... Too rare for something of this size…] Ruby said with a frown.

[So, you think that there’s something even dirtier under the dirt rug?] Gaz asked, and Ruby nodded slightly.

“But, there’s still one thing left, gentleman!” The man said once again over the speaker. “The champions will also have a chance to take on one last bout amongst themselves to compete for the supreme prize that will leave all of you with your mouths watering!” He stopped to give them some time to sink in with the last piece of news. “Two hundred grams of the ultra-rare, Foehorn aberrant headpiece alloy!”

“How… HOW DO THEY HAVE THAT?” Ruby asked shocked.

“What happened, sweety?” Lunn asked, surprised with Ruby’s sudden reaction.

Noticing that her outburst attracted the attention of the surrounding people, Ruby quickly hid herself behind Lunn before speaking.

“That… That robot ceased to exist ten years ago from what I know.” She whispered to the elf. “It’s said that the headpiece of an aberrant was an electricity conductor without equal.” She said lowly, to which the elf nodded.

“That… Seems expensive.” Lunn said shocked, to which Ruby nodded.

“With what he announced as a prize, we should have enough to buy a small house easily.” Ruby said. “That’s… Not something they would give away as a prize within a place like this.”

Lunn’s eyes widened before nodding while biting her fingernails. She seemed to think for a moment before nodding and turning to Ruby.

“Look, when Ylli come back, I’ll have her stay with you.” The elf said briefly. “I’ll try to see if I can find Mr. Serious pants somehow. We might need his help with this.”

Ruby widened his eyes briefly before nodding.

[Say… If that alloy is so incredible…] Gaz commented on the link. [What if we made the sensor with it?]

Ruby’s eyes widened for a moment, before staring at him for a few seconds. She nodded lightly while saying only a few words.

[That… Could work…]