Owen was incredibly relieved to see us go. Sloane and the others were disappointed to leave, but when they heard we were heading for an arena they perked up. Arenas were pretty popular among Ascendants from what I'd been able to find. We were all show offs who loved to make a scene and being able to make flashy moves in an open space against a strong enemy while potentially thousands of people watched was a popular pass time.

I couldn't pretend to be any different really. I'd gotten excited as soon as I'd heard about the arena, and I was DEFINITELY going to fight someone there. Maybe not Lament, since I didn't want any part of a combatant someone would equate to Abel in terms of skill, especially not someone who knew and had fought with him. Granted, from what I could tell, Abel had gotten exponentially scarier after years of being a sausage selling hermit who presumably trained constantly because he had no social life, but still.

So we were all in a pretty good mood as we headed for the Bone Arena, Doomtown's answer to the unspoken questions on every Ascendants mind: 'is there something stupid and violent we can do today, and how many people will watch?'. As expected, traveling with our full contingent was apparently more than most people wanted to bite into, so we weren't attacked again, and we made good time getting to the arena, which was a massive black stone coliseum that somehow managed to look squat and dark despite being ten times the size of every other building here.

When we got to the Arena, Mel was the one who took the lead, stepping past Abel and waving jovially to the dark armored woman standing to the left side of the entrance. "Ceras! I thought that was you. I haven't seen you in years. They have you on door duty huh? You still fighting? Or is this your usual gig." She stepped up to hug the surprised guardswoman, shooting a perfunctory nod to the man on the other side but otherwise ignoring him in favor of an old friend.

As Ceras responded and the two began catching up, Abel stepped up to us and leaned in to murmur. "Mel was always much more interested in the arena than I was. Don't get me wrong, I came here often enough, but I've always preferred a spontaneous battle to scripted combat. Mel practically lived at this place during our time in the Twenty though. Starbreaker was the queen of the Bone Arena for years, so don't be surprised if she seems to know more than a few of the people here."

As if on cue, Mel waved us all over. "Alright you lot, Ceras says there are a few fights on the card for the evening, but we still have time for the open bouts. Some of the Spear Legion are here. That Wren guy that Owen mentioned is around, but Lament doesn't show up until right before her matches. They have her up against the reigning champion tonight." She turned to Abel. "Apparently Blight is still fighting here. He moved up after I left and has been undefeated for quite a while recently."

Abel snorted out a laugh. "Blight? That super pale kid with the long hair and the skinny chest who only wore leather pants and a vest and followed you around like a puppy? I forgot that kid even existed. Oh wow, this place has slipped since we left." He shot her a wolfish grin. "Though I suppose it became obvious when we first arrived that this place had...gone to the dogs."

We all groaned at that, and one of the Beast Lord Garden intitiates actually booed loudly, though when Abel turned to see who it was he didn't seem to be able to tell. Shame, I'd have liked to tell them how funny I thought it was. Mel had just rolled her eyes and ignored her boyfriend. "Anyway, there are still plenty of matches open for sign up if you two want to fight against Wren. If he accepts you can try challenging him two on one. There aren't a lot of limits in the arena aside from what the contestants agree on."

I turned quickly to shoot Callie a pleading look, which she saw immediately, prompting an eye roll and a giggle. "Oh stop it. I'm fine with a fight. Even if this guy is too tough for us it'll be good practice for the tournament and give us something to work off of. If he isn't we can put the fear of us into the Spear Legion, so really it's a win win." She turned to Mel. "Do we have to pay for this?" We had some money, but most of it had gone into expanding the Pavilion, so we weren't carrying much of it on hand.

Luckily, Mel just shook her head. "Not directly. They charge to watch the fights, but its sort of an all access pass for the open challenges, and fighters are exempted. The rest of us will be fine, Ceras will let us in just this once. The owner, Melkar, is an old friend, and he won't mind her letting me in for free with some friends. So, are you going to challenge Wren? Because if so I have bets to place."

I snickered at that. "Place some for us too then, because yes. Most of our liquid cash is in the Pavilion so just take it out of there. Though I'm not quite as confident as you are that we'll win. We've been training our asses off, but competing against someone like this is a level of combat we haven't ever really experienced. Beat and Sever were the closest but they were distracted and they're locals anyway. This is a guy from a force considered powerful in the star system as a whole. I have a feeling he won't be an easy mark."

Mel just shrugged. "If you lose you lose. It's not like I'm betting my life savings on you. Besides, if he's been doing well the odds should be pretty good. I'll make sure not to put too much of your own cash on you either. I figure ten G-rank chits or so." We followed her past Ceras and into the arena, but the other guard led us away from the group and down a side hallway. We had to stop to do a bit of paperwork before being led to a waiting area with more than a few other Ascendants in it.

We'd signed up for pairs, with the option to fight singles as a team, and when we arrived we sought out Wren, who was actually really easy to find. A huge man with olive skin and long red hair, he was easily identifiable by the absolutely colossal bone spear leaning against the wall next to him. Made from what appeared to be a femur the size of a person, the thing had been shaved down to be grippable by Wren's dinner plate sized hands (seriously, he was at least seven feet tall) and had a single steel coated tooth molded seamlessly into the end, honed to a razor's edge.

We stopped in front of the big man, whose amber eyes remained closed as he reclined in his seat, at least until he heard us stop. They creaked open slightly. "What do you want?" He said in perhaps the most relaxed voice I'd ever heard. "I'm trying to nap before my next match." He yawned expansively after he spoke, but despite the relaxation and laziness, I noted that his hand was never more then a full arm's extension from grabbing the spear. He might be napping, but if he was he wasn't stupid enough to leave any openings.

Callie smiled cheerfully, holding out her hand to shake. "Hi there! I'm Nightstrike and this is Solomon. Can we both fight you at once?" Her tone was upbeat and entirely without shame for how unbalanced the match was, and everyone in the room turned to look at us in confusion. They had all been sitting quietly, staring down opponents or trying to look disaffected and tough.

Wren's eyes opened completely, focusing on Callie, before his lips twitched into a wide grin and he burst out laughing. "That...that was the weirdest challenge I've had since I got here. Wow. No posturing or excuses huh? Just 'let us gang up on you so we can kick your ass?'" He paused in contemplation before standing up, cracking his neck and hoisting the spear up over his shoulder. "You know what? Sure. What the hell. I was going to let them do a random match thing, but why the hell not?"

He strolled over to the window where a clerk was quietly doing paperwork on one end of the room to accept a challenge, and I turned to Callie. She'd been smiling widely at his acceptance, but as soon as he was out of range her face turned serious. "I'm assuming you noticed that?"

I nodded grimly. "He was straining to lift that spear. Not a lot, but anyone at peak G-rank in a physical combat style should have absurdly high Might. Whatever the fuck that thing is made from, it's HEAVY." I wasn't sure what the weight ratio was on bone, but since Ascendants in the G-rank clocked lifting power in the TONS I was pretty sure that thing wasn't any normal type of bone. It seemed to be made from F-ranked materials if the Impact was anything to go by, but it was probably on the high end of that scale.

Instead of coming back, Wren gave us a broad wave and gestured over to a hallway across the room with a sign next to it saying 'left gate enclosure' he turned and vanished into the one on the right, and I got the obvious idea. Callie and I headed for the hall, walking down it to a small stone room with a dark metal gate on one side. It was lit with widely spaced torches, though the flames were the same red we saw in most of Doomtown.

Seeing the closed gate Callie and I posted up nearby. I turned to cock my head at her. "You ready for this? Our first taste of real combat at the star system level? I'm pretty psyched myself." My hands were basically shaking with anticipation. One slipped down to my coat to slide my cane free, twirling it between my fingers so fast the sand at our feet was blown around.

"I can tell." Callie said fondly. "But yeah. This will be fun. How is your Balam Skill by the way? We've been training a while, and I forgot to ask. I know you're at Lesser, but with all the non stop work we've put in I'm assuming you're coming close to Beginner?" She sounded hopeful, which I got. Even if it wasn't much of a restriction, the geas was inconvenient, and I would be just as glad when it was gone.

I shook my head sadly, but before I could answer, a loud voice rang through the stone. "Ladies and gentlemen! Our next match is going to be a special treat. A two on one showcase against Wren, who you've all seen in here the last few days." The gate began to rise. "Now, coming in from the left gate, put your hands together for NIGHTSTRIKE and SOLOMON!" Taking that as a cue we headed off out the gate and into thew massive expanse of sand that was the arena proper.

Seeing us enter, Wren gave a cheerful wave before gripping his spear one handed and whipping it through the air around him. The weight and force caused small explosions of air and sound as the thing broke the sound barrier, blowing the nearby sand around in a storm of motion. "Well!" He called across the sand. "Hope you two can give me a decent workout. I haven't had a solid fight since I got to this mudhole." There was an explosion of sand as he rocketed himself forward, moving so fast I wouldn't have been able to move out of the way if I hadn't been expecting it. Guess we were starting.