The next day found us reporting to one of the WAY too many arenas in Rajak. "Seriously." I complained. "Why are there like three hundred of these places in town? Do people not DO anything else?" I knew they did, actually, because tons of Ascendants spent most of their day hunting monsters for various bounties or Academy points. There was zero reason for them to be so bored as to run off to a random Arena to mess around.

Callie giggled at my annoyed tone. "Arenas are a time honored tradition among Ascendants. They give us an excuse to show off in front of a bunch of people, and they make money at the same time. Granted, places like this are way more regulated than arenas down in the WCP, but the Unity is still an organization for cultivators, and they'd be stupid not to take advantage. You need to make a name for yourself to get stronger, and for people outside of the major organizations this is the easiest way."

"She's right." Chimed in Abel. "This is pretty much universal. Arenas are a valued commodity on almost every planet. They give poor and underexposed Ascendants a method of showing off and getting attention. More than one of the current E-rankers were arena-born. Hell, most of them scout their best talent from places like this. By that logic, do you honestly think in a city this size that three hundred arenas is a lot?"

Now that he said it like that..."Huh. Now I'm wondering why there aren't more of them." Before either of them could speak I held up my hands. "It's just a figure of speech, I understand the concept of diminishing returns. Anyway, with twelve hundred and fifty fights spread over three hundred arenas the first round should only be four fights. If that's the case why the gap between the fight days?"

Callie gestured around. "Buzz. This whole thing might be for selecting slots, but every one of these contestants is a possible recipient of a ton of renown. Most of the factions here are live streaming this back to their own planets and territories. Burning out the viewers with constant repetitive fights would be a waste. By have only one fight a day or so they can keep people excited and milk the most our of the attention."

That actually made a lot of sense. I could understand why they would agree to it to. Under the assumption the others would do the same they could reap a ton of benefits. Sadly I couldn't learn more about how this would work because the announcer for the arena called our names. "Alright." Said Callie. "Everyone remember your roles. We practiced this last night." She drew the dagger we'd looted from the necropolis.

We had practiced, and as we made our way down the tunnel leading to the arena proper, I went over the various strategies in my head, trying to make sure I could react with a moments notice. As we walked, I triggered Touch of Tears and Consecration of Flames as usual. If nothing else they would theoretically allow my cane to actually make contact with the ghosts.

Once we stepped out onto the sand, the previously roaring crowd cut off completely. Looking up, I could see them still yelling in the stands, but their mouths weren't producing any sounds. Some kind of barrier maybe? It seemed to only cover the actual arena pit. Interesting. My eyes, which had been scanning the arena, finally fell onto the group of four beings standing across from us, clearly waiting for us to arrive.

The one in the lead, who I assumed was Selariam, didn't look like much. Just a super pale guy with silver hair and delicate features. He was short, maybe five foot six, and his icy blue eyes were calm and analytical. "Hello." He said as we approached. "You must be our opponents. We represent the Halls of the Nether, a D-ranked force located on the planet Vakram. My name is Selariam, and these are my brothers, Sennec, Vile, and Runk. Might I have the honor of knowing what your faction is called?"

I opened my mouth to answer, and quickly had to break off the response as my senses screamed at me that I was about to be attacked. It took me almost too long to realize I wasn't the one being targeted. I spun on my heel, lashing out at the air behind Callie with a Flurry of Blows enhanced smash of my cane. There was a crash as the head of my weapon met the blades of a huge double headed axe, and another figure faded into view.

As he did, the largest of the four enemy combatants dissolved into silvery mist. I bared my teeth at him and triggered one of my fire attacks through my cane, releasing a giant burst of slightly corrosive flame. Granted, it wasn't as effective as actually using the skills synergized with the attack, but it was faster and much less of a strain. The massive bearded ghost warrior's eyes widened and he flickered backwards unnaturally as the wave of light green fire swallowed the space he'd been occupying.

While I was distracted, the other three had attacked, but Selariam himself and the one I was pretty sure was Vile had both been intercepted by Abel, while Mel had snagged Sennec in a flame cage. That left Callie and I to do what we did best. I dashed forward, annoyed that our plans had been spoiled, but we'd made contingencies for a surprise attack (what kind of moron doesn't expect to be jump scared by a ghost?). I brought my cane down overhand at Runk's head, imbuing it with a triple stacked density shifted attack.

As he backpedaled, a wall of darkness about a foot high sprouted behind his feet, and he tripped for a second before seeming to remember he didn't need to obey the laws of gravity and just...stopping, midair. A massive stockade of shadow jumped off the ground, clamping down around his hands and neck, and apparently shadow constructs counted as energy because he had to plant his feet to get the leverage to tear free.

The second he did I triggered Sucking Mud, along with a shadow attack. Runk managed to tear free of the stockades within seconds, but by that time my tendrils had already caught his legs. The shadow imbued earth held him where I knew regular earth wouldn't, and Callie took advantage to split off into half a dozen clones and surround him, her armor making her own form just as deceptive to the eye as the shadow simulacra.

Planting a foot, I spun out off front toe, letting my cane ride the axis of the spin the build up enough momentum as I synergized Balam and triggered another triple stack density shifted blow. Sadly, the brief period of confusion from our barrage had worn off and Runk was ready for me, catching the blow on his double headed axe with a grunt and using the force to catapult him out of the shadow mud.

I saw his grip tighten as the blade of the axe cracked slightly under the force. Then he lunged forward to swing his axe at me, and I pulled up my cane to block, only to get bodied by one of Callie's clones before a swing from behind could take off my head. The ghostly form I'd been looking at faded into smoke as Runk appeared behind where I'd been standing, grinning nastily.

Damn. This one was tougher than expected. I looked over to check on the others, and saw Selarium manifesting some kind of huge ghastly face that screamed at Abel, only for the thing to get belted in the mouth with a fist manifestation. I was pretty sure Selarium's was an ability, not a high Intermediate Skill. I climbed to my feet, groaning slightly as I glared at Runk.

"Ok." I said testily. "That was uncalled for." I mean sure, that wouldn't have killed me with my armor, but still. I considered using my magma leg to finish things, but I knew it would mess me up. My head was twinging a bit already from the shadow swamp. Besides, I needed to stop relying so much on big finishing moves. I wouldn't be able to hold my own against stronger opponents if I let things turn into a competition of trump cards.

I noted, interestingly, that Runk had avoided getting too close to Callie. i wondered if he could feel the spectral severer, because she'd put the thing away temporarily to avoid letting him see it, presumably waiting for a shot. Since that was our best bet against him I rushed forward to play distraction again, hurling myself up into a forward flip to smash an axe kick down on the bastard, imbuing it with yet another triple stacked density shift.

As my foot slammed down on the axe, I had a second to think while I was in the air. Despite the numbed of exchanges, due to our speed and Perception, we had only been fighting for a short while. I considered trying to stall him and letting Abel take care of this, but dismissed the thought almost immediately. I'd be fighting solo soon enough, which meant it was imperative to sharped my one on one combat. My team wouldn't be there to bail me out later.

Which is why, as he raised his axe to block the kick, I lashed out and triggered Cloud Step. Through a tricky bit of maneuvering I managed to bounce off a pair of Cloud Step spots in the air, and combined with Flurry of Blows and a triple stack density shift, along with Mercy Kill and Consecration of Flame and Touch of Tears (otherwise it wouldn't have even landed) I hammered a kick directly into the side of his head, completely bypassing his defense before he could even process was was happening. Though not before he could snap out a backhand to my ribs, bouncing me away from him.

As he staggered, a storm of razor sharp shadow snowflakes burst out into a cloud of destruction, coming right up from his shadow to swallow him nearly whole, with only his legs being visible. There was a scream, and I got the vague impression of someone waving an axe frantically, but he was too obscured from view for me to keep track for long.

Callie appeared next to me. "You ok?" She said unhappily, glaring at the ghostly fighter. "Because, that looked like a nasty hit." My ribs ached, mostly because that had been blunt force (and how much bullshit was it that they could use physical attacks fine but ours wouldn't work), but I wasn't too bad off. I triggered a scan heal heal burst combo, and since it was just bruising it wouldn't take too long to patch me up.

I went to move forward, but she held up a hand to stop me. "Wait. I had an idea. We need a big finisher, and neither of our abilities does that well from range. My constructs can be large, but it makes them less solid, and your attacks are for close range mostly. Will you let me try something?" I could hear in her voice that what she was really asking was if I trusted her. I did, so I just nodded.

Callie closed her eyes and held out a hand. Then I felt a PULL. Not like when I channeled skills into her, that was always directly physical, like with Abel's punch. This time she used the bond to LITERALLY synergize with my skills, and what's more, use my stored attacks. From the ground in front of her crawled a huge dragon construct, not unlike the wyvern we fought in the necropolis, though obviously smaller.

She poured skills and attacks into it. Stone Limb, giving the whole thing solidity, Touch of Tears and Consecration of Flame imbuing it with poisoned flame, bolstering it with a fire attack, even adding Mercy Kill to give it a boost. By the time she was done, the massive black flaming magma dragon looked so terrifying that Runk froze as the cloud of snowflakes melted away.

Callie swayed, clearly having taken most of the soul weight on herself for this, but was still aware enough to make it pounce. As it crashed down, I had to grin to myself. All in all, effects like this meant our bond was getting stronger and this was bound to make a hell of an impression. I'd say this had been a good fight.