"The terms of this bout to the death are the relinquishment of the Baron title onto the challenger should the Baron be defeated. When you are ready." The butler was stood in a cage above the arena. His voice booming to the audience, though he didn't have a microphone in hand.
"No hard feelings. This is what the world needs. If you were in my position you would do the exact same thing." My opponent began to speak with no reservations. Before, these people were deferent, when battle tensions came to the surface that quickly changed. I suppose with your life on the line you quickly forgot etiquette.
"Is that so?"
"The strong take, I'm just adhering to that law of the world." Certainly, they did...
"Make sure you don't regret it." I don't want to paint this world red once again. Just the thought of eating made me nauseas enough. Then there was that last bout in the arena. Can I justify it as self-defense?
That's all I've been doing this entire time, justifying my actions through the lens of this world. Cannibalism is fine because I can't survive any other way. Killing... is fine because they threatened my life.
It was a system of justifications that allowed me to survive. It's not something that's so easy to throw away.
"No chances." My opponent looked at me and whispered in a low voice. His already overbearing frame grew to an astonishing degree. The muscles grew over each other, new fibers interlocking and inserting into where his joints should be. Frankly, so many appeared that he shouldn't even be able to move properly.
That was my last thought before being sent hurtling across the floor, blood spurting from my mouth and body at each impact I made with the ground. Eventually coming to a disappointing settle, like an amateurishly skimmed stone.
Blood was leaving my body at a frightening rate... However, I don't feel the same anemia or sickliness that might be associated with it. It hurt, but not like it should. It was dulled, my fear response was lackluster in conjunction with that sensation.
The rolls of my stomach were gradually thinning, like a ball with a small hole in it, air was leaving. In my case, blood.
That's what they were...
This body wasn't exclusively developed with fat in mind. It wouldn't make sense for the Baron of Blood to be fixated on that development. The rolling flaps of flesh, the reddish colour of my skin, the almost inflated composition of my own body. Everything was a clear signifier of what my cultivation has been this entire time. Everything was about the blood.
These flaps that I thought were fat. They aren't. These are sacks of blood that surround the main body. So long as these existed it was like a perfect defense. Nothing could penetrate to the organ level, all that would spill was blood, blood that I could easily control and fill the sacks with once more. An automatic defense, one I didn't even have to pay attention to. With damage I could feel my strength slowly waning, but all the same it wouldn't kill me.
The question now was, how do I win this?
Even if I can shrug off the damage, this guy's body is beyond strong. I had a chance before with the small guy because my body is fast and powerful, despite the lack of fat and muscle. Why was that?
I understood that the blubber and liquid would serve to disperse any attacks that came in, but why were my attacks so effective, by all understanding it was just flesh filled with liquid that attacked...
Unless, it was an automatic offense of this body?
By controlling the body internally it was possible to create such damage by rushing the blood at high speeds as the body moved. Then does that mean...
I can control blood outside of the body?
How much? Is there a limit? Does it have to be my own blood? There were too many questions to ask and certainly not enough time to ascertain any compelling answers.
The wind rushed as a gigantic fist approached my oversized body.
I was flung through the air impacting against the wall of this arena. Blood spurted, covering the front rows of the onlookers, like a geyser. I was a living water balloon thrown at a wall, I deflated and popped immediately. Or rather, the sacks of blood adorning my body did.
My skin had breaks all over, body deflating slowly creating a blanket of loose skin as I stood in a bath of my own blood.
It was the perfect moment to try it.
Will it.
Blood is mine.
Even if I don't understand it. The same way that this body remembers to fight internally. Command the blood as if you always had. As if I had never travelled to this land, as if I were the Baron himself.
Droplets nearby rose up and clotted forming slipshod shapes; spirals, spikes, jagged formations. It was barely a fraction of the blood that had already been spilt, all the same, I urged to throw them at the monstrous figure approaching.
Splash!
Useless, like the waves of an early tide against a mountain. Maybe over years they could erode that man and finally defeat him, however, I didn't have the luxury of waiting years for his defeat. My life hung in the balance at this very moment.
"Useless! The Baron has grown this weak, this incompetent! How pitiful." The behemoth's voice boomed out. More leviathan than human. The giant peered down at me, like some ever present God. It was as if the very titans in myths of olde had come to life and decided to destroy me. Atlas was no longer holding this world, no he was fully intent on crushing the world and me alongside it.
"I'll squash you like the bug you are!" Still hunched over, my body was unprepared for the gargantuan foot threatening to crush me into the ground. My thoughts screamed as the overbearing weight sunk into me. What was I thinking? I didn't know how to fight. I was surviving in this place due to my position and unique body. Otherwise I would've been dead on the very first day I had travelled to this nightmarish world.
This was the natural progression.
Being squashed like a bug underneath the boot of someone much stronger. Pressure descended upon me like a hungry predator. My eyes bulged and felt that they might pop, the same was true for the rest of my body as the foot drove me deeper into the floor of this arena.
Goddamnit...
I still had things I wanted to do...
Crunch!
Pop!
Gush!
The world was once again a deep red.