The Savage Brawl [Round 5: Battletopia]

Originally posted on MSPA by Ixcalibur.

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Ziirphael was conflicted, on the one hand he was furious at his unseen ‘benefactor’ who had seemingly arranged for his entry into this battle, but on the other he had a plan to get rid of The Cultivator and he was pretty sure that it would be useful in locating and dispatching his benefactor as well. The one emotion balanced out the other. Ziir exited the radio studio via a back door into a narrow alleyway, which could barely contain his hulking carapaced frame. He grabbed onto the brickwork of the radio station wall with one claw and scrambled up the side of the building. Standing atop the roof, he looked down at the town as it woke up. There was more traffic on the streets now, specifically in the street below an ambulance driver wandered from his vehicle into the radio station to see what was taking so long.

From this vantage Ziirphael could see children in uniform walking to school chatting amongst themselves, people driving to work ignorant of the danger that loomed. He could not see the logic in choosing this place as a battlefield. In previous rounds everything that moved was a potential threat, whether from an opponent or something else entirely, this place was littered with people and things that were completely irrelevant to the task at hand. And for that matter when compared to previous rounds this environment was pretty dull. A fairly standard, if old fashioned backwater town somewhere? Even he could have done better, but this train of thought was not helping him locate Konka Rar. There had to be some way to use this environment to his advantage, earlier he had contemplated soliciting the Lich’s location over the radio and waiting for a response. This was a foolish move, he did not have the trust of this town, they were unlikely to volunteer such information, and that was assuming that they encountered the Lich and lived to tell anyone about it. Ziir had since contemplated paying a visit to the local police station and hoping that someone would call in with his location, but again this was too passive and unreliable. He had spent far too long playing The Cultivator’s game; he did not intend to waste any more time. Suddenly it became clear that he had been overcomplicating matters; it was obvious where the Lich would go, he would use this rare opportunity to raise some minions from the local cemetery. Ziirphael scanned the horizon and noticed a church spire in the distance. Ziirphael bounded across the rooftops of the city, leaping from one to the next, surprisingly agile for such a huge shape. A look of grim satisfaction spread across his face, so near to his freedom and his revenge that he could taste it in the air.