The man or woman, Mash couldn’t tell with the armor, walked off the rising platform even before the creature was released. Raising their sword into the air and letting a seemingly endless stream of fire launch into the air. It was as thick as a small building, and the heat was warping the air around it. Mash was surprised to be unable to feel the heat and figured the wielder had a high amount of control of the weapon. Even without the display of power, the weapon was easily recognizable. The announcer’s words only confirmed what Mash already knew.

“The legendary sword of flame, of a hero who delivered freedom to all people of the land. The sword of devastation, Melcent. Its new wielder, known as the Forger. Once a blacksmith and metal mage, they have been chosen by the weapon to pave the way for humanity.”

The announcer spoke more animatedly than he had before, but at the same time, Mash realized that he sounded uncertain. It was like he didn’t expect this from the person, which probably meant that fighter had only recently acquired the weapon. The announcer was being forced to adjust to the changes. The announcer was able to adapt quickly and continued his introduction.

“No opponent could truly challenge the hero, but we have prepared the best challenge we could manage. From the tall jungles of the south, we have brought a silver-rank Golden Back Crusher! Let us witness the demonstration of the hero’s power!”

The gate containing the creature rose as the announcer finished his words. The creature moved out slowly at first, and Mash got a good look at the beast. Silver-rank would mean it was over level 100, which was quite impressive. It stood as tall as the golem from earlier but was wildly different in appearance. The golem had been blocky and flat, but this creature bulged with thick muscles. Its large hands were as big as Red’s hammer from earlier, and it had four of them. The creature didn’t seem to have any legs and only possessed four arms. With dark-brown fur covering its body, Mash could easily make out the glint of gold as it contrasted with the fur. Covering a large majority of its back rested a golden shell, that sparkled under the gentle light of the sun.

The adventurer prepared for the fight, angling his blade towards the creature, ready to parry a blow. The monster seemed to take it as a provocation and launched itself forward. It didn’t run or jump, it seemed to pound against the ground and throw itself with its muscular arms. The very air became a weapon for the creature as the force of its throw had propelled the air as well. He held out the sword, aiming it at the monster’s body, and let out another pillar of flame. It shot forward thicker than it had been before. A loud pained roar could be heard from within the flame, the entire building shaking from the noise. The creature never appeared from the flame, only its shell remaining as the fire dissipated.

It was a display much like his own fight, where the organizer had given the adventurer an opponent who was woefully unable to do anything. Despite that Mash’s full attention was on the hero, everyone’s gaze fell upon the weapon in their hands. To some extent, everyone in the audience was hoping the person would die, that they would have the opportunity to claim the weapon for themselves. Despite knowing that the weapon chose its owner somehow, Mash felt the same temptation as the others. It wouldn’t do anything to synergize with his skills or abilities, but it wouldn’t matter with a weapon like that. No, its power was simple, and anyone could find a use for it, especially since it would likely supersede any skill they possessed. Everyone’s focus was on the platform, long after the hero had disappeared beneath it.

Mash winced as he saw Jill rise, to the stares of the entire stadium. He felt bad as she probably didn’t know what was going on and was left facing the greedy stares of everyone. His feeling of pity only grew as he realized that she would need to fight after the hero. Despite everyone’s focus on her, no one actually looked like they were paying attention. Even his own gaze drew away from Jill, who seemed completely dumbfounded by the situation.

“We have another powerful contestant. A young prodigy of space magic, a follower of the mysterious fey, and wielder of their many abilities. Will she be up to the challenge against the formidable Hounds of the Shadow Forest? “

Mash watched as three wolves came out of the gates. They were partially covered in shadows, and he recognized them as the monsters they faced before. It meant that this fight would be easy for her, and he wasn’t really worried about the outcome. Normally the wolves would be dangerous for a mage, so he understood why the organizers of the fights had chosen them as her opponent. However, much of the danger of these creatures came from a lack of knowledge or unpreparedness of fighting multiple opponents. That didn’t apply to them as they knew of the creatures’ abilities and had been fighting multiple opponents for as long as they could remember.

As expected, the fight was trivial for Jill. Teleporting behind the creatures, she teleported the entire group of wolves up into the air. Far higher than was necessary to kill them and teleported herself back to the ground. The monsters yelled loudly as they fell to their deaths. Some people might recognize the power it took to teleport unwilling creatures, but most would just think that the colosseum had failed in preparing an adequate fight for Jill. While that was true, it did not take away from what Jill had done. In order to teleport a creature against her will, she would need to overpower its resistance. Both from the mana the creatures had, and their individual wills. Still, she easily crushed them and finished the three creatures in a single move. The quick fight had not done anything to make her known and only made people remember the hero from before.

She was overshadowed by the previous fight, and he expected Red and Luke to be similarly forgotten Well, maybe not Luke as he was basically a hero incarnate. Red though would become a mere preamble to the hero. Honestly, the thought made Mash a little grateful to the hero. He had been increasingly worried about the fame his group was building and was relieved to see that Jill’s fight went by unnoticed. Who knows, maybe they would even forget about Luke? That made the hero’s fight a blessing in disguise for them, but Mash kept his mouth shut as he looked over his friends. He didn’t think they would like to hear that their fights would likely be ignored. Jill teleported into their room, clearly unsatisfied with the outcome of the fight. She had won but had not accomplished half of what she wanted. Mash didn’t stick around and listen to her complain, instead of heading down for his fight. He moved quickly somewhat hoping that he would catch the hero leaving.

He wasn’t so lucky; the man or women being long gone by the time he arrived at the fighter’s entrance. The attendant from before was there, and she told him to wait for the current fight to end. Mash hadn’t paid the slightest attention to who was fighting before him and didn’t really care. He wanted to finish his fight quickly since there would be nothing he could do to compete with the hero from earlier. It may have been careless to think the fight would be easy, but he hadn’t displayed much of his strength earlier, so he didn’t think that the fight organizer could prepare something adequate.

The next fighter descended the ramp, the attendant walking them back casually. He was a slightly older man, who proudly wore several badges on his clothing. It was a simple armor that had metal plates separated by leather along the joints. It didn’t cover him completely, only providing him a little more protection around his vitals. It was covered in tiny scratches too, but Mash didn’t think many were from his fight today. The man seemed unblemished, likely having ended his fight easily.

Mash got an idea for how the colosseum operated now. The first fight a person had was merely used to gauge the power of the challenger, and only the proceeding fights had any real challenge associated with them. It was probably why they made a person sign up for several fights, rather than just one at a time. So, he wasn’t worried much about his fight since he only displayed the type of magic he possessed. His thoughts were disrupted as the attendant told him to follow her, and he walked down the familiar ramp. This time he had arrived a bit late, as he missed his introduction. However, he did manage to catch the end of the announcer’s words pertaining to the monsters.

The announcer had called them Fire Ants, which actually caused Mash to feel a little relieved. It was one of the things that Jack had told them about yesterday, and Mash could recall some of what he knew. They were monsters that were weak individually, and usually only fought in large hordes. Their bodies would coat in flames, and they could even launch balls of fire from their abdomens. Mash wasn’t overly worried about a few insects.

Sure, the matchup wasn’t great for Mash, but it wasn’t particularly bad either. Fire didn’t counter wood as many might believe. Instead, it added to its danger. It would essentially just make all of his wooden creations into burning weapons of flame. He guessed that the fire wouldn’t do much damage to the ants, but they would still die from the wood, nonetheless. The only real problem it created for Mash, was restricting his use of his armor. So, he let the armor fall apart as he rose to the stadium, knowing that it wouldn’t do him much good. As he entered the arena, he realized what the organizers had planned for him.

Each gate was bursting with ants, and he could hear their rumbling and clicking from where he stood. There were easily over hundred of the monsters visible to him, and he guessed that there might even be more than that beyond the gates. He was impressed by the sheer number of monsters the Colosseum possessed, and guessed they had a method of breeding them. Perhaps, they captured a queen and were sending its children after him. Alternatively, they might be sending one of the ant queens at him, but he doubted they would waste such a valuable monster on a fight. As he looked over the monsters he remembered more what Jack had said.

The ants were a swarm-type monster like the rats from his first mission, so their levels weren’t particularly high, and he guessed that most ants would be a lower level than himself. They were trying to overwhelm him, to swarm him with a plethora of monsters. They probably assumed that he was the type of mage that used his mana quickly and was planning on exhausting his resources. He couldn’t contain his laughter anymore and let it out freely. It echoed from beneath his mask, but he just let it grow louder. Priscilla shared in his excitement, realizing what this fight would mean for them. In their foolish attempts to give him a real challenge, they had instead given him a small army worth of level-ups.

He knew that he probably looked crazy to the audience, laughing as the gates rose to let the monsters flood towards him. As the ground trembled from their marching. Mash couldn’t stop himself though and continued the laughter as wooden replica’s Priscilla formed from his back as though he were a hundred-tailed beast. For his part, he started his motions, swinging his sword staff about him in his usual style to take advantage of Persist. He continued laughing as his energy drained, as the ants grew closer, and the carnage could begin in all its glory.