"We don't really care much on who wins, really. Sure, if the beasties win we hope them brave boys and girls would get out safely, but sometimes shit happens. It's just how life is.

As long as the fightin's good though? We'd be there to cheer for them again and again." - Peony Langenscheidt, longtime fan of the Aquatic Arena.

"What an upset folks! The bulwark's undefeated run was broken by our first-time contender! It had scurried back to its cage for dear life! Let's hear some applause for our brave young man from abroad for his persistence!" yelled the announcer loudly.

Cal had learned from some of the fans seated near her that a victory had not always meant the death of the other party in the arena. While it was rare, as long as a fighter managed to drive away a beast or made it unwilling to fight, it would also count as their victory. Most beasts were too dumb and fought until they perished though.

"Now for our next event!" announced the announcer with rising excitement after a short break. "We have another young first-time challenger from the Union! Please welcome Miss Giselle Aldenvar with a hearty applause!"

Giselle walked out under the shower of welcoming applause. The timid, shy girl Cal first met a few years ago was nowhere to be seen. She strode with confidence and pride, even if how she was dressed merely in a short tunic and shorts undermined that somewhat, with her shorter sword in hand.

Unlike Ognar, who made a big splash when he jumped into the water, Giselle dived elegantly. She had always been a good swimmer, and it showed in the ease and grace with which she navigated the waters. Her slender body easily passed through gaps between the bars of the cage as she waited for her opponent.

"Our courageous youngster has chosen Horanis the Tyrant as her opponent! Please welcome our veteran lord of the underwater arena! With her thirty-four bouts and twenty-six victories, seventeen of which ended in fatalities, and only eight draws, one of the most successful beasts we had ever seen!"

Cal raised an eyebrow as she spotted the creature that entered the cage. Superficially, it looked almost as if a deepmaw had bred with an alligator. The beast was roughly seven to eight meters long, and was rather lithe and slender in form.

Its scaly skin sported many scars from previous battles, and its massive maw - easily a third of its total body length - was filled to the brim with dagger-like fangs. Four large fins propelled the beast through water rapidly, while its long, sinuous tail added more propulsion and helped it steer itself in the water.

The beast looked at Giselle with disdain in its eyes. It probably thought her too small a morsel to snack on, considering its size. Even so, it charged at her rapidly - far faster than a creature that size had any right to be - and its jaws snapped shut, only to bite into nothing but water.

Giselle had moved just as swiftly from where she was, and used her sword to score the beast's side as it rushed by. She frowned at the faint mark it had left on the creature's scales. The beast too hardy to be injured so easily.

She tried it once more on the beast's next rush, this time with a steeper angle to her blade and aimed at the beast's underbelly. She gouged a shallow, bleeding wound this time, while in exchange the beast's teeth grazed her calf and cut a deep wound. Some of the crowd murmured in surprise when Giselle acted as if nothing happened, and the wound on her leg had not even bled in the water.

For the next few minutes, the beast and Giselle struck at each other with varying success. Giselle had cut it closer and closer, as she caused deeper wounds in exchange for taking some herself. Her tunic was in tatters, and multiple cuts adorned her body. Some deep into her muscles and organs, wounds that would have incapacitated a normal person.

Eventually she seemed to realize that she had gotten nowhere with that tactic. She had switched to her longer sword by then, but even with it, the wounds she scored were but superficial flesh wounds to the beast.

Cal noticed when Giselle changed tactics. She saw how the girl made no preparations to evade the next time the beast rushed at her with its maw open wide. She had prepared to brace herself instead.

Many spectators screamed when the beast's maw snapped down towards Giselle, who had made no move to evade. Cal saw what the girl had in mind however. She had twisted around and caught the two halves of the maw with her legs, as she held her ground with her legs split wide like a stake that prevented the beast from closing its maw.

Her legs trembled under the immense pressure, but they held as she gritted her teeth and held her longsword in both hands. Then she stabbed upwards into the roof of the beast's mouth, again and again, as her magically reinforced strength pushed her blade deeper and deeper into the beast's flesh.

The beast wriggled and contorted in panic. It tried to spit her out, to dislodge her from her spot between its maw, but to no avail. It tried to press down harder to crush her between its jaws, going to an extent that it rammed the upper half of its jaw against the reinforced cage.

Giselle held even through the impact, as she dug further and further into the roof of the beast's mouth. Finally her blade met with bone rather than flesh, and she drew her blade back, as she gathered strength and prepared herself, before she viciously stabbed upward with both hands.

From the outside, all the spectators saw was how the beast seemed to stagger for a moment, then shook wildly as if it was seized by a seizure. After several minutes, it finally stilled, then floated, belly-up, onto the surface of the cage.

From within the murky blood that leaked out from the beast's mouth, Giselle emerged, cuts and gouges all over her body, none of them bleeding, which gave off an eerie atmosphere. She climbed on top of the beast's corpse, then raised her arms and yelled to declare her victory.

The crowd answered her yell with cheers a hundred times louder.