Chapter Text
“Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for waiting! It is now time that we begin…the fourth round of Ragnarooooooooooook!”
The colosseum, once again, explodes with noise. Cheers and chants arise from both the humans and the gods, with the gods jeering at the humans to give up trying to “delay the inevitable” and the humans just simply cheering for victory, nearly completely ignoring them.
The arena had been brought back to its normal form, a simple, large limestone circle walled off by the bleachers high above.
“With the shocking conclusion to the third round of Ragnarok and humanity’s unforeseen victory, what was once an indisputable victory for the gods is now in a toss-up! Will humanity, once again, manage to scavenge another round?! Or will the gods prove their victory to be nothing but a fluke and regain the momentum by winning the fourth round?!”
The noise scales up another volume as both sides begin jeering at each other, falling to the announcer’s obvious provocation.Heimdall lets them simmer for a little while before finally continuing.
“Now, fighting for the gods…is this individual!”
The dark iron gates on one side of the arena below slowly began to rise off the ground, revealing a large, dark corridor leading into the bowels of the arena.
“Once just a mere mortal, this god forced his way to divinity!”
The sounds of horses neighing suddenly arise from the corridor.
“Favored by both god and human alike, he conquered countless trials and tribulations! Despite being shunned by the queen of the Greek pantheon herself, he climbed his way to the top!”
The sounds of galloping suddenly come from the tunnel. It rapidly gets louder and louder before…
“Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the fighter representing the gods in the fourth round of Ragnarok…”
A chariot, pulled by two large, black horses emerges from the tunnel, galloping forward until almost reaching the center of the arena before their rider suddenly pulls on their reins, bringing them to a complete halt almost instantly. They bucked wildly for a moment, their maws wide open and razor sharp teeth bared to the audience, before their rider, again, pulled on their reins. They come to a complete stop.
HERCULES
Cheers exploded from the gods’ side as the rider hopped off of the chariot. He was a very large, muscular man with bright red hair tied into a ponytail and his equally red eyebrows set into a stern, deadset fashion. He was dressed in nothing but a brown leather shoulder guard, a golden fleece loincloth, and long-strapped brown leather sandals. In his hand was a large silver club, its head fashioned into the shape of the head of a roaring lion. All over his chest were red tattoos resembling flames.
The cheers persisted, even as Heimdall continued on.
“Now, fighting for humanity iiiiiis this individual!”
This time, it was the humans who started cheering as the large, dark iron gate on their side of the arena began to rise from the ground.
“Traversing from world to world no matter where it may be, he brings life to the party wherever he goes!”
A single figure suddenly emerges from the corridor on the humans’ side of the arena…riding a bright red skateboard. He performs a small hop with it, the skateboard spinning in the air for a moment before landing back onto the ground with a clack , until he almost reaches the center of the arena. He hops off the skateboard before slamming his foot down on one side of it, sending it into the air before he catches it smoothly with one hand. It disappears with a purple shimmer.
“‘Not even the destroyer himself dares to lay a finger on me,’ he claims! Untouchable, he remains! Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you humanity’s fighter for the fourth round of Ragnarok!”
FRESH
Cheers exploded from the human spectators as their fighter struck a pose, more to encourage their representative than at any excitement for who their fighter was at all. Though enthusiastic, they also sounded a tad bit confused. Which was understandable considering his unusual appearance.
This figure was obviously a skeleton just like humanity’s three fighters prior to this round, as can be seen by his bone-white body and skeletal structure. However, unlike the other three fighters, his appearance seemed…a lot “louder.” He was wearing a very bright and colorful hooded jacket, its zipper open to reveal a purple shirt underneath it, baggy, bright lime green shorts, and bright, colorful laced shoes. Sitting on his skull was a red hat, worn backwards, and over his eye sockets were sunglasses, though with YO written in one lens and LO written in the other in big, bright colorful letters.
The humans didn’t mind his strange appearance though. Their last three fighters also seemed strange to them at first, and one of them actually killed a god. They just kept on cheering as they always did, their hopes and dreams peaking for the third time.
“Now, may the fourth round of Ragnaroooooook…begin!”
Immediately after that announcement, Hercules began to walk towards his opponent.
It was the second time out of the four fights that the divine combatant was the one to first approach their opponent.
Fresh, however, remained entirely unintimidated. Instead, he points finger guns at the god.
“Yo wassup, brah!” he greets, his voice a deep baritone just like the other skeletons’ but seemingly a touch more shrill. The letters in the lens of his sunglasses change to read WAS and SUP. “The name’s Fresh, the freshest skeleton you’ll ever meet!”
Hercules just kept walking towards him, his head bent down just enough so that the shadow of his hair hovered over his eyes.
“I’m not exactly the kinda guy who likes to get into fights, so instead, why don’t we strike a deal of some sort?” the skeleton asks. “I’m sure it’ll save the both of us sooo much more time and nobody gets hurt in the end! Sounds great, dunnit?”
Hercules suddenly stops at that. Fresh just watched, his toothy grin plastered onto his skull as he cocked his head to the side inquisitively.
“Wait, are ya actually considering it?” he asks.
Hercules closes his eyes for a moment. He takes a deep breath before reopening his eyes.
“Great! So-”
“Whoever you are, I’m sorry for this.”
He suddenly raises his club. His body bends forward ever so slightly before…
“Truly, I am.”
He suddenly slings himself forward, slamming his club right onto the skeleton. Fresh hops to the side, just barely managing to avoid the attack, the question marks in his sunglasses are replaced by WO and AH.
The lion head slams into the ground, easily smashing through the limestone ground. Fragments of stone go flying into the air.
“Whoa, not cool, brah!” Fresh exclaims.
Hercules doesn’t regard it though, his hair casting a shadow over his eyes as he quickly picks up his club once again and, gripping it tightly in both hands, swings it horizontally at him.
A shimmer of purple energy comes to life within Fresh’s hands. Out of seemingly nowhere, a wooden baseball bat suddenly appears.
Fresh dropped to the ground, rolling right under the swing as he gets within Hercules’s guard. He quickly rights himself, swinging his bat right at the god’s exposed side.
The bat whoosh es as it soars towards its target until…
The side of the bat slams into the god’s side with a plaff , air exploding from the contact point.
However, unfortunately for the skeleton, that was all that happened.
The god didn’t go flying across the arena. He didn’t bend over in pain or cough out blood or even so much as gasp. As the bat collided with the god’s side, it just simply stopped.
For a moment, the whole arena went completely silent as the two fighters just stood on the arena, with Hercules holding his club post-swing and Fresh with his baseball bat gripped tightly in both hands.
The skeleton audibly gulps as he slowly looks up, a drop of sweat rolling down his skull from under his cap. The letters in the lens of his sunglasses switched to read UH and OH. From almost two heads of height above him, Hercules glared down at the skeleton.
Then, there was a flash of tan as a loud BAM suddenly rang throughout the arena.
Hercules’s free hand came up, his fist slamming into the skeleton’s jaw. The collision caused a shockwave of air as Fresh was sent flying into the air.
The gods cheered as the skeleton soared through the air, landing back onto the ground a fair distance away. Fresh lets out a grunt of pain as he reached for his bat which had dropped to the ground beside him. Just as his phalanges wrap around its handle, he immediately rolls away.
Just as Hercules drops from the sky right on top of his spot on the ground like a boulder.
The ground fragments as he brought his club down onto the ground in front of him, narrowly missing the skeleton. More debris went flying into the air.
Fresh quickly hops back onto his feet. His body was already starting to dust slightly.
“Golly gee,” the skeleton mutters to himself as he gets into a preparatory stance. “He’s a bit crazier than I gave him credit for.”
Immediately after he’s managed to pick his club off the ground, Hercules dashes forward swinging it at the skeleton. Fresh side steps the attack before ducking under another horizontal swing.
So the ribs are a no-go, he thinks to himself as he jumps back, dodging another swing. Alright then.
Hercules raises his club before slamming it back down on his opponent.
Before the attack could reach him though, Fresh ducks and dashes right past the god’s side, easily getting behind hiim. He digs for something within his jacket pocket, pulling something roughly circular and about the size of his fist.
I’ll just go right for the head!
There was a whoosh. Hercules quickly turns around at the side just in time to see something flying right towards his face.
His other hand comes up, catching it in midair.
It was a fuzzy, purple toy that vaguely resembled an egg-shaped bird with its face on its body and unusually large ears. The toy’s beak opened and closed a few times with a whir as its eyes “blinked” twice.
A toy? Hercules thinks to himself.
That was at least until it rapidly started to glow. The god’s eyes widened.
The unusual object goes up in a bright, fiery explosion. A loud boom resounded throughout the colosseum as cinders and debris of flaming limestone flew everywhere.
Hercules lands back onto the ground a somewhat safe distance away from the explosion, having jumped back just in time to avoid most of the blast. He held his arm up to his face to protect it from some of the limestone debris still flying through the air. His eyes darted from side to side as he searched the arena around the singed area where the explosion had taken place.
Where’d he go?
Just as that thought crossed his mind, he hears a whoosh . Then the skeleton’s familiar voice…right behind him.
“Gotcha!”
Fresh, having used the explosion as a distraction to get behind his opponent, swings his bat directly at the back of Hercules’s leg.
There was a boom as air rippled around the point of contact. Hercules lets out a short grunt as his whole body collapses down onto one knee. That, however, was shortly followed by a loud crack as Fresh’s bat snaps, the top half of it breaking off and flying into the air as a result of the force of the attack.
He doesn’t stop though, tossing away the splintered bat just as his skateboard appears beneath one of his shoes. He slams his heel onto it, sending it into the air before catching it with both his hands and swinging it at the god’s head.
The wheels violently slam into the side of Hercules’s head from behind, violently bending his head to the side, before quickly jumping back. Fresh landed back onto the ground a safe distance away, taking a few steps back as he kept his watch on the god.
Hercules remains there in that pose for just a second before he slowly stands back up, re-straightening his neck as he rubbed the back of it with his free hand. He rolls around his head before turning around to face the skeleton once again. He turns his head to the side for just a moment to spit out some blood and a few loose teeth.
Other than that, there was no other indication that Hercules had taken any damage at all. In fact, after he took a short moment to properly recollect himself, it was as if he hadn’t taken any damage at all.
On the other hand, despite the battle having not lasted for very long, Fresh’s body was already starting to slowly disintegrate into dust, a common sign of injury all three skeletons before him had shown upon being damaged by an attack.
“I’m sorry, but it’s useless,” he says, rubbing his chin with the back of his free hand. “You may dodge all you want, but you have no hope if attacks as weak as these are all you can manage to dish out against me. And if an endurance battle is what you’re going for here, then be my guest and try it. See how that goes for you.”
With that, Hercules dashes right at the skeleton, his club raised once again.
Fresh gulps as another drop of sweat runs down his skull.
“Aaaaaaaaaaah! He’s getting completely destroyed!”
Goll lets out yet another shriek of panic as Hercules rampages across the arena, close behind Fresh’s tail as the skeleton dodged and weaved, sometimes getting onto his skateboard to maneuver around the arena. Occasionally, he pulled more explosives out of his jacket and threw them at the god, but Hercules either swatted them away or dodged them. The various explosions they caused did little to deter him.
“That’s strange,” Brunhilde says. “He’s not choosing to use bones or telekinesis or any of his other abilities?”
“It’s not that he’s choosing not to, it’s that he can’t!” Ink says, his usually cheerful voice ringing through the room despite the grim situation down on the arena.
“He can’t?!” screams back, her eyes wide as she whipped her head toward him. “What do you mean he can’t?!”
“You see, Fresh is a weeeeee bit different from the rest of us skeletons,” Ink says. “To start off, if we look at things from a strictly fundamental viewpoint, Fresh is much, much weaker than almost every other skeleton.”
“Weaker?” Brunhilde repeats, raising an eyebrow.
“Yes, even back in the Multiverse, he was incapable of many of the most simple abilities that most other skeletons are able to use!” Ink continues. “In fact, remember how Blue was at the very least capable of summoning bones last round? Fresh isn’t even capable of that!”
“What?! Then, how’s he going to fight Hercules-sama?!” Goll shrieks. “If things keep on like this-!”
“Don’t worry!” Ink says, his usual permanently toothy grin seeming a tad bit wider than normal. “Despite that fact, he’s completely untouchable in our Multiverse! Seriously, not even our destroyer wants to have anything to do with him!”
“I take it that his unique ability has something to do with that?” Brunhilde asks.
“Well, I guess you could say that,” Ink says with a slight shrug. “Though it’s not exactly…his unique ability, per say.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“You’ll see what I mean soon,” Ink says. “After all, everything will change…”
The skeleton brings a finger up to the side of his skull, tapping the bone right next to his right eye socket.
“...once those glasses inevitably come falling off his skull.”
The gods’ cheers were deafeningly loud as Hercules hunted his skeletal opponent all throughout the arena.
To everybody watching the battle unfold, it was completely one-sided. The momentum of the fight belonged entirely to Hercules. His offense was ruthless and unceasing without the slightest indication that he was going to slow down any time soon, not even when his opponent was using explosives as his method of counter attack. His attacks were fast and powerful, yet deadly precise and accurate, each just barely missing their target.
Geez, when’s he gonna finally run out of gas?
Fresh uses his skateboard to hop over yet another downwards swing as he skillfully weaves around the many craters Hercules had created and , one hand on the top of his hat to prevent it from falling off.
Hercules prepares to take off after him again, but then stops. A better idea comes to mind.
He bends down, taking three chunks of fragmented limestone with his free hand, each about the size of a golf ball. Then, he takes a step back, bending his body back slightly and holding his hand out behind him before…
He slings his upper body forward, bringing his arm with him as he throws the rocks at the skeleton’s exposed back with all his might.
Fresh turns around just in time to see the god throw the rocks at him. The lenses of his sunglasses change to read WO and AH right before he quickly ducks right under the projectiles, holding onto his hat as the projectiles soared right over his head.
Being in a crouched position on a skateboard, however, momentarily took away his ability to maintain the precise control he needed to traverse the arena A fact made glaringly obvious to Fresh as, at the moment, his skateboard was charging full speed into a cluster of pebble-sized chunks of limestone lying on the ground.
He doesn’t manage to stop himself quickly enough to prevent his skateboard’s front wheels from ramming into them at full speed.
The collision catapults Fresh forward, sending both skeleton and skateboard flying into the air.
The skeleton tumbles to the ground onto a relatively undamaged spot of the arena, fortunately for him. He rolls to the side a short distance just as his skateboard lands onto the ground beside him.
He quickly gets back up onto his feet, immediately dashing towards his skateboard in an attempt to grab it. Just as he was about to reach an arm's length of it, out of the corner of his eye socket, he saw something approaching him from the right. Something large and, most of all, very fast.
He immediately jumps back just as Hercules’s large frame suddenly came barreling in from the side, his club smashing right through the ground right in front of the spot Fresh was standing on just a split second before.
Fortunately for the skeleton, he managed to get away unscathed and make some distance. Unfortunately for him, he would find out a bit too late that the god wasn’t looking to finish him off with that attack.
Hercules’s club smashes right down onto the middle of the skateboard.
The force of the attack completely destroys the contraption, splitting it down the middle. Both halves of the skateboard go flying in opposite directions.
Fresh’s eye sockets widened behind his sunglasses.
“Oh you little sock , I know for a FACT that you didn’t just-!”
Hercules doesn’t give the skeleton’s anger any acknowledgement as he immediately charges forward, raising his club. Anticipating just another swing, Fresh hops back just enough to get out of range.
But then, something different happens.
The lion head on the top of Hercules’s club suddenly begins to move. It seemed to stretch outwards ever so slightly and its jaws opened wider before…
It suddenly let out a deafeningly loud roar.
Fresh’s eye sockets widened even further as the god swung it downwards onto the empty ground between himself and the skeleton.
This move baffled Fresh. The attack was a very obvious miss, causing the skeleton to wonder why Hercules continued on with it anyway as the god’s attacks prior to that point were usually thrown with deadly precision, making the miss seem particularly unusual.
That was at least until Hercules’s club finally reached the ground.
A large shockwave of pure force suddenly exploded forward from the point of contact as a loud boom resonated around the colosseum. As it barreled forward, the limestone of the arena was crushed with ease, leaving behind an increasingly long trench behind it. But as powerful as it seemed, it was also fast.
So fast that Fresh didn’t have nearly enough time to dodge it. By the time he had even fully registered its existence, it had already rammed into him.
The blast slams into the skeleton’s front full force, sending him flying backwards. Its force scatters in every direction, sending strong gusts of wind outwards all around them, strong enough to reach even the members of the audience.
By the time the blast wave had completely dissipated, Fresh was still in the air, the particles of dust his body was disintegrating into glowing under the rays of the sun. It takes him a few more seconds before his motionless body finally tumbles to the ground. His sunglasses fly off of his skull, arcing almost gracefully through the air before tumbling
The humans just looked down at the arena in shock and horror as the gods exploded into deafeningly loud exhilaration. Brunhilde and Goll both stared at the arena with shocked expressions on their faces, obviously shook by how quickly their fighter was taken down.
Hercules wordlessly brings his club to his side as he stares at the skeleton’s slowly dusting body, a seemingly empty look on his face. It wasn't until almost half of the skeleton’s body was gone that he finally turned around and began making his way back into the catacombs of the arena.
“What a one-sided battle!” comes the announcement. “With a relentless assault, Hercules utterly destroys his opponent in one quick, yet brutal onslaught! Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the winner of the fourth round of Ragnarooooooooook, Her-!”
Suddenly, the declaration was completely cut off. The cheers from the gods all over the arena, once enthusiastically booming, began to quickly quieten before going completely silent.
Puzzled, Hercules stops. He looks up at the gods sitting in the seats above the arena in front of him.
They were staring at something, eyes wide with surprise as they stared at something behind him.
The god immediately whips around, his club held at the ready in front of him.
Yet what he saw took him unawares nonetheless.
In the case of the three skeleton fighters prior to this one, the moment that they’re bodies started dusting was usually when they were in the process of dying. The process didn’t stop until their whole bodies had disintegrated completely, which signaled absolute death for them with the exception of the first skeleton, who managed to revitalize himself once before permanently dying in the very same way.
Thus, when he saw the skeleton begin to dust away, he somewhat expected him to do so until the rest of the body was completely gone. Even after that, if something were to happen, the god expected the skeleton to revive in a magical explosion, just like how the first skeleton had.
What he didn’t expect was to see the skeleton’s half-dusted body to begin reforming itself.
It was slow at first, but then it began to quickly hasten. In just several seconds, his whole body had been completely rebuilt. Even his clothes, which had also begun to dust when his body did as if they were part of him, had mended themselves.
The skeleton not too far in front of him slowly gets back onto his feet. He currently had his back to the god, as he had yet to turn towards his opponent.
“Y’know, before we started this little scuffle of ours, I gave you an easy way out,” he says. The tone of his voice suddenly becomes much more serious, completely out of character for the usually relaxed skeleton. “But I’m not exactly someone who’s got the right to tell ya how to make your life decisions. On the other hand, makin’ ya absolutely regret those decisions?”
Hercules doesn’t bother waiting to hear out the skeleton. He immediately dashes towards him, raising his club into the air.
It was only then that Fresh finally turned around, finally revealing his eye sockets for the first time since the start of the fight.
And his magical eye. Not a small, bright flame within his left eye socket just like the other skeletons’, but rather, a small, glowing upside down heart floating within it. A small amount of purple goop began to dribble down the crook of his eye sockets.
“ One of my favorite hobbies. ”
All of Hercules’s instincts suddenly screamed danger, causing him to immediately bring himself to a halt in front of the skeleton before he could get within range.
Nonetheless, Fresh’s toothy grin opened up ever so slightly before…
He shrieked.