Chapter Text
Karl truly and honestly did not know what to make of this - what, arena? Castle? Stadium?
His pocket watch buzzed with energy, excited to finally travel again. It had been a while since his last ‘journey’, if one could call them such, and the buildup of whatever allowed him to move through time had been immense. He was still reeling from the journey here, his grip on reality was still adjusting.
A clawed hand fell onto his shoulder, and he yelped, turning around with a sharp gasp. He eyes met violet, eerily reminiscent of an enderman’s, and he instinctively snapped his gaze away. The owner of the eyes shook with laughter, shaking Karl with them as their hand stayed firm on his shoulder, and he risked a glance back up. (Being careful, still, to avoid the eyes. Just in case.)
He struggled to hide his shock at the stranger’s appearance, trying and failing to hold back another gasp. The person - or, creature? - was bent over to meet Karl’s height. They must have been at least twice his size, and just as intimidating, despite the friendly expression painting their frankly terrifying features and quiet laughter escaping them.
Their eyes weren’t just violet, as he had previously observed - they were violently vibrant, a swirling mixture of purples, blues, and even hints of green around split pupils. Not to mention, the whites of their eyes were far from white, instead a darker indigo color.
Trailing from and around their eyes, and painted across the rest of their face, were either dark markings or scales. Karl noticed, dazedly, that they shimmered green when hit with sunlight.
And to regard the rest of their person, simply put, they were nowhere near human. They distantly reminded him of an enderman’s physiology, but no endermen he knew was so eerily humanoid and yet so animalistic in style.
Perhaps the most humanoid part about them was their clothing, even just the fact that they wore such. The silks were clearly expensive and dearly cared for; he wouldn’t be surprised if he were talking to royalty, somehow.
Wings shuffled behind them - and wasn’t that a shock, though he was given no time to dwell on it- and they finally released him. “I haven’t seen a traveler such as yourself in decades!” They exclaimed, a static hum coating their words and dripping from the air. “Have you come to observe the Mᔑℸ ̣ ᓵ⍑ᒷᓭ 𝙹⎓ p∷╎↸ᒷ ?”
He blinked, taken aback by the abrupt change in language, and took a slow second to process the words he could understand. “I’m...sorry?”
The regal stranger laughed once again, rising to their natural height and forcing Karl to crane his head to look at them. “I had a feeling you didn’t know Endspeak,”
was that what that was?
“but I’m afraid there’s no translation into common that quite captures the nature of todays festivities.” They hummed, a calm smile settling on their face as they turned to face the center of the arena from where they both stood in the stands. “I suppose you could compare them to those gladiator matches you have in the Overworld, yes?”
He just nodded, not really sure what was going on, but assuming they were right. The stranger, if anything, only looked mildly amused by him.
They tilted their head, and he noticed the crown sat atop their head as the gems caught in the sunlight. The metal nestled between two horns, unlike any animal he had seen before. “Hm? No ‘Yes, your Majesty’?” Their tone was teasing, but something foreign yet dangerously familiar lurked behind their eyes, and Karl scrambled to fix his mistake.
“Ah-oh, my, uh, my apologies, your majesty,” he said, bowing his head and trying not to wince at how unsure he sounded. When he hesitantly raised his head again, the ruler was staring back out at the arena.
Suddenly, a bell sounded throughout the stands, loud and demanding. The ringing bounced around his head for a few seconds after it ended, and he winced as a grin crossed the ruler’s face. Two rows rows of fangs, he noted. Terrifying, how lovely.
“Well, that’s the warning bell. We’d best get to our seats before the match begins, unless you want to miss it.” He glanced up at the stranger, confusion clear on his face at the wording. He didn’t dare question them, however, and simply followed after them when they began walking through the gather crowds.
The crowds were an interesting mix, Karl realized as they walked. He didn’t linger on any one person, in fear of appearing rude, but he found himself both tensing and relaxing at the diversity of the viewers.
Nether hybrids seemed to make up most of it, between blazes forged from fire, ash rising with each excited cheer, and ghasts whose shouts carried loud above the rest. Even more than nether born, though, were endermen.
Not just those born of one endermen. He meant actual mob endermen, sitting among players and cheering right alongside them. It was...an odd sight to see, but not one he dwelled on for long. Different times, he reminded himself, and kept walking just behind the ruler in front of him.
(Something even stranger, he noted, was the long hair trailing after the taller endermen. Even the ruler he was trailing behind had a mane of their own, well-kept and intricately done. He had never seen an enderman with long hair, before.)
He followed them all the way up to their separated booth, and paused in his steps when they reached what he assumed to be their throne. It was about as large and intimidating as the one sitting upon it, but he wasn’t given time to take it in fully as he was regarded by an enderman he guessed was a servant, of sorts. The enderman guided him to a seat a little ways away from the throne, but still with the same crystal-clear view. He tossed a glance to the ruler, not understanding why he, a foreigner who had more than likely offended them, was getting such special treatment.
They turned their grin on him, raising a finger to their lips and looking back to the arena as another bell rang - this one quieter than the last. Karl reluctantly sat down, following their gaze as something was rolled out onto the...ground.
He wasn’t quite sure what the ground was made of. At first glance, he’d thought it to be sand, but it was far too solid for that. It was an off shade, as well, like stone, but not like any material he had encountered before. That seemed to be a theme, so far.
The something being rolled out was a cage, he realized as he looked closer. Golden and intricately made, but a cage nonetheless.
The ruler wasn’t lying when they said it was alike gladiator fights. He could only hope this wouldn’t end like the last ‘journey’ he’d been to that was like this.
In the cage, a beast stormed back and forth, snapping at anything that dared to even glance its way. It was a mix of creatures, Karl thought, but had the integrity of any hostile mob. He recognized the telltale tusks of a hoglin, not to mention how the beast was built, and inferred the off-colored blotches painting it’s back to be alike a creeper. It had an ungodly amount of limbs - spider, probably - and each one of them was pure muscle.
Multiple set of eyes - okay, definitely spider - studied the arena with a desperate haste. Maybe hunger, it was difficult to get a read on the monstrosity. It’s eyes (all 28 of them, he counted) locked onto the other side of the fighting area, and Karl’s own gaze snapped over with mild interest. He didn’t particularly enjoy fighting, but he didn’t seem to have much of a choice in watching the match, anyways.
On the other side, the gates opened, slow and grinding. He squinted, pushing his hair away from his face as he tried to get a better look at whatever was walking through to the ring. The stepped out of the shadows, into view, and-
“Players and enderfolk!” A voice cut through the stadium, making Karl jump. He glanced around wildly, but was unable to locate the voice. Odd. “The champion returns for one final battle! Will the beast be able to stand a chance against Y𝙹⚍リ⊣ c∷||ᓭℸ ̣ ᔑꖎ ?” The sudden dip into chirps and hums was jarring, but nobody else seemed to think so, so he stayed quiet. “Turn your eyes to the one, the only, Rᔑリʖ𝙹𝙹 !”
A name, he could tell by the emphasis, but not one he could recognize right off the bat. Hearing the crowd repeat the name, however, made him think he could almost place the vague familiarity of it. Before he could think too hard about it, the ruler stood up, and the stadium fell silent.
They didn’t say a word, instead waiting for the announcer to continue.
And continue they did.
“Long live the Queen! Long live the Dragon!”
The crowd erupted as the Queen turned, sitting back down in her throne. She sent Karl a knowing look, and all he could do was keep his eyes trained on the arena as two servants came up to stand beside her.
The word ‘dragon’ echoed in his mind, sending a chill down his spine. He didn’t know what he’d stumbled across, and he didn’t care to find out.
He didn’t know dragons existed out of fairytales, much less a hybrid of one. Or, he assumed. The Queen was too humanoid to be anything else, right?
One final ring of the bell sounded, and the beast was let out. Karl’s eyes traveled back to the so-called ‘champion’, struggling to find him for a few moments. He caught sight of a two-toned braid, and-
He gripped the arms of his seat, biting hard on his cheek to keep himself from reacting outwardly at the risk of raising suspicions from the Queen.
He knew that face.
The champion moved like a spider, scurrying around the beast and knicking it here and there. Karl might have thought the cuts were doing nothing if not for the worsening balance of the beast as it stumbled around, trying to land a hit on the fighter. He kicked up dust, slashed at the beast, seemingly doing whatever it took with no dignity, yet Karl couldn’t help but think the young-looking boy was almost elegant in his fighting.
Karl glanced to the Queen, but her eyes were solely on the fighter, tracking his movements with a look that could only be described as greed . He shuddered to think of the implications behind the thought, and instead turned his attention back to the fight.
As soon as he found the beast, the towering abomination was already falling. With a thud, a coat of silence fell once more over the arena, each audience member waiting for the result with baited breath.
Out of the corner of his eye, Karl saw the Queen rise once again, walking to the edge of the booth and raising a hand. Bringing it down with an air of formality, her voice rang clear throughout the stadium
“As our champion, reigns victorious in the Mᔑℸ ̣ ᓵ⍑ᒷᓭ 𝙹⎓ p∷╎↸ᒷ shall too will his name be given at last!”
Karl turned to her, completely lost. He thought the champion already had a known name? They had been chanting it earlier, had they not?
“As the prize for surviving to retirement, hereby should the Y𝙹⚍リ⊣ c∷||ᓭℸ ̣ ᔑꖎ, Rᔑリʖ𝙹𝙹, be known as Ranboo!”
Icy fear struck Karl in his place, paralyzing him as the audience roared with excitement and joy. The boy, still standing over the beast, face younger than Karl had ever seen him before, finally raised his head up to the stands. Heterochromatic eyes met Karl’s, and he felt like he might have passed out had the Queen not beckoned him to stand behind her.
Trembling enough for the world to see, he rose from his seat, shakily making his way over to the Queen. She mistook his disturbance for excitement, apparently, her grin growing ever fiercer.
“Well, I don’t believe you’ve told me your name yet, oh traveller,” she remarked, eyes still trained on the too-familiar boy who Karl was looking anywhere but. Something else, something deeper, sat just underneath her words, but he couldn’t process it enough to understand.
He gulped, resisting the urge to tug at the hem of his hoodie, hyper-aware of how inappropriately dressed he was for this occasion (though he was for almost every occasion he’d stumbled across before.) “Ah, it’s, um, it’s Karl, your majesty,” he answered, bowing his head once again.
The Queen laughed, her hand finding itself back on his shoulder, threatening enough to make Karl tense up but lax enough for him to be unable to do anything about it. Now that he was actually looking, he could see the crimson permanently staining clawed fingertips. He loathed to imagine how one could even achieve such coloration.
“I will not lie to you, Karl , you entertain me,” she said, pronouncing his name like it had amused her personally. “As you are so clearly not familiar with my land or culture, I’m going to give you a tour, of sorts.”
He kept his eyes forward as she began to walk, dragging him along by her grip on him. Her refused to meet her eye, a lump forming in his throat.
“What do you say we go greet our champion?”