Rise of a Legend

by C.L. Mozena

Chapter 30

  Boss walked through the large dojo, glancing at all the new faces gathered there to train themselves for battle. The demonstration was a huge success, adding over a hundred new members to the ATA. Unfortunately, those new members were just ordinary people who had no fighting experience whatsoever. In a meeting earlier, he had explained to them all that they needed to be ready in case the horrible telblecs were to travel to Lunspae and take the land here, too. He knew that the telblecs had never, in the entire war, invaded Lunspae, and he figured they never would, either, but he had to get all the new members ready for battle without letting them know he had planned on attacking the telblec palace. He wondered briefly how he was going to get them all in the mood to travel to Olhoe and attack. He wasn’t too worried about that, though, because the zealots knew how to play a crowd. They had, after all, recruited over a hundred new members, but they needed to be trained, and as soon as possible, before anyone outside the ATA got wind of what was happening.

  A cry from a boxing ring caught his attention. A middle-aged man was being carried away, gripping his knee tightly. Boss figured that his leg had been broken. The fighter in the ring, however, was still hopping from foot to foot, looking for another challenger.

  “Is there anyone here who isn’t too much of a coward to get into the ring with me?” he called out to the entire dojo. Several people turned to face him, but one by one, they shrank back and continued what they were doing. “Anyone?” he called again.

  “I’ll challenge you,” Boss said as he climbed up into the ring. “What’s your name?” he asked as he slowly removed his wristbands.

  “They call me the Slasher,” he said, “‘cause my finishing move makes my opponent look like he was slashed with a knife.” Boss lifted his eyebrows. That was impressive, to draw blood using nothing more than your own knuckles.

  “All right, Slasher,” Boss said, taking a defensive position, “Show me what you got.”