The Crystals - 48 Lava Gladiator

“It was like 150 years ago,” started Mr. Sutton,

“A monstrous person whose name is unknown came to our village. He called himself the Lava Gladiator. He killed us indiscriminately. All the magnificent warriors of Orange village died fighting him. Many of them escaped for the sake of avoiding death. We realized we had no hope of winning by force.

I wouldn’t say he is stronger than Oranton or Smomb. But we were already dried up of warriors because of the demon Oranton and his army. Plus, he is more vicious than Oranton. Oranton only took our freedom and did nothing as long as we were under his rules. But Lava Gladiator just comes and carries on massacre.

So, we decided to negotiate. But how? He just comes, kills and goes away. No room left to talk.

So, we chose two brave warriors to assassinate him. They followed the Lava Gladiator and found out that that beast has no home. He just sleeps in the jungle. This was the perfect chance for the assassins to start their actions. One of them dug his dagger into his neck. But it was as if he had lava instead of blood. After the dagger went through the skin, the lava melted the dagger’s blade and woke the Lava Gladiator. He woke up and killed the assassin. The other one escaped and reported us to the situation.

Then a nobleman named Hamilton had enough of it. He was no warrior, but nothing short of it either. When Lava Gladiator came to massacre like they always do, he just went in front of him face to face. He looked him into the eyes and asked, ‘Why are you massacring us? What did we ever do to you?’

‘What did you ever do? I am not that evil. I am not the type to hold grudges. I just love the feeling that comes with it, the feeling that I am so powerful and an entire village is powerless against me, a single person. I feel so godly.’

‘Please, I beg of you. Stop this. We have seen the extent of your power. We want no more death.’

The Lava Gladiator let out an evil echoing laugh and said, ‘Yes. Everybody should be like you. You enhanced the feeling. Its more entertaining to kill someone like you.’

The evil freak was about to hammer him with his fists. But the fearless person spoke again, ‘If you truly consider yourself powerful, why do you come and slay weaklings like us? Nobody from anywhere will consider you a threat except the weaklings only. People will only deem you powerful if you destroy powerful foe.’

The Lava Gladiator stopped and thought. He left without saying a word.

The villagers didn’t see him for a month or two. But he came back. He searched for Hamilton and killed those who failed to answer. He was the one who wanted to negotiate, sitting with Hamilton.

He told that he visited other cities and challenged warriors. He could defeat some of them. But he was defeated by many. This frustrated him. He had not the power to kill anymore and if he tried, the warriors of the big cities will kill him. So, he missed the feeling that he got from killing. He said, he will come from time to time to kill in our village.

The reason he was negotiating was that after battling powerful warriors he doesn’t have the motivation to fight us. But he still wants to kill us. And we cannot take advantage of the fact that he was drained when he comes here because he is just mentally drained to fight us. But if we fight back, he has the power to exterminate the village.

Thus, we adopted a policy. One that will not lead us to extinction and neither will it force us to live in terror. We told him we will accept only if he kills one person every time he comes. And we told the villagers to tell their children about a sleep haunter. Whenever he comes, we sound a siren. And if people do not sleep at the sound of the siren, the sleep haunter would kill them. Thus, this generation doesn’t have the tension we had. They think they will not die if they sleep and the ones who died, died because they didn’t sleep and it is their fault.”

Zohaifa sensing the story is finished said, “This isn’t everything. You are still hiding something.”