Chapter Twenty – Flint and Steel

"How does this fight thing work?" Silk asked.

"You fight against legends like ourselves and if you die you are revived back in your room." Crusher answered.

"Do all legends specialise in fighting," Silk continued his questioning as they walked down the white corridor. Gods seemed to like white.

"Most," Phoenix took the initiative to answer this time.

"If we win do we walk back to our room escorted?" Silk asked.

"Yes," Crusher and Phoenix replied in unison.

Silk smiled, "these escorts are golems, right?"

"High grade unimaginably powerful and intelligent ones," Phoenix seemed to guess Silk had a plan so was trying to nudge him away from fighting with the golems but she didn't know that Silk had disregarded this a long time ago.

They entered into a room with equipment hanging everywhere.

"Fifteen minutes until entering arena." The mechanical voice announced.

"The gods still use minutes," Silk exclaimed.

"Not quite," Phoenix answered. "There is some sort of translation magical system at work here."

"Cool," he marvelled. "Can both of you turn around now? I have to make modifications to my suit." He asked abruptly stripping.

Crusher and Phoenix turned around to give him privacy. In their minds quirks like these were normal in the legends community.

The modifications required unravelling top-grade relics in the room and using them to embroider the amplification enchantment onto the suit. As Silk didn't have much magic power it recharged surprisingly fast. He knew the amplification relics like the back of his hand and was just copying them from the white suit.

Threads flew everywhere on magical needles until after ten minutes Silk sweating heavily had completed the suit. He was lucky to get enough thread as he was unable to unravel defence material relics which were the majority.

The new suit had a few new tricks that Silk had thought of adding whenever he had a chance before however none of the new enchantments were brutal killing spells. Silk took his oaths seriously but he knew that without the magical amplification enchantments he would be a sitting duck in this world.

Silk put his modified suit on in satisfaction and showed it off to both Crusher and Phoenix with a twirl. He had made it with about two minutes to go. The both of them were holding weapons, Crusher held a sword which had a blade that was just as big as Silk. Phoenix held a staff which Silk presumed was for holding to boost her spells.

"I would suggest getting one of these godly relics to boost your fighting power," Phoenix advised.

"I could never use something that I didn't make." He replied honestly.

Silk looked around at all of the relics carefully but didn't find anything he liked, they all seemed to be for the precise use of killing. While Silk still knew that killing would be inevitable he in turn knew if he held to much power his morals would be corrupted and unlike in stories you the reader have read all human life is precious.

"Can the two team of threes now come into the arena." The mechanical voice had a bit more of life that resemble excitement when it announced this.

Silk grabbed onto both of Phoenix's and Crusher's soldiers and whispered, "If we win this I have a plan to get out of here, trust me."

Crusher grunted acknowledging he heard. Phoenix pushed Silk away coldly but nodded to him.

They arrived in an arena which had just as much space as a battlefield. The announcers voice radiated throughout the battlefield, "We have two favourites here today. The mighty and powerful crusher and the mystical and brilliant phoenix. These two old hands have been given a newbie to take car of, the unimpressive Silk the Spider."

"Unimpressive," he exclaimed. "That's a low blow."

The announcers mechanical voice continued, "they will be fighting three newly captured demonic soldiers from the demon army. The odds on this battle or pretty even."

"Is the announcer saying that some random soldiers are just as powerful as you," Silk asked.

"Yes," Crusher answered.

"In my world they definitely not that powerful."

"That sounds like a fledgling world, a demon won't usually mature until they are at least one hundred years old." Phoenix said.

"You called them canon fodder," Silk blurted out.

"I know, that's what make the demonic army so terrifying." Phoenix explained calmly.

Three silhouettes suddenly cam over the top of the hill in front of the three of them.

"One of them each," Crusher gave out his orders which seemed reasonable so no one argued.

"Time to feast," Phoenix smiled while licking her lips. Fiery wings sprouted from her back and the fire spread over her body, the flames took form in a bird shape, it was the spitting image of a phoenix. She took off and struck a approaching demon lifting it up in its talons and all the while Silk was gawking.

"The name makes so much sense now," he marvelled.

"Get out the way," Crusher shouted pushing Silk about one hundred meters to his right causing him to hit the ground rolling. Silk looked up to see Crusher swinging his sword hitting the target and a cloud of dust covering the scene. The dust cleared showing a ravine and the demon that was targeted crawling out without a scratch but instead its scales glistening.

"They are definitely more powerful than the things on Earth," Silk gasped. Suddenly something flashed in front of Silk's eyes making him roll, where he just as now stood a blade. The blade was attached to the body like a praying mantis but it held the characteristics of a mammal with fur covering it but strange hexagonal eyes.

Silk composed himself and jumped up and looked at his opponent. "Please surrender, if you do I might win this," he tried to reason.

The demon looked at him slightly confused before striking again, Silk reacted by layering atoms from anywhere in front of him where he was being struck but the force still made him fly backwards so he activated another enchantment which forced air behind him acting like a crumple zone and cushioning his landing.

The demon jumped over to where Silk was and looked at him curiously. Silk grabbed a random branch from the ground and armed himself with it. The demon pounced after watching him do this, it was obviously playing with him. Silk guarded while jumping back and watched as the knife-like limbs cut it in half.

"Come on," he groaned. Silk tossed the branch at the demon and ran. The demon calmly knocked the incoming wood away and casually ran after its pray, this was obviously just a hunt to it. He saw a piece of flat rock in the ground and got a good idea.

The demon seemed to notice the slight change of attitude of Silk and sensing danger it pounced as fast as a dart but Silk predicting this ducked and rolled. He lurched forward from the roll grabbing the rock but causing him to trip and fall on the ground but he twisted to land on his back.

A blade came snaking in front of his eyes, he used the rock to guard against the flat of the blade and flicking his wrist watching a spark generate. Silk smiled when he saw the spark and poured nearly all his magical energy into it and with the magic amplification it was not a small amount.

"Boo," he grinned while saying this. The flame became bigger and bigger until it engulfed the demon.

The demon screeched angrily into the sky. There was a thundering sound and lighting rained down from the sky on top of Silk but like back on Earth a faraday cage was activated discharging it into the ground.

Seeing its failure, the demon shook itself and the flames dispersed from around it showing a now bald body gleaming in the light.

Silk laughed hysterically seeing this. The demon didn't appreciate this and struck Silk's head to avoid the seemingly impenetrable suit and killing him in an instance. The last thing he saw before the blade penetrated through his face was the bloodshot eyes of the east with the weird hexagonal pupils.

He woke up back in the white room. He jumped up and checked his pockets but he found what he found what he was looking for, four keys.

He door opened, Phoenix and Crusher walked in.

"Did you win?" Silk asked.

"Just," Phoenix replied. "No thanks to you though."

"Don't be so harsh on the kid," Crusher had loosened up and he laughed heartily. "He did quite well for his first fight."

"Do you know what you need to do to improve?" Phoenix asked condescendingly.

"I should work on my tactics," he guessed.

"No," she shouted. "Improve the suit, your tactics in the fight were the only thing going for you."

Silk suddenly became angry. "How could I improve the suit? It's a masterpiece like my other suit."

"Your so-called masterpiece won't cut it in this place. You need to make your symbols smaller so you can add more enchantments for more situations. One example would by being able to create a spark with the suit instead of relying on circumstance. You need to improve the whole goddam thing!" Phoenix argued.

"And how would I improve it without proper sewing equipment," he argued back. Suddenly a hatch in the roof opened and sewing material and equipment rained down onto the floor. Silk was gobsmacked.

"You have equipment now," Crusher laughed.

Phoenix sighed out angrily and went to a corner and started meditating.