Mr. Zackson

When we arrived on the island port, we were told to head to the big arena, a circular battlefield that must have been at least 300 meters in diameter. "This is like a battle zone," said Jacob.

He was right, while the center of the arena was empty, the surrounding area was filled with obstacles, short walls, and sniping points that were located on higher walls.

A man in a suit walked on to the overhead stage and spoke into the mic. "Good evening everyone, my name is Mr. Zackson," he said in a British accent, "proud owner of this grand island. I heard that you all had some trouble at sea, even so, the show must go on, release them."Then he just stood there with a small smile on his face.

"What?" I said "rel--"

"AWOOOOO"

"SHIT, NIGHT WOLVES," Jacob said as we booked it to the obstacles, every other Slayer shared the same idea dashing to take cover and gain an advantage on the Night Wolves, but that was when I notice where stomping of paws was coming from.

"Brace your selves, they're coming straight at us!" I screamed as a wolf cleared a 2-meter high wall in front of me, lunging with forcefully at me, I noticed it's white fur, largemouth, dead eyes that had the burning passion of the earth's magma, and sharp k9 teeth ready to plunge into my skin and devour me. I barely dodged it, the speed at which it traveled matched my own or maybe it was faster, I quickly readied my dagger and pointed it at the wolf signaling it to come once more, its face changed to one of anger it must have thought I was mocking it. It charged me faster than it had the last time, but I was ready, my plan was to dodge at the last moment and attacked the vulnerable skin on the side of its body, but it predicted my move tackling me to the ground and biting my left forearm. It jerked its head in an attempt to take my forearm off, and I took this opportunity to cut the beast eyeball out only to hit the left side of his face, but I know it did some damage as it let go of my forearm squealing from the injuries it got from my dagger. I quickly got up but knew that I was fighting a losing battle, it was able to get some good damage in on my arm. I only realized how much it hurt due to the adrenaline wearing off from the exchange, and what did I get out of that, only some cuts on the wolve's face. "Man this was a bad matchup," I said, "I may even die, Night Wolves are a rank E monster Stella and Jacob should be fine, but Ophelia... OH SHIT WH--." Then I was once again tackled to the ground, the wolf had taken advantage of me worrying and got a surprise attack, but all I thought was, "Am I going to die."

"HALT" came over the loudspeakers in the arena as a long-ranged magic attack hit the wolf that was on my back sending it a good 2 meters away from me, I looked around to see Stella running over to me. I then looked over to the Night wolf to see it walking away, although it looked like it was going to die.

"Are you okay," Stella asked as she looked at both my forearm and back. "Man I got blood on my hands, Ophelia come heal Max."

"Got it," she said, kneeling down, "these look kinda bad, those night wolves were a bad match for you."

"No, it's my fault I got hurt because I broke formation," I said looking down at my arm "I was supposed to be guarding your back, but I got caught up on one wolf."

"Sorry for the surprise," came over the loudspeaker "it was a necessity to have you all evaluate your combat skill against some E rank monsters, of which you will see a lot more of as you grow past E rank. Now I know some of you may have your concerns about how I dealt with your first part of the training, and to that, I say deal with it, this won't be some walk in the park, you will all be tested beyond what you believe your limits to be. Also, if you so desire to leave the island, then good luck swimming back to the mainland because there won't be any boats carrying those of you who want to. One final thing to make clear, ON THIS ISLAND I CREATE THE LAW, thank you."

"Stella, what did you get us into," I said, turning to her only to find her licking her hand and murdering something under her breath.

"What," she said, but then chaos followed after as some of the slayers attempted to leave the arena presumably heading to the port, the guards stopped some of them before they were able to flee.

"Everyone stay still," said Jacob "we still don't know what Zackson wants." We did as our leader said and heard Mr. Zackson order the capture of those who have left the arena, he then instructed all of us who are complying to get our groups to be assigned rooms we will be staying in. We ended up getting an apartment in the north-east part of the island, which was apart on a complex on the second floor and contained a living room and 2 separate rooms opposite each other connected by a small hallway in the living room. There was no kitchen due to the building having a cafeteria connected to the main complex on the first floor. When we got the apartment, we set our bags down that were dropped off by a B ranker represented by the B on his uniform.

"Imagine being a B ranker and having a delivery duty," Stella said while laughing.

"Yeah I'm sure that delivery guy can knock you out in one punch," I replied.

"Ahaha, wow Max I didn't know you were a comedian, let's continue our 'conversation' in our room," she said, forcefully grabbing my arm and pulling me into one of the rooms.

"Wait, we can't share a room," I shot back.

"Why not, oh don't tell me your pride will be hurt when I find out you get nervous because you're sharing a room with a girl," I felt myself getting mad at this point "aww don't worwy little baby, I'll make sure your alri-," I slapped her across the face, both Ophelia and Jacob had shocked expressions, then Jacob spoke up "alright let's calm down, maybe it's best if Max and I share a room-,"

"No," replied Stella with a happy grin on her face "we were just joking you know how we banter a lot," she continued cheerfully laughing to which, I started to laugh as well not because of her explanation but by the way she reacted. "Come on, Max," she continued "let's set down our things." She pushed me inside and closed the door behind her, "So now you owe me," she said.

"What, how do I owe you?"

"If it weren't for me, you would have been dog food back in the arena."

I put on my best-confused face saying, "really, and I think I was doing alright, and the wolf stopped when Mr. Zackson yelled, "Halt."

"No, no, no, don't twist the truth, I rescued you like a damsel in distress, and I was the price."

"Really I don't remember, I must have been too focused on the fight,"

She paused for a second, then continued, "Since you owe me, I want you to help me investigate Mr. Zackson."

"Why."

"Because he's acting strange."

"wa-, wa-, wait how do you know he's acting strange, did you know him before?"

"Yes, when I was 4 he first showed up in our village, he said, he had just come back for being in a dungeon for a long time, but he was never mean to anyone while he stayed with us, and when we asked about his family he said he was looking for his wife and his 1-year-old son. Also, for some reason, he's speaking in a British accent he's, American I'm sure of it."

"Shouldn't you be telling this to Jacob and Ophelia too."

"No, Jacob isn't good at collecting information, and Ophelia will spill everything if she gets caught, so I'm asking you, your an assassin type so, aren't you meant to be sneaky."

"I'm an 'assassin type' not, a real one," I said exaggeratedly, "look, can we talk about this in the morning I'm getting tired."

"Okay, you can sleep on the floor since there is only one bed."

"Oh, hell, naw! In fact, you should sleep on the floor, aren't all you elves some nature freaks, look the floor is made out of 100% wood, the perfect place for you to-" she walked up to me, putting one hand on my neck shutting me up.

"You know," she said with a large amount of frustration in her voice "I let the slap go because I thought you had finally grown some balls, but now you're just being a dick about things," she continued as she looked me in the eyes. I got the feeling that she wasn't looking at me as a human but rather as prey. "I was going to wait until you were at your prime," she said, pushing me back and strengthening her grip on my neck.

I stopped and grabbed her wrist "look you being 20 and, having the body of a 15-year-old takes away from any intimidation you might what to achieve," I said, putting my other hand on my face and turning my head side to side.

"Daze," followed by a smile fueled with cruelty rather than, happiness appeared on her face as my vision faded to black.

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In a warehouse near the arena, the captured slayers kneel before Mr. Zackson. "We've restrained the slayers attempting to escape," said an A rank slayer "what is your next order, Mr. Zackson."

"Good job Jason, have the 23 of them separated into their own groups, I'll deal with them then."

After being separated, Mr. Zackson askes, "I will tell you again chose to stay or not to leave the island I recommend you to stay." 18 out of the 23 chose to accept the offer this time. The remaining 5 were reluctant. "Now I say again, I recommend you stay on the island," said Mr. Zackson.

"And why the hell should we trust you!" said the group leader, "we don't even know who you are!"

"That's because I want to help you grow as a slayer."

"You can still say that after what you pulled, you going on about how you rule this island, and you expect me to believe you're up to no good keep all these people on the island! If you believed I would have ever agreed, then you're a damn fool!"

"Does this go for all of you as well," Zackson said looking at the other four members of the group, all nodding "Well looks like a good team with a good leader too, may I know your name."

"Screw you, let me and my team go, we want nothing to do with you or this shady place."

Mr. Zackson looked on, took a deep breath, and gave the order "execute them," He then hung his head down, "and, I'm sorry."

'Why didn't you use me? You could have turned them to your side.'

'No,' thought Mr. Zackson, 'They don't know about you or your power yet.'

'But things will be so much simpler if you did.'

'You're not the only one of your kind here, we can't show our hand before we make our move, it needs to follow the plan to have the highest probability of success.'

'I don't think its health, to have such a strong grudge.'

'Like you would anything about family, I'm sure your kind doesn't have a family.'

'No, we do, we just aren't close.'

Mr. Zackson raised his head up questioning, "Jason has their body be cremated, and their belonging destroyed we can't have the other slayers finding out about this, it would decrease morale and trust."