Fantastic Tournament: Champions Edition [NONCANON] - [Round 1: Ghost Station]

[Ixcalibur]

Let’s not mess around here. You know about Grand Battles, so does The Authority. The Authority however has the distinction of not really being on good terms with the Grandmasters that run that shit and as such his repeated requests to host an official Grand Battle were met with naught but derision. I mean come on, he would protest, you let that guy Zaire host a Grand Battle and not me? The Authority was eventually forced to concede that the Grandmasters on the in-crowd were a bunch of dicks and he could host Grand Battles better than them anyway. And so The Authority, his babe (The Dreamer), and a bunch of his best bros all got together and put together a series of battles just as good, if not better than those run by the douchebag Director. They called them Fantastic Tournaments, and their success was mixed.

The Authority’s battle started out promisingly but ended prematurely when he misjudged the lethality of his second round. Before he was back from getting refreshments all his contestants had rather unfortunately died. The Authority was pretty pissed following this, and it didn’t help that Dreamer’s battle turned out even worse. In the third round the remaining contestants managed to unexpectedly find a way to the Dreamer’s pocket dimension and overwhelmed her, making her one of the first Grandmasters to be taken out by her own contestants. The Authority watched the other battles from the security of his own pocket dimension, growing more and more certain that the other Grandmasters were laughing at him and his misfortune.

Slowly their battles all wound to a close with a single victor, and they pondered what to do next. It was then that the Authority made his move, approaching them and telling them about a rumour he heard from a certain Ghost. He told them that the Grand Battles were to at some point have a battle featuring the winners of the previous battles, an All Stars Battle. Every single Grandmaster wanted in on it, and there just happened to be one Grandmaster without a contestant of his own who could host the thing. The Grandmasters gathered up their winners and put them in the hands of the Authority.

It was time for the FANTASTIC TOURNAMENT - CHAMPIONS EDITION.

show spoiler

hide spoiler

YOU PROBABLY ALREADY KNOW ALL THIS BUT WHATEVER:

Grand Battles are writing contests where people make characters and have them fight or interact or whatever. Each round the worst writer is eliminated until we have a winner. Much later these winners are placed into an All Stars battle to fight the other winners from their series. This battle does not take place in the official Grand Battle canon and the main premise is that we’ve skipped to the end and we’re going to do the All Stars battle as though all your characters have won their ‘Fantastic Tournaments’.

If you need more information on Grand Battles please check out the Grand Battle Information/Planning Thread or the Grand Battle Wiki. Familiarity with the format of Grand Battles is highly advised if you want to take part in this battle.

RULES AND SHIT:

Reserves in this battle last for 24 hours, after that people may still hold of if they want to but don’t take extended reserves for granted. If you put down a reserve and then piss off for a week or so I will be pissed. Reserves for long periods of time with no communication to other players are simply unacceptable.

I’m keeping signups open for a little while in the hopes of attracting some cool people. How long for you ask? I have no fucking idea.

A LITTLE HELPFUL INFORMATION:

Pines in his battle made it clear in the rules that grammar is super important and without it you're out. I'd like to make it clear in my rules that while you are certainly expected to be readable I am more interested in good story and interesting characters. Not a hard and fast rule, more a guideline.

PROFILE:

Here’s the thing you really opened the spoiler for. I know you didn’t read any of the stuff above this. For shame! Please note the differences between this and a regular Grand Battle form.

Username: Your internet identity.
Name: What we call your character.
Gender: So we have a pronoun to refer to your character with.
Race: What the fuck is your character?
Color: Use colour tags or background tags for some reason. Not sure what this is actually for. Try not to go overboard with backgrounds. Fuck you if you want to use bold or italics or a font.
Weapon/Abilities: Cool shit your character can do/has.
Description: First a description of your character’s appearance (bear in mind they’ve gone through a Fantastic Tournament, but also they will have had a little time in between then and now to do shit), then a description of your character’s personality.
Backstory: A brief history of your combatant. Ideally you want some information about them before their tournament, during the tournament and then after the tournament.

Grandmaster Title: The name of your grandmaster.
Grandmaster Colour: The colour of your grandmaster.
Tournament Information: Shit that is relevant about your characters tournament. This is just the basics. You can go into excruciating detail in in-battle flashbacks if you want.

Players:
- Pax Musica (Deepskyblue on black.) / The Abomination (grey on black) - TimeothyHour
- The Coat (#93773F) / The Lachrymose (#DFF6FF on #6E7273) - engineclock
- The Vase (blue) / The Executive Producer (DarkSlateGray) - cyber95
- Titan (#600060) / The Courier (#4F4F2F) - Pick Yer Poison
- Detective Erin O'Donobate (#0055BB) / Madame The (#663300) - Lord Paradise
- The Inmate and Suzanne (#9C3108 & #333366) / The Warden (88888 on black) - Mirdini
- Clyde Clemens (#96CBA2) / Selvsetter (#264F3A) - Schazer
- Leonard Robertson (#67890A) / The Dullard (#06DF18) - Dragon Fogel
- Zephyr (#80BFFF) / The Eccentric (#FFBFFF on black) - Wojjan
- Conswarm Sigma (#595959) / The Dreamer (#7CC576 background) - Raum

[TimeothyHour]

show spoiler

hide spoiler

YOUR REGULARLY SCHEDULED MIND CONTROL MAY BEGIN:

Username: TimeothyHour

Name: Pax Musica

Gender: None, gender of hosts may vary.

Race: Parasitic Sentient Techno Hivemind

Colour: Deepskyblue on black.

Weapons/Abilities: Propagation of the collective is achieved via the members of Pax Musica’s entourage. Fully integrated members wear rather standard-looking headphones which have been modified with robotic cables, wireless receivers, and wires that insert at the base of the brain, along with an iPod (pfft copyright) playing hallucinogenic musical pieces. This design gives Pax Musica full control of its hosts while the former beings are reduced to a state of music-induced euphoria. If the headphones are removed, or music is not played through the headphones for over a minute and a half, a failsafe is activated that automatically kills the host. This basic building block of Pax Musica’s control allows for the first step in propagation: Introduction. The host, when encountering a non-converted being, will appear like a normal member of the host's species and attempt converse with the prey. When it appears contextually appropriate, the host will then unplug its iPod and play a 30-60 second sample of its music in order to briefly stun the target with its psychedelic beats. The second phase then begins: detention. The host attempts to grab its prey, binding it or otherwise incapacitating it, and brings it back to the main body of Pax Musica…

Description: …which essentially appears as a fairly standard nightclub. The interior has psychoactive music playing constantly, effectively incapacitating any prey inside. After a short period of time, the target is introduced to the central consciousness of Pax Musica, which inhabits a jukebox in a back room of the club. This room is soundproof and has no music playing. Within the room, the prey is allowed to regain consciousness and sanity before the third step is begun: Conversion. The target directly meets Pax, and from there, no one is really sure what happens. Regardless, a new being is added to the hivemind consciousness, and the cycle repeats. The central consciousnesses communicates to the rest of the collective via wireless signals. At the time of disappearance, Pax Musica had about twenty hosts within the club, who were taken with Pax Musica. Pax has 4 currently unspecified alien, non-bipedal creatures, and a very large number of npc's from various locales.

Biography:
Some people say music has soul. And on a version of earth, battered by combat, a withered husk of what it once was, the last effort for peace tried to make that true.

In some ways, they were successful.

Grandmaster Title: The Abomination- an eldritch horror who hates the bipedal form. He entered only non-humanoid characters into his battle.

Grandmaster Colour: black on grey

Tournament info: None of the characters were human, resulting in a very surreal battle- moments of alien beauty intermixed with brutal violence. Pax managed to grab and control the minds of 4 of the contestants (including the second place contestant, who was Pax's only friend ever) and countless npc's. Spending another year on the Pax's half-destroyed world to prepare, Pax is returning with better remixes, bigger weapons, and more organized tactics than ever.

[Not The Author]

show spoiler

hide spoiler

Username: Not The Author

Name: The Charlatan

Race: Grandmaster

Gender: Male

Color: Green

Abilities: He's very fast, has inhuman reflexes, and is capable of flight and partial or full incorporeality; standard fare for those with the power to flit between dimensions, really.

Additionally, he's a master illusionist, capable of bending light and sound to his will. He can use this power to create mirages, throw his voice, alter temperature, move in silence, become invisible, throw other peoples' voices, etc, etc. He tries to be creative with what others of his kin might consider a limited power pool.

He carries only a Pocket Nonspecific Impatience Demonstrator, an advanced piece of technology that takes whatever form is most suited to informing your company you don't really give a shit about them, though it usually takes the form of a book or phone.

Description: The Charlatan is tall and slim with a tendency to loom. He is clothed in forest-green-and-white magician's garb, complete with top hat and not-quite-floor-length high-collared cape. The cape is typically drawn around him so as to be all mysterious and shit. His face is obscured by a semicircular mask of a toothy smile that appears to be made from the color white. Close inspection reveals that no part of his body is visible.

Personality-wise, he's a dick. He's insulting, condescending, and sarcastic. He lies, cheats, and deceives to get what he desires; assuming he can't just take it without asking. Or, preferably, ask and then take regardless of the answer. That his face is perpetually locked in a Cheshire smile only serves to make things worse.

Biography: While his ascent to Semiomnipotence is necessarily unrelatable, he has spent most of his time since spreading mischief throughout the various realities. He has tested For Want Of A Nail on several occasions; shut down vital systems at inopportune moments on several craft modern, magical, and otherwise; created several major religious figures via precision hallucination; and subtly influenced no less than three Grand Battle rosters with careful application of disembodied voices posing as the soon-to-be-host's own thoughts.

He was entered against his will into The Grand Clusterfuck, a battle hosted by the Executive Producer that was intended to be the single largest Battle in history. Unfortunately, due to Unspecified Time Shenanigans, GCf's original timeline was destroyed, leaving The Charlatan as the only survivor. While he has started a Battle of his own since, spectating just doesn't excite him as much as participating did. When he heard about FT:CE, he just couldn't pass up the opportunity to screw over another group of unfortunate souls.

Of course, since he didn't win Clusterfuck by conventional means, the Executive Producer isn't actually sponsoring him. Of course, he wouldn't let a little something like that stop him...



Grandmaster Title: The Charlatan

Grandmaster Colour: Green

Tournament Information: The Grand Clusterfuck was a competition planned to involve 24 (or more!) contestants. The Charlatan managed to escape GCf's original timeline (by exploiting one of the other contestant's time-burrowing abilities)/(when it abruptly went off the air) [PICK ONE] and went on to host a battle of his own.

He may or may not have actually been invited to participate in the Fantastic Tournament.

[Raum]

Username: Raum
Unit Identification: Sigma
Unit Classification: Construction Swarm

Specifications: Conswarm units are comprised of a core and a swarm. The core is a mechanised floating sphere with a diameter of six inches. The core contains the data that controls the Conswarm unit’s actions. When not in commission the only data that remains on the Conswarm unit are behavioural protocols and an encyclopaedic knowledge of potential construction materials. Before an assignment a Conswarm unit is uploaded with detailed blueprints of the structures to be built. On larger assignments a single unit can be assigned to numerous differing buildings. To prevent self-cannibalisation the core is covered with a layer of skin.

The swarm is a flexible cloud of nanobots that surround the core. They receive their programming directly from the core. Their standard function is to seek out large quantities of a suitable construction material, break that material down and use it to build with. These nanobot swarms in accordance with government regulations have been programmed to be unable to affect flesh. This prevents them from deconstructing any passers by, and is the reason why a layer of skin is effective protection for the core.

Behavioural protocols: In the event of a Conswarm unit encountering an unauthorized person on a construction site they are programmed to firmly but politely instruct the individual to leave the area. If the individual insists on remaining upon the construction site the Conswarm unit will wirelessly contact the local authorities.

Sometimes Conswarm units are used in conjunction with humanoid construction workers. In these cases they are programmed to obey the instructions of their co-workers so long as these instructions do not interfere with their ability to carry out their primary function. By popular demand, in these scenarios they are designed to switch to the voice and personality of a flirtatious female. This personality adjustment has been found to foster a greater sense of camaraderie and a better working environment for all.

Unit History:
23/07/2189: Unit Sigma constructed.
25/07/2189: Unit Sigma passes safety and behavioural protocols test.
28/07/2189: Unit Sigma assigned to New Vaelin Contract.
29/07/2189: Unit Sigma does not respond to remote ping. Later confirmed missing by construction workers on the scene.

Colour: Dark Grey

Grandmaster Title: The Dreamer (Deceased)
Grandmaster Colour: Pale Green Background
Tournament Information: Sigma is the last remaining contestant of The Dreamer’s battle. While the other contestants went off to try to combat The Dreamer Sigma minded its own business building shit. After the others had successfully killed their Grandmaster they waited to be returned to their own universes, only to find that this was not a thing that was not going to happen. Time passed and their bickering slowly escalated into resentment and eventually they all killed one another. The lost one left trapped in the Dreamer’s barren realm slowly starved to death. This makes Sigma the winner by default.

[cyber95]

Username: cyber95
Name: None.
Gender: No gender. It is an it. No gender pronouns.
Race: Ceramic Ming Dynasty Vase
Color: Blue (Yes it's the same as Time's color. They had the same color in different battles.)
Weapon/Abilities: Nothing. It’s a vase. It’s immobile. It’s nonsentient. It has a carrying capacity of nearly two gallons. Contained within it are three grenades, somewhat caked in the cocaine sitting at the bottom.
Description: White in color, the vase is decorated with blue painted birds and flowers. Narrow at the top and wide at the bottom. It’s large enough that the average person can fit their arm in there with maybe getting it stuck for a bit. It’s got a spot of blood on it, and several relatively unnoticeable scratches, but other than that, is in remarkably good condition.

show spoiler

hide spoiler

It’s a vase. It has no personality.
Backstory: For a perfectly ordinary vase, it sure had an interesting history. Wherever it went, it would take interesting situations along with it. An uncountable number of gang wars. The Kennedy Assassination. The Hindenburg disaster. Hitler being rejected from art school. That one time the ice cream store ran out of everything. Somehow, it managed to be indirectly responsible for all of these things, merely by being there, serving some nefarious purpose.
Here’s an example of an average day for this vase.
John Arnold found the vase, immediately deciding it had value just from the look of it, so he did what anybody would do in this situation. He put it on Craigslist. He managed to get a response in less than an hour, and put it in the back of his pick-up truck, next to all the pillows and blankets his daughter had forgotten to take out when she arrived at her friend’s house for a sleepover.
After a particularly nasty pothole in the road, the back of the truck managed to jolt open, causing the vase to fall out of the moving truck, along with the pillows and blankets, cushioning its fall. Little Timmy Trinket saw this, and went to get the vase in amazement, only to end up with a gun pointed towards his head once he picked it up. Mr. Trinket owed a lot of money to the mafia, and Timmy would apparently have a new residence until that could be paid. Timmy carried the vase all the way to the mafia hideout, as the mobster figured they could probably use it for something. As it so happens, it was the perfect thing to stuff with cocaine. They had a deal going on later, and needed something that somebody would expect to pay a lot for to hide it in. On the way to the deal, unfortunately, it became apparent that a local gang had caught wind of this deal, and intercepted it. A firefight broke out, with the vase in the middle of it all. Somewhere during all of this, somebody managed to lose track of the vase, almost like it had just disappeared.
During the battle, the vase had just managed to be there the whole time. Every emotional hook, every climactic death, every important event. The vase was there, and probably responsible for it. Right to the very end, where it managed to be knocked over, pushing a jar of antimatter onto the final contestant.
Back in its home world, it continued doing its thing. It managed to get over to Iraq at some point, where it regularly traded hands between the US Soldiers and Iraqi insurgents. At the point of abduction for the second time, it was serving as a container for holding grenades.

Grandmaster Title: The Executive Producer
Grandmaster Colour: DarkSlateGray
Tournament Information: The Executive Producer just can’t have a battle that isn’t televised. He loves popularity, so of course The Multiversal Consensus wanted your votes, viewers. All the contestants were chosen based on user vote, as were the arenas, and many of the events that happened during the course of the game.
Of course, the multiversal constant are trolls and assholes. This battle was filled with the most hilariously useless combatants ever, and there was a large campaign to have the inanimate object win via overwhelming all of the user choices to be in its favour.
The vase made every single kill in that battle. Everything from a cocaine high gone bad, to antimatter application, to simply being a distraction at the wrong moment. Some might have seen this user takeover as a failure, but the Executive Producer saw it as a monumental success. He didn’t have to do anything, and he was able to pump out an ungodly amount of merchandise based around a vase. Surely, the vase would be a fan-favourite for its reprise in Champions Edition. And the Errand Boy said it was a terrible idea. The Executive Producer never needed him in the first place!

[Agent1022]

Bwaaahhhhh reservyservles~

[ch00_bakka]

Username: Ch00_bakka

Character name: Nils Stronginthearm

Gender: Male

Race: Dwarf

Color: #708090

Weapons 'n' Stuff: Deathmop the Sweeper of Souls, a dwarf-bone mop with dwarf-hair bristles. It has decorations on it made of dwarf leather, depicting dwarves screaming, burning, and dying. It is encrusted with black diamonds (shut up, those are totally things), and menaces with spikes of obsidian. It is one badass mop. It also has the ability to reapsweep souls. If there are any dead bodies around, a simple wiping with Deathmop will gather them up into the black diamonds (still totally a thing. Shut up.) and store them for later use. Muahahahaha. This will probably mean necromancy or some shit. Right now about an eighth of the diamonds are filled. This is all he was able to clean up before he was taken away. He also has an assortment of Dwarven cleaning products: rock polish (a mild acid), Torgo's Noble Powder (1001 uses!), Troll fat soap (very nice soap), and Windex. And his AXE! Which is just a plain iron axe.

Description: Nils is about four feet tall, and has a big bushy beard and long brown hair. He is wearing Goblin Leather Overalls, and a chain mail shirt. He has an axe about as big as him strapped across his back, a utility belt full of cleaning products, and a badass mop in his hand. His dark blue eyes have a haunted look about them, and he seems very gloomy at a glance. His beard and hair are messy, but his hands are sparkling clean, as are the soles of his big stompy boots.

He is a very gloomy person, and is obsessed with cleanliness. He wants everything to be clean, and seems to have very strong OCD. He will hurt anyone who messes up what he's cleaned. And then clean up all the mess he just made.

Bio: Nils Stronginthearm was a janitor in a Dwarven fortress. He was born in the fortress of Tidyhalls to a mother and father who were both janitors, and at the age of sixteen took his grandfather's broom and his grandmother's axe and left to the fortress of Bloodydeath the Painful Demise of Dwarves. He spent most of his time cleaning up goblin corpses and resetting traps. Occasionally he would have to kill a kobold or two, but mostly his life was very nice and boring and easy to write about. He was seen as an exemplar of Dwarven Janitoritude by The Janitor, who took him to the entirely janitor-filled battle. Nils beat the other eight contestants at poker, axe throwing, a footrace (dwarves are natural sprinters. Very dangerous over short distances), Monopoly, foursquare, go fish, and chess, and won, at which point he was sent back to Bloodydeath the Paniful Demise of Dwarves. Right after everyone else had been killed by goblins. He was immediately sent into a strange mood, and took several corpses of dwarves into a craftsdwarf's workshop. He created Deathmop the Sweeper of Souls, a dwarf-bone mop with dwarf-hair bristles. It has decorations on it made of dwarf leather, depicting dwarves screaming, burning, and dying. It is encrusted with black diamonds (shut up, those are totally things), and menaces with spikes of obsidian. It is one badass mop. Then he was taken again to this battle.


Grandmaster Title: The Janitor - his personality can best be described as OH GODS THE CLEANING PUNS.

Grandmaster color: "navy"

Tournament Info: The Tidy Tussle was a very mild battle. None of the contestants were really combat-ready. And they were ALL janitors. Why the Janitor was ever allowed to host a battle is beyond me. The eight contestants didn't want to fight each other, and just sat around in the most quiet spot they could find and played a game each round to decide the loser. Really quite boring.

show spoiler

hide spoiler

Dwarven necro-janitor is go!

[Lord Paradise]

Username: Lord Paradise

Name: Det. Erin O’Donabate

Gender: Female

Race: Cop

Color: #0055BB

Weapon/Abilities: Erin has jurisdiction throughout the entire multiverse, and, being ignorant of the exact statutes and regulations of many of the locations she has patrolled, enforces a reasonable common law based on the culture and practices of her locale. She carries a baton forged by Vulcan’t, one of the twin firearms of The Bulletrix (seized as evidence on a case and later requisitioned as an approved non-regulation crime deterrant) and three pairs of unbreakable adaptive appendage-cuffs. She also carries a badge that gives legally-binding answers to any “yes” or “no” question, and a walkie-talkie that can either call for backup from any local law enforcement agency, or turn into a friggin’ car. The backseat of the car is a portal to a pocket dimension known as “the Cl!nk” where you will be detained pending trial. Erin knows exactly what your rights are, and is trained in being a cop.

Description: Long story short, Erin is a ginger in a navy blue cop uniform. Long story long, Erin is sexy enough (in a curvy 1980s sort of way) that it infringes on her professionality, so she does her best to hide it beneath sunglasses, a hat, a ponytail, and a grim disposition. All of these, however, have to fall off in various tense situations. Erin’s place in the Buddy Cop Dynamic reverses in response to her partner; if she’s working alongside someone who works by the book, she will find herself letting loose a bit more than if her partner is a shady informant, or a PTSD-fueled rogue cop on the edge. She made few friends in her last battle, but then again, it wasn’t her job to make friends.

Backstory: When Erin O’Donabate was pulled into the Clever Distraction, she was a vice cop fresh out of the academy and subjected to treatment that a lesser woman might consider sexist. But someone had to pretend to be a hooker, and none of the men were properly equipped or good enough liars. Unfortunately, though Officer O’Donabate achieved some respect among her peers through the arrests to which she contributed while undercover, the badge and gun in your purse doesn’t do much to counteract the fact that you’re the only contestant to show up in a tube top and blue eyeliner. They didn’t think she had it in her. They were wrong.

The Clever Distraction stalled in round 5, with three of the remaining contestants locked safely away in solitary confinement in the Cl!nk. Erin walked her beat for days, expecting her Grandmistress to come after her for ending the Clever Distraction at any moment, but she didn’t. Where had she gotten to?

Grandmistress Title: Madame The

Grandmistress Colour: #663300

Tournament Information: Turns out that Madame The had bigger plans than hosting her own battle; by tracking down and questioning all eight “gentlewomen,” Erin uncovered a plan by Madame The to make off with an entire multiverse and leave a cheap cameo-round facsimile in its place, leaving the other Grandmistress none the wiser. Erin offered deals to her fellow battlers, offering them a commuted sentence if they helped her bring Madame The to justice. By establishing a Network and getting in touch with some of the other Grandmasters, Erin was able to issue an arrest warrant. The Errand Boy found Madame The in the space between lovers’ sighs, where she was served papers and brought to trial before she could find a buyer for her cosmic contraband.

The trial was a messy affair; Erin and her fellow battlers bore witness before a jury of Grandmasters (the only peers capable of judging Madame The) of course, but one of them died of a sudden-onset STD before he could give testimony, a circumstance Erin could never conclusively tie back to the Gentlewomen. In the end, a verdict of Guilty was reached, and Madame The served only two of her eight aeons in the Warden's jail, getting out on good behavior just in time for no time to have passed from her contestants’ perspective. The battle proceeded from there, with the caveat that the Grandmasters agreed to promote Erin to the rank of Detective for her work in the case.

After winning, Erin patrolled the multiverse for a few more months, and was abducted to the Champions’ Edition just days before her scheduled sargeant’s exam.

[Wojjan]

In because Pax Musica is in

[engineclock]

Went a little overboard.

Username: Engine McClockus

Name: Identified CRS by the initials on its label. No current preferred name known. Colloquially known as “the coat”, “that damned coat”, “Jesus Christ what is that”, etc.

Gender: It.

Race: Sentient mobile evil necromantic labcoat. Formerly a scientist but no one cares about that.

Color: A nondescript beige.

Weapon/Abilities: CRS’s greatest weapon is itself; once wrapped in it, the will of its victims depletes instantly and their personalities are overwhelmed by that of the coat’s former owner, Chester R. Sabellico. Chester is a well-meaning but severely traumatized and unstable young man; the aspects of his personality that the coat imprints reflect this, as well as the panicked state he was in at the time of his death. “Chester” is incapable of forming permanent memories in this state, and each time he manifests he starts out essentially as a blank slate, unaware that any time has passed between now and his impending death over a year ago. Despite appearances to the contrary, the coat remains in control of “Chester” at all times. He will follow its commands without knowing why or being able to resist, and is inevitably terrified to find himself in a body that is not his own. The female ones in particular seem to distress him quite a bit.

The coat is imbued with the life-sucking powers that drove its former owner out of his mind, and has either no ability or no desire to turn them off. Anything with any kind of life will find itself feeling weak in its presence; small plants and insects die almost instantly, with larger organisms going catatonic and flatlining in minutes. The effects can be warded off by numbers and strength of will, but are more or less unavoidable. This effect weakens temporarily once the coat has taken a host as it apparently focuses on that poor soul instead: the average lifespan of CRS’s victims is between 1 and 2 hours, with that time shortening or lengthening drastically according to its will.

The energy consumed by the coat goes towards fueling both its own existence and its powers. In addition to draining the vital energy from its surroundings, the coat can store and transfer the same essence from body to body: this is most commonly used for the predictable task of creating zombies and other undead minions. Completely resurrecting a body to its former wholesome state (mind, body, and soul intact) is significantly more difficult than merely animating it, as the coat prefers to do. The number of beings the coat is capable of reanimating in this way depend on how much energy it’s consumed recently, but given the extended period of time between battles in which it fed, the general answer is “a lot”.

Although not as dexterous and certainly more noticeable than when it’s possessing a host, CRS is capable of independent movement in the form of flight and a horrible sort of slithering crawl. Its ability to interact with its surroundings in this form is limited, and it’s mainly used as a way for the coat to locate a new host once the old one has been drained of life.


Description:


A plain labcoat, size M, brand and year of make unknown. Once a neat, pristine white, the coat has sustained a considerable amount of damage during its time in HS. Now closer to a filthy grey-brown in color, one sleeve ends in a ragged tangle of threads, the breast pocket has been torn off, and the hems are soaked with dirt, blood, and other unpleasant substances. Numerous stains, burns, tears, and other flaws can be found in no particular pattern on the coat’s surface. There are two especially vibrant smears that seem to resemble crude eyes on the coat’s flanks, particularly visible when the coat is in flight. Their origin and purpose are unclear, but the coat seems to fancy them so they’re likely to stick around for a while longer.

The coat’s personality is still largely unknown, as it is unable to speak when not possessing a host and communicating through the persona of “Chester”. What can be deduced from its actions seems to indicate an entity devoid of pity, remorse, and hesitation, blessed with a high level of intelligence and an animalistic cunning. It is capable of bargaining and disguising its presence and nature for extended periods of time in the interest of survival and access to further prey. On a few rare occasions it has been seen to act in apparent defense of “Chester’s” mental and physical health, although this is admittedly difficult to distinguish from simple self-defense and limited by the nature of its host’s restricted memory.

Chester, or at least the copy of him presented by the coat, is unfailingly polite and generally harmless, though regrettably prone to panic and hysteria when alarmed, which is often. Overly-eager to make friends and avoid conflict, he prefers to flee from any potential rather than face it directly. Although he is unable to disobey the commands of the coat and interprets them as his own desires, he frequently questions them, particularly when they conflict with his current course of action.

He is completely oblivious as to the coat’s control over him, and when alerted to it (as has happened a number of times) invariably flips the fuck out. Luckily for him, he doesn’t have to remember it for any longer than it takes the current host to die and the coat to leave the wasted corpse behind. A blissful existence, really, barring the constant mindless terror and extremely poor hygiene of his coat.


Backstory: Chester R. Sabellico was a promising and highly intelligent young scientist who dedicated his career to studying what he called “vitae”, essentially the energy that comprises life. His praises were many, his enemies were few, and when he accidentally found a way to gather that same energy in himself at an uncontrollable rate it broke his stupid little heart. He was dragged into HS an instant before his “powers” kicked in, and had no prior experience on his resume for being a walking harvester of souls. During the initial rounds of the battle he managed suppress the effects through a number of oddly convenient devices found in the various round settings; it wasn’t until the fourth round (the Atlantean Necropolis) that he lost complete control. Spending much of his time stumbling around weeping and accidentally resurrecting swarms of undead fishpeople, Chester Sabellico was apparently killed off at the end of the round by a fellow contestant desperate to eliminate the source of the zombie horde. Curiously, though, his coat traveled to the next round, and in a Shocking Twist That No One Saw Coming it devoured the contestant that had killed its owner in the first post of the round.

Chester’s coat continued through the rest of the Harrowing Sorrow with little left to oppose it. It never cared about trying to form alliances, overthrow the Grandmaster, or anything that wasn’t sucking the life out of everything around it. When its last opponent shriveled to death from inside its folds, CRS accepted its victory with the unflappable grace of a piece of clothing and was sent on its way home.

The scientific enclave that Chester had come from was understandably unprepared for a ravenous necromantic labcoat, and all the personnel present perished in a matter of days. The world beyond it behaved in a similar way, and except for the occasional demon hunter, secret government force, plucky time traveler, and genre-savvy bystander it devoured everything that came across its path without relent. The repeated occurrence of “Chester” was rarely documented and explained as coincidence when it was; no permanent way of stopping the coat was ever found. It fed on the life force of hundreds of souls, unrepentant and resistant to the numerous attempts to wash it, unaware or uncaring that it would soon be entered in another battle to the death.


Grandmaster Title: The Lachrymose (alt. The Weeping Lady, The Sorrower, The Constant Downer)

Grandmaster Colour: Ice and ashes. Tragedy!

Tournament Information: The Harrowing Sorrow was run by the Lachrymose as an exercise in the futility of avoiding death. Unnaturally elongated and stiff-jointed, the Lachrymose followed her contestants throughout the various rounds at a distance, a constant reminder of Death’s perpetual presence. She delivered several of the killing blows herself under the pretense that the contestants in question were far too close to the chill of death to resist it any longer. Questionable practices aside, she regarded her entrants distantly and greeted CRS’s victory with a burst of her usual sobbing. The prize promised and rewarded was the gift of immortality “excluding outside interference”; the coat returned to its homeworld ignorant of this benefit and fed heartily until its entrance into the FT.

Any alliances or rivalries formed during HS were on Chester’s part and dissolved with his death. CRS does not regard any of its former competitors with any particular level of like or dislike, though it does remember both them and the round locations with a high level of detail. Sentimentality is, regrettably, not its strong suit.

[Dragon Fogel]

All right, I'm going to try to come up with something for this.

[Pick Yer Poison]

Name: Titan
Gender: Technically none, but identifies as a male
Race: Construct
Color: 600060
Weapons/Abilities: Titan is a weapon in and of himself.
Description: Titan is 8'4" at his full height. His legs are large, metal poles, as are his arms. They are quite thick and very sturdy. His torso is similar to a rounded rectangle, but it slopes inwards near the bottom. His head is another rounded rectangle, with the back sloping sharply down. The front features his eyes, two round circles of light. They serve a dual purpose, acting as both sensory input ports and, when required, flashlights. The bottoms of his legs end in flat plates, but he has hands with opposable thumbs on the ends of his arms that are flexible enough for rudimentary actions. They are oversized, however, so fine manipulation of anything smaller than a bread box is difficult at best. They also contain strong magnets, allowing him to pick up magnetic objects with ease whenever he turns on the current to them.

Titan packs a lot of force behind his punches, and is capable of easily crushing a human's bones (or a solid steel wall) with a single solid hit. Precision booster jets on his back are used for providing extra force while pushing objects, an invaluable thing while moving extremely heavy cargo. Titan's body is in remarkable condition, largely free from rust or wear and tear. Evidence of on-spot repair jobs can be seen in a few places, but they have been patched up expertly, rendering Titan an almost literal iron giant.

Titan is, arguably, sentient. He rarely speaks, but when he does he can be quite verbose. He shows no emotion, speaking with the bare minimum of voice inflections, but he is capable of logical decisions, which tend to favor calculation over emotion. He often takes a "don't fuck with me and I won't fuck with you" mentality, leaving things that don't interfere with or concern him alone, although he has safety protocols that cause him to make weird choices when it comes to deciding what concerns him.

Biography: Titan's creator was a highly skilled engineer with a lovely wife and two baby girls. He constructed the automaton over a period of several years, and then put him to work shifting cargo. Capable of lifting hundred-pound crates with ease, he soon became well-known, and someone inevitably attempted to steal him. In the morning, the thief was found dead next to Titan, with his skull caved in and his blood on Titan's fist. Titan was deactivated and shunned after a public scandal which ruined the shipping company's publicity for the next several months, left to rust away in an abandoned warehouse.

Fast-forward about three millenia.

Having destroyed itself several times over through nuclear warfare, mankind is now a nomadic species wandering barren deserts and wastelands, trying to survive as best they can. Tribes occasionally wandered across pre-apocalyptic tech; some tried to restore it to working order, others took it apart for materials, but most simply left it to rust, not wanting to concern themselves with a dead era. As was bound to happen eventually, Titan was discovered lying dead and motionless in a pile of discarded junk by some scavengers from a tribe that was passing through the area. Fortunately for him, the tribe was one of those that were eager to use ancient tech. The scavengers cleaned him up and turned him on, and Titan rose again for the first time in 3000 years. He gazed down emotionlessly at his finders, assuming them to be his new owners and awaiting his next instructions.

With Titan's help, the nomadic tribe the scavengers belonged to thrived. None dared attack them with their iron watchdog keeping a sleepless guard on their camp, not after he had calmly strode through the gunfire of three combined gatling guns, ripping the mobile platforms up from the ground as he reached them and throwing them at each other, coming out no worse for the wear. Eventually, the tribe accumulated large numbers of enemies, who banded together and tricked the tribe's metal guardian, leading Titan into a trap (all members of which were killed), while the main force slaughtered the villagers. Titan returned to find the village in ruins, and the enemy leader standing triumphant before it as he lit a torch to the lead hut, setting it aflame. His forces quailed when they saw Titan's form on the horizon, but Titan took no action against them. He paused as he reached the village for a few moments, then calmly continued walking, passing through the enemy formation like Moses through the Red Sea. The story goes that he is still walking to this day; however, Titan was simply abducted several days later, vanishing from that world, possibly forever.

Grandmaster Title: The Courier (a.k.a. The Grandmaster Formerly Known As The Errand Boy)
Grandmaster Color: #4F4F2F
Tournament Information: Were you to ask him how he got around to starting a Fantastic Tournament, the Courier would tell you a story a bit like this.

Back when his name was still the Errand Boy, the Courier played the part of the voice of reason to the Executive Producer for decades, quietly guiding his shows along a more logical course than he had intended, thus keeping them on the air for much longer than expected. Whether this is actually true is up to debate, although the Courier would consider arguing such an obvious truth pointless.

Continuing with his story, the Courier would then squint his eyes and spit out the tale of how he was fired, exclaiming that it was while he was only offering his intelligent and enlightened opinion to that no-good-dirty-son-of-a-- and then abruptly cut himself off with a large swig of his postal beer, after which he would say, in a monotone voice, that he changed his name to the Courier shortly after that and started up a Fantastic Tournament of his own out of Spite.

No, he'd say if you asked him, that wasn't a mistake when he said "Spite" instead of "spite," the dramatic pronunciation was important. Spite is an extremely powerful resource the Courier discovered and figured out how to utilize, which temporarily elevated his powers to those of a true Grandmaster. That was how he was able to start his tournament, the EPic SUCKSess. He was, he would explain, quite drunk when he named it, and would insist that it "seemed like a good idea at the time!"

But that wasn't enough for him. With his mind empowered and befuddled by the combination of Spite and alcohol in his bloodstream, the Courier began abducting the greatest producers to ever live from various universes and placing them in his tournament. However, he admits that, drunk as he was, he did make a few mistakes, chief of which was mixing up "Titan," the colloquial nickname for a producing legend, with "Titan," a powerful metal automaton, and entering the wrong one in his tournament. Titan - oh, and it was the robot he mistakenly entered in the tournament, he'd add - easily slaughtered the other contestants whenever they didn't manage to kill themselves. Unsurprisingly, he'd say with more than a little relish, it turns out that producers can be really stupid sometimes. He'd then launch into another rant about how he was unfairly fired, but nobody really needs to hear about that again, now do they?

[Mirdini]

Similar sentiment to Fogel here.

Demoncoat is just too good an opponent to pass up on.

But first I've gotta do some mafia writing (Quarantiiiiine *fistshake*)~

[BlastYoBoots]

Username: BlastYoBoots
Name: Lillian Ames-Victoria Lilac ("Lily")
Gender: Female, but changes based on form.
Race: Human
Color: Lilac, of course. (#C8A2C8) Liable to change if she gets temporarily overwhelmed with another personality.

Weapon/Abilities: The Lilac clan has perfected and passed down a unique form of the art of transformation. Specifically, Lily has the ability to take on the form, abilities, learned skills, equipment, and some of the mindset of any entity that has ever fallen in love with her. Changing to forms besides her original takes some energy, but once transformed she can remain in a given form indefinitely without effort. Upon transformation, she gains any clothes and equipment that form possessed at the moment they fell for her, though such items have no ontological inertia and will vanish if she distances herself from them or switches forms.

Acquired Forms:

Raphael Donovan – Human – Lily's preferred combat form, and the main persona she took into the Fantastic Bachelorette. Raphael is the definition of suave, his flowing shoulder-length brown locks, professionally-trimmed goatee, rose-adorned tux, and devious grin all cleverly calculated to lure in the ladies. He is also a world-class prick, using and dumping women for fun, laughs, and intercourse. Lily convinced Raphael that she was rich and famous due to her lineage, obscuring his normally manipulative intellect to her unusual intentions enough to coax out the most similar emotion to love the man could muster (in this case, blinding avarice with a touch of lust). Luckily, this counted. In combat, he has the ability to turn lit cigarettes into powerful flaming weapons such as swords, arrows, and bombs, as well as the martial training to use them impressively. Raphael's tuxedo is armed with cigarette packs, lighters, and a couple of emergency cigars for when victims of his one-night-stands or their relatives happen to be armed.

Yvethra Dimanche – Lycaridas – The (arguably) beautiful prize of the Fantastic Bachelorette, Yvethra is an eleven-foot-tall eight-limbed spider lady and Lily's fiancée. She has sharp claws, venomous fangs, night vision, and the sadistic bent and bloodlust typical of her race. When she fell in love with Lily, she was wearing a stunning dark emerald-green dress to match her black-brown exoskeleton, with a monogrammed whip at her side.

Albert Ngzyujh – Yujhva – A member of a green-gray species with three legs and 1.5 arms. Yujhva have sticky feet that can bond like cement to organic substances, useful for staying rooted in their tempestuous, forested homeworld. Their stunted-looking left arms are able to launch out and stretch dozens of meters in length, sticking similarly to simplify navigation between branches. For self-defense and hunting, their drooping, anteater-like mouths have the ability to generate and launch poison-coated spines at bullet-like speeds. Combined with their sunken, all-purple eyes evolved for stunning long-distance vision, this turns them into natural sniper-rifles. Lily met Albert, a struggling businessman, in a bar catering to an interspecies clientele. Albert suffers from severe clinical depression, and wore a wine-stained business suit with a wedding ring on the second-from-right finger of his four-fingered hand when Lily seduced him.

Daisy Nightingale – Fairy – A camerawoman for the Fantastic Bachelorette, her ability to fly silently perfect for capturing sweeping sky angles. Daisy is a short-haired ginger with bright peach skin, sparkling dragonfly wings, and a permanent, wider-than-human grin plastered on her face. Possibly with real plaster; you can tell she's had some work done here and there. Manic and obsessive, she attempted to seduce Lily (in Raphael's form), who took the bait in order to gain her abilities and appearance to explore the set. The scandal broke wide open in round 6, forcing Lily to privately confess her true identity to Yvethra Dimanche and miraculously earning her forgiveness for the round. Daisy was wearing jeans, a Hawaiian-looking number over her torso, and a taser at her belt when she finally fell in love.

Fido – Slime – A mildly acidic gelatinous blob, and Lilly and Yvethra's pet. About a hundred pounds of green, translucent semisolid, Fido is rather stupid, and fully willing to love and/or hump anything that moves. It has a useful healing factor, able to devour and dissolve loose organic substances to regenerate and increase its mass. (If Lily isn't careful to only regenerate what is necessary, she'll gain weight when she switches back.) It also glows in the dark, and leaves a similar glowing, sticky trail underfoot as it meanders about mindlessly. Lily's mind only possesses a background presence in this form, able to nudge its will hard enough to return back to normal, but not much else.

The personalities of Lily's forms bleed into her own when she transforms into them, for good or ill. This effect gradually and slightly intensifies the longer she stays in a given form. If a persona has a particularly intense or distorted mindset, it may override Lily's own entirely: this makes her most dangerous acquisition, the persona of John Sexlington, suitable only for the most dire of emergencies. He was a failed (or possibly successful) experiment by The Shipper himself, and seducing him despite his reality-warping manliness risked Lily's sanity and life.


Description: Lily Lilac is a blonde, brown-eyed young woman with an honest countenance that usually gives away any attempts at clever deception on her part. She kind of lives up to the stereotype, absent-minded and slow to catch on to the obvious. Despite this, determination can allow her to focus through if she sets her mind to things... along with a little help from her transformations' more focused mindsets.

She is currently wearing a decent violet turtleneck and dark slacks. A jeweled pin rests on her chest, depicting a lilac blossom with a tiny heart at the center: the symbol of her clan, now worn openly. A small dagger is concealed near her belt, also with that symbol, and she is well trained in its use. Her family systematically desensitized her to killing as part of her training, but not other major triggers like heartbreak or loss, making her rather absurdly quick to tears for a trained killer.

Backstory: For a descendant of a magic clan priding itself on the manipulation and seduction of those with power, Lillian Lilac turned out disappointingly thick-headed. A couple years into her career, she had failed to seduce a single individual; though her martial skills were 'adequate', the Lilac clan's clients expected far more extraordinary results. Eventually, she was 'exiled' in the form of a well-paid vacation, keeping her out of the way to protect the clan's image.

That's when The Shipper came in. A cruel and disgusting multiversal overlord with the appearance of a sweaty anthropomorphic elephant, the grandmaster abducted and enslaved the Lilac clan to fulfill fantasies and fanfictions across his domain. Lily discovered this, and dedicated herself to revenge: she discovered the Fantastic Bachelorette, seduced a powerful and manipulative male persona to imitate, and pulled her clan's last remaining favors and strings to get herself brought in as a contestant.


Grandmaster Title: The Shipper.
Grandmaster Colour: Sweaty, pasty elephant love. (#FFC0CB on #808080)

Tournament Information: The Fantastic Bachelorette was a multiversal contest to find the ideal mate for Yvethra Dimanche, a lonely and fabulously rich example of Lycaridan royalty. The Shipper selected suave and daring heartthrobs from throughout the multiverse, all competing desperately to win Yvethra's heart, as well as their lives; Yvethra was allowed to personally eviscerate the suitor eliminated each round. The winner would be granted the choice between a wish granted by the Grandmaster and the hand of Miss Dimanche. Lily entered the contest disguised as Raphael, intending to reach the final round – a duel to the death between the remaining two contestants, presided over by The Shipper himself – for an opportunity to take the grandmaster's life.

However, over the course of the contest, Lily was forced to reveal herself to Yvethra, and eventually found herself attracted to this arachnid-like woman. Her charm, her intelligence, her graceful-yet-painful way with a whip, were all incredibly enticing and exotic. In the end, Lily slew her final competition and chose Yvethra's hand over revenge.

The Shipper may or may not have been responsible for that broadening of her sexuality, behind the scenes.

Though betrothed to each other, Yvethra and Lily took a slow year to truly get to know each other, a sort of extended pre-honeymoon. As they traveled the multiverse, Lily confided her still-unfulfilled desire for revenge to Yvethra, who agreed that she wouldn't mind to see The Shipper pay. With her intelligent assistance, Lily honed her seductive skills, attempting to manipulate romance-susceptible aliens who would prove weapons against the grandmaster. Their plans were eventually pushed aside as their wedding day approached.

A week before the scheduled ceremony, The Shipper entered her into this match of champions. After all, what relationship couldn't use a little more romantic drama?

[Dragon Fogel]

Username: Dragon Fogel
Name: Leonard Robertson
Gender: Male
Race: Human
Color: #67890A
Weapon/Abilities: He carries an enchanted sword. He has no idea how to use it.
He also has the blood of a powerful line of mages, which means he has great magical potential, but he doesn't actually know any spells.
Description: Leonard is a young man of about 20. He has dark hair and a bit of stubble. He wears a leather jacket, a white T-shirt, and blue jeans.
Backstory: Leonard led a fairly ordinary life in the suburbs. Went to school, did okay, but not great. Made some friends, went on a date, that didn't go too well. Then he went into college, and majored in English. That went all right, but he didn't like it a whole lot.
When he turned 18, his parents told him that they'd found him on their doorstep as a baby, and they had no idea who his real parents were. He was a bit shocked, but ultimately, he still cared about his adopted family.
Finally, Leonard's 20th birthday arrived. He was just about to blow out the candles on his cake when, three states away, one Samantha Jenkins was hit by a car.
In another dimension, a single word was spoken.
"Finally."
Moments later, Leonard found himself taken from his birthday party, and in the middle of a laundromat covered with blood. Six strangers stood near him, unmoving. Then Leonard heard a strange-yet-oddly-familiar voice welcoming him to Round 2, the Laundromat of Doom.
After a brief explanation that raised more questions than it answered, Leonard found himself inside a haunted washing machine and climbed out, confused.
It wasn't until three "rounds" later that he was able to get a full explanation, based on what he was told by one of the locals: he and seven others had been entered in a battle to the death, apparently from a very young age. His entire life, as far as he could remember, was spent in Round One.
Then he won the battle and was sent back home... to the completely different world of his birth. It wasn't a very nice place. Without the Chosen One (namely, Leonard), the Dark Lord had easily taken over. Everyone who could properly train Leonard to use the magic that was his birthright had been killed or captured, and his only hope was to wield the enchanted sword whose name he couldn't pronounce.
Unfortunately, he was still in the middle of being trained (by the town drunk, who was the only person he could find with any knowledge of swordplay) when he was pulled into the Fantastic Tournament: Champion Edition.

Grandmaster Title: The Dullard
Grandmaster Colour: #06DF18
Tournament Information: The Dullard started the Tedious Timewaster as a way to pass the hours. He'd watch it every day waiting for something to happen.
He started with eight infants from eight worlds, explained the situation to them, then sent them to eight doorstops on Earth for the first round. Then he just watched them for twenty years until Samantha Jenkins died, before he finally moved on with Round Two.
One participant was given the name Herbert Sanderson by his adoptive parents. However, he had a perfect memory, and so he remembered both his birth name (Prince Alvas of Thora) and the fact that he was entered in a battle to the death.
And the glorious palace that would have awaited him if not for the latter fact.
As a result, he spent his life on Earth preparing to take down the others. He knew what they were capable of, but he also knew they, unlike him, wouldn't realize it due to their upbringing on this world. So he designed several weapons, to prepare for the possibility his future opponents realizing their potential.
Unfortunately, his preparations were cut short with the tragic accident that ended Samantha Jenkins' life early.
Nevertheless, he was still dangerous enough to eliminate five of his competitors. In the end, only Leonard was left. Determined not to let Alvas/Herbert/whatever-his-name-was win, Leonard managed to outwit him and emerge victorious.
The Dullard was a bit surprised, but he shrugged and sent Leonard back home - to the world he was born in, not the world he grew up in.

[Solaris]

Username: THE GODDAMN SUN
Name: William James Smith and Charlotte "Lottie" Smith
Gender: Husband and Wife
Race: Giant Lizards (Okay they are more like 3 feet tall, that's still giant for them)
Color: They share this'un (#aa8855)
Weapon/Abilities: William has his mighty pair of six shooters while Lottie has her specialized shotgun. Their aim is exceptional, and they always carry around plenty of bullets. They are a resourceful duo who trust each other absolutely. In addition to their "normal" arms, they have a few left overs, such as a pair of light swords and a headband scanner from Ultra Mecha Citadel. The slippery couple believe that they can do anything as long as they do it together.
Description: They are both as mentioned, Giant Clay Brown Lizards, about three feet tall each. Will has green eyes and wears a brown vest over a white shirt along with a nice tailor made classic cowboy hat. Lottie has a nice pale blue dress and a matching headband. She's got red eyes and orange hair.
Will is a wild card, always has been, always will be. Showy, a daredevil, but he always comes through. Now that he's a married man though, he's going to take a few more precautions to protect his wife, even if it means not being the center of action.
Lottie was always the more level headed of the two, she was always worried about Will when they dated and wished that he would take less risks. As it turned out, after she was dragged along the multiverse, she learned that risks are sometimes necessary and she began to be a bit more risky.
They are prepared to do anything to make sure that their lives, and love stays intact.
Backstory:When Willaim Smith entered the quiet little town of Grege, he was not expecting very much. He was hunting for the notorious Benjamin Fitz, an arsonist who had last been seen heading in the direction of the small town. He rode in, asked around, and eventually found out that the tip was a bust. Just as William was about to pack up and leave, he saw her.

Charlotte Gordon, daughter of the mayor. She was just a simple lass, sheltered by her father after he lost her mother in a tragic accident. She was content, and happy with her quiet life, never wanting anything more... until she laid eyes on William Smith.

It was love at first sight.
In the coming months, the two met in secret, as Charlotte knew that her father would never condone her marrying a vigilante, and as William knew that if people knew about her, they would get her to get to him.
She wished that he would leave his life of hunting criminals, but he just couldn't.

Then, just as they had another one of their meetings, William rode off into the distance, and he was taken to an multidimensional battle. However, to his dismay, so was Charlotte.

Each of the contestants had one thing in common, they all had someone or something that they were deeply in love with. The grandmaster was against their love, he wanted their bonds to break as the battle went on, however, it had the opposite effect. After Lottie was forced to deal with being a captive for most of the battle, as she was paired with the only self-serving jerk in the battle, William decided he would tone down the action. At the same time, after seeing Will risk everything for her, and after learning a few things from the other contestants, Lottie decided that maybe a life of danger wouldn't be so bad, at long as they were together.

After the events of the battle, they got married, made a life of their own wrangling cattle and hunting criminals and doing all sorts of things.

Grandmaster Title: The Isolator
Grandmaster Colour: Things like this color is why no one likes him. (000FFF on FFF000)
Tournament Information: The Isolator is a heartbreaker. Okay not really he's a loser.
Like a really big loser.
Almost the biggest in the multiverse.
Okay, probably the biggest.
Anyway, point is no one likes him.
And he doesn't like that.
So in a partial attempt to both impress a pretty lady and to get some petty revenge, The Isolator went and selected eight people in budding love and entered them and their significant other(s) in a battle to the death.
The Broken Heartbreak (just the kind of redundant and unimaginative name this loser would come up with) would place the eight main contestants on a quest to go find the person or persons or in one case inanimate object that they loved most. The eight main contestants were each paired off with the significant other of another contestant. The result was less tragic than he wanted, while yes, many of the contestants died, in the end none of them blamed their relationship on it, and to his dismay the love actually grew! Most of them pooled their forces together and worked with their, as the Isolator put it, "bait" to fight against the less co-operative battlers and eventually... him.
In the final round, The Isolator, in a characteristic tantrum caused by yet another rejection, attempted to permanently split up the remaining two contestants from their cherished ones, but in the end, their TRUE LOVE prevailed. James held his pistol in The Isolators face, but after he cried like a baby, he and the motherly squid-mage decided to let him go.

After that fiasco, (which everyone laughed at behind his back, I mean he cried) he sort of kept to himself until he heard word of some Fantastic Tournament. Against the wishes of basically everyone else involved, he motioned to enter both of his contestants, only to find that the Squid mage had taken precautions against people taking her or her daughter. As a result he entered the newlyweds for one hell of a second honeymoon.

[Ixcalibur]

Abitrary decision has been made that you have just under two more days to get profiles in before signups are finished. I'm closin' em up at an unspecified time on Thursday night/Friday morning (BST). This has always been the plan and I have not justed changed it I don't know what you mean. Decisions will be made the following day and rostered up. Intropost soon (?) after.

P.s. All these profiles are fantastic. How do people even decide these things?!

[Wojjan]

Username: Woff-jj-an-ie-les. Take a pick.

Name: Zephyr

Gender: Male

Race: Human all the way.

Color: #80BFFF

Weapon/Abilities: Zephyr has a very useful ability some scientist nuts called “ghosting.” His body can become intangible and back again at his fancy. Being intangible brings all the pros and cons usually attached to the trait. Nothing can hit him, he can't hit anything, he can heal his wounds by ghosting that part of his body, but you can only manage so much pain, and ghosting takes some concentration.

Description: To call Zephyr thin, having spent the majority of his life in some nuthouse and the rest of it running away from things, would be a grave understatement. His black vest might have once fitted his size, but now it's left dangling over his ribcage just as loosely as if one would hang a tablecloth over his shoulder. His cargo trousers were his one defining feature that kept him from looking like a total skeleton, but somewhere along the whateverth round, some psychotic douche lizard tore into his leg and ruined the anti-ghosting fiber infused in them. He tried ghosting with his ripped pants once. The loose fibers connected with his leg and gave off a feeling similar to an electric shock. He's entering the champions edition in his gray boxers. It's a touchy subject, try to avoid it. His feet are cased in heavy metal boots, plated with anti-grosting material (he's pretty much anti-ghosting everything)

Zephyr's hair is so blond it creeps close to white altogether. Originally he was just a very very bright golden-haired kid, but living off of food pellets and the stress that the Delicious Engagement brought about colored it even whiter than before. His eyes are a brilliant blue, and he's starting to show a bit of moustache. More of a layer of fluff than anything, but he has this thrilling fantasy of once growing a trimmed goatee in another life, so that foresight makes him appreciate the fur a bit more.

Backstory: In a way, Zephyr's life started when he got thrown into the Delicious Engagement. He grew up in some sort of facility of an equally vague military organisation, and basically was theirs as long as he could remember. Entering the tournament was not a way to make close friends. In the penultimate round, he was fighting some demonic angel who found everyone not intelligent enough to live, and some sort of rock golem with wings that he in the end killed by having it jump and fall into Death Gorge With Lava.

Yes, that was the actual setting of the final round. Death Gorge With Lava.

Grandmaster Title: The Eccentric. Yes, him.

Grandmaster Colour: Eggshell giggles!

Tournament Information: Due to a series of very unfortunate circumstances, one of which a greedy psychobitch that couldn't settle with just one battle, The Eccentric thought it would be for the best if he took a step aside on the Grand Battle stage for some time, after the takeover of his Delicious Engagement. That step aside had him falling off the stage entirely, and landing in the lowly circle of Authority and associates. Though he at first shunned the offer to host, looking over his odds of ever hosting a battle again, he decided that this was as good as any, and he still had a lot of stuff in a locker somewhere regarding Dee-Ee and what he planned out for it.

Since a lot of the multiverse was already confiscated for official Grand Battles only, Eccentric and his crew were left mooching off the side dishes. That was raather a problem, seeing as the Delicious Engagement already had nine contestants in a past life. He managed to salvage one kid of his official lineup, Zephyr, but other than that was left looking for contestants that were as close to his own cast as possible. He failed to convince Zephyr to carry around a bunch of books, by the by.

[Schazer]

Username: Schazer
Name: Clyde Clemens
Gender: Male
Race: Possessed Human Artist
Color: Eton blue, a.k.a. #96C8A2
Weapon/Abilities: Clyde's preferred medium is magical oil paint (toxic if ingested, irritant, somewhat runnier in consistency; he likes working in jewel tones with lots of bleeding and dripping). Between his synaesthesia and the magical abilities of his muse, he can imbibe paints with certain abilities. Before he won the Titular Bullshit he'd discovered a highly corrosive chartreuse, flammable fuchsia, neon neons, indomitable azure, flesh-rending rufous, and of course the battle-ending null black (of which he mercifully has only a tiny, mostly-exhausted tube remaining). When he got home, he prepared for All-Stars by concocting even more shades. Colours in the world around him often "speak" to him as to what they could do in his hands – a kaleidoscope would serve as an excellent distraction/mindfuck. Sufficiently deep blacks make him nervous, although he's never seen anything close to Null. Because of its properties in affecting the spiritual plane, Clyde's muse instils in him a dislike of purples, too.

He's a dab hand with a paintbrush, and carries a full range of different-sized ones, all with hardwood handles and dagger-sharp tips. He keeps his paint in a satchel, with at least a few tubes of paint "holstered" along the strap. He's also got paint thinner, several large tubes of white (a good mixer to add bulk at the cost of potency), and some kind of foul-smelling powder in a bag which he mixes with found substances (beverages, saps, blood) to mix "natural" hues on the fly.

His muse grants Clyde eyes in the back of his head, warning the man of potential threats. Considering the way he strolls about in an apparent paint fume-derived daze, this has saved him on at least one occasion.

Description: Clyde rocks the starving artist look pretty well, in conjunction with the substance-abusing homeless look. Red-rimmed grey eyes from paint inhalation, short sandy hair, a dress shirt that's seen better days worn under a thin, yellow hoodie that's faded under grime. Jeans, boots, and the aforementioned satchel.
He's almost certainly insane – he was entered into the Titular Bullshit as a significantly less magical serial killer, but fell foul of one of the many malevolent spirits in the competition's fourth round – set in the crypts of the demonologist and painter Bariccia. This "muse" took a shining to the young lad, took up residence in the impressionable man's mind, and ramped his synaesthesia up to eleven just for kicks. The spirit is likely demonic in origin, possessing no name. It registers in Clyde's mind as a soothing, female voice, always helpful and never angry. For motivations unknown beyond being a simple monster, it's happiest when Clyde's getting his kill on.

Backstory: Clyde was probably an unsuccessful artist-turned paint-huffing serial killer with a suitably tragic backstory to convince Selvsetter that his flimsy stabbing-sticks could stand up to the likes of a giant dragonfly from an age of sentient insect steampunk sky-piracy, a good-cop bad-cop duo who could only exist in reflected surfaces, a hexapod golem carrying alien technology that crashed from the stars, and some other whacky bullshit.
He snagged an early, friendly, psychopathic rivalry with his fellow serial killer - a venus-flytrap-in-a-miniature-warship - and struggled with advances from a lady-scorpion who just wished he'd come right. He fell into a rather mopey and uninteresting despondency toward round 3's end, but Bariccia's "muse" set him straight come Round 4. He gutted the lady-scorpion in a dramatic round-ender and overhaul of his character that got everyone else on edge, then innovated with quirky yet logical-enough-to-not-call-bullcrap additions to his magical paint-based repertoire of attacks. He hunted down his enemies one by one, capitalising on the little advantages his Grandmaster had conferred him in the rounds' layouts (preventing his foes from congregating and mustering a capable defence).
Clyde had ripped apart every contestant save the hexapod golem, who had been working his own subplot of convincing the other contestants to buy it time so it could enact its master plan in the final round. There was a climactic fight and it probably got very metaphysical but that just meant the muse got involved and, in a final desperate act, Clyde struck Tharrsh'stl'ka with Null – the Defining Black. That Which Must March Across All And All Alone.
The result was… messy. Tharrsh'stl'ka's author had honestly had enough of the constant bullshit the Titular Bullshit's Grandmaster kept spouting, and was probably borderline trolling her when writing this deathpost.

The Grandmaster gave no shits. She gave her champion the Expanse, gave him Plum and Byzantium and Carmine and Cyan enough to paint doors to wherever he wished, and set the madman free. The metagaming maniac who condoned this course of action was none other than...



Grandmaster Title: Selvsetter
Grandmaster Colour: Greatcoat green.
Tournament Information: Selvsetter was a writer in several Fantastic Tournaments, and planned to snag a hosting spot later in the season. Her plans were somewhat interrupted by an untimely distraction, but after presumably doing something no less nonsensical and aggressive than pistolwhipping/bitchslapping the glitchy GBCE that had waylaid her into submission, she found her way back into reality. The sojourn gave her the questionably useful and disgracefully self-indulgent ability to eschew narrative control for a more hands-on approach. Claiming that Grandmasters as a whole were "a pack of fuckin' self-inserts anyway, so this is just cutting to the fucking chase, y'know?" she hosted the Titular Bullshit with an unpretentious, foul-mouthed, foul-minded, abusive, abrasive, fourth-wall desecrating positive bitch of a Grandmaster who "didn't have time for your bullshit names so just fuckin' call me Selvsetter".

This disgrace to original character tournaments ran a battle rife with lampshading, Grandmaster asides, staring through the fourth wall, irked intervention when things weren't convoluted/explosive enough for her liking (as dictated by her ever-changing whims), throwing things through the fourth wall, and really friggin' bitchy dialogues with other Grandmasters which basically brought the sum of their interactions in line with however Selvsetter felt about the host behind the omnipotent douchebag.

In some sort of protest that nobody remembers the exact instigators for (although it was probably Selvsetter's fault), the Grandmaster "locked" herself in her in-game universe – addressing only the game hosts (via likely-confused facades of the Grandmasters, whose authors probably struggled with keeping any sort of in-universe realistic quality to their exchanges with the crazy bitch) and the "Gentlemen" who participated in her game. Those "friends" of Selvsetter who care about this delusional lunatic for some reason (or just want to see her receive comeuppance) have bandied together to take her down and convince her to come back to the real world again and acknowledge what a terrible thing she's been doing.

[Mirdini]

show spoiler

hide spoiler

YEESH that was pretty last-minute cheers for the flexible deadline Ix~

Username: Murderini

Name: The Inmate (Actually Jack Hastings) & Suzanne (Latest alias of an interdimensional criminal artifact)

Gender: Male/Indeterminate

Race: Human? He’s not entirely sure himself anymore.

Color: Burnt Sienna or Gangster Noir (#9C3108 )

Greyish Purple or Artifact Shake (#333366)

Weapon/Abilities:

A little ol’ interdimensional Thompson submachine gun that prefers the moniker “Suzanne” in her current incarnation. Jack doesn’t quite remember how he came to run into Suzanne; in fact he doesn’t quite remember much of his life prior to acquiring her at all. Suzanne is bound to Jack in ways he can’t comprehend, not that it matters much to him - he’s happy to employ her many talents in pursuit of multiversal criminality, which is just the way she likes it.

Being an item of incomprehensible (at least by human definitions) power, the weapon gives Jack several visible benefits – and a couple he probably hasn’t figured out. It’s remarkably sentient, and has an instinctive directive to seek out suitable partners in the multiverse and bond with them. Once bound Suzanne (as she’ll be referred to henceforth) takes a shape familiar to her partner (in Jack’s case, an M1921 tommy gun). As to what she looks for within partners accounts are conflicting – a good deal of ruthlessness, resourcefulness and intelligence all factor in to some extent, but the trait that most agree on is a desire to get up to incredible criminal escapades – whether those be heists or genocides doesn’t seem to matter. Her personality also warps somewhat to fit that of her partners – a ruthless tyrant might receive a similarly homicidal (and quite masculine) sword, Jack ended up with the inanimate equivalent of a cutthroat flapper.

In return for their partnership Suzanne makes her partners timeless – or at least slows down the effect time has on their bodies enough that they are functionally immune to its ravages. This point is obviously moot if her partner is already immortal when bound to, but she also serves as a particularly lethal variant of whatever form she chooses upon bonding, and will break several universal constants in order to stay with her partner whenever she feels she is needed. In her current form she doesn’t need reloading and can fire a wide variety of ammunition, though she generally needs to pause to ‘catch her breath’ if fired continuously for extended periods of time. She can alleviate this and increase her own (and by proxy Jack’s) power by accessing power sources, though it generally takes at least a sun’s worth of energy to have any noticeable effect.

Suzanne additionally makes her partners generally hardier at all times, considering that most mortals otherwise have trouble living an interdimensional lifestyle. She also shares a general telepathic link with her partner, which is the only method of communication available to her short of shooting/carving/burning/whathaveyou letters into surfaces.

Of course, if a partner happens to perish while bound to her Suzanne has no qualms about abandoning them – they were obviously not suitable enough, so she (well, it) will drift through the multiverse seeking a more enterprising and hopefully more successful partner.


Description:

Jack Hastings looks much like you’d expect a quintessential mid-20s gangster to look – Caucasian, messy brown hair and matching eyes generally kept beneath a fedora, never without a matching suit and tie – and the violin case Suzanne relaxes in when she’s not needed. He’s of average height (some 5’10’’) and somewhat emaciated from his recent stay in the jailhouse – multiversal prisons aren’t known for their nourishing fare, and The Meritorious Trial hadn’t given him time to sleep, much less eat. In spite of that he’s in reasonably good health, mostly thanks to the endurance provided by his link with Suzanne.

He’s quite sane, though his sense of morality is shaky bordering on nonexistent and his pursuit of criminality (and the kick he gets out of it) comes close to outright hedonism. Nothing pleases Jack more than a properly executed heist, or a refreshing round of extortion and bootlegging. This mindset along with an unreasonable amount of perseverance (helped along by Suzanne’s presence both as a cheerleader and fellow plotter) are what made Jack one of the most successful partners Suzanne’s ever had – up to his unfortunate capture and imprisonment by The Arbiter. He’s at times far too headstrong, raising when he should be folding – which has caused him no end of trouble (including his inglorious arrest), particularly because Suzanne only cheers on that kind of instinctual recklessness he tries not to succumb to.

Suzanne is the splitting image of an M1921 Thompson submachine gun, with a few minor embellishments – the seemingly wooden stock of the weapon changes color depending on her mood and the grip has several esoteric markings that appear somewhere on all of her incarnations. When not spitting hot lead she reclines in an ornate (and beautifully crafted) violin case. She also weighs almost nothing to Jack, a convenient benefit of their partnership.

Suzanne’s personality changes from incarnation to incarnation as previously stated, but she generally shares an amiable or at least pragmatically like-minded relationship with her partners. The personality she’s gained while bound to Jack is at times enthusiastically bloodthirsty and quite rational at others – though she generally prefers the “fill ‘em with lead” style of negotiation; she is a weapon after all.

Backstory:

Jack finds trying to recollect his life before meeting Suzanne as if peering through bubbled glass – warped and fragmented, which is why he generally doesn’t bother with it. Not that he had much sentimentality in the first place, from the little he can remember.

The first moment Jack can recall clearly is when, dying from a multitude of gunshot wounds on a dirt road somewhere out in rural Wisconsin, he was ripped through space and time to land in some sort of dimensional speakeasy, a splendid violin case standing by the barstool he landed in. Finding himself in simultaneously familiar and unfamiliar territory Jack quickly wised up to the way things worked now that he had apparently gone off the deep end of the multiverse – helped by a series of (alternatively) near-death experiences and lectures from several self-interested patrons who recognized what he had become.

He then embarked upon what was if not one of the most notorious multiversal criminal careers certainly one of the most successful. At first just running guns and liquor into civilizations that had either never encountered them or banned them wholesale, he worked his way up to orchestrating the thefts of revered artifacts from the center of universal empires and extorting information from demigods. His final score was an attempt to steal a particularly vital communications device from a Grandmaster, which temporarily a crowning triumph – until it brought The Arbiter down on his head and got him shut into a Void Prison chaired by The Warden.

Prison life was a peculiarly familiar and unfamiliar situation for Jack, much like his entrance into the multiverse. He’d certainly done time before, but couldn’t quite recall what it had been like. Turned out that it was shit, not to mention incredibly boring. The Warden took perhaps a little too much pleasure in depriving his prisoners of any form of stimulation, even taking into account the fact that most within were locked up for crimes on a multiversal scale – unless they had just happened to really get on a Grandmaster’s nerves. Worst of all was his complete separation from Suzanne, who had been confiscated and restrained by The Arbiter during processing – it felt much like losing his arms, and he was so tired all the time.

When The Warden got the idea for a prisoner’s grand battle into his head he didn’t bother to contact The Arbiter or anyone knowledgeable on the matter, simply tossing his eight least favorite inmates into The Meritorious Trial along with their gear. In Jack’s case this included Suzanne, and while overcoming a demonic kraken-hound, ethereal assassin and celestial guitar salesman (to name a few) wasn’t easy for someone who had previously preferred to operate with a minimum of wet work Suzanne had relished the opportunity to really let loose. When Jack found himself face-to-face with The Warden after forcing his last opponent, a sentient sun-in-a-box, into the round’s hazard (a particularly thrilling black hole) holding Suzanne, the outcome was an almost foregone conclusion. The Warden wasn’t much of a Grandmaster – lulled into sloth by millennia of watching his prisoners (all safely restrained by the work of The Arbiter) – and while it required nearly all the energy Suzanne had stolen from their last opponent Jack managed to throw him into the void, ending the round and returning him to the prison in The Warden’s place.

He quickly initiated a prison break to distract The Arbiter from his impending escape, and had just managed to retrieve his suit, tie and fedora when he was whisked off to the Fantastic Tournament’s Champion round – The Warden having pre-registered the victor of his battle in it to serve as further punishment for whatever guilty scum would eventually emerge victorious.

Realizing what had happened while being processed for the Fantastic Tournament, he resolved to call himself The Inmate on all the forms provided, mostly to spite The Warden – having defeated the purported “Grandmaster” surely he deserved such a title as well.


Grandmaster Title: The Warden (Deceased)

Grandmaster Colour: Lockdown.

Tournament Information:

The Meritorious Trial was (ill-) conceived by The Warden while in a funk over finding further ways to punish his prisoners – with the prison population containing some of the most dangerous criminals in the multiverse they simply refused to respond to regular deprivation or abuse. Ignoring the fact that many of them had power to rival his own when freed from the strictures set in place by The Arbiter around the prison, The Warden plucked the eight inmates he most detested out of Death Row and allowed them to serve their sentences to each other while he watched. This had the convenient side effect of actually enabling their executions, as The Warden didn’t have the ability (or, legally speaking, the jurisdiction) to do so back at the prison. As the rounds went on he grew less and less cautious about intervening in the name of “justice”, mostly to ensure that contestants he found more entertaining (or those he wanted to suffer more than others) survived to later, even more painful rounds. As for the champion of the tournament, he had planned for their reward to be an eternity of grand battles until they perished – much like a gladiator, but without the promise of parole. It was, in his mind, the perfect way to finally break one of the scum that blasphemed proper order.

He was so caught up in the ecstasy of Jack’s elimination of Solaris that he sauntered right up to the victor to gloat over how his triumph was only the beginning of an eter- before Jack tossed him into the vortex of the Black Hole, ripping The Warden to shreds and ridding The Arbiter of a rather incompetent underling.

[Ixcalibur]

Aaaaand signups are closed. Decision coming later today.

[Ixcalibur]

So here's the lineup.

1. Pax Musica - TimeothyHour
2. The Coat - engineclock
3. The Vase - Cyber95
4. Titan - PickYerPoison
5. Detective Erin O'Donobate - Lord Paradise
6. The Inmate and Suzanne - Mirdini
7. Clyde Clemens - Schazer
8. Leonard Robertson - Dragon Fogel
9. Zephyr - Wojjan
10. Conswarm Sigma - Raum

Apologies to those who didn't get in, the quality of profiles was amazing and there simply was not enough slots to fit you all. You can expect an intropost in the next couple of days, hopefully sooner rather than later.

(I am the worst host)

[Pick Yer Poison]

Poor Titan, nobody loves you :<

EDIT: Except people eeee

[Ixcalibur]

Ding dong!

There was no response, and so, with a sob, the Lachrymose pushed the doorbell again.

“Chillax would ya? I’m coming!” the Authority yelled from inside the surf shack that he called his home. The assembled grandmasters shuffled awkwardly for a minute before the door was thrown open. The Authority was looking more upbeat than he had the last time any of the other Grandmasters had actually seen him in person. He had a smug smirk on his face that made the group feel a little uneasy. He was as ever wearing a gaudy Hawaiian shirt, stonewashed denim jeans, a bunch of wristbands and a pair of ‘bitchin’ shades. He had studs in his ears and his blond hair was gelled straight up. He had in one hand a fruity cocktail with an umbrella in it.

“Give it up Mjil, you’ll never be the fuckin’ Overseer.” Selvsetter snarked.

“Hey bros and bitches.” He said, pointedly ignoring Selv’s comment. “Welcome to the Champion’s Edish, and more importantly to my bitchin’ new crib.”

The gathered group stared blankly at The Authority, clearly not impressed. He didn’t seem to notice as he downed his cocktail and slung the glass haphazardly over his shoulder. Once that was done from out of thin air he produced a clipboard with a thick sheaf of papers clipped onto it and a cheesy novelty pen attached to the board with a bit of old string.

“I know you’re all keen to get in here and get your battle on, but first you gotta sign here.” The Authority said. Madame The strode up and snatched the clipboard out of his hands and began examining it. The Authority shrugged to the other grandmasters.

“I was not informed I would be expected to sign a contract. Especially not a contract with you…” Madame The irately flipped through the sheaf of papers.

“Hey don’t shoot the messenger babes.” The Authority raised his hands as if to indicate his innocence in the matter. “How do you think a bro is supposed to run a battle if he don’t have no authority?”

“...Fine.” Madame The signed her name, elegant in cursive script and passed the clipboard over to The Dullard, who signed it without a moment’s hesitation. Slowly the clipboard made the rounds of the assembled Grandmasters, the Courier all but bludgeoning the Executive Producer with it as he passed it over and The Eccentric replaced the pen with one that leaked ink all over the Lachrymose causing her to sob even more profusely. Eventually The Abomination passed the completed forms back to the Authority quietly furious that he’d had to give his humanoid any authority over him.

“Hey any of you seen The Warden?” The Authority asked regarding the spot where the jailor’s signature should have been. “Oh screw him; we still got his contestant, his loss amirite?” The Authority grinned widely and the clipboard vanished back to wherever it was it came from in the first place. “So now that the boring paperwork bullshit is over with come on inside.” The Authority said. “My casa is su casa.” He led the group inside to a massive lounge with about ten large flatscreen televisions arranged at the far end of the room; each one displayed a different contestant. Surfboards hung on the wall and all the furnishings seemed to have the same gaudy tropical colouring. There was a semi-circle of seats ranging from sofas to beach chairs and in the middle a luxurious leather recliner. On the table in front of seats there was a selection of beers and bowls of popcorn.

“Here we are.” The Authority said with a grin. “Take a look at these bad boys: 52 inch high def three-d. Some say that watching shit on these is better than being there.” Once again nobody shared the Authority’s enthusiasm. “…So I guess you should all make yourselves at home while I go and give the briefing to the champions themselves.” He started towards the door, but after a second hesitated and turned back to the Grandmasters. “I got dibs on the recliner.” He said, and with a grin he turned and left.

---------

In a room adjacent to where the Grandmasters were bickering over the best seats ten contestants were in a familiar situation; they were stood in a circle unable to move. They had actually been stood like this for about an hour now and were getting a little fed up. A door in the corner of the room opened and the Authority walked in.

“Hey bros what’s up?” He greeted the champions. “So here you all are: Champions Edition. I come bearing best wishes from the other Grandmasters; we’re all totally pumped for this battle.” He grinned and stepped into the middle of the circle.

“So let’s get this show on the road and make with the introductions.” He paused and thought for a moment before smacking his hand against his forehead. “Of course, some of you might not need an introduction, thanks to ‘The Web’ you set up… Yeah we knew about that don’t think that we didn’t.” He directed the attention of the group to the first champion, which appeared to be an ordinary jukebox. “Oh actually you might also know one another through cameo rounds and all that.” He sighed. “This introduction is starting to sound slightly pointless but fuck it I’m here now.”

“This…” He gestured at the jukebox again. “…is Pax Musica. Or at least this is its brain or something? I don’t know it all went a bit over my head. It has musicslaves and it wants to make you its musicslave. It’s pretty sweet actually.”

He moved onto the next champion, a scruffy labcoat lying on the floor. “This is The Coat. It was actually just a coat until shenanigans happened and now it’s some kind of demoncoat and it wants to wear you.” The Authority grinned to himself.

“Contestant number three is… this vase.” The Authority examined The Vase. “Is this a joke? A non-sentient vase? Okay apparently not. This Vase somehow won its battle despite being unable to fight, move or even think.” He stared at the priceless vase. “What is this, I don’t even. Amirite?”

“Ahh, this is more like it!” The Authority said with a grin. The fourth champion was a massive metal robot, towering over the other champions. “Titan here is a fightan’ robot and he’ll fight you if he wants.”

The Authority gestured towards the fifth champion, a female police officer with sunglasses and ginger hair tied back into a ponytail. “This is Detective Erin O’Donobate. She’s a space cop, I think, and she’s all business. You commit a crime you’ll probably find yourself in the pocket dimension she called The Cl!nk. To tell the truth she’s probably gonna be a bit of a downer on the battle, but nevermind, she’s here now.”

“Man, I don’t know about you dudes but I’m exhausted.” The Authority said. “Jegus why are there even so many of you? Fuck it I need a sit down and an ice cold brewski. I’ll leave you in the capable hands of The Tedious.” The Authority turned and headed back out the door he had came in through, shooting finger-guns at the champions as he did so.

There was a long minute where nothing seemed to be happening and the champions wondered how long they were going to be left stuck here this time. Then a grey shape that had somehow gone unnoticed for the entire time they had been here stood up and walked into the circle. It was a greyscale man with a sensible haircut, a striped black and white shirt, black shorts and a whistle around his neck. “Hello. I am not as was previously indicated The Tedious. I am The Referee.” His voice was slow and totally monotone with no trace of emotion whatsoever. He commenced his portion of the introduction by explaining that this was a battle to the death and that his role was no concern of the champions themselves.

--------

“What the fuck is this Mjil?” Selvsetter demanded. “Not got enough Grandmasters in this bullshit already?” The Authority grabbed a beer and sat down in his recliner, ignorant of the crowd of Grandmasters staring at him.

“The Referee is here to enforce the rules, that’s all.” The Authority said dismissively.

“What rules?” The Dullard asked.

“The rules in the contract you signed.” The Authority explained. “It’s just to stop you from interfering too much with the battle.”

“And why would we want to interfere?” Madame The asked suspiciously.

“Because if your champion dies, you die.” The Authority grinned wickedly. “It was all there in the contract if you’d bothered to read it.”

“What the fuck Mjil?” Selvsetter yelled, climbing up and striding towards The Authority. “Fuck that shit!”

“Hold up Selvy.” The Authority said. “If you kill me then The Referee kills you. He’s more powerful than he looks.” He paused. “And really guys if your champion is as great as you think then what have you got to worry about?” Selvsetter stopped, and angrily returned to her seat. The Referee was finally getting back to the introductions.

--------

“Champion number six is The Inmate and his sentient machine gun known as Suzanne.” The Referee gestured towards the 20s gangster in a suit and fedora who clutched at his side a violin case, presumably not containing a violin. “’Suzanne’ is a powerful multiversal artefact that seeks out villains. She has been with The Inmate as long as he can remember. My notes indicate that he is responsible for murdering The Warden and causing the largest jailbreak in the known multiverse.”

The Referee gestured towards the next champion, a very ill looking man in a paint-stained yellow hoodie. “Champion number seven is Clyde Clemens. His signature weapon is a selection of magical oil paints. In his battle he used them to great effect after discovering a muse that encouraged his murderous tendencies.”

The Referee indicated the next champion; a normal looking guy of about twenty who was carrying an enchanted sword. “Champion number eight is Leonard Robertson. He has been battling for longer than the rest of you put together. He is the descendant of a powerful line of mages and has enormous magical potential.”

Next up was a guy dressed in only grey boxer shorts and heavy metal boots. His hair was almost ghostly white and his features sunken from hunger and stress. “Champion number nine is Zephyr. He has an ability known as ‘ghosting’ in which he can make any part of his body intangible at will. I do not know why he is only wearing boxer shorts. It is apparently a sore subject.” The Referee shrugged; the most expressive thing he had done so far.

And finally the referee came to the final champion. It was a floating sphere covered entirely in flesh. It was surrounded by a black haze. “Champion number nine is Conswarm Sigma. It is a construction robot that builds using a cloud of nanobots. It is arguably non-sentient and cannot affect flesh. It won its battle essentially by default.”

The door opened and The Authority strolled back in. “S’okay brah, I can take it from here. Go keep an eye on the other Grandmasters.” The Referee did as he was bid, leaving the champions in The Authority’s hands. “Blah blah blah amirite? I imagine all you guys are keen to get all up ons your first round.” The Authority clicked his fingers and suddenly they were elsewhere.

They were in a barren rocky field, devoid of any plantlife or animals as far as the eye could see, which admittedly was not far. They were surrounded by noxious green fog which hung over them like a blanket.

“Welcome to Catoxy,” The Authority said “officially one of the least habitable planets in the multiverse. The air here is not just toxic but also highly acidic. Five minutes in this stuff and even Titan would be nothing but dust. Don’t worry I’m not about to leave you out in this stuff. I learnt my lesson on that idea from my last battle.” He clicked his fingers again and suddenly they were in a lobby of some sort, the wall they were facing was curved upwards and entirely transparent. Through it they could see the deadly fog that covered the planet.

“This is the Ghost Station.” The Authority said. “It’s an enormous self sustaining city sealed to protect it from the numerous threats lurking just on the other side of this window. If it looks a bit drab, that’s because the rest of the multiverse has forgotten these poor saps exist. Equally these guys have been alone so long that the rest of the multiverse is regarded as nothing more than fiction. You guys are gonna blow their minds.” He paused thoughtfully. “I think I’m forgetting something… but… no I have no idea. Maybe it’ll come to me. In the meantime enjoy The Ghost Station, and try not to break it.” The Authority winked as he said that last part, and with a click of his fingers the contestants were scattered across the station.

show spoiler

hide spoiler

The specific rules the Grandmasters have agreed to are that they cannot directly kill another contestant and nothing more complex than that. They can interfere in other ways if you wish them to, but they don't have to. Bear in mind they don’t know how far they can go before The Referee gets involved.

[Dragon Fogel]

All right, let's get this trainwreck rolling.