L.A.W. - League of Anime Wrestling

Oscar's moment of celebration was cut short as his music abruptly stopped- watching the Titantron flicker to life as he laid eyes on an all-too familiar face: Spectre. The Barbarian Prince's bright smile slowly faded as old memories resurfaced- recalling a match he previously had with the hacker woman that didn't exactly turn out in his favor thanks to a few dirty tricks and outright cheating... Oscar felt a bit of phantom pain in his body recalling the whole thing.

Oscar's expression harderened- became more serious as he listened to Spectre's mockery and false praise- especially with how Oscar had just showed kindness to Vorona after he knocked her out. Spectre's choice of words caught Oscar's attention as well when referring to Vorona as a "test operative". Was that all this open challenge really was? A means for Spectre to see how much stronger he had become? To collect data on him? Was his brave challenger actually nothing more than Spectre's pawn to be played? While Oscar was deep in thought, the referee tapped Oscar on his shoulder to catch his attention, offering him a microphone to give Spectre a rebuttal. Oscar, of course, accepted the mic and stood firmly where he was- staring at the titantron with a serious look in his eye.

"Such a delight to hear your shrill voice again, Spector! It's been so long that almost forgot what it sounded like. I think I remembered the noises you made when my knee sank into your stomach better than anything else"

Oscar spoke with a hint of sarcasm in his voice, earning some ooing from the crowd as they heard him clap back.

"But I gotta say- I'm disappointed in you, Spetor. All of this big bad heel stuff and you wouldn't even show up to fight me yourself? Did those blows to your gut traumatize you that bad that you have to hide behind a screen to trash talk me? Send someone to fight in your place? A wrestler that hides away from a challenge? Well, I'll be blunt. That dosen't sound like much of a wrestler to me"

The crowd let out even more OOOHHHs- losing their minds at how the unofficial champ was responding to Spectre.

"Let me make a few things perfectly clear to you and to everyone else who is watching this... if you think I've been "de-clawed" as Spectre put it, then you clearly don't know me at all. Kindness is NOT a weakness in this industry- nor is showing sportsmanship. And most importantly... THIS WILL NOT BE. MY ONLY. DEFENCE!!"

Oscar jabbed a defiant finger at Spectre- his voice booming throught the arena as the audience erupted into cheers!

"I will keep holding onto this belt for as long as I am able to. Until someone who is worthy can prove themselves by taking me down, I will fight. I will keep picking myself up. I will keep showing everyone that the intergender division belongs in LAW- and that my victory in the Kings and Queens tournament was ANYTHING but a fluke!"

Oscar ended his speech by raising the kings and queens belt into the air as the crowd exploded into cheers. The Barbarian Prince stared the the jumbotron with a defiant, confident smirk- almost DARING Spectre to come out to try something.

As Oscar went on, Spectre honed intensity into her eyes. A proverbial pin was prodding at her bubble, comment by comment. After he pointed, a finger thrust, the crowd joined and started pointing at Spectre. "Squeal! Squeal! Squeal!"

They were neck-tent worthy. Her brow flinched when faced taunted for her stomach, which tightened, then reverbed a small pain. She covered it with a spread palm under the camera shot. A bruise didn't bloom—but maybe one lurked after that. One corner on the upper-lip pulled up slightly and briefly, giving way to an audible TSK as the crowd roared. "Yanno, for a herbivore barbarian, I'd say that was actually, not bad—." Almost robotically, her head tilted towards the side, giving an audible hmm in the background. "But, really? Me? Chicken to you?" She looked disgusted by the idea, lifting a brow like a disappointed parent, closing her gaze to shake her head. A dramatic hand came to comfort the top of her forehead, "I can’t help but think this is a way to deny me my credit.” She raised her arms in a shrug, turned her head to the side, glancing at the shot, then giving her practiced 'I know what you don't' sneer, "You're five, six wins after I effortlessly squashed you. Someone might call that a comeback but I just call it emulation. You want to talk about guts and flukes? Here I am — "Squeal!”— fattening you up like a pig —"Squeal!” — and you're acting like this isn’t the greatest patronage of your life!”

"Squeal! Squeal!" The self-assurance made her feel molten and her stomach tightened again. The tiny throb grew like an inside ball above her navel. STILL, the actual truth she spoke was warming to finally say aloud. "So, Where’s my shoutout? No praise? You’re just gonna be smug, yell some fodder and pretend like it never happened, then try to bait me into ‘proving’ it??" And the crowd responded with their favourite, "Squeal!” Then her finger wagged, "Not. How. I. Work." Then she presented a stop hand before checking her nails. "Put it like this, Oscar. You have a belt, you are a champion, but you’re still veeeeeeery much my piggy bitch." Her tongue clicked, "So stop pretending like it wouldn't just be another fat one-sided dub on my tally and just say oink."

As soon as her voice left, jeers restarted and they went at again: "Squeal! Squeal! Squeal!"
Then the detractors kicked in, a loose fringe amongst them: "Oink! Oink! Oink!"
"Squeal! Squeal! Squeal!"
"Oink! Oink! Oink!"

Signs sprang up across the stadium protesting in a range of slogans, crossed out images and memes speculating on her defeat. Crimson did grow across her cheeks alongside a curse stuck in her throat. She swallowed, grabbed the camera’s neck and then pulled it along on the dollie. An array of large stacked monitors changed to animated a catalogue of names, faces, CCTV photos of Mixed Division competitors and charts from TV ratings to new sign-ees and other metrics, flowing like midas's treasury. "I came to show you all this. I’m going to let him stay Champion until I say so. And in-between point A and B, I’ll reduce this division to pigslop by giving a piece of trauma for all these incoming faces and more. If you're thankful, say oink again."

"Squeal! Squeal! Squeal!"
"Oink! Oink! Oink!"
"Squeal! Squeal! Squeal!"
"Oink! Oink! Oink!"

Although they reached an apex, it started to wane with possibilities burning into their retinas. Once one anxiety was planted, it spread and multiplied till they weren't fixated on punching her down but lamenting a casualty report before it began. The word more was baked into a voice command that triggered the monitors to show an array of Spectre Ai's, each slightly different by hair, secondary colour or outfit version, talking in unison. "That means you and I will be cost and incentive, house and high-roller, winner and pigstye. Just keep an eye out for our symbol, send a goodbye text to your loved ones and run for as loooong as you can, even if—" The feed ended. The camera whipped around to face Spectre, pointed up, a judging set of sly snake eyes looking back, then showing her a thin jet-black bracer. A form-fitting material ran down her arm except for elevated purple squares, ending off at a palm with a lattice pattern and exposed copper electrodes. Her metal-tip fingers made a claw, then electrical arcs zig-zagged in-between and sizzled, thrumming until a final pop ended the feed when she spread her digits.

"There's only bad endings."

At first, Oscar responded to Spectre's claims about squashing him with a shake of his head and a soft chuckle. While the Barbarian Prince remembered what Spectre did to him a year or two ago, he definitely remembered it happening much differently than how Spectre described it. Oscar's attention shifted as the crowd grew divided in supporting himself and Spectre- thankfully in a relatively normal way by chanting at eachother. Certainly better than that riot that broke out when he was a young lion.

Next came the monitots- which brought a more serious look to his face as he analyzed what he saw. Existing talent- both men and women, as well as faces he recognized and faces he could not. It was no surprise to Oscar that the intergender division was blowing up in popular in LAW- but the threat Spectre muttered... it seemed to make Oscar scoff a little, crossing his arms like he was disappointed in what Spectre had to say- at least until the sparks in her hand surprised him and caused him to hop a little before composing himself.

"... Y'know, as sad as it is to admit this, the whole 'Instead of fighting you, I'm going to jump and humiliate random people and your closest friends and loved ones instead' bit isn't new, or even original. You're easily like- the third or fourth person to have pulled that kind of stuff on me in particular. Call me what you will, and you're more than welcome to be as delusional about our first match as you want, but all that threat is doing is showing everyone that you're too afraid to see how much I've grown and improved- and that you're definitely not worthy of inheriting this belt!"

Oscar would raise the belt up high again, the fans starting to cheer as he followed up on Spectre's final statements.

"The people I care about are FAR more capable than you can imagine. I have the utmost faith that the new talent trickling in have the potential and talent to feed you your own words with a few well placed gut kicks I'd imagine, and most importantly... there ARE such things as good endings- and I will carve the path towards the day a worthy opponent succeeds me. That's a promise!

The crowd popped one last time as the match came to a close- leaving much in the air. How far will Oscar go with this unofficial title? What is Spectre planning? What does the future hold for the intergender division of LAW? Only time will tell...

WINNER BY PINFALL: OSCAR ORELASH
OSCAR RETAINS THE KINGS AND QUEENS BELT