(The scene begins with an overshot of a local community, as it focuses on a small building with a sign reading "Howe's Pub")
Inside, you can see a bunch of men wining and dining in the middle of the afternoon, when a young man in a cloak and a sword strapped to his back walks in, and suddenly the whole pub erupts in cheers as they praise him. Suddenly, a middle-aged woman from behind the counter slams a mug down, calming everyone as she speaks with a soft tone.
"Ell, my boy, come here and have a drink." As she slides it closer to him.
"Madam Howe, how's business these days? I see the place is packed." He says as he pulls down his cloak, revealing his copper-brown skin, silver hair, and red eyes.
"Yes, the Festival of Peace does bring about a lot of travelers, trying to get contestants like you to help them with petty chores for free. Instead, they drink to stupor in the middle of the day!" She says while staring at the men with full cups of booze in hand.
"Come on, Howe, we are just celebrating our boy, Ra'ell, for making it pass the tournament phase. He's come so far without his parents, and he's still better off than us who had parents." An old man said while holding Ra'ell's shoulder.
"Oh, how wrong he is?" Ra'ell thought to himself as he had a flashback of a man bleeding out in front of him.
"Hey Ra, how 'bout ya tell us about one of your duels during the tourney, eh? " said another man in the pub.
"Nah, man, I gotta go, or I'll miss the Roc that's supposed to pick me up." He says while chugging down the mug of crab-apple blood.
"Aww, come on, dude, just one before you go." The other man said while the rest of the pub backed him up.
"Just tell them one so that they can shut up and pay their tabs when you're done." Madam Howe said while cleaning up a mug.
"Alright, here's the story of the finale my toughest battle yet." Ra'ell said while standing on the counter like he was about to reenact the battle.
(The scene then cuts to a flashback of Ra'ell about to face off in a sparring ring against an opponent dressed in a black robe with cloud patterns with an oversized box hung over her shoulders.)
"The finale between the combatants Ra'ell the bladed beast and Sosa the puppet master begins by the count of 3."
The referee announces, and at the count, he gestures for the duel to begin, and immediately Sosa jumps back, and then proceeds to release a scorpion-like construct from the box, and as soon as it was out, it sprung to life, then it suddenly lunges towards Ra'ell, aiming to land a preemptive strike, but it is immediately countered by his blade, and he follows up with a parrying slash from below, but even his attack was blocked by the tail of the construct.
"Ten limbs and a tail is gonna be a lot to watch out for in the middle of battle, but it's not gonna be a problem." He thinks to himself when he narrowly dodges another attack from one of its legs.
"As long as I pay attention, that is."
He thinks again as he pushes it away and proceeds to charge at it while striking relentlessly at the construct forcing it into a difficult position, and it's movements suddenly come to a halt for no more than a second, but that was more than enough time to remove the pincers and stinger, leaving it nearly unable to attack, as he then kicks the construct towards it's master, which once again stopped it's movements for a split second, the construct then proceeds to jump at him, and he charges in retaliation, slicing through the construct and landing him right in front of Sosa, he then knocks her out of the ring with the back of his blade, securing his win.
The referee then announces him the winner of the tournament and qualified to participate in the upcoming Festival's Quest.
Ra'ell then turns to face Sosa, who's busy picking up pieces of her construct with a defeated expression, when he says, "That was way too easy, I mean even your name gave it away, 'Soso the puppet master' of course your construct was controlled by strings, I just has to prove my theory by tangling the threads and making them slack by moving it closer to you and it was already over".
"The name's Sosa, if my poison touched you, you would be finished." She replied with an annoyed tone.
"Haa, like hell you would have, your little toy didn't even touch me, and having to resort to poisons to win just shows how weak you are, am even shocked you made it to the finale, Soso." He replied while laughing his heart out, and the crowd followed suit, and Sosa ran away in tears while carrying the pieces of her construct.
(The scene then shifts back to the pub, where everyone is cheering him on, when all of a sudden he is pushed off the counter by Madam Howe as she says.)
"How dare you make such a young lass like her cry, you were too mean, you need to like to be more of a gentleman if you don't want to end up alone like all these men here, and weren't you the one who was out like a light for a whole day after such an easy fight."
He replies saying,"Ouch, Madam Howe, you know how I am, I call it how I see it, and she was weak, plus you know I ain't getting in any relationships till I win this thing, and even then I might still not, also you know why I was down for a day so don't hold it against me."
As he picked himself up, one of the men spoke, "Wait, you said you were gonna tell us about your hardest battle yet, but it just sounded like you wiped the floor with her?"
Ra'ell replies saying, "Well, none of my fights have been particularly difficult, so to say, but I hear there's a lot more stronger opponents from the other 7 realms and I can't wait to test my strength against theirs. Anyways, I gotta be going now. The Roc's gonna arrive any minute now."
The men greet him as he leaves, shouting at the top of their lungs, "Goodluck Ra'ell, may Kartoz, smile upon you, make the people of Valmorra and Rozma proud, ya hear!".
He waves in response as he leaves with a smile on his face. After walking for a few minutes, he reaches a crossroads, where he sees a giant pink colored hawk in the middle of the road. As he approaches, it speaks, "Ra'ell the bladed beast from Valmorra, are you thou?" He nods in response as he gets on the bird and flies off while staring into the horizon.