The Past

In my previous life I was born in a poor family of eight. I am the eldest son, so at a young and tender age of ten I have to work already. Unlike other kids, during the day instead of playing around I went early in the dumpsite that is near our place, to gather scraps and metals that can be sold and also other items that can be exchanged with money. During those time I enjoyed my life with my family even though sometimes we ate one meal in a day. I did not hate my status back then not until a pandemic swept across the globe.  The pandemic lasted over a year, before the government developed a cure.  Many people died in the pandemic and that includes all my family member and I’m the only one that have survived. Since then, I learned to live on the streets begging for foods from people passing by. I also constantly fighting with other children in the street and one of those fights that I am in changed my life.

One fine afternoon, after the sun has set, I am walking alone in an alley going back to the place where I usually stay at night to rest and sleep when suddenly a group of children consisting of four people comes out from the side of the alley. These children are about my age and their faces are very familiar to me.

“They must have been hiding in the bushes waiting for me.” I said in my mind.

These four children and I have constantly clashed because they always tried to take away my food and every fight I always won. But this time it’s different, they have teamed up to fight me.

“Did you wait for to long?” I asked with a smile on my face.

“Shut up!” the biggest of them shouted.

“Hand over your collection today.” He added while pointing his finger at me.

“What if I refuse.” I replied.

“Ha! ha! ha! You’re still acting tuff.” The other kid beside the biggest kid shouted.

“Stop talking to him and lets just get his collection.” The third kid shouted.

“I agree.” The fourth kid replied and started running towards me.

At that time strong gust of wind started to blow and at the same time rain started falling down. We were engaged in a fight at that moment and I know that I can not take them all at once so I first focused hitting their strongest one which is the first kid who rushed towards me. I hold onto his shirt and started hitting him on the face ignoring the other three who are beating me at the same time. When their strongest fainted, my body is already full of bruises from the punches and kicks of the other kids.  Our fight lasted for half an hour and I am lying on the ground drenched and bruise all over my body. But the I am still smiling even though they manage to take my money because I had dealt a lot of damage to all four of them.  I can hardly move my body so I just lied there with my eyes closed, then suddenly I felt that there is no rain hitting my body and as I opened my eyes, I saw a man dressed in black holding an umbrella and standing beside me.  I just stare at him then he suddenly spoked.

“You are brave kid.” He said then looked down on me.

“Do you want to be stronger?” he asked.

“Who are you?” I asked without answering his question.

“Follow me if you want to become stronger.” The man in black said without answering my question back. Then he started walking leaving behind as the rain started hitting my body again.

I gathered all my strength to get on my feet, just to follow the mysterious man. I followed him wobbling an we kept walking more than an hour, then we stopped in front of a large building. He walked towards the front door and another man in black came to meet him they talked for a bit and the man who just came stared at me for quite a bit. He then walked towards me and tap my shoulder.

“Boy what is your name?” he asked.

“My name is Tigreal.” I replied calmly but deep inside I am a bit nervous.

“What a nice name. I am Tony by the way.” He replied with a smile on his face then he took me inside the building leaving the first man in black outside.

They treated my injury first before sending me in a room where children like me is staying. Starting from that day I lived inside that room for more than ten years. The room is spacious and it has small rooms where each of the children sleeps at night. The room also have a food section where we can have our food during meal time. For the first month that we stayed there we lived like rich people but after that we didn’t expect a harsh training and brutal killing inside the room. On the start of the second month there is an announcement that all of the children will gather at the center of the room, so all children flocked at the center chatting and talking with each other asking what is happening. Then a platform emerged in front of us with a man standing in the center. That man explained what is happening to all of us.

He said that “Every first day of the month starting now we will cut your number into half. We will do this by eliminating your opponent”

“Now you will have a one-on-one fight with another kid and the winner will advance and the loser will be executed.” He added then there’s an uproar coming from the children, we are shocked and frightened by the last words of the man.

“ We will determine your opponent using the numbers that were given to you the moment you entered the room, and it will be a draw lots.” He continued ignoring the children uproar.

“So lets start the first match.” He said and a hologram pop up on top of the ring and numbers are rolling until it stopped, showing two numbers.

“ Number 288 and number 50 come inside the ring.” The man said. After a minute or so no one went on the ring. Then a loud sound echoed in the room and two bodies are drenched in blood having half of their body parts missing. Then most of the kids started crying and screaming after seeing the bodies.

“Oh yes I forgot to tell you kids, if no one will enter the ring after a minute the contestants will both die.” The man on the stage shouted then smiled. After that the numbers rolled again then stopped again showing two numbers. This time both of them entered the ring and started fighting, after their fight the loser exploded after exiting the ring. The selection lasted for three days for most of the other kids don’t have experience in fighting. After the selection all the remaining kids started training, we were taught how to gather qi and train our body. After a month another fight happened cutting our number by half this continued until there were only five of us left. All five of us now are best fighter of the organization and I am the leader of the group. My best friend who poisoned in that life is one of those best fighter.

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