Silent City

33. The Mantis Lords

    It was a while before anything started up in the arena again. Grimm had returned to the group, but nobody asked him why he had spent so long walking around the colosseum. Everyone else that sat around them was native to Hallownest, and currently the group included Hornet, the Pale King, the Hollow Knight, Grimm, the Radiance, Oro, and Mato. Nobody spoke much during the interim, but the silence between them wasn't awkward since there were still quite a few college students near them screwing around. One of them actually approached the Radiance after a while. He had dark brown hair and a smug look on his face, which grew wider as the Radiance turned to look at him.

"You... respectfully..." He started, biting his lower lip mischievously, "could be... my... mommy."

Hornet muffled a laugh. She wondered for a moment whether or not the Radiance knew what he meant by that. Of course, it was easy to tell that she did, in fact, know what he meant, since she was now glaring at him with her eyes hooded with disappointment. She reached a hand out towards him, and Hornet cut in.

"Come on, don't do it. It was funny." She chuckles. Radi looks over at her for a second, annoyed, and then looks back at the boy.

"You live in blissful ignorance, my child." She says to him, lightly brushing back his hair. His face goes slightly red as the Radiance turns back towards the empty battleground, and scurries off back to his group of friends.

"That boy has some balls." Grimm comments.

"I would agree with you, but I doubt he knows who I really am... so I don't give him that much credit." Radi replies.

"You have an intimidating presence. He doesn't need to know who you are to be at least a little bit brave for doing that." Grimm glances back at the arena. "How long does it take to get ready for the next round? We've been waiting forever."

"You seem in a hurry for the end of the world as we know it." Hornet mutters.

"At this point I just want to get it over with." Grimm's eyes suddenly light up as he spots someone walking down towards the balcony. "Victor! Fancy seeing you here. Were you called?"

"Grimm?" He questions, his eyes narrowing as he walks nearer. "What happened to you?"

"Oh," Grimm looks down at his outfit, and runs his fingers through his twisted, scarlet red hair, which would have been black if he wasn't in the dream realm, in his nightmare form. "Different form. The hair's a bit much, don't you think? A little bit too bright for my liking, but I can't really change it at this point."

Victor's eyes scanned the balcony and its inhabitants, two of which still had their eyes focused on the empty arena, the other two of which were staring at him through discerning eyes.

"Who are you two?"

"Hornet."

"The Pale King."

Both responses were flat and vacant. It made Victor feel unwelcome and unworthy to be in their presence, so he looked to the other two, and recognized the Goddess of Light immediately. Even though she was looking away from him, he could swear he felt her eyes on him, boring into his soul.

"Victor," Grimm began, walking over to him and placing a hand around his shoulder. "Why don't we take a walk? I can talk to you about what's going on. I doubt you want--"

There was a sudden, loud ringing sound that pierced all their ears, and a bright light that announced the beginning of a new sequence of battles. The arena that appeared following the light was characterized by a cloudy void beneath three evenly spaced floating platforms. Ghost stood staring upwards on one of them, until another enemy appeared floating above them. The Radiance stood up a little bit straighter, making a noise of intrigue at the new opponent.