Chapter 85: Do not judge a book for its pages, or something like that...

...

"This prisoner has really no shame, he dared to commit a crime and has the nerve to not kneel in front of his Majesty... Either that or he is too stupid to know what he needs to do"

"It's probably the second option, which bandit could be so stupid to try and steal from the owner of this coliseum? It's like asking for participating in the [Clean-Up]..."

"Let's watch thig guy closely, he seems to be rather confident on his own abilities for him to not kneel, heck, he doesn't even look troubled by the fact that he is with no armor nor a proper weapon"

"Now that you mention it, he does look kinda bored now that I watch him properly"

The crowd blew up in conversation and gossiping when they saw the most recently added prisoner not kneel in front of the King, even while all the other criminals were kneeling with great effort in order to gain his majesty's favor.

This action did not especially anger the crowd, but just left them a bit baffled. After all, there have been some similar situations in the past where some of the participants did not kneel because they simply did not have a chance to win in the first place. However, these actions angered those serving directly under the royal family, as they respected them beyond measure, and for a lowlife to not kneel in front of such an important figure annoyed them a lot. One of the previously mentioned people being the warrior that was standing next to the king, and stopped the crowd from talking when the King was about to give his speech.

'Filthy bastard... he can't even understand the greatness of the King, I'm glad he will die quickly when the rest of the prisoners gang up on him for being the weakest' He tightened the grip on his sword and gritted his teeth in anger while seeing such a petty person disrespect his idol. Probably, if he had twitter he could probably write a 100,000 words post telling why this guy was a horrible human being, and his idol was the pinnacle of humanity.

The king beside him just looked at this prisoner briefly before he stood up and prepared to give his speech.

A person with blue robes that was standing a few meters away from the King approached when he saw the King stand up and started gathering mana in front of the King's mouth.

"Dear citizen of Nuwa Kingdom, today we have all gathered together in order to carry out the yearly event [Clean-Up]! These few weeks we have been going through harsh times due to the war against the giant hive, However, as the King of this nation, I tell you... do not despair! The famous scientist, Sir Delbere, will give an announcement when this event finishes, so let us all enjoy today's show and set aside the worries of the war!  These fifty warriors in front of us will today fight against each other for the right of gaining their freedom, and you people will decide the destiny of the last survivor depending on your own judgment! Finally, I wish you all a great event"

*Gong!*

When the King finished his speech, the crowd erupted into cheers and the sound of a gong announced the beginning of the event.

The forty-nine prisoners, who until now were kneeling on the ground, soon moved towards their spot at the borders of the arena when they heard the gong and took their stances for when the fight started.

As for the brown-haired prisoner... he was rather confused about where his spot was, but after some seconds he finally managed to find it.

The prisoners started equipping their armor and weapons while sweating a bit due to the heat of the sun, and the nervousness before the fight, each of them looked extremely fierce and savage while carrying their weapons. And even the King looked a bit impressed.

It was then, the King noticed the brown-haired prisoner taking out his shirt and sitting on the ground with a rather calm expression. But what surprised him more about this prisoner was that his muscles, although smaller than the ones from his fellow prisoners, looked really compact and sturdy. There was even muscle on parts where people could find it hard to train or exercise. But there was another thing that surprised him the most about this man.

"No scars...?"

"Is something wrong father?" Princess Yuuki asked when she heard his father muttering in a low voice while glancing at the rather peculiar prisoner from before.

"Hmm... It's just that this particular prisoner... his body does not even have one scar, but it's still developed excellently... is he a soldier that defected and started performing banditry before he could fight against those monsters?"

"We will have to see..." Yuuki narrowed her eyes slightly while glancing at the arena, although she didn't really care that much about the violence and blood that this event had, she still found it rather entertaining to watch. Though she probably could prefer to be dealing with more important matters from this Kingdom, rather than seeing fifty guys beat each other to death.

*Gong!!*

As the gong echoed all around the coliseum, the roars of fury from the prisoners erupted and they launched themselves towards his fellow inmates.

Blood splattered on the ground, and dozens of corpses soon spread across the ground like lifeless puppets that had their string cut off. Some heads were even sent flying away, or limbs were severed from the body of their owners with rather ease.

This place looked like hell brought to reality. But not something Aspen hadn't seen before.

*Munch...*

Aspen sat on a corner of the arena and started eating a piece of beef jerky away from everyone's prying eyes, which were too focused on the current battle for them to even notice his presence. Except for a certain King and princess that is...

"What the heck is he doing? No... where did he even get that beef jerky in the first place?" The King muttered in disbelief seeing the man's calm actions, looked forward on which could be the next actions of such a strange man.

"Aren't Prisoners just given bread? Where did he get that?" Yuuki, who also noticed the irregularity, massaged her chin while trying to find an answer, but was unable to come with one.

"He seems to be waiting for the number of Prisoners to decrease" 

"Is he going for a surprise attack when only one participant remains?" Yuuki glanced at her father and asked with a raised eyebrow, he was probably making use of the chaos among the battlefield to lay low and wait for the correct moment to strike. However, unlike what she expected her father shook his head and narrowed his eyes while looking at the arena.

"At the beginning, I thought so too... but then I noticed that the rest of the prisoners had already noticed that man's behavior, but for some reason, they aren't attacking him... I could even say that they are avoiding him"

"What?"

Right when the King was about to explain it to her daughter, suddenly the whole crowd turned silent. And no wonder, only twenty participants remained, and what was more surprising, they seemed to be grouping and walking towards the brown-haired participant!

"Incredible!! A whole group of twenty participants seems to be ganging up against a lone participant that is... Eating a beef jerky?" The presenter yelled in excitement while seeing such a rare sight, However, he ended up adding a bit of doubt to his voice when he saw Aspen eating calmly while the rest of the prisoners walked towards him.

*Step*

*Step*

*Step*

"I don't know if what you told us is pure bullshit, or you are really that dangerous, but we aren't taking the risk newbie, sorry" Reo kneeled in front of Aspen and narrowed his eyes while glancing at him. He expected him to taunt him, or try and ask for forgiveness but was welcomed with the face of a munching Aspen.

*Munch*

*Munch*

*Munch*

*Gulp...*

Aspen breathed with satisfaction after he finished eating, and then turned to look at Reo with a smile on his face.

"Don't mind it, I could do the same thing"

*Slash!!*

In the blink of an eye, Reo who had been standing in front of Aspen with a calm expression, suddenly had his head sent flying away. Blood splattered on the faces of those accompanying Reo and blinded them slightly.

"Wha-?!" When they cleaned the blood away, Aspen had already disappeared from his previous spot and reappeared behind them.

*Shack!!*

The rusty sword on Aspen's hand stabbed deeply into another participant's heart and killed him on the spot.

"Darn you!!!" Another man tried swinging his hammer towards Aspen's head, but unlike what he expected, the hammer was stopped on the spot by Aspen's hand and taken away from his hands.

Suddenly, the man had his head grabbed from behind, and pulled with great strength forward.

*Crack!*

Aspen crashed his own forehead against the man's nose with extreme strength and crushed his entire skull in one go. Deforming his entire face, and squashed his brain in the process.

The body of the man fell lifelessly to the ground no long after Aspen released him from his grip, making all the other prisoners back away in shock and horror.

Aspen's face darkened and a vicious smile started growing on his face while he cracked his knuckles and walked towards the group with a bloodthirsty gaze on his eyes.

The entire crowd had gone silent at the view, and all the important officials had grown wide eyes before such a display of brute force. No one dared to make a noise fearing that they could interrupt the fight, and all of them were too immersed in the brutality of Aspen's attack to notice the change in the atmosphere around the coliseum.

Without minding the crowd, Aspen used Cthulhu's shield and dashed right in front of one of the participants before he grabbed his face with his hand and slammed it onto the ground. 

*Crack!*

Spider-web-like cracks appeared on the ground, and the man's head got crushed in one go after Aspen slammed it on the ground. Then, without even letting the prisoners rest, Aspen appeared in front of one of them and created a small mana blade on the tip of his hand before he pierced the man's head and then kicked the lifeless body away into the distance like some old rag.

He swung his hand in order to clean the blood splattered all over it, and then dashed right in front of another man before he grabbed his mouth and whispered like a devil enjoying some kind of spectacle.

"It feels damn good killing guys like you"

...

Jarron7

Some sadism, and violence in this chapter because I felt like it.

Also, I was thinking of creating a fanfic about Minecraft, what do you guys think?

It should be about a person with blurry memories waking up in the body of a piglin. So yeah, another harsh survival type story. But this one has something else that this one doesn't have... The guy will re-spawn after being killed.

What do you guys think? Tell me your opinions!