Description: Da da da da dah, daah~
A young man strides the busy streets on a dark, overcast day - the sort of day that promises an oncoming storm. The dreary atmosphere does little to deter those who carry on. Clad in what may charitably be called a worn and ragged karate gi with torn sleeves and matching pants with a notable absence of shoes, instead of what some may instead dismiss as rags that have somehow not faded in color in contrast to highly extensive use. His headband flutters in the breeze that carries through the streets every so often, a large white bag slung over one shoulder held by a cord in his right hand.
In his other hand, a coin - a United States quarter, worn and tarnished - contemplated only briefly as he passes by the crowds that go about their own day. More than a few take notice, and a certain name is called several times over. Flashes of light blink between those who see it fit to immortalize the man's presence in the moment.
He appears to pay little mind. His eyes stay set on but one object in the distance that seems all too easy to lose in the sights and sounds of ordinary life. An object - nay, a location! - that hadn't yet time to distinguish itself as such in the face of rapid change of a growing industry. Were it not for a friend's suggestions, the young man would have been headed that way a week later.
If he were impatient, the measured steps of his approach did not speak of this. Assured might have been the better fit, reaching the shade of an extended awning that would obscure his features as he gently opened the door...
The door to one of the newly opened branches of Living Legends Live, the new license holder to the Neo League.
Lightning flashed to the deafening crack of thunder, illuminating his features within the span of time its light would shine to all who could see it as if to punctuate his arrival.
"I'm looking for a challenge," the young man spoke clear of his intent. There is no traditional greeting, no confusion over whether he was in the right place. His unwavering path had led him here, and no hesitation marred his speech.
His desire was immediately understood.
"Just a challenge, World Warrior?" Said a confident-sounding man whose presence behind a nearby desk suggested he may have been working well below his station this day. "Isn't that aiming a little low?"
"A little low?" Asked the young man.
"You'll get more than one," the other assured him, "a challenge? Surely, you seek more than just 'a' challenge."
Lightning cracks again. A smile can be made out in the darkness of the young man.
"You know exactly what I'm looking for..."
"It's more a surprise it took you this long to find us!" The desk-bound man claps his hands together. "Come on in. Don't mind the darkness. We're just getting the generator up and running..."
Wordlessly, the young man - the World Warrior, as he is called - accepts this invitation as lightning flashes once again. The intensity of his features seem to grow sharper with every peek the lightning gives. The silhouette of a fighter was impossible to miss even in the poor lighting of a branch office that still suffered the growing pains of a bold new acquisition in the business race to be the top of the organized fighting industry.
"I hope I haven't come too early," the young man says as he journeys further inward down through the path of societal necessities in a world where battle has become increasingly a concept that is commercialized, micromanaged, and bound to so many rules and permissions of those who may never have thrown a single punch in their own lives.
"Nonsense! We'd always make the time for those of your calibur... Ryu." The once desk-bound man starts hastily - eagerly! - sifting through papers in the relative darkness, the momentous meeting a far greater honor than any inconvenience faulty or incomplete electrical wiring can dare impede upon. "Just have to get a few things in order..."
"Whatever it takes," Ryu responds as he sets down the quarter upon the countertop of a display honoring the first Neo League champion, the emergent superstar wrestler Rainbow Mika, "I'm in."
Said quarter would never retrieved, a forgotten footnote in the face of a promise of far greater fights to come.
Log created on 07:38:40 11/24/2015 by Ryu, and last modified on 08:34:45 11/24/2015.