Into the Arena

"Arjuna! Arjuna! Arjuna!" the chants from the crowd resounding throughout the arena. Arjuna smiled slightly, then loosed another flurry of arrows, dropping all the targets released. During each shot, the only thing he remembered was his trainer Drona's advice, "See only the head, not the body." Eager to show even greater prowess, he hopped on his horse and galloped throughout the arena, hitting target after target without fail, prompting even more cheers from the crowd. Finally, the time came for the greatest exhibition, and an iron boar was loosed into the arena. To any witness, the next five arrows that Arjuna released were faster than the wind itself, and all hit the boar straight in the mouth, as if they were but a single arrow. The boar dropped dead, and the arena rang with the mightiest cheers anyone present had ever heard.

As Arjuna reveled in his glory, not all were pleased for the great prince. Duryodhana, neighboring king, was angered at watching his rival's son receiving all the praise. He was soon edified as a tall, dark figure, clad head to toe in the most radiant of armor, strode into the arena and called out "I am Karna, and I will match and excel at all the feats exhibited by Arjuna." The crowd stared in a hushed whisper, which grew into a mighty roar as Karna replicated, and in the opinion of some, surpassed, the feats of Arjuna. Finally, at the completion of the demonstration, Karna stood in the center of the arena and shouted "Now I will prove my superiority, and challenge Arjuna to single combat." Arjuna was overcome with anger and pride with this challenge and willingly accepted, drawing Windshaper, his magic bow, and advancing into the arena.

It was at this moment, Krpa, the tournament master, stepped forward and asked Karna his rank. Karna declared he had no official title, to which Krpa replied, "then this combat cannot take place, for single combat may only occur among equals." Duryodhana, seeing his chance, stood up and said, "then come here and let me knight you Karna, and make you a landowner, so that you may fight in combat." Thus was the ritual completed, and the combatants set across from each other in the arena.

Arjuna led off the combat by releasing arrow after arrow from Windshaper, with such speed that no one could tell how many arrows were loosed. Each of these arrows was either caught by Karna's shield Maelstrom, which appeared to pull the arrows into it, or batted aside by his sword Helmrend. When Arjuna was out of arrows, he drew his famous blade Stormcaller and charged into combat. Mighty blows were exchanged, the whole arena danced with fire and lightning, and the audience members themselves were torn on which great hero they supported, for both were fighting with an intensity and skill no one had ever seen. Hours passed as the two heroes exchanged blow after blow, neither able to gain an advantage over the other, while the audience sat entranced by what they were witnessing. At sunset, a horn sounded, and Krpa announced to the crowd and combatants that the fight would need to be continued tomorrow, for no tournament could continue into nightfall. Everyone left, knowing that had witnessed something magical that day, and with the foreboding that tomorrow would bring death to one of the great combatants.

Author's note:

In the original story, Arjuna is training with Drona, after his brothers have failed to master archery, and greatly pleases Drona for his skill in archery. His father, the king, then hosts a day of games to show off the strength and skill of his sons, which causes jealousy among others, but gives the crowd the opportunity to be awed by Arjuna's prowess. Karna enters the arena and demands to have people watch his prowess, which causes Arjuna to be jealous. Then a challenge between the two is met, which only occurs once Karna is kinged by a jealous king, but no fight occurs because of sunset. For this story, I didn't make many explicit changes, just talked about the magic weapons and actually gave them names, as well as allowed Karna and Arjuna to actually fight before sunset. The setting itself is slightly shifted to be more medieval fantasy, but not as in your face setting change as my other stories, due to the version we read sound fairly medieval to begin with. Another thing I did to add more spice to the story was actually narrate some of their blows and the way they fought, to make the fight intriguing, rather than just generically discuss the action. The one thing I did keep from the original was the openness of the ending, to allow a story to fill in the gap later.

Bibliography:

Krishna Dharma,Mahabharata, The Martial Exhibition

Images:

Header Image: Gladiator Mosaic, from Wikimedia Commons

In-Text Image: Rome Colosseum, from pixabay