Chosen

rematch

The three of you hadn't even gone to school the next day. Instead, Jim had trained like a beast. Both with Blinky and with you. You'd helped him go over every method of losing one's humanity, and you had to admit, he'd improved by a lot. Jim had told you that he'd found a way to read the trollish books Blinky had given him by shining the blue light of his amulet on the trollish letters, turning them into normal english.

Every moment you weren't with Jim, you saw Draal getting phsyced up by his lunatic troll-friends. It hurt you that he'd turned out to be like this and you wondered whether he'd stay that way forever. And if today was the day he'd kill Jim.

"Gathered trollkind!" Vendel's voice echoed through the Hero's Forge. Every single troll in Trollmarket had turned up to see the rematch and every row in the stone walls were filled to the brim by trolls of all kinds. Green, blue, grey, young and old. "The Trollhunter has laid a chalenge before the son of his predecessor, and you shall asll bear witness to the ensuing battle, which will be one of the ages.." he loudly told. "If not remarkably painful and short," he added quietly to himself.

You, Jim, Toby, Blinky and AAARRRGGHH were standing in an entrance opposite to the main entrance to the Forge. The entrance you were standing in looked like a troll's mouth with the rest of its head as a wall-decoration. There were stone-bars in front of it, that prevented any raging fighters to entered the Forge out of timing, and a set of stairs leading down to the arena.

You noticed Jim had two white envelopes in his hands and he took a deep sigh before handing one of them to you and the other to Tobias. "Hey, I.. want you guys to have these," he said. "What's this?" Toby asked, looking down at the envelope in his hands. "It says everything I want to say," he replied, locking his sweet eyes with yours. You wanted to say something, but you were dumbstruck at Jim beliving that the fight would go so badly that he had to write a letter to the two of you. 

"You promised me tacos," Tobias retorted. Jim scoffed with a soft smile. "Now is not the time for lunch, Tobes," he smiled. "Last week, we went for tacos. I paid. You said, 'Next time on me,'" he insisted. "You're going to get this letter back unopened after the fight, and when you get back, we'll get tacos," he promised, holding tears back. "Tacos sounds good," Jim chuckled softly before turning to you, who was clutching the letter. "You'll be just fine," you smiled, trying your best to look confident in the hunter. "You think so?" he asked. "I know so."

"Draal, son of Kanjigar, son of Tarigar," Vendel announced, regaining everyone's attention. "Draal 'the Destroyer,' come forth," he said before Draal's blue body rolled like a rocket in to the arena from the main entrance, making two spotlights, you didn't even know you had, follow him. He ascended from the ground as he reached the center and smashed into the ground, sending echoes through every part of Trollmarket. He let out a roar, which quickly turned into a triumphant laugh as he looked upon his cheering audience. It was clear that he came to win.

AAARRRGGHH placed a heavy hand on Jim's shoulder and smiled at him. "It's time to put everything I've every said to you to practice," Blinky intstructed as he approached him and AAARRRGGHH. "With a little luck, he'll trip and fall." "Now tell me: rule one," he begun. "Always be afraid," Jim replied in the blink of an eye. "Rule two," Blinky moved on. "Always finish the fight," Jim replied confidently as AAARRRGGHH's hand left his shoulder. "Rule three?" "About that," Jim begun, "I was reading, when the Venerable Behilde fought the Hydrabeast, there were no grunk-nuks, but there was a weakness under its scales." "You read the book!" Blinky exclaimed in disbelief. "So it got me thinking. Does Draal have a weakness?" he asked, but Blinky was too excited to register the question. "He read the book. He read the book!" Blinky beamed as he hugged Jim, all six of his eyes as round as dinnerplates and his smile as wide as it had ever been. "Books tasty," AAARRRGGHH agreed, smiling as well.