The third round of the Warriors of the World tournament is underway! All these fighters now have two wins under their belt, a net positive outcome, but it only gets tougher from here on out! Seed no. 51, Lucy Heartfilia (Nominated by FinnMcMissileCar) versus seed no. 46, Ryu Hayabusa (nominated by Somebody)!
Tournament Main Page is here
Voting[]
Voting has ended.
Intro[]
The audience has once again been gripped by a shocking death to a brave fighter, delivered by another heroic soul. Is this tournament corrupting its participants with power as they push themselves to win it all? Or is there still a huge discrepancy in the strength of the combatants even after almost 100 have been eliminated? With one of the upcoming fighters having barely escaped a violent death dealer only to face another coming into this round, breaths are held. With the changing of the fighters, significant members of the audience also change: images of the next two warriors of the world are projected high in the sky, and those who intend to root for (or against) them are moving up to front and center of the floating stands.
Announcer: Seed number fifty-one, who previously defeated Jason Voorhees… LUCY HEARTFILIA!!!
While the transportation pillars are a spectacle to behold no matter who they bring into the battlefield, some characters just seem to suit them better than everyone else. The magical mages of the Fairy Tail guild are among them, with the beam glittering like fairy dust as it slams from heaven to earth, teleporting the Celestial Spirit mage into the warzone. Healing between battles isn’t limited to just physical; mental reparations are also performed by the tournament’s state-beyond-the-art facilities, but it’s still apparent that Lucy carries with her some trauma from her bout with the slasher villain. Behind her blonde hair and bright blue uniform, her eyes are wary, and much more focused on the upcoming battle.
Elfman: It would take a REAL man to challenge Lucy after the absolute thrashings she’s been giving out. Hmph!
Mavis: I provided her with seven thousand four hundred and twenty two battle strategies for all the variety of foes she’d face. If she follows any of the three designed for ninjas, her victory is guaranteed!
Announcer: Seed number fourty-six, who previously defeated FN-2199… RYU HAYABUSA!!!
Opposite the magical girl comes a man of the sword. When the pillar of light summons forth the ninja to the battlefield, it comes as a surprise to some when it is just as bright and spectacular as the rest of them, given his penchant for darkness and stealth. But clad in his dark cloth, Ryu Hayabusa makes no attempt to hide as he steps out into the battlefield, his Dragon Sword already unsheathed and glinting in the light. His eyes are locked on to Lucy, perhaps in a show of arrogance, or a subtle wordless gesture that he recognizes the strength she brings, and he won’t dance around it with tricks. With a quick spin of the blade around his wrist, Hayabusa crouches, preparing himself to strike the millisecond the battle begins.
Murai: It would be a disgrace for you to lose to this hussy, Hayabusa. Don’t even bother with your sword.
Rachel: I hope he doesn’t kill her at least. Some of Ryu’s friends want her for beach volleyball when this is all over.
Ryu remains motionless, unnerving Lucy as she realizes she needs to prepare a defense to save her life already. Her hands trembling, she fumbles around the ring of keys at her waist, nervously sifting through to find the best one to use. The two stare each other down while the arena’s monitors flash through a sequence of landscapes in a random pattern, this round’s replacement of the dual-biome battlefield.
Lucy: I should warn you… my friends and I are a lot tougher than we look!
Ryu: Exactly.
Lucy: Crap… that didn’t phase him in the slightest…
Settling on a key, she grips it tightly while the arena once again begins to tremble and rip apart as hard-light holographic projections begin to take hold. The random battlefield generator has settled on an image of the inside of series of fighter jets lining the runway of a carrier. But as the battlefield is generated around them, it soon becomes apparent that this is no ordinary aircraft carrier. Unbound by the laws of the sea, this vessel becomes situated in the sky, the ground around it collapsing into a fifty-thousand foot drop. The logo of the security organization SHIELD is painted over the runway of the patented Helicarrier, and all of its toys are free for use in the battle of sword and sorcery. And all this time, Hayabusa has not moved an inch from his starting crouch.
ONE MINUTE MELEE! READY!
FIGHT!!![]
60
In a split second, Ryu blitzes forward with an upwards slash, the Dragon Sword flashing like a crescent moon. The Celestial Spirit Key held in Lucy’s hand is nicked by the blade, and it’s a miracle it isn’t cleaved in half (a bigger miracle that she didn’t lose her fingers). But instead, the weapon is forced out of her hand and up into the air.
59
As Lucy stumbles backwards in surprise, Ryu leaps up into a spinning kick, his first heel striking the falling key and sending it flying off into the carrier, where it thunks uselessly into the side of a jet. The second kick comes into the side of Lucy’s head, dropping her down to the ground with a harsh landing and a cry of pain. Standing triumphant already, the dragon eagle wastes no time in casting his shadow over his opponent, flipping his katana around and gripping it with both fists, ready to drive it down and run his foe through. But when he shoves the Dragon Sword down, he’s met with a bright flash of light that causes his eyes to glow in surprise; the tip of his sword doesn’t pierce flesh, it stabs into a solid glass wall reinforced with a magical barrier. Lucy’s body is contained within Horologium the Clock Spirit, who looks nonplussed up at the bloody ninja while his master crouches within him in the fetal position.
Horologium: “You fell for it!”, my mistress exclaims brashly.
Swinging his sword down, Ryu slices clean through the metal of the carrier to get the edge of his blade underneath the living clock, lifting and hurling him into the air with a powerful upper slash. With a strong leap, he chases after him, and the Dragon Sword glows with a malevolent red shadow as Ryu slashes rapidly across the clock; each slash rams into a protective shield cast by the spirit’s defensive magic, but it’s a barrier that Ryu rapidly burns through with each strike. All the while, Lucy’s body glows with a bright light inside, making it a race to see who can hit their goal first: Lucy transforming, or Ryu cutting her apart. And when the vertical momentum of his jump runs out, Hayabusa grips the sides of the clock and takes him with him in his fall, spinning into a violent piledriver that smashes Horologium against the helicarrier floor. Horologium, stone-faced as ever, disappears in a flash of golden light, his power exhausted… and from out of this light, Lucy Heartfilia leaps out, now clad in a cow print bikini and packing a knuckle sandwich that she feeds straight into the ninja’s jaw.
49
Rocked by the blow, Hayabusa flies backwards, turning his fall into a handspring and a backflip to avoid completely collapsing over. With a quick glance over to the side, he sees the cause of the confusion; as indicated by a flashing comic bubble, the key he kicked out of Lucy’s hands is a paltry one, belonging to the useless spirit Plue. A decoy to bait him into robbing her of a useless weapon. Clasping his hands together, he pours his life energy into a ninja art, conjuring burning wheels of flame into the air beside him that he quickly launches back to Lucy, hoping not to lose any momentum. With the physical enhancements of the bull spirit Taurus, plus her experience on the wrong end of Natsu’s fire magic, Heartfilia simply crosses her arms in front of her to brace for the attack. The fire wheels reach her and blast apart like fireworks on impact, though she holds her own while only sliding backwards a couple of feet; keeping this guard up also helps her block Ryu’s incoming flying kick. While he aims his stomp at her face, he only succeeds in striking her covered forearms and sending her sliding on her heels to the side of the carrier, right next to an ambient jet. With a crack of the whip at her hip, Lucy snags the fighter by the wing and twists her torso, hurling the entire jet towards Ryu, the ninja becoming blanketed by the incoming projectile’s shadow in less than a second. But unafraid, he leaps forward to take it head on; the Dragon Sword is quick-drawn, and a line of light appears through the jet before it is cleaved in half, each segment falling to the side of its target and exploding in a brilliant fireball. However, Lucy’s next whip swing is to the ground in front of her, packing enough force to carve a huge gash into the carrier and generate a tremendous shockwave of energy, a shockwave that Ryu lands in and gets ruptured by.
38
Stunned on the spot, Ryu is hapless for a few seconds while Lucy rushes towards him, jabbing another key into the air. Opening the gate into the spirit world, the Fairy Tail mage summons one of her greatest allies while equipping herself into his star dress visage at the same time; now clad in a beautiful black ballgown, she compliments the tuxedo of Loke nicely as he lands on the opposite side of Ryu to begin a tag-team beatdown. Spirit and summon both mirror each other’s movements punch for punch, kick for kick, as they lay into Hayabusa, each strike sending off a flash of golden light with its impact. As he struggles to stay standing, the pair continues beating him back and forth between them until leaping up into synchronized spinning kicks, launching the Dragon Ninja into the air and over the side of the helicarrier, where only a simulated drop to his death awaits him below. Not willing to go out so easily, Hayabusa quickly draws out one of his most trusted weapons; a heavily-weighted Kusarigama that he launches forward into the side of the carrier, imbedding its spiked blade into the side of the military craft and stopping his fall.
30
Dangling by a chain, Ryu swings his body into the side of the carrier, planting his feet against its wall. And with the grace of a ninja, he propels himself into a run, sprinting up the vertical surface in defiance of the air resistance and clearing his way back to the main level of the carrier, much to Lucy and Loke’s surprise. Arms spread wide and legs crouched in, Hayabusa resembles a descending eagle as he moves down against Lucy, and that’s exactly what he transforms into with a sudden plume of smoke. With a shrill shriek, the bird of prey dive-bombs Lucy and yanks her into the air through her hair before Loke can intervene. The lion spirit, desperate to save his friend and master, propels himself upwards with a raised fist, his punch overflowing with golden Regulus energy, but it’s an attack he never gets to land as Ryu hurls Lucy up before turning his attention to the Spirit. Just before the punch’s impact, Hayabusa returns to normal, now holding a scroll between his hands that he plants in the path of Leo’s punch; upon striking it, the Golden Spirit suddenly finds himself within the trappings of a burst of white light, and in a split second, he falls to the carrier floor encased in a boulder of ice. A successful gambit, but he’s not done; glancing behind him, Ryu sees an enraged Celestial Mage falling towards him, now donning a blue qipao and two bright red swords.
20
Wielding the Dragon’s Claw and the Tiger’s Fang, Hayabusa brings his own pair of swords up to clash against Lucy’s mid-air. Blocking her attack by crossing his blades, he then rips them apart to force Heartfilia off of him and back down to the surface of the carrier where they both land, only to rush towards each other again. Four blades duel in a violent dance, but Hayabusa’s superior skill is evident almost immediately. For each strike Lucy swings his way, he parries it twice for good measure, gradually pressing her backwards until she’s on the full defensive. And with a glint in his eyes, he twirls his twin katanas before slashing them horizontally three times; Heartfilia flinches, and when her eyes open, the swords in her hands fall apart into four fragments, having been cut cleanly through. Her jaw drops and her eyes explode into blank white discs at her predicament, and just before Hayabusa swings to decapitate her, she drops into a crouch, the trailing ends of her ponytail being all that gets cut for now.
11
And then she kicks him in the balls.
Pouting like a child, the crouching Lucy swings her foot up with all her might, smiting the Ninja between his Gaidens with enough force to nearly pop his eyeballs out of his skull.
10
Barely avoiding falling over, Ryu swings his knee up into Lucy’s face, a blow with mitigated strength thanks to the internal damage echoing through his body. Heartfilia, being somewhat proud of herself, takes the hit and rolls away, buying herself distance between the two fighters before she gets up. At the same time, Ryu makes a few short hops away, having the same idea in mind. It’s time for a final showdown, and Ryu claps his hands together while summoning forth a last ninja art. As his hands channel the powers of fire, opposite him, Lucy begins to glow blue, her Star Dress once again changing into a revealing bikini armour, this one a light aqua colour. These faint glows rapidly intensify until Ryu Hayabysa is basically a walking furnace, while Lucy becomes the ocean incarnate, overflowing with hydro power. And both thrust their attacks forward at the same time. Lucy’s Torrent rushes forward like a concentrated cannon of water, while Ryu’s True Inferno becomes a stream of flame shaped like a roaring dragon. Red meets blue when the elemental attacks smash into each other, causing one half of the carrier to light up in the colour of its respective warrior.
3
The beam struggle holds out for a few seconds, each fighter trying their best in this final push to join the ranks of the top sixteen Warriors of the World. But nature prevails when water overcomes fire; in spite of all the evaporation and steam the dragon flame forces upon its opposition, the powers of Aquarius triumph when the wave blasts the dragon apart and dissipates it, sending a crashing wave of water right down on top of Hayabusa.
K.O!!![]
After the deluge washes over Lucy’s opponent, the flood rushes over the surface of the helicarrier, rapidly drenching a large portion of it in a foot of water; it begins to cascade over the side like a waterfall, carrying a stray jet with it as it falls beautifully through the air, catching a rainbow in its mists. Fortunately, Hayabusa’s water-logged body doesn’t get washed to its death over the side of the ship, and as the levels recede, he becomes visible, drenched and unconscious in a Yamcha-pose. Not only that, but the residual heat from his fire art has already begun to melt the ice boulder Loke was imprisoned in, a fact Lucy only becomes aware of when she suddenly spots her Celestial Spirit’s hand twitching in the open air. In a panic, she forgets about her victory and rushes over to embrace him while the audience cheers for her hard-fought win.
Announcer: THIS MATCH’S WINNER IS… LUCY HEARTFILIA!!!
Happy: And the power of Lucy’s friendship carries her to a win over a bloodlusted slasher for the second time in a row. AYE!
Outro[]
Misc.[]
- This is the eighteenth fight in MP's One Month of Melee May 2025
- For the rest of MP999's Melees, click here: User:MP999
- For MP999's Death Battles, click here