Adrian chuckled at Lydia. [i]"Don't believe me yet, huh? Well, we'll see how things turn out."[/i] Adrian began walking toward the entrance of the villain arena, but a voice halted his progress.

"Well, well, well," she said, and Adrian turned to see a lanky girl with long, brunette hair and light skin. "If it isn't the big, bad Abaddon."

"Sally," said Adrian as he turned to face her. "Just who I was looking for."

Sally raised an eyebrow at this, "Oh, really? If I recall correctly you didn't want a damn thing to do with me. What'd you want?"

"I have use of you now. Nothing more, nothing less."

"'Use of me?' Christ, you're still a prick."

"What?"

Sally rolled her eyes and sighed, "and clueless," she said before walking past him, but as she did Adrian lightly grabbed her by the arm.

"Listen, you don't have to do much. All I need you to do is heal me."

Sally ripped her arm away from him, "Fuck off! Even Lilith treats me better than you did, and she's a fucking [i]demon[/i]. She actually communicates with me and doesn't shut me out. So why the hell would I help you?" she asked, staring him down.

Adrian stood his ground and a moment of silence passed before the arena below them erupted into cheers and whoops, "Don't worry about it," he said, turning to make way to the villain arena.

"I feel bad for Dillon! She must be going through hell!" Sally called after him, but Adrian offered her no response as he continued to descend the stairs to the arena. Despite his silence, however, her words did not ring hollow.

[b][center]Khione vs. Miasma[/center][/b]

Veronica and Frank put their hands to their lips to hush the crowd, and the villains and minions quieted themselves. In the arena stood only two villains this time, and standing on the first place pedestal was Khione. She stood at 5'5 with platinum blond hair, icy blue eyes, and pale skin. From her body drifted a cold mist and the entire platform she stood on was frozen solid, covering the glowing one in blue ice. To her left stood Miasma who was a young boy with straight, short black hair but was seemingly ordinary as he stood upon the platform numbered '2.'

"Unfortunately, since our third ranked villain isn't here, we'll have to disqualify him," she said, making a sad face for the audience to see, and then following up with running her index finger from the corner of her eye down her cheek. 

"As heart breaking as it is, Veronica," said Frank as he pretended to pull a tissue from his pocket and handed it to her, but she responded by playfully smacking his hand away. "Luckily, we have two villains here ready to rip one another to pieces!" 

The crowd cheered in response to this as Frank waltzed over to Miasma and asked, "So, Miasma, do you feel good about today's match?"

"I-I don't know."

"Oh? Well, will you challenge Khione then? Or will you stay where you are?"

Miasma took a deep breath and swallowed hard, and looked over to Khione who glared at him, daring him to answer with anything that isn't "no." He hesitated to say anything, but the crowd's wide eyes stared him down as they held their breath.

"I-I don't think I will," he stammered.

"Booo!" yelled a minion from the audience, which prompted the other villains and minions to join in, causing the entire stadium to erupt in boos and insults.

"Aww," said Veronica as she made another sad face. "Come on!"

"Yeah!" encouraged Frank. "Give the people a show! Right?" he said, encouraging the crowd to cheer, which they did, various whoops and yells could be heard in the stands.

"Y-yeah. A-alright, I'll challenge her."

"Atta boy!" Frank cajoled as the audience cheered along with him. "Let's get this match started then!"

Khione sighed upon his response, uncrossed her arms, and stepped down from her platform. Frank and Veronica simultaneously clapped twice, and disappeared in their usual dense cloud of pink smoke, leaving Khione and Miasma to stare at one another. 

"Can't say I'm surprised, just disappointed," Khione said, a white smoke left her mouth upon every word she uttered. "You think you're brave taking me on, don't you? In actuality, you're foolish and cowardly by giving into them," she said. "All they want to do is see you bleed. And they will."

Miasma's brows furrowed as he gritted his teeth. "Oh yeah?"

"Yeah."

Miasma took a long, deep breath, his chest expanding to unnaturally large proportions before closing his mouth. A moment passed in hushed silence amongst the crowd as something stirred within Miasma's chest, but Khione only callously examined the cuticles of her fingernails.

Suddenly Miasma lurched forward, opening his mouth and releasing a purple gas that bulleted toward Khione and the audience behind her. Immediately, ice already formed beneath Khione's feet expanded, and erected into a massive ice pillar that lifted her fifty feet into the air. The gas slamming into the base of the ice pillar instead of Khione.

Just then, a blue force-field formed around and above the arena, enveloping Miasma and Khione within the battle-zone, and closing off any of the gas from escaping into the stands.

The purple gas was so thick and prominent the floor and base of the ice pillar could not be seen, and surrounded Miasma as it loomed a few feet above the arena floor. "So," Khione called down to him with her hands on her hips. "This is suppose to be the part where your opponent inhales your gas, coughs, and then passes out; but only if they don't hold their breath for a period of time before finally having to breathe, am I right?"

"No, this is the part where I do this," he said as he motioned his left hand toward Khione and pointed at her. The gas flew toward her as she snapped her head around, eyes wide. She clapped her hands together, and the ice pillar expanded again, surrounding her in an ice dome. The gas besieged the fortress of ice with a resounding 'boom', but the fortress did not crack, but stood firmly. The gas surrounded the ice dome's entirety, attempting to locate a way to circumvent the ice's hard exterior. 

"You can't stay in there forever, Khione!" Miasma called up to her. "What will you do now?!"

After a moment a dozen ice spikes flew out from the side of the ice dome and straight toward Miasma. Miasma jumped back, and the ice spike shattered upon impact with the ground where he previously stood, but another managed to fly into his upper shoulder. "Gah!" He cried out in pain while blood poured from his wound. "Dammit!"

The other ice spikes impeded themselves into the sand behind him. More sharp spikes jutted out from the ice dome, ready to fly again. 

[i]"Interesting,"[/i] thought Adrian. [i]"A defeat like this might be boring, but it's slow, humiliating, painful, and cruel. Reminds me of my match with Lilith.[/i]

The ice spikes shot from the ice dome again, but this time one flew into Miasma's foot and upper thigh. Miasma continued to scream in pain and desperation. [i]"Now he can't move. This is over."[/i]

Leaving no time for recovery more ice spikes shot from the ice dome toward Miasma. He covered his head in a protective manner as the ice spikes shot toward him and sank into his chest. He continued to cry out in pain and coughed up blood into the tanned sand. Miasma raised his hand defensively and said, "O-okay! I'm sorry! I'm so sorry! I yield! I quit!" Miasma's gas slowly dispersed as he held his hand up and the ice dome opened up to reveal a smirking Khione. Her eyes shifted over to Adrian while he stared back at her, [I]"Were you trying to get my attention?"[/i] he thought to himself. [i]"Well, you certainly have it now."[/i]