"It would put a bad taste in my mouth to see two brothers kill each other in the ring." The voice said. The voice speaking turned out to be none other than the Emperor himself.
"Sir, we have the trunk that you asked for." Perka said as several servants brought a large trunk into the Emperor's suite.
"Ah good, just in time." The Emperor said as he opened the case and removed a large curved sword with fur around the hilt.
"Oh? What is that shabby looking sword your majesty?" One of the Imperial counselors said. With both the Ministers' of the Left and Right dead, the rest of the Imperial Court were poised to seize control of the Empire. The counselors seemed jovial and were laughing and celebrating.
"What are these fools so happy about?" Perka thought as she watched them. "Can't they see how the Emperor is looking at them? It's like…"
Suddenly all the counselors were dead. They had been cut in to pieces by the Emperor's sword.
"He was looking at them like a hawk looks at his prey."
"Anyway," The Emperor said as he got back on the speaker. "Like I was saying, it'd be a bummer to see a man kill his brother. But don't worry I have a different opponent in mind for you."
Suddenly, a man started to make his way down into the arena. He had long red hair and wore an extravagant but weathered suit of armor and carried a large curved sword with fur around the hilt.
People in the arena started to wonder who the man was. Who other than "Star" would be trusted with the final battle to decide the fate of the Empire?
The answer to this question requires that we go back in time over 500 years in the past. During the time of the end of the Second Great Coalition War. According to Imperial records, the conflict was an Imperial victory and lead to the greatest expansion in territory in the Empire's history.
This was technically true, but the records leave out a great deal of important details. The largest omission was the fact that the Coalition Army at that time had actually pushed the Imperial Army back to the capital and laid siege to Lakashia. The Imperial records insist that the Imperial Army had never suffered a defeat before in pitched battle.
The Coalition at that time was led by an Empire that many people on Earth would actually be familiar with. The leader of the Coalition was actually the Neo Mongol Empire. The story for how the Mongol Empire ended up in space is obviously a long one but to make the story short, the Mongols had actually discovered the use of aura and used their new found abilities to turn their conquests towards space.
The Mongol Empire on Earth would collapse and break apart soon after their departure as they took many of their strongest warriors and Generals. However, the space ward faction would lead great conquests of their own and create what would come to be known as the Neo Mongol Empire.
The conquests of the Mongols put them into direct conflict with the Celestial Empire of Lakashia around 500 years ago. For the first time since their formation, the Imperial forces were dealt defeat after defeat until they were pushed all the way back to the Imperial capital.
The Imperial capital had only known victory for centuries, so it was ill suited to withstand a siege. Therefore the Emperor at the time, Rahamzat II, entered negotiations with the Neo Mongolian Army. The negotiations between the two sides lasted over a year. They refused to surrender outright, but suggested a compromise that would result in the least amount of bloodshed in the capital.
The compromise came in the form of what would now be known as a Grand War Festival. The exact same event that was currently being held. Fifteen of the strongest Mongol warriors went up against fifteen of the Empire's best.
The Neo Mongol Coalition team had a 7-6 lead going into the second to last match. In that match the current Empire's strongest warrior, a man by the name Gou Haku Mei, easily won his match to tie the score. Gou Haku Mei was an unparalleled genius and a peerless warrior. However, he had found a kindred spirit in the strongest warrior of the Neo Mongols Taimoor, who he had developed a strong friendship with over the past year.
With the score tied and the final match featuring Taimoor, he knew that the Imperials would lose. He was fine with that, though he was a part of the nobility he had no love nor even interest in the Empire. His whole life had been one of absolute boredom. No opponent had ever been strong enough to interest him. Nobody had ever caught his interest at all.
It was only Taimoor and his sister were the light in the darkness that was the life of Gou Haku Mei. Taimoor was the only man that could rival Gou Haku Mei's peerless strength, and Gou Haku Mei loved Taimoor's sister Ujin.
Though he was a member the noble Mei clan, he had no such love for the Empire that he served. Therefore, he had no problem with the fact that the Empire was about to fall at the hands of his friend.
The same could not be said for the Emperor however. When he saw that Taimoor was about to defeat his champion, he had his guards seize his sister and put a sword to his throat. This distracted him long enough for his opponent to land a fatal blow.
This turn of events enraged Gou Haku Mei. He slaughtered the guards and the Emperor, and every other Imperial official in attendance. Unfortunately, Ujin was killed by one of the guards in the commotion.
In the aftermath of the event the two ministers of the Right and Left, who weren't present at the time of the slaughter, took control of the Empire and set the man who killed the former Emperor on the throne. However, they knew that these turns of events would cause panic across the Empire.
Their solution was to erase the involvement of the Neo Mongol Empire, and declare that the Second Coalition War was a dominant victory for the Empire. Secondly, the slaughter of the Imperial officials was blamed on Gou Haku Mei, and the Mei clan was punished for his actions. In reality, they changed Gou Haku Mei's name to Rahamzat III and put him on the throne in an attempt to alleviate his rage.
However, Gou Haku Mei did not feel rage after a while. In fact, he didn't feel much of anything at all. With the only people he ever cared about gone, his life slipped back into the colorless mundane existence that it had been before.
To alleviate his boredom, he introduced the system of War Festivals, hoping to one day find another warrior that could equal him like Taimoor did. He spent his days drinking and spending time with an ever growing harem of women from around the Empire hoping to one day love a woman the way he loved Ujin. Gou Haku Mei's power was so great that he never aged, nor was anyone powerful enough to kill him, so he spent century after century searching someone or something to fill the two holes that were left in his heart. Until finally, Toro Fernandez emerged as a warrior worthy of his attention.
"Ahahaha!" The man let out a great laugh as he stepped foot into the arena. "I've been waiting for this moment for 500 years. Don't disappoint me now. My friend!" Gou Haku Mei said as he slashed his sword at Toro.
"Don't disappoint you?" Toro said as he parried the strike. "That's my line. I might not have waited 500 years, but I've been looking forward to this fight too!"