A volley of arrows ripped across the sky over the dark army. At the front of the army, a great general lead his men in to the Noxian shields. The great leader ran fast at his enemies swingling wildly. He wore a blue and yellow breast plate and a plated skirt. He raised raised the sword in his right hand in to the air and let out a war cry. They charged.

My eyes opened and I jolted up. I looked around the room gasping for air. I caught my breath and sat back against the headboard of my bed. “Holy shit.” I said softly. I stood up and walked over to my window and threw it open. The winter Demacian air entered my room and nearly froze the sweat to my chest and neck. I looked out in to the streets at a group of guards patrolling the streets.

“Nice night? Am I right?” I called out to them and paused waiting for an answer.

“Absolutely perfect, but my hands are probably going to fall off.” Yelled a guard up at me.

I let out a small laugh and closed my window. I turned to my door and left my room. The lights were on downstairs which meant my room mate must have been up. I was attending the Combat University of Demacian, majoring in swordsmanship and minoring in matial arts. I walked down the stairs from my attic bedroom and entered the kitchen where he was preparing a sandwich.

“What are you doing up so late?” I asked him in a tired voice as I scratched at my eyes. He turned his eyes and filled his mouth with the sandwich.

He chewed his food quickly and answered. “Practicing my lightning shit, I’m still pretty bad at it.” He explained.

I moved in to the living room where textbooks littered the table and a battery Othello was charging. Othello was the best friend I had ever had, and the only man from my group that survived the Trial with me. The Trials was a Demacian festivity ever since the great war of Runeterra. It was Demacia’s way of weeding out the weak and only allowing only the strong to move forwards in life. It began in the beginning of the winter months, where children at the age of twelve were sent in groups in to the mountains to fight other groups. No one was allowed to come back before the two week mark or after the three week mark. Those who came before, or after, the marks would be shot and killed.

I was orphaned at the age of eleven, since my father was killed in war and my mother died giving birth to me. And if it weren’t for the death of my parents, I would have never been able to kill anyone. I was a peaceful lonely child who grew up with King Jarvan Lightshield the Fourth until after the Trials, when I was shipped to the Combat University. I swore to myself I would kill the man who was responsible for killing my father, and anything that stood in my way would fall the way my father did. It is said that he was killed by a man named Swain, who was now the tyrant over Noxus. For a long time I doubted my ability to kill someone, until it was time for my Trial.

I had just turned twelve the month before the Trials, but I was a lot more matured than the other children. In my group was a healer who’s name was Markus, an archer named Dwayne, a huge guy with a massive rock hammer named Odis, Othello and I. I was the only white guy there because I had no friends and they needed a final guy. I was probably one of the only non- racist people in my generation towards the blacks. Blacks were few but not so far between in Demacia. They all lived in the same district, because they were among the only families that could afford it, considering the majority of blacks came from the Shurima Desert and were rich from mineral exportation.

Everyone claimed that there was no racism in Demacia, but any realist could see it everytime they saw the way white people avoided the blacks. It was pretty normal though, the Blacks were technically Aliens to Demacia. Aliens that wanted out of the year round summer and endless days. They weren’t aliens to me, they were what made up my group of friends. It was really the white kids I avoided because they bullied me my whole life.

The first rule of the Trials is that no one is to kill anyone in the first day, but that didn’t stop people from throwing people off of cliffs, or freezing them with ice spells. The second rule was that no one was to kill a teammate, but that wasn’t really obeyed either. You see, the man who brought home the most dog tags was declared the Champion of that year. Champions were sought after by the League of Legends to be hired as entertainers.

We were given a week to devise a game plan before the beginning. We looked primarily at our advantages and disadvantages. We found two major advantages and a major distadvantage, the two advantages being we had an elemental mage that could create water, and we had an archer who could poison the water sources for us and our major disadvantage being that we had no one with heavy armor. We made a simple plan, poison water and avoid fighting. Neither of those things really happened.

We left the walls of Demacia and travelled south- east in to the mountains. I swore Markus hated me the minute we started the Trails. He always spoke to me with no respect, as if I was lesser than he was. But what could he do? Markus was a healer, he couldn’t kill me in my sleep. We made our way deep in to the mountains and ran in to another group.

“Hey! Look. It’s team Oreo cookie.” Jarvan the Fifth called out to us. Immediately we squared off in defensive positions.

“Move along J5, you know there’s no fighting on the first day.” Othello said calmly.

Jarvan five looked at Othello with a calm smirk on his face. “So you live to die another day… Grease moneky.”

Othello smiled at his insult and blew a kiss at Jarvan. Everyone loved Jarvan the Fifth, who they called J5 or Jarv. The only reason they loved him was because he was Jarvan Four’s, our king’s, son. Being on good terms with the king meant you were on good terms with the country, which meant good jobs, cheap housing, and none of the dirty work in the military. It was a lazy life to be honest. I hated Demacia and everything it didn’t stand for. It stood for justice primarily. Justice and honour. If you asked me, I feel like justice and honour were among things that Demacia lacked most.

I couldn’t wait to leave this shit hole and move to the island country of Ionia. There you could be anything, literally anything, and be accepted by the people. It didn’t matter if you were white, black, purple, green or a monkey like the great Wukong is. Respect was something that was earned in Ionia, and not from the people you knew. No, in Ionia respect was earned by your talents as a person and as a warrior. It was where misfits went to become legend. The blind, the weak, the strong; anyone was allowed in Ionia.

After our little run in with J5 and his elite group of dick heads, we made our way to the water system. We rested along side the river while Dwayne readied his posion. Odis stood up and declared we had made a mistake, and that we couldn’t poison the water.

“This river supplies much of the water to Demacia. If we poison this water we could kill thousands.” His voice was low and strong.

And a harsh reality that fighting and killing was our only way out of this settled on us. We shared a small moment of silence and reconciled on what was to come. We set up camp and Othello built a small fire for us to sleep around. Othello sat up that night, not sleeping at all. None of us really did, all because of Othello. He had this intuition like no other, and we trusted it. What choice did we really have? If he felt like something bad was going to happen, it most likely was.

He sat up and watched the snow covered trees for the smallest of movements in the woods. I watched his eyes survey the woods. I went to speak, but my words were met quickly by a sound of dissmissal. I looked out to where he was looking, his lips sat still.

An arrow ripped out from the woods towards Othello, he ducked down and shot a line of fire in to the tree lighting the tree in flames. They engaged on us from the woods sending magic and arrows down on us. I drew my sword and charged at them. I locked eyes with a blonde haired girl who held a double sided axe in her hands. She jumped in the air and swung down hard on me. I moved beside the axe to my right and swung a punch upwards on her chin. Her head swung backwards after the swing; I followed up with a thrust of my sword to her stomach. She moved just of the way and swung heavy with her axe. I raised my sword to block her right handed baseball swing. Her axe knocked my sword clean out of my hand and on to the snow a few feet to my left. She swung from the left, I ducked. I came up and slammed my right hand in to her stomach and she buckled over. I grabbed her throat and threw her backwards on to the ground. I came down on top of her and planted my hands on her throat once more.

I squeezed tighter and tighter around her throat with every ounce of strength and hatred I had. She begged silently for her life, moving her lips and grabbing my forearms. She became weaker and weaker as she struggled and finally she grew pale and stopped moving. I let go of her throat and at the enxact imprint of my fingers on her neck. Her eyes didn’t shut, and her chest didn’t inflate anymore. She was dead, never to see, hear, love or have children. I looked up around me at the eight individuals who sat and watched me sit over her and stare at the finger marks on her neck. I grabbed my sword and stood up and looked further at their faces. My blood flowed fast through me veins, heating my body beyond comfort.

A young man stepped forwards towards me and swung downwards with his sword. I spun beside his swing and gave him a swing of my own. My sword came a little downwards on the back of his neck. I looked over to the kid that stood beside him and stabbed my sword through his chest. The last one took off running, I left my sword in the chest and went after him. I sprinted hard after and lept on to his back, throwing him to the ground. I rolled him over and began to swing down, over and over, and over again. I placed my thumb on his throat, and felt no pulse. I sat back off of him and rested against a tree.

Who was I? Did I really just do what I did? the seconds felt like hours while I sat against that tree. The longest seconds I have ever felt. I stared at the bloody and mutilated face of the young man I just murdered. Othello joined me against the tree and held in his hands a few dog tags and my sword.

“Are you alright?” He asked me, his desert accent weight heavily through his words.

“Surprisingly, yeah. I’m a hundred percent perfect right now. To be honest, I feel relieved.” I said softly.

He set the dog tags in my hand and my sword to my right side. I read the names of the children I had just killed. Soneyah, Daughter of Kroff, Yoness, Son of Kroff, Marcal, Son of Kroff. Triplets, I thought to myself and sighed. David, Son of Mercuriah and Shaun, Son of Playtea. I placed the dogtags in a small leather pouch I had hanging off of the waist of my pants. I looked over at Soneyah and her throat that was now black and blue from the choke marks bruising. I grabbed my sword, sheathed it and walked over to her body. I knelt down beside her and brushed the hair off her face and closed her eyes. I picked her up and began walking towards Demacia.

I could hear Othello, Odis, Markus and Dwayne take a body and do the same thing. The city wasn’t far from us, and it didn’t take long for us to show up. In the distance we could see Jarvan five and his group of rejects standing over a group of five bodies. I set Soneya down once we reached the walls.

“Killing little girls are we?” He asked him while leaning on his lance that was still stuck in the chest of a kid named Kaytar. He looked at the bruises on her throat and elaborated.

“I bet she begged you for her life before you squeezed it out of her.”

I looked over at him, and didn’t speak. I drew my sword, the four men behind him drew weapons as well.

“Now, now. This will be him and I. The winner get’s the pleasure of returning his dog tags.” J5 said before removing a couple of dog tags from his leather pouch and showed me. I let out a small laugh and grabbed at the five in my pouch and showed him.

“Must have been tough crushing that little girls neck.” He picked at me.

I took a step towards him and held my sword straight outwards at him. He took a step back and grabbed his lance and lifted it to me. “I hope that you’re ready kid, because I’m not some little helpless girl.”

I didn’t speak a sound. I watched the anger in his eyes as he lunged at me with his lance. I swung my sword sideways and knocked the tip to my right and I swung. Jarvan raised his left hand and slammed his wrist guard against my sword and slammed his shoulder in to mine. I took a few steps and studied him; his movements, his weaknesses, his speed. He let out a heavy war cry and began to swing his lance in a large circle. I jumped backwards to avoid the bladed tip but it cut the front of my shirt. Jarvan finished his spin and aimed his spear at my chest, he lunged again. I knocked his lance away again and he jumped at me and smashed downwards on my wrists, knocking my sword out of my hand. He reset his stance and lunged again, I dodged to my right. He lunged again, I jumped to my left. He took a deep breath and pulled his arms back. The tip of his spear glowed a bright yellow and blue colour, to the point where it was nearly blinding. He screamed and thrusted forwards, I saw the tip of the spear and reached out to it. The end of the spear slammed in to my hands and stopped only a few inches in front of me.

Jarvan the fifth let go of the lance and stood still only to stare at what happened. I let go of the spear head and walked up to him. He shook gently in the wind and stared at me as if I were a ghost. I looked down at his neck and grabbed the dog tags and tore the chain off of him.

“Crushing that little girls neck, wasn’t half as easy as crushing you.” I said in a harsh voice in his ear. He kept silent and stared at me helplessly. I looked up at the walls, that were lined with the people of Demacia who watched our duel. “Those are your people up there, watching you fall. See, in there, you’re the law. But outside these walls, in the trial, you’re mine.” I looked back up to the still faces and back to him. “They counted on you. They counted on their future king to win. They counted wrong.”