Arrival in Valenhelm

After a month, the ship arrived in the elf kingdoms.

"We're here, sire" said Taria.

It was a few more days on horseback before they reached Valenhelm where they were taken to the colosseum where a blonde male elf was sat on a throne.

"Ruliron Stormlock" said Alice, "Emperor of the High Elf Empire"

Next to Ruliron was his wife Tarvanya.

"So you're this dark lord everyone's been talking about" he said, "I gotta say, I was expecting more"

"Is this gonna be one of those elves are better than us things?"

Fred always did think the Lord of the Rings elves were just a bunch of stuck up pricks. Tarena was in awe at the place. In the human kingdoms, a high elf like her was treated like dirt to the point she believed her kind were inferior to humans.

Fred spotted some black guys standing around. They were dressed like Persians.

"Are they in the tournament?" asked Fred, "aren't they human?"

"They're from a different continent called Perdigger" said Alice, "don't make eye contact or-"

Suddenly one of the guys from Perdigger noticed Fred and Alice and walked up to them.

"Good day, I would like to humbly apologise for the piracy and slavery we once practiced on your kind"

"I was afraid of this" said Alice, "every race on Arizelle has practiced slavery and still practices it these guys feel the need to constantly apologise for a form of it that ended over a century ago. Its better than what you get from the orcs"

"Yeah, we killed a bunch of orcs when we invaded Crowind"

"Those were just mercenaries" said Alice, "the Orc Nations are still mad because humans and elves once enslaved orcs. Nevermind the fact that orcs were doing to same thing to humans and elves and even other orcs, or the fact that they were the ones who sold the orc slaves to humans and elves or the fact they still carry on this practice"

"So basically, they're a bunch of butthurt hypocrites?"

"That's one way to put it"

While butthurt was not a term widely used in Arizelle, Alice had been around Fred long enough to understand his dialect. Fred could see some male orcs. Among them were a bunch of naked female orcs being led by chains round their necks.

"Damn, the males are fuck ugly but the females are fucking hot"

"Those are half-orcs" said Alice, "its impossible to tell if they're half-human or half-elf. Pureblood female orcs are used mostly for keeping themselves racial pure but the halfbreeds are used for pleasure"

The whole thing reminded Fred of a really bad movie there male and female dwarves found one another repulsive, making him wonder how they weren't extinct. Fred talked with the Predigger leader, Tritrus.

Tritrus was a jovial fellow. The two talked about various feats they'd accomplished. It turned out Predigger had been fighting the Crimson Dominion who had been trying to invade their lands. Tritrus himself had brought down various generals.

It was indeed possible that without Crowind's conflict with Predigger, they might have been better defended when Team Fred attacked the place. It turned out one of the other fighters was Tritrus' sister, Ritsa, who had also fought the Crimson Dominion.

Speaking of the Crimson Dominion, Fred then saw their current empress Farsel and a group of dark elves and quickly approached her.

"What are you doing here?" he asked.

"We came for the prize money" said Farsel.

"Planning to fund an invasion now that Jormund is dead? Listen, if our teams end up fighting each other, I want you to throw the match. If you do, I'll let you out of that chastity device"

"Deal"

"And whats that smell?"

"Like I told you before" said Farsel, "I can't take the thing off so I have to shit in it"

Fred decided he should probably let Farsel out anyway given the impracticalities of this punishment.

But she didn't need to know that. Having another team willing to throw the match against him would be huge advantage.