Nariko Inazuma vs Artemis Kaiser

[Alex Smiley]

Reminder:

- Word limit for Group Stage matches is 1500.
- 1 RP per wrestler per match.
- Deadline: January 20, 2019, at 11:59PM Pacific.

[Vonberry]

You know me, Nariko, more than anyone else in this tournament.

But I also know you like if I held you in my arms when you were a baby yourself.

[Artemis Kaiser had a nasty habit of picking at dead skin if she was feeling a certain kind of way. Georgie stole the win away from her, the one she needed the most. Rollups are particularly something Artemis hates. So when she loses that way, she tends to let her psyche go. As she sat in the subtle lighting of a barren room, Artemis didn't look at the camera. Her eyes were seemingly fixated on something no one else could see, a phantom image that Artemis couldn't escape.]

Back when Strike first brought you in, I was one of the first to see you and greet you. I decided that a young wolf like you needed someone to look up to. That's exactly what I sought out. I let Strike handle how you would go about training but I bore witness to the efforts you began to make to separate yourself from what your father paved, to refrain from leaning on his legacy. He sent you to Lyn Dallins and Caroline Stark--oh, I mean, Caroline Dallins---

[It was a hidden barb aimed at Caroline, who Artemis both idolized and disliked in the same breath. A shot at the fractured relationship she once had in the past. Ergo, it was a shot that might entice the flames that nestled itself into Nariko's heart. If she was anything like her father, she would bear it, and Artemis would love to see if she could exploit that. The sinister giggle that followed her statement echoed that sentiment.]

Nariko Inazuma, the bastard child of Chris Strike, the student of the Dallins, and one of those progenies meant to take over the wrestling world one day. Yet, you realize several things about this match. We've both walked out of our matches with the same exact record. Conversely, we lost to the opposite people and now we sit here, needing this key win in order to save face. That's pressure to us, the suffocating feeling of being a failure in one of the biggest tournaments that wrestling has to offer.

For you, it's also the fact that you're taking a spot.

Poor Leander couldn't make it.

[Artemis giggled softly, yet in the overall aggressive air that Artemis brought forward--there was sadness.]

You're his replacement but also the woman carrying his legacy. I wanted to face him but I can never get the chance now. Do you feel the weight on your shoulders? Has it begun to break them? Do you realize that you may have squandered this chance and made fun of the final effort put forward by Leander? He gave you this chance to try to foster you but by doing so, he threw you out into the ocean where there are only sharks waiting to eat you up. You already had a weight on your ankle, so it's only a matter of time before you sink.

But Georgie? Scorpio? They have no impact on your career as much as I do. You've been looking at this match in the lineup, feeling the excitement the whole time. But you know that an inkling of dread lingered in your mind. It's only natural, I hear, when people come to face me. Even Georgie defeating me had to escape the match against me. Scorpio understood what I left him with. Even beyond our other group members and the myriad of political conflicts around us, you couldn't help but see me.

You hear the stories of the amount of damage I cause.

[In this tournament alone, Artemis has made his presence known. Trying to break Scorpio's skull in with the full series of the Crusades as well as attacking Georgie post-match. They were mere glimpses of the kind of person that Artemis was. Cold, heartless, and seeking out nothing but destruction to satisfy the emptiness in her life.]

You see the tapes of me leaving people in pools of their own blood. These people aren't just the random pieces of filth that try to make a name for themselves. These are the world champions, the rookies of the year, the tournament winners, the household names, the legends---I've come and conquered them all.

[Andreas Lasiewicz, Dexter Jacobs, Miko Ayano, Chandler Scott--those names may not register in the world of the Extremes but to Nariko, she knew them well.]

You remember when I nearly defeated your father before I even hit my stride.

[In the earlier portions of Artemis' career, she challenged Nariko's father for the Rey del HELL Championship in a match that saw how close Artemis was at the time to the higher realm of competition.]

You remember how I broke your trainer, Caroline, and left her in her desolation.

[At FFW Unstoppable 9, Artemis kept her undefeated record there going by defeating the toughest opponent she had at the time, Caroline Dallins. With the decisive defeat by Artemis' hands, Caroline has since become a shell of herself, taking on many horrific traits.]

But finally, they say a girl always remembers her first time.

[A sick joke from the normally humorless Kaiser.]

Nariko, you recall your first ever match. The 2017 Young Guns Cup. It was the place you made your debut. It was the place where you saw your chance to make a name for yourself.

It was also the night that I beat you twice in the center of the ring.

[Nariko remembered that the most. Many praised her for bringing her best fight but it was not nearly enough to stop the dominant force that Artemis brought to the tournament. It was her debut and it took how the wrestling world operated in the most painful way.]

You brought a fight to me as I knew you would. Chris Strike didn't raise a coward but there were these precious moments where you would freeze up. That's when I knew that I had you in the palm of my hand. Even when you hit me with the Shotei, you looked entirely shocked that you could do it.

From there, you went out to try to learn.

[Artemis paused.]

You tried to learn to win.

Yet, all I've known you for is losing. You keep making the same mistakes over and over. It almost makes me sick to see the product of so much hard work and potential waste it. Even now, with Leander's blessing, I still see you attempting to find the foothold to victory. Taste that precious win that will influence the rest of your career. You didn't get it against Scorpio. You didn't get it against Georgie.

So.

In this Group C Decider...that's what you called it...

[When Artemis looked into the camera for the first time, her eyes were wide with fervent energy. Something was coursing in her mind, telling her to do the worst things. Nothing there was coddling Nariko's existence. Instead, she looked at the camera, no, at Nariko, the same way that she looked at everyone else.]

Do you want to learn how to win by beating me?

[In retort, Artemis cackled. She did so to the point of doubling over.]

No.

[Her tone melted back into the somber state it was previously.]

You know what happens when I lose, Nariko? You've seen how I take it. You know what I present to you. When Georgie rolled me up, you knew exactly what kind of mindset it would send me into. It would make me want to just to mess up the next thing I see, let alone fight. Those are the stories I hope you paid attention to. The tales of victimization by yours truly.

[Artemis patted on her chest with the same frantic essence.]

But you won't be intimidated. You won't be scared. But you know I love that.

I love when fools run to fight me with reckless abandon. Nariko, you're that fool! You will come at me with everything you have, everything you have learned, everything you have suffered! BUT IT WON'T BE ENOUGH! The unfortunate circumstance given to you is the fact you know me and I know you. You have studied me. You have tried to come up with every gameplan you have but you don't know personally what I'm capable of.

This isn't just random destruction.

This is handcrafted mutilation.

[Artemis took a moment to collect herself. She almost lost herself entirely there. It wasn't time yet for that.]

I almost want to apologize to Strike and Leander but no. It's not necessary because I'm just being a harsh teacher to you, Nariko. Auntie Artemis has the best lesson in store for you.

You're not going to learn how to win.

You're going to learn how to survive.

[Strike]

Nariko taps the pen against the desk in which she finds herself sat upon. She blinks, feeling the fatigue and jet lag hitting her in stride as she's hunched against her seat at the Dulles airport in Washington D.C., waiting on her eventual flight that would take her to London and to the final match-up of the Experts group...

A match she'd been anticipating and dreading all at once.

Artemis Kaiser wasn't just somebody to be feared and revered. Someway, somehow, the woman who had now become the matriarch of the family itself after her father's passing had seen something in her...and addressing her in front of a camera was not quite going to come out in the way in which she would want. Nariko's emotions were already at a fever pitch after a relentless string of losses in Pro Wrestling NEO's "Heaven or Hell" tournament that took the conventional tournament rules and flipped them upside their head with the eventual "survivor" of that tournament being guaranteed the equivalent of wrestling hell personified.

Add that to a disappointing Experts campaign and it was just yet another reminder that Nariko Inazuma was nowhere near the same level as oh-so-many of those around her in the world of professional wrestling.

...But one way or another, Artemis' feelings...hell, Nariko's own feelings regarding this match, it needed a proper response in some way or another. Even if Artemis would be the only person to ever read this (hopefully), Nariko tapped the pen against the notebook she had open and with a deep breath, she began to just...write.

"Dear Auntie Artemis,

I write to you on this particular day with the utmost sincerity in regards of everything that I have come to learn in this near month and a half since the start of the tournament at hand. We arrived here with different sets of expectations, with you craving new competition unlike anything that you'd experienced before and I craved the experience to be able to succeed in the future against the fiercest of competition. Your aim was absolute victory from the get-go while I...well, I believed seeking victory would allow me to become stronger, even if the results were not what I sought to achieve in my time here. A draw against Georgie Nickles might be as impressive as anything to some, but I knew I could have had her if I hadn't made the mistake of using the top rope instead of a springboard. And then, Scorpio proved he was every bit the legend...and the reality is that he might be even better at this moment than the legends of yesteryear.

But in the end, it was a draw and a loss. I have nothing to show for my efforts and all of that when trying to balance out so many different things...what Leander Apollo couldn't be here to do, what so many wish for me in terms of growing and becoming better, there is a feeling of dread and disappointment alongside self-doubt that I have to keep fighting every single day. Something tells me that in similar shoes to mine, many others might have just quit by now.

You know well that I cannot and will not do that. Even as I face you in that squared circle once again, two years removed from a rude awakening and welcoming into the world of professional wrestling by you.

I have a chance to show you that the faith you placed on me during the Young Guns Cup in 2017 wasn't misplaced. That there's been more to me in these last two years than just suffering loss after loss, frustration after frustration. Talk is cheap, I know that as well as anyone and more often than not, it's why I try to opt for shutting up and letting my actions do the talking. Even if it means having to punch above my own weight class time and time again. I'm afraid that part isn't coming to an end anytime soon and our match is another big proof of that. Even more so knowing how things have changed in these last two years.

Auntie Artemis, I know that you're not the same woman that you were in 2017. You're far better...and you're far more vicious. Now, people have their theories on what's changed, how it's changed you, etc. That's...not for me to judge, let alone mention in any way, shape or form. I know more than most would think in terms of how much family and how your surroundings can change you. Before I knew that my dad was out there and that he was Chris Strike, I just...lived a life where I kept imagining this world and where my perception was that the only way I would ever be a part of it would be as a fan who shitposts on the internet about it. Never in a million years did I think back then that I would become a part of it.

But I did. And I worked hard to get here and it sucks when everything that I have to show you after two years for it is that I can take a beating and nothing more.

It hurts...it hurts so badly at times that I want to just puke and curse my own inability.

Something has to change, Auntie Artemis.

I have to change.

So when I walk into this match against you, one fall to a finish, I need to have something for you. Something that proves that your faith wasn't misplaced, something that shows me that I haven't been waking up every single day and hurting all over my entire body. So I submit myself to taking on the woman who is the best professional wrestler currently on Earth. I walk into the lion's den when that bell rings and I will gladly take every single beating you see fit to give me. But I will fight, Auntie Artemis. Because at this point, that's what I can do...because unlike those who may curse their fates at having to face you or who scoff at the very notions of how deadly you are, I realize that if I slip up...you'll end me.

You'll end me for good and have no regrets.

My very survival in professional wrestling depends on how I perform in this match.

So I will fight you with every fiber of my being. Even if it means putting myself at the risk of facing your wrath.

No matter what happens, you'll always be Auntie Artemis to me.

I love you,

Nariko"