I knew the Peruvian would be trouble from the moment he appeared on the tournament floor. He seemed to hover an inch above the polished hardwood, coiled and ready to spring. He was heavily muscled, dark, hairy the quintessential kick-ass karate player.
Armando Ruiz. Mongo, his enemies called him, though never to his face.
I wasn't likely to spar him until at least the quarter finals. A lot could happen between now and then, but the way things looked, Mongo was the competitor most likely to steal my shot at the trophy.
I'd already defeated my first opponent; my second match was half an hour away. I had an opportunity to devote full attention to Ruiz as he stepped into the ring and exchanged bows with a sturdy, Nordic Shito-ryu player.
He scored a kill in eight seconds.
The match consumed so little time I had to replay it in my head to fully grasp it. Mongo had charged forward, punches flying one after the other, erasing the Viking's powerful defense as if it had been made of smoke. Three, four, five potent impacts to the face and the Viking logged off, leaving empty floor behind.
The referee raised Ruiz's arm and declared him the winner. The audience roared. The Peruvian waved at the bleachers, seemingly intoxicated by the noise. The stadium bulged to overflowing, attesting to the increasing popularity of VR combat arts. And why not? Not since the days of gladiators had sport combat been to the "death," and there was no such thing as a poor seat. Though the figures I saw seemed to extend up to the rafters, every spectator experienced the tournament as if from front row center.
Mongo strutted out of the ring, joining the contingent from South America. After the mandatory sixty-second delay, the loser logged back on in a fresh surrogate. The Viking, though now whole and uninjured, shook his head as if dazed and wandered off to the end of the tournament hall, where the consolation rounds would begin. The crowd mocked him.
Beside me, Mr. Callahan ran his fingers through his mop of intensely black hair. "First boxer I've seen at a WUKO event this season," he commented dryly.
At tournaments sanctioned by the newly reestablished World Union of Karate Organizations, contestants were supposed to be karateka, testing their skill against others of their kind. Ensuring that had been a problem long before the advent of full-scale virtual reality conferencing. Now it was worse. All sorts of opportunists were flocking to bask in the glory and prize money, including those who had scarcely seen the inside of a dojo.
I'd studied Ruiz's record after the contestant list had been issued just as he no doubt had checked mine. The Peruvian did have a black belt, but it was a hastily awarded sho dan from some backwater South American kenpo school known for its loose standards. Winner of dozens of boxing matches, the man had ridden the karate tournament circuit less than two months, just long enough to qualify for single A class. Now he'd come up to northern California thinking to walk over the players accessing the prestigious San Francisco VR node.
Mongo was a fake. A cheat. He diminished us all.
"Think you can beat him?" Callahan asked.
The grandmaster could answer that better than I. I figured it had to be a trick question, a teacher-to-student moment.
"I don't know."
Callahan smiled. Apparently that was the correct reply. He leaned close and said conspiratorially, "Think of it ... as a challenge."
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