The cat-woman's opponent in this duel was a nearly three-meter-tall humanoid gorilla.
His arms were thicker than the cat-woman's waist, with wrist lines extending past his knees rather than just his crotch.
When he walked toward the cat-woman, the ground seemed to tremble beneath his steps.
As the two combatants approached each other, the cheers from the massive circular stands grew louder.
From the lower stands behind the cat-woman came a hysterical scream:
"Kill her! Kill her! Fucking destroy her!"
The cat-woman dug a finger into her furry ear. "So damn noisy."
Without pause, she strode directly into the small circle at the arena's center.
Once the beast-fighting arena supervisor gave the signal, the two beasts standing in the circle could begin tearing into each other.
In fact, her last opponent had been the same type.
Not everyone enjoyed evenly matched fights.
Many came specifically to witness one-sided domination - torture, humiliation, and slaughter.
They were here for blood.
"Combatants ready," the arena supervisor announced, arms crossed on the circle's boundary line.
The cat-woman rolled her shoulders and raised her fists in a fighting stance.
The humanoid gorilla remained relaxed, only flashing a vicious grin when their eyes met.
Red meat fibers still clung between his teeth.
"Begin!"
...
"CRACK!"
Li Ban reflexively winced, teeth clenched as if he'd been the one smashed against the iron bars.
When he reopened his eyes, the cat-woman had already been grabbed again and hurled like a ball toward the opposite wall by the gorilla-man.
"Nice!"
The burly man beside Li Ban cheered, startling him.
Another muscular spectator asked, "Why cheer? Don't tell me you bet on Gao Tao?"
"Obviously. Gorilla versus cat? Everyone knows who's dying today. You didn't bet on him?"
"Nah." The second man grinned. "I put money on the cat."
"Seriously? You saw how badly she lost last time!"
"I was there. She lost, but never surrendered."
"So what?"
"No submission yet still breathing? Every time I see a beast like that, I tell myself - bet on them next time!"
The man smirked at his companion. "How do you think I got my south district house?"
"Bullshit luck! This arena's about pure strength!"
Despite his words, the first man frowned slightly, suddenly concerned about his wager.
Li Ban didn't care about their debate - he only worried for the cat-woman.
Initially, she'd used agile footwork and precision strikes to gain slight advantage against the gorilla.
But against his steel-like muscles, her claws and kicks proved ineffective.
When her stamina waned, the gorilla seized his chance - those massive arms limiting her movement before crushing her right leg with a sickening crack audible even at Li Ban's distance.
He grimaced in sympathetic pain.
What followed was pure brutality.
The gorilla deliberately prolonged the fight, hurling the cat-woman around like a ragdoll while the crowd chanted directions - whichever side cheered loudest determined her next impact point.
This had ceased being combat and become execution.
"THUD!"
The cat-woman crashed near Li Ban's section again.
"Just surrender!" he shouted through the bars, though he knew Tree-Person A had warned that another loss would send her to the second level.
Li Ban didn't know what awaited there, but surely it beat being slaughtered? Even if she went down, he could still help her later if he remained in Death Prison.
The cat-woman turned her bloody face toward his voice.
Eyes, nose, mouth - all leaking crimson, her body barely clinging to consciousness.
Her lips barely moved. "No."
Then she went limp, apparently accepting death over Level Two.
Li Ban gripped the bars helplessly. Was she choosing death to avoid descent?
"Even if you go down, I'll find ways to bring you meat! Understand?"
All calculations about this being a virtual world vanished - he only saw a friend about to die.
The cat-woman had been his longest companion since arriving in the Witch World.
Moody, infuriating, but her guidance had helped him survive Death Prison.
He couldn't let her die!
The gorilla-man lumbered over, grinding his foot against her motionless body.
"Pathetic. Died too quick."
Retracting his foot, he wound up for a skull-shattering finishing blow, torso coiling like a spring.
The punch came with a vicious whoosh, aimed directly at the cat-woman's head.
Li Ban braced for the gruesome impact - until his right eye twitched.
The seemingly lifeless cat-woman's torso suddenly bent at an impossible angle, folding beneath the gorilla's crotch as his unstoppable momentum carried the punch harmlessly overhead.
A split-second of horrified realization flashed across the gorilla's face -
"CRUNCH!"
The expected splattering sound came, but not from the cat-woman's skull.
Her strike found his vulnerable point with paralyzing precision, her body suddenly serpentining up his frame.
When the motion froze, she'd twisted behind him - legs braided around his neck and armpits while her clawless hands plunged into his skull with a wet crunch, fingers burying deep into brain matter through both the crown and base of his skull.
The gorilla-man spasmed once before collapsing.
The cat-woman backflipped free, landing steadily as if she hadn't just been a bloodied wreck moments prior.
The arena's roar of approval for the gorilla's final blow choked into stunned silence... then erupted tenfold with chants of the cat-woman's name.
The supervisor checked the gorilla's corpse before asking, "Want to finish with a head crush?"
"You do it if you want."
Dismissing him, she turned toward the exit tunnel - and locked eyes with Li Ban through the bars.
Seeing his shell-shocked expression, she winced like tasting something sour.
"Tch... there goes my meat."