Sharpened Hooks: The Bloody Contests of Tanadara

The real-life Frank Dux of Bloodsport fame claims that the Kumite is a secret 60-round single-elimination tournament held every five years. A sixty-round single-elimination tournament would require over a quintillion (~1.2 × 10¹⁸) participants, which is several orders of magnitude more than the total number of humans who are estimated to have ever lived on earth (~1.2 × 10¹¹ as of this writing) and would obviously be impossible to keep secret.

But of course, in imaginary worlds, fighting tournaments can remain unconstrained by size or secrecy. What if the whole world were embroiled in a fighting tournament?

Aeons ago, the apocalyptic elf cabal known as the Thorns of the Haemophage succeeded in their ages-long goal to summon the Blood Gods to the world of Tanadara. The forces of Chaos ran roughshod across the surface of the world, only stopping when the elves—rightly horrified at the destruction they had wrought and realizing that the end of the Age of Man would probably also be the end of the age of everything—invoked desperate spellcraft to bind the Blood Gods long enough to bring them to the negotiating table.

The price of peace was ultimately the Malraninin, a vast tournament requiring the participation of all able-bodied sapients on Tanadara. Occurring only once every hundred years, the Malraninin takes years to finish, comprising a single-elimination tournament featuring every healthy humanoid in the world. (Just wrangling everyone and pairing them takes weeks if not months.) Although most fights are not to the death, there are no restrictions, and enough fights are deadly that the Blood Gods remain quiescent for now.

As the longest-lived race, the elves are the keepers of the Malraninin, charged with ensuring all participate. (The average human is born and dies without ever participating in the Malraninin, which is more than enough time to forget the grave import of the contest.) Participation is mandatory; any who refuse, or who run and are caught, or who voluntarily maim themselves to avoid the contest, are executed. Cutting a deal with your opponent ahead of time to throw a fight is considered poor form and also a form of refusal, but it also tends to be rather hard to prove and so is somewhat commonplace in the early rounds. (But then again, sadistic opponents might take advantage of you taking a dive, so make sure you trust your fight partner before you coordinate a fight.)

It will probably surprise no one to learn that high-level magic-users are exceedingly rare on Tanadara, because they usually flee when they first learn teleportation or planar travel. Conversely, unknowing planar travelers may find themselves in a The Return of the Archons situation, being conscripted into the chaos of the Malraninin without a full understanding of the situation. (And the locals are unlikely to believe your claims of being from another world or dimension, because that sounds like exactly the sort of tall tale someone would spin if they were trying to claim an exit from the tournament. Not that it would help you even if they did believe you; the Blood Gods hunger for you just as well as any native-born Tanadaran.)

Incidentally, even those cosmologists who know of other worlds don't know about the Malraninin, because the folk of the world do not often speak of it, especially with strangers. The spies of the elves are always watching for tournament-dodgers, and it is best to avoid their scrutiny.

Unsurprisingly, however, Tanadara has a much higher concentration of martial artists than most other worlds; most inhabitants know at least the rudiments of boxing, swordplay, offensive magic, or some other self-defense art, even if they are not especially skilled.

During any given Malraninin, thousands if not millions of people can die, so the Malraninin is equal parts celebration and mourning ceremony. Despite the violence, the final rounds of the Malraninin bring pilgrims from across the world, so there is a certain level of cultural exchange brought by tournament season.

After the tournament, survivors often return to their lives a little more harrowed than before. (Which is especially unfortunate, given the silence and shame around the Malraninin. Domestic violence and suicides often spike after a Malraninin, not that anyone keeps track of such statistics.) Life continues apace, at least until the next tournament.

It goes without saying that the Malraninin requires years of planning, and that several large-scale projects (like war) stop for it. Farming and other necessities of course continue, although such responsibilities do not prevent participation. If your community needs you, you had better fight like it.

Story Hooks:

• Your village's headman was just and giving, but he died during the Malraninin and his sons are not quite so altruistic. You and your band have undertaken a quest to retrieve him from the lands of the dead (and maybe to get revenge on his killer along the way). But the elves claim bringing back one of the Malraninin dead risks the Blood Gods' wrath. Will you risk taboo to restore your village's fortunes? Will the elves allow this trespass to go unanswered?
• In the midst of adventuring in your GM's typical setting, you somehow stumble into Tanadara and are recruited into the Malraninin. (Perhaps you delve too deep into the Deepearth and emerge on the surface of Tanadara, or perhaps a wizard's trap sends you very far away.) Do you fight, or do you attempt to flee? If you flee, can you return to the anomaly that sent you here? And if you fight, what if one of your opponents seeks to fight to the death?
• Your remote tribe was uncontacted by the outside world until thirty years ago, when trade opened with your neighbors. Your village prospered under the trade agreements until now, when elves appeared and said all must participate in a fighting tournament or die. Will you go along with the strange foreign elves' wishes to avoid trouble, or will you resist their demands?