Storyline          fighting masters1.htm

1998

The world went mad.

No one knows why, but a general state of war was declared, chaos reigned for weeks as the armies of the world battled against an unseen opponent, and no one would say who or why.

September of this year saw fire rain from the skies, and cities burn.

In the end, a desperate humanity took the only action it could. It took to the shelters, and it burned the world.

It launched full scale nuclear Armageddon.

2010

Through use of special founder bacteria developed by pre Armageddon company ‘Pricetech’, radiation levels had dropped to acceptable, and the survivors came out from the darkness.

Things didn’t seem so bad then. The majority of the world populace had survived, and reconstruction began with a spirit of community thought impossible before the fire.

Preparation had saved humanity from annihilation and the whole world rejoiced.

2015

Supplies ran out.

Spirits dwindled.

Humanity struggled to overcome the harsh new world the nuclear fire had created, and were failing.  Their only hope lay in the fact that new generations of children seemed to be coping better due to inherent mutations.

The cities that many hoped would have become centres for their new hope never materialised.

2016

The Vanguard Came.

General Deacon had been a soldier in the army of one of the pre Armageddon nations, the ones who had chosen to burn the world.

Deacon had campaigned on every continent there was, and killed every type of person the world had to throw at him. In his travels he had uncovered dark secrets in the shadowy corners of the world, dark secrets that gave him eternal youth and superhuman power.

Deacon had discovered the power of CHI, inner force, which gave men and women the power to crush tanks with a punch, to ignore bullet fire, to leap over buildings, and hurl the energies of the cosmos at each other in godlike combat. This power had long ago been discovered by wise scholars, who in their wisdom had kept it hidden. Such power was not to be taken lightly, and its proliferation could mean the end of the world.

Deacon, however, wanted to share his discovery with the world.

HIS world.

He had been bitterly disappointed with Armageddon. Military estimates had told him that the move would destroy 9 tenths of the worlds populace. The fires had claimed a measly 3 tenths.

This left him with far too large a population to work with, he wanted to reforge humanity from grass roots. And so he created the Vanguard.

The Vanguard were his students. Soldiers trained in the art of CHI. Compared to conventional military forces these soldiers were invincible, able to take artillery fire in their stride, and destroy entire military divisions in hand to hand combat.

With only conventional military forces to protect them, the villages that peppered the wastes fell one by one. The strongest were taken and brainwashed to become Vanguard themselves, the rest burned as they should have nearly two decades ago.

The wise men who once sealed away the secret of CHI had not perished years ago, they too walked the Earth, and they were aghast at Deacon’s blatant proliferation of the CHI. They opposed Deacon openly, and though they were stronger than his soldiers, Deacon’s secrets were dark indeed and he crushed them almost to a man.

2020

Finally, the last stand of the CHI masters against Deacon took place.

In the end, battered and bruised, Deacon faced of with Senzo Takashi, master of the tainted CHI art known only as ‘the fist’.

The battle had raged long and hard, and of the original CHI masters, only two remained, Chi Zen the eternal monk, and Senzo Takashi. Chi Zen had been wounded and could only look on in horror as his friend faced off against the monstrous Deacon.

His body shattered, and his will all but spent, Senzo unleashed the most powerful attack known to ‘the fist’.

That was the end.

But as Chi Zen would say, the end of each story is merely the beginning of the next.

When the ultimate power of the fist had collided with the most fell and powerful of Deacon’s dark arts, the result had been a cataclysm, a horrendous imbalance of CHI force which ripped and tore at the world.

Deacon would have loved it, it was everything Armageddon was supposed to be. And Finally after all his work and effort, he had his 1 remaining tenth which he had been promised. But he and Senzo Takashi were consumed, at the very eye of the storm they had no hope of survival.

2230

Humanity survived.

They didn’t know how they had survived, but they did.

In the years that followed Humanity had to reshape itself from grass roots as Deacon had wanted.

Fortunately for the world Chi Zen had survived, and he made it his mission to ensure that the world would not be as Deacon wanted it. He travelled the wastes, teaching the occasional good man or woman the art of CHI. He invested a level of time and care only an immortal could, and helped by mysterious and shadowy benefactors, he managed to bring balance to the CHI so that life could begin again.

He also brought to Humanity a new leader in the form of James Chance. Chance was a rogue and a scoundrel from the waste communities, who had been brought to Chi Zen by the mysterious allies he had come to call ‘the Shadowstalkers’. Chance had extreme potential for use of CHI force, and Chi Zen taught him to use it for good purposes.

Chance became a figurehead for the people, and he called them together to form a city, which he optimistically named UTOPIA.

2250

UTOPIA had grown large indeed. But it had also grown unruly. Chance was a good man, despite his misguided youth, and he did not have the means to enforce law on UTOPIA. As it grew larger and larger, so it grew more lawless.

Finally, two developments occurred which saved UTOPIA from being engulfed in corruption.

Firstly, Chi Zen appealed to the Shadowstalkers for aid. They agreed to unofficially police the city, taking care of the worst scum, but told Chance that he must find a means to deal with the rest.

Secondly a relic from the past resurfaced. NAXO (the National Academy for the study of Xenobiological Oganisms) an obscure pre Armageddon organisation had come back. NAXO had remained hidden in the shelters after Armageddon, studying and prospering, they had become highly advanced and numerous. In return for land rights, NAXO now a new culture in its own right, gave James Chance and Utopia technology to provide electricity and all the luxuries of life people had enjoyed before Armageddon. This combined with the new police force that NAXO made possible with ‘donations’ served to settle UTOPIA down considerably.

Chi Zen was not happy however, since the Shadowstalkers had expressed concerns about NAXO, and warned Chi Zen that they were up to no good. Chance would not listen to his old mentor however, and allowed the formation of the city state of NAXO. Several months later, Chance was killed in a car bombing incident, and the ruling council formed in the wake of his death was deaf to Chi Zen and the Shadowstalkers pleas to oust NAXO.

2275

With the aid of NAXO, UTOPIA had come to be a sprawling metropolis with many millions of inhabitants.

Chi Zen had given up trying to guide the city, and contented himself to hope that the Shadowstalkers were wrong.

No fool, however, he had secretly begun training a school of CHI wielding warriors in order to combat the menace that NAXO might pose in the future. This precaution pleased the Shadowstalkers and they submitted several of their own warriors to train with Chi Zen and help train this new generation of protectors.

2280

NAXO turned out to be everything the stalkers had warned it would be. It became public knowledge that NAXO was conducting horrible experiments on humans, and that the sole purpose for which it had helped UTOPIA was to provide a ready stock of Human subjects.

Panic was widespread as NAXO tried to enforce martial law using the corrupt UTOPIA government and police force. It was Chi Zen and his new warriors who stepped forward to save the day, and powered by CHI, crushed NAXO and the government. A new police force was installed shortly after, but a period of lawlessness ensued, known as the NAXO anarchy.

NAXO was defeated, but it was too strong for the new warriors to mount an attack against. Against his better judgement, CHI ZEN had to begin training a much larger number of warriors, since he knew NAXO would be fascinated by CHI and would soon be sending CHI wielders of their own.

It was during the NAXO anarchy that the shadowstalkers brought to Chi Zen a young street punk by the name of Sasuke Amano. Amano was a normal young man with aspirations to a professional wrestling career, but Chi Zen knew instantly why the stalkers had brought him. The power of ‘the Fist’ had been reborn in this young man. Knowing that if this man was not trained properly, or if he fell into the wrong hands, a cataclysm like before could occur, Chi Zen set about training Amano.

2282

Chi Zen was greatly surprised when a member of the VANGUARD turned up at his training dojo. He sensed no evil in the man, who was obviously one of the soldiers who had been taken and brainwashed, but was surprised that such an amateur user of CHI could live so long and not age.

The soldier told Chi Zen that the Vanguard had all dropped into a deep sleep after Deacon’s defeat, but were now awakening in large numbers, unharmed and unaged. The soldier feared that this would mean that Deacon was returning from the dead, or worse yet, that he had already returned.

The man warned Chi Zen that he could feel a great call of evil in his mind, and that his will would not remain his own for long. He begged Chi Zen to kill him in honourable combat, rather than let him go on and commit more acts of murder. Chi Zen regretted having to kill someone who was in essence merely a victim, but could see no other way of helping him for now. He ordered that the man be put into stasis after death, so that he could eventually be restored when he would be free.

Chi Zen Led his students into the wastes, in an attempt to fight off and defeat the VANGUARD before Deacon could be reborn and threaten the newly reformed race of Humanity. They found a strange ally in NAXO, who seemed no more keen on the return of Deacon than anyone else. NAXO dispatched troops to help fight off the Vanguard while Chi Zen and his students went to deal with Deacon.

2283

After a long quest, the new warriors arrived at an old military complex, which was to be the site where Deacon would be reborn. Despite the sacrifice made by many Shadowstalkers, the rebirth had been completed and Deacon lived once again. The warriors had been prepared well and battled him fiercely, but death had simply taught him more dark secrets, and he was even more powerful than before.

History repeated itself in a twisted dance of Déjà vu, with the warriors and Chi Zen falling one by one, until only Sasuke Amano and Deacon remained. The power of the Fist called on Amano to unleash it, and he prepared to unleash the ultimate fist, as his predecessor had done so many years ago. Chi Zen could only watch helplessly as Deacon readied the same demonic attack which had reacted with the fist so many years ago to cause the dread cataclysm.

Deacon was delighted, he had only returned for an hour, and already he was about to destroy the world again.

At the last moment however, chance intervened and the CHI whipped winds blew past Amano a single sheet of paper, buried beneath the sands for nearly three centuries, only to fly for a moment then disintegrate into nothingness. The words on the paper were these

WRESTLING TONIGHT

EL DIABLO VERSUS THE HAMMER

Childhood dreams were rekindled, and with a roar, Amano unleashed his most deadly move, not the ultimate fist, but that same power channelled into his favourite wrestling move, the power bomb. Totally unprepared for the undisciplined attack, Deacon was helpless as the power of the Fist, for the first time under the control of its master, rather than the other way round, ripped his body to shreds.

With his dying scream, Deacon swore that he would return.

Amano became the first person ever to truly be ‘Master Fist’.

Chi Zen and the surviving warriors joined him in celebration.

2291

Time passed, and in honour of the role they had played in the salvation of the world from Deacon, UTOPIA signed a peace treaty with NAXO, and life progressed as normal. Without NAXO’s full support UTOPIA declined somewhat, but the remaining Shadowstalkers helped to keep crime roughly under control.

Amano had embarked on his career as the masked wrestler, EL DIABLO, in honour of that ancient entertainer whose memory had saved the world. He was somewhat surprised when the Shadowstalkers appeared to him in person and brought him a young child who they said must be his student. The young girl was called Yuchiko, the trauma of her family’s death at the hands of a NAXO harvesting crew made her refuse to use her family name.

Amano was stumped as to why the Stalkers would bring her to him instead of Chi Zen, and asked if there was a reason why Chi Zen had not been consulted. The stalkers said there was not, but that he was the more suitable teacher since he was ‘Master Fist’.

Amano understood at once, that this meant the power of the fist had resurfaced again, manifesting in this child. He thanked the stalkers and rushed to consult with Chi Zen.

Chi Zen was aghast the moment Amano brought the child to his training hall. Asking one of his students to look after the girl he took Amano aside. He explained that Yuchiko was an even more potent expression of the Fist than he or his predecessor had ever been, and that her power was further tainted by her trauma and hate. Teaching her could result in the creation of a creature more terrible than even Deacon had ever been.

Amano agreed, but argued that not teaching her could also give rise to that same creature, but at least if they taught her, they could try to steer her destiny. Chi Zen had to agree, and so they went out to meet the girl. The student who had been looking after her was Julie West, by a strange twist of fate, Amano’s current love interest. The two became Yuchiko’s foster parents, who she came to love dearly, and treat as mother and father (though they would not marry, and split up constantly only to get together again the same week). She also formed a bond with the mysterious Shadowstalkers, who became quite affectionate of the child, who they taught the ways of the shadow.

Under the tutelage of Amano and Chi Zen, Yuchiko did indeed become powerful, eventually surpassing her mentors in sheer power. By the time ten years had passed, though only 18, she could already beat both Chi Zen and Amano at the same time. The other students knew better than to face her in real combat. She had also grown wise in the ways of the Shadow, able to move undetected, kill without sound, and was extremely wise in the ways of politics and lies. Secretly she had begun a private war of vengeance against NAXO. Sneaking into the city state in the shadows, slaying their troops without mercy, and destroying their horrific flesh factories.

The shadowstalkers approved immensely, and provided her with troops and intelligence information with which to escalate her campaign. When Chi Zen found out, he was horrified, he tried to get Amano to forbid Yuchiko from these acts, but Amano could not bring himself to forbid her from acts he too secretly approved of. He tried to convince her that such hate would consume her, but when she expressed her resolve to destroy NAXO utterly, he conceded. Chi Zen would not give up easily, however, and began his own campaign to teach her the personal repercussions of such acts. Eventually he began to annoy her and she simply stopped attending her lessons with him. Worse, many of Chi Zen’s students began to accompany Yuchiko on her expeditions, as did members of the Utopia Police, and Army. Eventually, Yuchiko’s war of hate escalated to the point where NAXO could consider it an act of war by UTOPIA itself, in direct violation of their treaty. UTOPIA was forced to declare Yuchiko and anyone who followed her an outlaw, and sent the Army to arrest her.

Chi Zen also sent the new warriors, however, Amano intercepted them, and with Julie, defeated them before they could oppose Yuchiko. Amano thought Chi Zen would be angry, but the eternal monk understood that no matter her actions Yuchiko was Amano’s daughter and that he and Julie could not allow another to harm her. Chi Zen restated his continued friendship with the two, and promised that if they would finally get married, he would resolve to see what Yuchiko would make of the situation. They agreed, and were married by Chi Zen himself.

Yuchiko was a juggernaut of power and poularity. Without the support of Chi users, the Army and Police had no hope of restraining her. The now Julie Amano in the end confronted Yuchiko, and told her that if war with NAXO broke out, many innocent people would suffer the same fate that her parents had. In order to avoid that, Yuchiko announced that she would be forming a new city state, opposed to NAXO and its twisted goals.

Many people flocked to her, surprisingly, many workers from NAXO came to her, asking forgiveness for their complicity, and a chance to redeem themselves. With the help of the Shadowstalkers, she was able to determine those that could be trusted, and accepted their aid, bringing fantastic technology to her new state.

2315 Present Day

12 years since the formation of ‘The State’, and Yuchiko’s popularity amongst her minions is at an all time high, as is her power as a fighter.

NAXO has responded admirably to the threat, however, producing new troops and Chi users capable of holding off Yuchiko’s forces, whilst the newly uncovered Damocles unit, a massive CHI driven biowarrior of unprecedented power, prevents Yuchiko from simply destroying NAXO herself. Though she could destroy Damocles, or NAXO military, she cannot destroy both at once, and thus is held at a stalemate.

As Amano and Julie hoped, time has soothed Yuchiko’s rage, and she is now content to maintain her little kingdom, perpetually at war with NAXO. And while NAXO’s attentions are focused on THE STATE, UTOPIA can flourish.

Chi Zen’s faith in Amano’s judgement has been rewarded, since Yuchiko has proven to be a skilled, if a little harsh ruler of her people, and has remained mindful of her past, making no attempts to absorb UTOPIA into her state despite friction and land disputes between the two.

The Shadowstalkers have remained loyal friends to Chi Zen, and continue to help police both UTOPIA and THE STATE. They have claimed that if war were ever to break out between the two that no support would be given to either over the other. Chi Zen suspects differently, however, since their hate for NAXO and affection for Yuchiko both run deep.

Amano and Julie disappeared after Amano’s retirement match as El DIABLO, which he won. In truth the two have settled down to a relatively normal life as older people. Temptation to return to the limelight is great, however, in the light of the return of the VANGUARD. Though these soldiers claim that they can no longer feel the pull of Deacon on their minds, it has raised rumours that Deacon is still alive, or is coming back, even rumours that NAXO have cloned him, and that’s why the VANGUARD aren’t being controlled. And one other thing that’s just worrying away at the back of Amano’s mind. A new up and coming masked wrestler called THE HAMMER has arisen, and has been very vocal in calling out the legendary EL DIABLO. Only two people saw that poster in the last 300 years. Is it Deacon, or someone who simply knows too much?

Chi Zen has other problems on his hands, however. As the unofficial protector of UTOPIA, he is concerned that if it doesn’t find a way to match the prosperity of NAXO, and THE STATE, it will soon have no choice but to be absorbed by one or the other. Perhaps the VANGUARD can help, or maybe this new student of his, Jean-Paul Chance can help the city where his predecessor could not.

A dark shadow falls on the land,

Something is reborn