The Charlatan Will Be Exposed

Posts : 5 Join date : 2022-04-24

Diantha is quietly sitting in an otherwise empty locker room, twirling that very same tire iron that she had attempted to assault Azumi with. She is preoccupied with the sound that the metal is making against the cold concrete flooring, chuckling to herself as she twirls the iron one more time before picking it up off the floor. Not far away from the chair she’s sitting in is a blood red briefcase, a trophy from her latest conquest elsewhere.

“If we fight for money, I’ll stop hitting you when you ask me to. If we fight for pride….I’ll stop hitting you when I feel like it.”

This is, to be perfectly blunt about it, a perfect summation for what I feel about Azumi Goto. This is why I’m pleased that this match is No Holds Barred. You know something Azumi…I don’t like you. I’ve never fucking liked you. I don’t like the way you condescend to people. I don’t like the way that you and your retiring buddy Stephanie Matsuda act as if you fucking invented professional wrestling. I don’t like your clothes. I don’t like your proteges scattered all over the planet like disgusting little cockroaches. I don’t like anything about you in any shape or form.

When this match was announced, you seemed happy that it would be this way. That you wanted so desperately to get your hands on me and give me my comeuppance for making sure you couldn’t have your championship match. But are you sure that this is good for you? You’ve seen the lengths that I’ve gone to simply get your attention. Nearly running you over, ripping opportunities out of your hands and money out of your pocket. Humiliating you. Forcing you to reveal to these people what I already know for a fact:

You’re just a bloodthirsty hypocrite. You have this well-crafted image of being a hero, don’t you? We both know you’re no hero. In fact, you’re nothing more than a horrible, sinful opportunist. A careerist who did nothing that didn’t have something in it for her.

“NO ONE IN APEX WRESTLING IS MORE SPITEFUL THAN ME!”

Are you sure about that, my dear? More spiteful than the person who came to this place almost solely for the thrill of beating you within an inch of your life? I’m sure you have plenty of spite Azumi, but have you ever stopped to wonder exactly why that is? Have you ever stopped to think about why you’re such an angry little cunt? Me? I’ve made peace with my demons. I know exactly the way I am…and you know that too. You’ve listened to the stories. You know where I came from.

Everyone thought that everything was nice and gravy in the Rosso family household for me, yeah! Big family name, nice cushy house, an easy in for the wrestling business. It wasn’t like that at all for me. I didn’t have mentors and friends like you did to get me through the tough times, to protect me from people who wanted to use me for their benefit. I had to learn everything myself. All of what I am today is solely by my own effort, my own brand of violence, my own drive and initiative.

Can you say the same?

Of course you can’t.

You know that you can’t. Ever since you were born, you were coddled and groomed to be the perfect little joshi wrestler. You never had to suffer. You never had to sleep on the street and steal food. You never had to deal with your own family shunning you because you chose this line of work, did you?

Of course not.

What you have done here has given me free reign to do what I please. In this kind of match, I don’t have to adhere to rules. I don’t have to be honorable. I don’t have to show any kind of care for your safety, my safety, or the safety of anyone stupid enough to get involved. Do you know what that means? It means, my dear Azumi, that you get to experience what it’s like to be hanged, drawn and quartered in a modern sense.

I’m going to humiliate you.

I’m going to pick your body apart.

Then, I’m going to end you. It’s hard to get glory in APEX if your knee is shattered into tiny little pieces, isn’t it?

I’m expecting your absolute best. I know what you’re capable of when you’re angry. That’s why I’ve been prodding you, hoping that I can conjure up some of those old memories and old wounds that bring out the old Azumi Goto. You see you and I both know that I know the real you. You’re not a valiant defender or Hall of Fame caliber wrestler. You’re not an elder stateswoman or a guiding light.

You are a fraud.

I’ve had to sit back and listen to people ask me about why I do the things the way I do them. People boo me knowing my past but they cheer you even after some of the vile shit that you have done in your past! Leaving tag team partners out to dry! Using your political power to keep people in check. Holding down people like ME from reaching their full potential in this sport…THAT IS YOUR LEGACY AZUMI! AND YOU KNOW IT. Why do you deny it? Why do you want to frame me as a villain when you know in your heart that you are just as disgusting, just as brutal as you make me out to be? Why are you hiding your true self from not just the Apex fans but your own fucking mind!? Do you have any dignity left? Any self respect? At all?

I know the answer. And it’s a goddamn shame, truth be told. All you have to do is speak the truth, be genuine for once in your life and maybe things wouldn’t have come to the state they have…But you want to continue this charade. You want to pretend like I have no justification for trying to eliminate you. You want to pretend like everything is peaches and cream. Okay. I’ll let you pretend one more time. You can be the valiant hero trying to stop Big Bad Diantha from turning APEX into her personal playground the very same way she assimilated OWA for that role. You can come out with your pretty ring gear and catchy music and feel that adrenaline from the crowd!

I want you to soak it all in. Every last drop of adulation, every chill that runs up your spine when you feel the warmth of those people out there. Because in about fifteen seconds after that…I’m taking it from you. And it’s not going to be a gentle process. I’m going to take my sweet time with you. You have a lot of sins to answer for and like an inquisitor I’m going to torture one confession after another from your mouth.

You’re going to fight it though.

I know you.

But what you’re going to do by going that route, matching my brutality with your own…is prove the very point that I’m making. You’re not a hero…just a charlatan. For so long, you’ve had the audacity to speak ill of me, try to lecture me, try to lead me by the hand. You never saw me as competition. Only a pet project. Someone that you could rub off on and say that you “inspired” just like Stephanie Matsuda does with every fucking person she meets, just like your mentor “inspired” you, right?

I’m not a toy and I’m not a child!

I’m going to thoroughly enjoy doing what I have planned for you. Every single second of it. Until you reveal what you are to these people, I’m going to physically dissect you like no human being has ever done before. And you know that in a wrestling ring I’m very capable of that. I want to expose every flaw, every last detail about you that little mouthbreathers who worship you would be stunned to learn. Their hero, nothing more than a monster herself.

At one point we used to be friends. At one point I used to think the world of you. You may be shocked to hear that right now but at one point I actually considered you a friend. But where were you when I needed your help? When I was struggling with injury, when I had lost my way as a person and as an athlete, phone calls went unreturned. When Odyssey was calling out for a locker room leader…you were nowhere to be found. What kind of mentorship did you give us? What kind of legacy have you left in OWA other than chaos, instability, politics and bullshit morals that you yourself take off and on conveniently like it’s a fucking sweater!?

YOU HAVE NO LEGACY! NOT THERE! NOT ANYWHERE!

AND YOU WON’T HAVE ONE IN APEX!

I’m going to make sure of that. My victory is going to be so decisive, so complete, so brutal, that either due to injury or the shame that you’re cursed with you’ll have no choice but to step aside and let me lead this place instead. It’s fresh. It’s new. Perhaps it’s not too late to save it from the contamination, the pollution that your presence has brought to it. Oh yes. That will be the sweetest revenge of all for me: to mold this place into my image, fill it with my ideas. You’ve seen the matches that I’ve had so far here, yes?

I’m stronger than I was back when you and I faced off. I’ve gotten to the point that in every match I participate, I elevate my competition with my very presence. They rise to my level or I brutalize them until I feel like stopping. You understand what I’m telling you? I’m a benchmark figure at this point in our careers that you can only dream about being, and there’s no more appropriate way for me to demonstrate that to you besides crucifying you in front of a worldwide audience.

It didn’t have to be this way. If you had just accepted that you’re no longer needed, accepted that you’re a liar and a monster disguising yourself as a saint, this wouldn’t have happened. If you hadn’t retired in shame from Odyssey only to come back to OWA and weave more webs of lives and ensnare people in them, I wouldn’t be obligated to do what I am going to do to you. It’s sad but I really do have to save Apex from you.

More importantly, maybe, just maybe….I’ll save you from you.

As much as I want you to suffer, I still have maybe a crumb of empathy left in me. All you have to do is go away. Realize that this place doesn’t need you, that wrestling doesn’t need you, and none of this will have to go down. Tear up the contract. Don’t show up. Say you have COVID-19, monkeypox or some other disease. Do anything and everything you can to get out of fighting me, just like you have been doing the past two years anyway. If you do show up though…I can’t say that I’ll be fully responsible for what happens.

I have waited a long time for this so please, if you show up, don’t halfass it. Come at me full force. The harder you hit me, the more violent you are, the more joy that I’m going to take from breaking you down. I’m going to end the Legacy of Azumi Goto once and for all. You will lose your honor. You will lose the match. And even if you survive…you will be exposed.

One way or another. I’m leaving with victory.

Everything that you have done in your wicked past…it will visit you shortly.

And karma will be collected handsomely by my hands.