Well, that's just great… I wonder, did I accidentally stumble from one franchise into another, or is this even worse than I initially thought?
Instead of just the Avengers' drunken brawls with Hydras, Ultrons, and Thanoses, does this world also feature a psychedelic marathon of X-Men vs. Sentinels, Apocalypse, and two separate pirate copies of the Phoenix, all accompanied by interspecies race wars?
"Any other takers willing to try their luck with the Champion?!" the flabby man with the microphone began to call out while I pondered. "God is my witness, that was an excellent match, and it deserves a beautiful finale! What do you say?!"
A new wave of noise from the audience sparked another thought.
I'd already tested my predecessor's magical abilities fairly extensively, but I couldn't say the same for his combat skills. And Loki was a very capable fighter.
Physically, he was weaker than Thor and didn't particularly enjoy face-to-face brawls. But his rivalry with his brother had forced him, willy-nilly, to diligently study the martial arts. As I knew from the future, he was fully capable of fighting Thor on equal footing.
Testing myself on ordinary humans would be, to put it mildly, pointless. But a fight with a mutant regenerator, specifically a fight that was guaranteed not to be lethal, could be exactly what I needed.
I could worry about the problem of merging space-time continuums later. Especially since no one else seemed eager to challenge Logan, which meant the show was likely about to wrap up.
"Will you watch my coat, darling?" I called out to Rogue, having already made up my mind and shrugged off my outerwear.
"Huh?" The mutant girl turned to me in confusion, only to immediately find a bundle of clothes in her hands and a charming smile from Loki's collection of "Best Smiles" aimed at her face.
Since I'm wearing this name now, I need to get used to killing two birds with every stone.
If only she were the femme fatale from the '92 animated series, or the cute goth-hedgehog from the 2000s Evolution show. But alas and alack, beautiful girls were not shipped to this universe. The local Rogue barely qualifies as "cute," certainly not "beautiful."
Making sure my coat wasn't about to slip from the hands of the slightly bewildered lady, I headed for the arena entrance. My approach was noticed immediately.
"Oh! Looks like we have a contender after all!" the organizer rejoiced. "Hey, kid, aren't you a little scrawny for this?" covering the microphone with his hand, he leaned toward me as soon as I was close.
"Don't worry, I know kung fu," I replied with a smirk right to his face.
"Well, it's your funeral," the referee, who was also the bookie and whatever else this guy did, shrugged. "Rules are simple: no hitting the balls, bare knuckles only, last man standing wins. You drop Wolverine, three hundred bucks are yours. He drops you, no complaints allowed, got it?"
"Perfectly," I nodded, and the organizer finally stepped aside, letting me into the cage where a grim, unshaven, shirtless type was already waiting at the far end.
"Aren't you afraid of ruining that pretty face, kid?" Logan greeted me politely.
"You know, a moment ago I just wanted to stretch my legs a bit. But now I have a distinct desire to beat you like a god beats a turtle," I smiled broadly and joyfully in his face. Pity I'm the only one here who gets that joke.
"Yeah, yeah, don't hurt yourself, pipsqueak," Wolverine grunted.
"Shall we begin? Not that I'm in a huge rush, but it must be hard for an old man like you to stay on his feet for so long…" I tilted my head to the side.
"Heh, you've got a mouth on you," the mutant's grin widened. Then he lunged at me and, with a short, snapping motion, fired a straight right at my jaw.
Or rather, tried to.
The body reacted almost on its own, with minimal input from the mind, a small step back and to the side, a twist of the torso to intercept the arm, and follow the momentum.
"Ha, looks like the kid wasn't joking about kung fu! Just look at that airtime, ladies and gentlemen! But I doubt that'll be enough to take down our undefeated champion!"
"Hmph, alright then," Logan, who found himself on the floor after being thrown into the cage wall, stood up and theatrically cracked his neck. "You've got some moves."
Now the mutant acted much more cautiously and less straightforwardly.
He tried to circle me, feinting with deceptive strikes and lunges, but… I was faster, stronger, and possessed a thousand years of combat experience, specifically in melee and weapon combat, even if it wasn't originally mine.
Logan was a veteran, of course, and extremely experienced too, plus he had his animal instincts.
But right now he had amnesia, and his combat history was mostly either with claws or using more traditional mortal tools like rifles and rocket launchers.
And he was used to fighting ordinary humans, which played a role.
Loki's experience was incredibly diverse. Opponents with abilities far exceeding human limits were the norm for him, not the exception.
This, by the way, was one of the main reasons Asgard used cold weapons as their primary armament.
Many races, the Aesir included, were nearly invulnerable to purely physical damage, whether it was a bullet or a blaster bolt.
To inflict life-threatening injuries, you needed weapons with a magical component. Enchanting every bullet is impossible even in a technomagic civilization, magic is too individual, you can't put it on an assembly line.
But enchanting a sword or armor? Very doable. Especially considering you only have to do it once every five thousand years, which is the average lifespan of an Asgardian, and they generally use the same weapon their whole life.
So, every one of Logan's strikes was smoothly deflected, only occasionally meeting a hard block. And every block or deflection was followed by a counterattack. And every time, it turned out to be quite nasty, or rather, devious.