[A table.]
[Atop this table sits the Sparta Cup. Scattered acrossed the table is different pieces of news media. All with different headlines that read the same.]
THE ARTIST DEFIES THE ODDS!
THE SPARTAN HAS RISEN!
JASPER REDGRAVE MAKES HISTORY!
[A hand appears, grabbing one of the newspapers.]
[The hand of Jasper Redgrave.]
“All week long I’ve read each headline to go through the presses.”
“Each and every one of them all say the same thing in a different set of wording.”
“My name is on the tip of every Arcadian’s tongue.”
“First, I was the man who took Tombstone to his limits. The man who almost did the unthinkable and dethroned the king.”
“And now? Now they know me as the man who outlasted eight other competitors. The man who competed in three different matches in one night and came out victorious in each of them.”
“Not even an amputated finger on ice has been able to stifle my spotlight.”
“I’ve been called many of things. Each headline has described me in different shades of light..”
“But there was one headline that grabbed my attention over all others.”
[Jasper slaps the newspaper ontop of the rest, a finger extended to the words on the page.]
REDGRAVE IS ON FIRE!
“This week, my opponent is no stranger to fire and what it’s capable of..”
“At a very young age, Destructo Boy watched as everything his loving family had worked for was burned down around him. Everything and everyone he had every loved turned to ash before his very eyes.”
“Despite everything set to flame, you managed to come out the other side once.”
“But fire tends to not be so kind, and the odds of you surviving another white hot fire is next to none.”
“Walking down that ramp this week is like turning around and walking back into the burning house you once escaped.”
[Jasper pulls a lighter from his pocket. As he produces a flame, he sets one of the newspaper corners on fire.]
“I’m giving you a warning, kid.”
“Ask your pal Felix Foley.”
“I’m a kind of fire that cannot be contained.”
“And now that I’ve caught fire, that fire will start to spread.”
[Right on cue, the fire begins to spread across the rest of the pages on the table.]
[Until the whole table is set ablaze.]
“Soon, all of OSW will be engulfed in my flame.”
“You may have survived the fire once, kid, but this is one inferno you can’t walk away from.”
“I have the power to take the one thing you have left that is of any value.”
“Your life.“
[Jasper smiles over the flames.]
“Turn back now, boy.”
“Take your leave and I shall spare your life.”
“Show up to NXT Level and be scorched to ash just like your mother was.”
“My flame is unforgiving..”
“And it won’t be extinguished until the OSW World Championship belongs to me.”
[Jasper grabs the Sparta Cup with one hand and takes his leave.]
[The fire still burns.]
[Fade.]