Hi, my name is Link Shane. I was born in the city of Bensolent, in district 3. I am the son of Debra and Rick Shane. Also, the brother to Lilly Shane. I was born in the year 2005. I don’t expect you to listen to my dumb and maybe boring story. All I care is that I am telling it to someone. So just sit there and look pretty.

It was the beginning of the summer, in the year 2020 and my family and I were currently in debt. What I mean by we, is that it was just me, your aunt Lilly, and Grandma Debra. We had no food or enough money to live off of, after your grandpa Rick died. Oh man, your grandpa Rick, he was a tough one. Always acting tough, like he was wise, and offering to fix stuff he hardly knew how to fix. Although, he wasn’t always like that. Sometimes he would try so hard to make me and your aunt Lilly laugh. He would do these crazy dance moves he saw in the 1990’s by Mick Jagger. Whoever the heck that was. Anyways, I was saying…..uh. Huh, what was I saying? Who cares about it anymore? The point is that we were poor.

One faithful day I was with my best friend Mark Snider. We spent the night walking around town while eating a burger and drinking some soda. Any time Mark got, he would tease me. He would talk about how I had a crush on Jessica Stone, a girl that was in our grade. We never got mad at each other because it’s just what two normal 15 year-old boys do.

Mark and I were walking by the ‘’Pet & Mon-stars’’ store on our way home when we heard screaming. We saw a man screaming at a poor little swap monster. ’’You are useless and weak,’’ said the man. Then he kicked it into a pile of barbed wire. So I screamed at the top of my lungs ’’Hey stop!’’ The man ran off in a flash. I didn’t see the man’s face but I didn’t need to know. So I stayed with the swap monster while Mark ran into the store and bought a 6-pack of swap cubes. They are used to carry around your swap monster, so were able to take him to the nearby vet. When we took him to the vet he requested $2.00 to bandage him up and to sign an information sheet. I did not know what to put as his name, so I just put Wind Bite, as I noticed he had the power of wind. How did I know this, you ask? When he was on the floor breathing deeply it felt like a giant fan in front of my face. The doctor told us I would have to keep him for a couple of days, just until the wound on his leg was healed.

This swap monster was smaller than any other monster I had ever seen. He was 5.5ft tall and looked like a big black and white wolf. He had a little black and white swirl of fur on his chest. When I took another look at him I thought, ’’This is my chance, if I win a couple of swap battles, and make a little money to get us going.’’

Swap monster battles are like a boxing match between humans. You put your swap monsters of your choice in arena and at least one has to survive in order to win. The winner either gets to steal one of the opponent’s monsters or leave them be. Each district has a champion. Our champion was Lu Kang. He was a mean, cocky, old man in his late forties. If someone were to defeat him they not only earn the new title as district 3 champion, but they would also get 3 million dollars.

After Wind Bite was healed, I taught him some cool moves to use in the arena in my backyard, and we really bonded and trusted each other. Then I started putting him in these small battles, so I can get used to it, to get noticed, but most importantly to get some more monsters. After fighting in a couple battles, I won a 3ft tall ferret with the power of fire that I named Burn. He was orange, red, and a hint of yellow. I also got a monster named Project X. He was a 4ft tall lizard like monster with the power to project an image of itself to trick its victims so it may spit poison into the other monsters eyes then hit them with a wild punch. Just because he usually does that, he also knows how to do other things.

After school I was walking home without your aunt Lilly, because I had to stay to make up a test. Suddenly I heard a man scream out, “Hey you!’’ Then he started running after me, so I ran. Then at the end of the street I heard him say, “Don’t you want to be the next swap monster champion.’’ I turned around and said, “Who are you?’’ As he was jogging to me, he told me everything. As if he was a T.V. broadcaster he said “Hello my name is Richard Swanzy, telling you, you will have the chance to compete in the championship arena tomorrow at 9am, if you just say yes.’’ I didn’t know what to say. I was so shocked. I don’t know how but I said yes. It was like my body answered for me.

That night I thought, “What was I thinking joining swap monster fighting? My monsters and I are going to be pummeled.’’ Then I just said to myself that if I could do this then my monsters could too. When I woke up, I fed my monsters then trained them in my back yard. Your grandma and aunt did not mind because they too bonded with all my monsters. They knew if I won the family would get 3 million dollars. Then once it became 8:00am, we left.

Watching my monsters fighting the other monsters in the arena I thought that we just might make it out of this all in one whole piece.’ I don’t mean to say this like my monsters were the best in the whole championship. Trust me they were tough to beat. Good thing they had a pit stop for monsters to heal. I just hoped I could beat Lu Kang. As I was finishing the last round, I kind of didn’t want to win. It was mostly because I invited Jessica stone. You know the girl I talked about earlier. If I lost it I would look like a loser, but ‘’It’s too late for me to turn back now.’’ You know why I felt like this, it was because Lu Kang was next.

As I walked into the arena with my monsters, Lu Kang started laughing, then Wind Bite started growling out of nowhere. He said, “You’re going to fight me with those kid? I thought I kicked that thing into a wall?” So he was the one who kicked Wind Bite into the wall. He just grinned at me. “I’m surprised you made it this far with those things.” “You know, they have names just like everyone else,” I said. “Really, and what might those be? Wind Bite, Project X, and Burn. Burn is what I’m going to do to your monster.’’ Then we started to battle.

When we started, we both had three monsters and now just it was up to Wind Bite and Lu Kang’s best monster. Then he hit Wind Bite in his wound. I thought he was done for. As I stared at Wind Bite, he stared back at me from the floor and I knew we were both thinking the same thing, “This is far from over.’’ In a flash, Wind Bite got up using a giant tornado to lift himself up. The tornado was so big it broke the glass that was used as a ceiling, sucking up rocks from the rocky floor of the arena, and also knocking out the other monster. When the tornado’s wrath was over, everyone was amazed about how powerful my monster was and the fact that I won the battle.

So kids, how did you like the story? I still have other stories about battles I had back then. “No more dad, these stories are boring,” said my two spoiled teenage kids. As I told you in the beginning of this story, ‘‘I don’t expect you to listen to my dumb and maybe boring story. All I care is that I am telling it to someone. So just sit there and look pretty.’’ Then they sighed in boredom, which I kind of secretly liked.