Tournament of the Dead

"Please enter my realm, but beware, before you can enter my game all your powers must be taken from you, field rules, y'know? Defeat my game, and you can take control of my realm..."

- The Composer's message to the universe

The Tournament of the Dead was a tournament organized by the Composer that pitted many deceased characters against each other in a dimension known as the Underground. Although the outcome of the tournament was left unknown, many of the characters who were resurrected in order to compete in the tournament eventually found their way back to the mortal realm of the Original Universe.

Description
The Tournament of the Dead was a competition held in the Underground that was created and organized by the Composer with the assistance of Sho Minamimoto. The Composer initially invited anyone in the Original Universe to join the tournament, but when no-one responded to his invitation, he decided to populate it with the deceased by resurrecting countless dead characters in the Underground in new but powerless bodies. Players were required to form a Pact by pairing up with another player in order to compete in the tournament, with players who did not form Pacts being returned to death. Players who formed Pacts were then given Pins that contained their life force and physical strength, which the Composer stated would not function outside of a pairing. If a player's Pin was stolen by another player, the victim would die while the thief would gain their victim's strength and life force.

The objective of the tournament was never stated outright, but the first challenge that the Composer issued to the Happy Person and The Guy Who Was Engulfed In Milk was to defeat two Carcin Noise. This challenge took place in the same location across two parallel planes of existence where neither man could see the other, but both shared the same physical health, meaning that any damage inflicted on one would also affect the other. This was also true for their enemies: any damage inflicted upon the Carcin Noise of one plane would also be applied to the Carcin Noise in the other.

The Tournament of the Dead began to unravel when the Composer seemingly abandoned it and the contestants began to steal others' Pins in the hope of becoming strong enough to escape from the Underground instead of completing challenges that the Composer had assigned.

History
In 150,080 CMT, the Composer opened an inter-dimensional vortex on the planet Linkit that sucked in several Agrippa and Froog and transported them to the Underground (UG). The Composer then broadcasted the following message from the vortex to the entire universe:. However, because Trantoshen was the only one who came to investigate the vortex (and only because he wanted to find a way to close it), the Composer instead decided to populate the tournament with the deceased, resurrecting almost every single dead BZPB character inside the UG in bodies that were identical to their living bodies with the exception that they were devoid of power and strength. The Composer welcomed the new players to the UG and informed them that they would need to form Pacts by sorting themselves into pairs in order to participate in the tournament, threatening that failing to find a partner would result in the odd ones out being returned to death. While the crowd of players were surrounded and rounded up by Carcin Noise, the Composer added Trantoshen to the ranks of the deceased by sucking him through the vortex and stripping him of his powers.

One dead character who was resurrected to play the Tournament of the Dead was the Happy Person, who cheerily waved at everyone until he felt his greatest strength - his happiness - be drained from his powerless body. The Guy Who Was Engulfed In Milk approached the Happy Person and divulged that he would need to make a pact with someone if he wanted to get his happiness back, so he offered to make a pact with him so that he could also earn back his milk. After the Happy Person accepted the offer, the two humans were approached by Akzer, Rahn, Tidal Wave, Tulio, and the unidentified gelatinous apprentice, who asked them if they knew how they could fight the crabs.

The Composer then bestowed a Pin upon each player who had successfully formed a Pact with another player. The Composer explained that each Pin contained the life force and physical strength of their owner, meaning that, if a player's Pin was stolen by another player, the victim would be returned to death while their life force would be added to that of the Pin's thief. After the Composer ordered the players to touch a crab to proceed to their first challenge, the disembodied voice of Sho Minamimoto repeated the Composer's orders with vigor. TGWWEIM obeyed the Composer's orders and poked one of the Carcin Noise, which caused the Happy Person and himself to be transported to a deserted street-like environment that existed across two parallel planes of existence: although neither could see the other on the street, they felt that they were in the same place and shared sensations, with the Happy Person feeling the blow of a stone that hit TGWWEIM. The Composer then gave them their first challenge: to defeat a Carcin Noise that appeared before each man in the middle of the street. The Composer explained. Meanwhile, Helryx, Teridax, Xintun, and SM Ynot explored their new surroundings, the first of whom reacted with disbelief at being powerless.

Akzer decided to rally the former Apprentices of Caiaphus against the crabs. He and Rahn each grabbed one of the crabs' arms while Tidal Wave and two other former Apprentices began to attack it from the front. However, Tulio attacked a different crab entirely while TGWWEIM picked up a rock and charged at the one on his street. Teridax made a grab for Helryx's Pin, but she flipped him over and stole his instead, returning him to death. After SMY killed Xintun, Helryx and SMY made a Pact together to survive and targeted TGWWEIM, who appeared to be alone because he and the Happy Person were on separate planes of existence. SMY jump-kicked TGWWEIM, who responded by saying before karate-kicking SMY through the air. However, SMY landed on his feet and punched TGWWEIM, who punched back and drop-kicked SMY. Meanwhile, Akzer and Rahn realized that, if the contestants could fight each other for life force and strength, then one could eventually accumulate enough to return to the mortal world, similar to a Situation 456 that Caiaphus once mentioned. Despite a warning from Beastman, Akzer then attempted to steal Tidal Wave's Pin, which kicked off a brawl between the former Apprentices in which some were returned to death.

Eager to return to the mortal world, SMY made an offer to TGWWEIM: if TGWWEIM surrendered to him there and then, SMY would resurrect him in the mortal world after the tournament was over. TGWWEIM seemingly agreed, because SMY then acquired his Pin without continuing resistance. Meanwhile, in the mortal world, Blackout used a spark extractor to extract Ynot's soul from the Ironclad, which separated Hollow Ynot from Ynot's body and caused him to appear in the UG. When SMY told HY about the tournament and its rules, HY collected several Pins from random zombies that he then handed to SMY to help him win before teleporting away. Meanwhile, Akzer, Rahn, Tulio, and Tidal Wave left the brawl between the Apprentices. Tulio proposed an alliance between the four of them that would last until only they remained, at which point they would settle the winner amongst themselves; Akzer, Rahn, and Tidal Wave agreed. While SMY and Helryx eavesdropped on them, Shika suddenly appeared in disguise as "Ryuzaki", which led to a conversation about SMY's morality.

Akzer made a proposition to the Composer where he asked for himself and his allies to be returned to life so that they could hunt down and slay the people who had killed them in the real world, which would be a mutually beneficial outcome for both parties because the Apprentices of Caiaphus would get revenge against their killers, while the Composer would get revenge against those who ignored his invitation to the UG, as well as more players added to the tournament in the form of the Apprentices' victims. Tulio interjected to tell the Composer that, if he accepted their offer but the Apprentices failed, they could either return to the UG or lose their Pins, whichever the Composer preferred. However, Minamimoto rejected Akzer's proposal on the Composer's behalf, so the Apprentices returned to fighting among themselves.

Trivia

 * The Tournament of the Dead was based on the Reapers' Game from The World Ends With You.