Prayuth vs. Giulia La Rocca - Seeing Stars

Prayuth moved in, strong and sure, looking to secure the hold and start asserting his dominance. The results were a bit odd - he managed to take the advantage, it felt like,but Giulia was surprisingly hard to shove away, more firm than he'd anticipated. Maybe she just had a solid bass, maybe his own stance was messed up, maybe it was just the lack of wrestling experience on his part. Whatever the reason, it wasn't working, and he had plans to change up tactics

That all changed, however, when she beat him to the punch. Or knee, to be specific.

Part of the problem was that he honestly wasn't expecting her to throw a strike his way, whatever her style was supposed to be. He clearly had the reach on her, and his whole attire scream ‘dangerous striker’. It seemed like an obvious no-go.

But she did, hitting him right in the breadbasket was an impressive blow. It wasn't the worst shot he'd ever taken to the stomach, but it took him off guard, and that made it all the worst. He bent as the wind flew out of him, and the next thing he knew, there was a surprisingly muscular arm wrapped around his skull, pulling him tight and anchoring him to the mat.

Needless to say, it was not a good look.

Prayuth went into panic mode away and began to push at Giulia’s back while he yanked his head back, attempting to pull it free.

Was it a bad idea to challenge Prayuth to a striking contest? Most probably yes. But that was far from Giulia's intentions there. For her, the point was merely to take advantage of the surprise effect. And also, she needed a way to get somehow closer to him without the risk of falling victim to numerous punches and kicks in the process that were probably at the core of Prayuth's move arsenal.

And so far, it seemed to work perfectly! Even if she wasn't being quite nice by tricking him like that, nice was something Giulia La Rocca didn't consider herself necessary to be once having entered the ring.

While Giulia wasn't a specifically proficient striker, far from the level of her Thai opponent, she did pack some puch in them. And that was evident in his crouching reaction to the knee strike. Sure, the surprise effect was aggravating that, but the Italian had nothing to complain about the results.

With the Thai bending forward, it was easy for Giulia to now step forward and turn a bit in order to get him into a side headlock. She would have actually wanted to exchange a few words there - or namely maybe just taunt the guy a bit, but his resistance was escalating quickly and the Italian became less confident on her ability to keep him put there for a while.

Thus, Giulia quickly tried to resolve the situation by jumping forward, hoping to deliver Prayuth's face into the mat with a simple Bulldog in the process.

So what did Prayuth know about Giulia La Rocca so far? A few things. She was stronger than she appeared to be at a glance, which he guessed she'd have to be if she was serious about competing in Tension. She was built, well-built, and while her strikes weren't the best he'd ever seen. She certainly had the power aspect down.

She was bold, too, he'd give her that. Not the weak little waif he'd been hoping to start things off with, but in the end it was no big deal, right? The way a movie ended was more important than the way it began, and wrestling matches were about the same. As long as he made sure things wound up in his favor, people could forget the stuttering start.

A good thing, too, because Giulia didn’t seem to be in the mood to slow down anytime soon. Barely a moment had passed before she began to pull forward, dragging Prayuth along in her tight hold. For what reasons? He didn’t know and didn’t want to know. He just knew that he didn’t want it to happen.

He made his escape attempt as soon as she leaped into the air, no doubt attempting to drop her with some wild attack. While she was up, he put his all into a hard shove at her back, trying to wrench his head free. That wasn’t all, either - the moment he rose up, he’d send a hard kick out, targeting her sides with the brunt of his shin. Just a little something to show her what he was all about.

If Prayuth was one of those guys who froze when confronted with such strength as Giulia's, this was about the time she would have known about that. The Thai fighter wasn't. That was evident already with the difficulty of keeping hold of the side headlock, and the sooner the Italian would get him stunned a bit the better.

Thus, a quick Bulldog would probably solve that problem. And so Giulia jumped...

The rest of the move didn't follow the script though. Something hit her back halfway through the jump, and it hit her hard. Surprise effect was once again playing its part as the Italian instinctively let go of her opponent's head, ruining her plans of stunning Prayuth at all. Instead, her mid-air hit back hit the mat harder than she had prepared for.

Rolling over to facing the mat, the Italian was holding her back. That didn't keep her opponent from attacking her again though, as the guy was amazingly fast back up again. Giulia got a hard kick delivered to her side, which made her roll around one round further away from her Thai foe.

OK, Giulia had to admit that Prayuth had proved himself to be a proficient striker. She didn't want to have to take many of those strikes anymore.

Giulia would first get up to her all fours, the Italian then wanted to get back up again. But her progress was slow, and danger was looming close by.

Giulia was wide open, Prayuth had the initiative, and he did was came naturally to a fighter like him: he seized the opportunity. There was nothing wrong with it. She was open, he took his chances, and it paid off for him in a big way - he landed the blow, nice and clean.

But before he could even start to bask in the moment, a strange thing happened, something he hadn’t foreseen. Only a moment after landing the kick and making that meaty smacking sound, the crowd started to boo him.

He didn’t let it distract him too much, especially since his people had warned him that men tended to get negative reactions from the Tension crowd until they’d built up some popularity. Even so, it took him by surprise, gave him a second’s pause. It was the first time he’d ever gotten that kind of reaction, and for what? Fighting in a fight?

He shrugged it off, and focused on the task at hand, closing in on Giulia as she started to rise. He stepped over to her side, raised his leg up high, then tried to bring it down on the small of her back with a swift axe kick, hoping to keep her down on the mat.

Despite her precautions, Prayuth had managed to catch Giulia off guard, and deliver some of his signature moves. Kicks and hits. But the Italian couldn't really blame herself... If anything, the Thai guy was just proving his point about having some skills. He wasn't a movie star for nothing.

Except that for some reason, the crowds weren't admiring his stardom for the moment. Booing, really? That was definitely a surprise. Giulia hadn't seen that one coming. And she guessed that they were booing at him, not her, right?

And with that, she got an idea. Maybe she could persuade the crowds to boo at him even louder? How would that make the supposed movie star react? Could it mess up his game?

With that in mind, maybe she should just let Prayuth's moves keep coming for now. Well, to be honest, she wasn't in a position to defend from them much either. Soon enough, before even getting back up again, the Thai delivered a swift axe kick on her back.

Yes, it hurt. But not as much as it appeared to based on Giulia's reaction. The girl let out a scream, dropping back to the mat again. Rolling around one time, she acted like being in serious pain, but still setting herself up like a perfect prey for another attack.

Let's see what the guy would do, and how the crowds would react.

Prayuth had launched more kicks in his career than even the most hardcore of his fans could ever hope to count, strikes of every kind onto just about all sorts of enemies from all sorts of positions in all manner of ways. But, all through that time, he'd never experienced that sort of reaction. Both from his opponent and from the crowd.

Sure, the kick had to have hurt, it was meant to, but she took it like a gunshot. He didn’t know what he was expecting, but the audience seemed to have their own opinions, throwing a fresh round of boos his way.

He winced as he looked down at her and chewed his lip for a moment, rethinking this from the bottom up. Maybe he needed to take it slower for a second. Maybe he needed to give her a little chance to breath. Make a real match out of this. Okay.

Deciding to take things a little slower, her reached down and grabbed Giulia by the head, pulling her up into a front facelock and forcing her to feet. All the while, he tried to considered ways to end this quick and not look like a royal jackass…

He wasn’t coming up with many answers.

Giulia wasn't one to play all nice in the ring. She wasn't going to break the rules, she wasn't going to do anything stupid - but she wasn't above playing psychological games and tricking her opponents into something they weren't expecting at all. And that was exactly the case with Prayuth right now. Behaving unexpectedly could be messing up his game.

Well, at least the Thai guy gave up on his kicks and hits for now. Already the moment he spent apparently thinking about the situation, considering how to react, betrayed him for having second thoughts.

And that reminded Giulia about something. She had overheard the words debut match. That was something she should concentrate on. Prayuth may have been an experienced fighter, but he hadn't been in a wrestling match before. In one, things were often not as straightforward as in other types of fighting.

Soon enough though Giulia was pulled back up - in a front facelock. Apparently the Thai guy had some idea of wrestling moves... So should she keep on letting him have his way for now? Let the crowds feel for her?

Nah, letting oneself become a victim to too many attacks was never a wise thing to do. Besides, he was being too open right now. The Italian couldn't resist trying to surprise Prayuth with a couple of hard punches to his midsection. If those connected the way she wanted them to, she'd soon be freed from the facelock. Then she could try to quickly grab hold of his arm and Irish Whip the guy towards the nearest corner.

”Hey, come on! Fight fair!”

”That was a cheap shot!”

”Having problems with a girl, huh?”

As Prayuth went about his business - what with the whole ‘wrestling match’ and everything - he couldn’t help but notice that there was a particularly rowdy group of guys at ringside, heckling him hard enough to be heard loud and clear. They were doing a good job of rallying the crowd against him, too, as he picked Giulia and put her into a deadly front facelock. He was tempted to start yelling back at them, too, public relations be damned.

Before he got the chance, though he felt a hard, sharp pain in his stomach, landing hard against his chiseled abs and knocking the wind out of him. He tried to refill his lungs, but another blow knocked slammed into his pecs. Strong shots. Forceful. He’d taken some of the best blows from some of the best fighter, and these? They were right up there.

The next thing he knew, he was being hurled off into the nearest turnbuckle with a surprising pull and throw. He hit the top pad hard with his chest and stumbled back, wincing as he tried to get his senses back.

So, the crowds seemed to be turning into Giulia's favor. If Prayuth had been a star entering the ring, he didn't seem to be that anymore. At least from what the Italian could hear from the audience closer to the ring. But she had to admit being somewhat at a loss of what was causing it. Did the crowds really think Prayuth was being too rough on her? Or had her curved and toned body in a rather generous outfit managed to persuade them on her side? Or did everyone just simply prefer the girl winning?

Whatever the reason, Giulia couldn't really complain. And the crowds were giving her even more reasons to punch the air out of the Thai guy's lungs.

According to the plan, that made the trick. No more facelock to deal with, and Prayuth was all ready to be sent towards the turnbuckle.

Obviously, Giulia was not by any means a super-skillful striker. But honestly, skill wasn't really all that necessary when one's fists had the amount of strength of the Italian's.

Anyway, now it was time to rush after the Thai guy. As he was stumbling backwards, Giulia crashed into his back with her body. Pushing him forward a little in the process as well, maybe she could get his chest hit the turnbuckle the second time.

But that could be considered just a side effect. What the Italian really wanted to do was to start showing off her power moves. And once she had gotten herself positioned behind Prayuth's back, that would be the perfect moment to try that by executing a simple belly-to-back suplex on the Muay Thai star. Start giving him a little taste of what wrestling was all about.