Up on the hill, the smoke can already be seen as the area is spiritually cleansed for the final Bout and the subsequent winner’s ceremony. Friends, I can assure you that the Cult of the Dark One has been working overtime this year to ensure that we have a really electrifying, energetic closing show, and I know you’re not going to want to miss it. Who knows? Maybe one of these two operators will be the star of the show.

SupernovaStarbright has leapt to prominence in this contest as the underground duellist enfant terrible who has put much older and more seasoned competitors to the sword. One of them has been SIngularByte; the last time they met, in Bout 2, she came away with the win. But since then she’s been behind SingularByte in the league rankings - not through any fault of her own, but because SingularByte has remained consistently close to the top of the craft. He comes in today as the narrow favourite, the world number 2 vs the number 5, but no-one thinks that an upset is out of the question.

And they’re off!

It’s DuckMech starting strong, coming to position 13, and Hard Hat holds tight at 16, watching what its opponent will do next in this battle of the shovers. DuckMech moves into ramming speed but as it slams into Hard Hat its Opponent does not budge - the two bots are almost perfectly matched on paper but Supernova is clearly hoping that that ram will be the difference between them.

Oh, but SingularByte has other ideas - it thinks that the difference between them is a flipper, and it’s not wrong! DuckMech is on its back, and now it is EASILY shoved - so Hard Hat now obliges, with its trademark move, pushing DuckMech all the way back to position 8! Snisbo finds a way to right the Duck and gets two good rams in - once while Hard Hat attempts a flip while DuckMech is still mid-recovery - but before long it’s back on its back, and now it’s being shoved again, this time all the way back to position 1! This looks bad - does DuckMech have an answer? It looks like no - again, with the ram, but all this damage is just being absorbed by that giant mitt, and then DuckMech is on its back again - and with one final shove, DuckMech is in the place where it’s put so many of its competitors - in the gutter - and the judges have called it! HARD HAT WINS BY TKO!

SingularByte will be aware that Brendan has already won his bout, so this sends Hard Hat to the Round 3 playoff against either Trapdoorspyder or Habanero. But this moment is all for SupernovaStarbright - the audience here have loved every minute she’s been in the Operator cockpit. DuckMech merch has sold by the bucketload here, and for sure, if she comes back next year it won’t be as a rookie - it’ll be as a contender that anyone is afraid to scrap with. SupernovaStarbright, out in fifth.