In officially less than two weeks, Cody Rhodes will be taking the ring opposite Brock Lesnar for a fight against “The Beast Incarnate” at Night of Champions in Saudi Arabia.

After entering into a program on the RAW after WrestleMania and then getting into a short, bloody affair at Backlash one month later in Puerto Rico, soon, Rhodes will be able to see if he can best “The Beast” and accelerate to the next chapter of his story, which will presumably come to an end when he becomes the Undisputed WWE Universal Champion at some point down the line.

Addressing the WWE Universe for the first time since, well, the previous edition of RAW, Rhodes decided to inform the fans in Greensboro about one of his favorite parables, The Scorpion and The Frog, and explained how the lessons from that story could impact his own pursuit of ultimate glory.

“So, Greensboro, North Carolina. What do you wanna talk about?” Cody Rhodes asked. “I know these grounds, I know this arena. This is the fabled very first home of Starrcade. A wonderful memory, a great amount of mutual respect, respect that is not shared by Brock Lesnar, who has elected not to be here. But you guys are a fun audience, right?

“Well, I'm gonna try one out, not something you hear on a typical sports entertainment show, but ladies and gentlemen, have you heard the one about the scorpion and the frog? It's a simple story. Scorpion is on one side of the river, needs to get to the other side, and he asks the frog who can hop, who can swim over there, he says ‘can I get a ride to the other side of the river?' The frog says ‘h*ll no. You'd sting me!' Scorpion says ‘no, I wouldn't sting you, because if I did, we'd both drown, so I'm not gonna sting you.' That logic is airtight for the frog, y'all. That works, frog puts him on his back, carries him across the river, and halfway across, what do you think happens? He stings him. And as the poison is filling up that frog's lungs, he asks the scorpion, ‘why?' And the scorpion said ‘it's my nature.' It is Brock Lesnar's nature to hunt. Brock Lesnar must be hunting. But make sure, Brock, if you're the one who's hunting, let me ask you something: How's your face?

“I know, Brock Lesnar, you look in the mirror, you see a lion, you see the alpha male of our species, but you should also see a black eye, a set of staples, and when I look in the mirror, I see the man who put them there. I see a man who busted Brock Lesnar's face and maybe broke his spirit and beat the biggest bully in WWE history, so I gladly accept Brock Lesnar's challenge at Night of Champions. And I'm not gonna go out of bounds on Brock Lesnar. There's always been this talk about his ego, his manipulation on the roster, his dates. You wanna know why Brock Lesnar is on top and has been on top? Because Brock Lesnar is better than 99.9% of the superstars that come in this ring. But at Backlash, Brock Lesnar was not better than me. He called it a cheap win. Oh, a wrestling counter to a wrestling move in a wrestling ring. How cheap that is. Brock, even if I had been imbued with the powers of a god and beat you in 20 seconds, you still would have hunted me, because this is not about a championship. This is about something else. This is about who is the big thing on Monday Night RAW. ‘The next big thing,' that's what they always said about Brock Lesnar. ‘The next big thing. The next big thing. The next big thing,' and they were right. But eventually, Brock, what happens when they just say ‘next.' You have conquered WWE, you have conquered sports entertainment, you have conquered this sport, but we are at the point where I need you to take your busted face, I need you to step aside, because you, sir, are not the big thing around here anymore. You are simply in my way.”

You've gotta give it to Rhodes; he certainly knows how to elevate a moment in the pursuit of making each of his WWE PLE performances feel special. Whether he's able to become one of the rare performers who can secure consecutive wins over Lesnar, however, is far less cut and dry, as Lesnar has won everywhere he's wrestled, won 72 percent of his matches according to Cagematch, and, according to Dave Meltzer, has special rules that just don't apply to other WWE Superstars.

Eric Bischoff believes Cody Rhodes losing at WrestleMania 39 was the right call.

Discussing the decision to give Rhodes the L at WrestleMania 39 in an interview with Jon Chuckery, Eric Bischoff explained that, much like anything in wrestling, if there's a larger story involved, the decision was the right one.

“I think it's absolutely the right decision,” Bischoff said via Fightful. “Having Cody Rhodes chase that title, yes. If, giant ‘if' fluorescent colors, fireworks, or anything else you can think of to draw attention to the word ‘if' in this context; if they have a plan,” he said. “Look at what they did with The Bloodline storyline. That was a phenomenal storyline from a storyteller's point of view. The character development, the art of each of the characters, the layers in the story, the defined arc within that story, all of it was as good as anything I've ever seen in professional wrestling. From a technical point of view. I thought it was amazing, really amazing. Now, if they can, however, they ended up with that incredible storyline, six months, eight months leading up to WrestleMania, whoever that team was, if they can replicate anything close to that level of success over the next 12 months, that is absolutely the best decision. On the other hand, if they don't have a really great plan, then it could be a lost opportunity, but we won't know until we know.”

Does WWE have something bigger planned for Rhodes past the current storyline with Lesnar? Will this match at Night of Champions lead to something bigger at SummerSlam, maybe Rhodes vs. Reigns II, or a third match with “The Beast?” Fans will have to wait until the RAW after Night of Champions to see the fallout.