Blood.
Kleist could smell it, clearly, but she didn't really care. She just sat up and held her belly on the hard bed of animal skins.
Pain followed her everywhere, and the injuries the beast had given her three days ago had not fully recovered yet.
The slave owners had already treated her. They threw her into an instrument. When she came out, the bloody wound on her lower abdomen had disappeared, leaving only an ugly scar. But that doesn't mean she won't be in pain.
Who doesn’t feel pain?
This question was born, and a giant covered in blood flashed before her eyes.
Maybe he will too.
"Can't you sleep?" a man asked under the burning torch.
Kleist recognized him as the man fighting with two daggers.
His upper body was bare, and there were five ugly scratches on his chest that were clustered together. The scars were thick, like some kind of flesh-colored bugs writhing under his skin, and raised a terrifying outline. He was scratching his forearm with a short knife.
"What's your name?" Kleist asked.
The man smiled - among gladiators, asking each other's names was a sign of respect. Most people would die within two or three battles, so exchanging names became unnecessary.
"Karelian," he said. "From Nor Sand."
"Sand? I come from the forest. I am Kleist." Kleist said. "But I don't know what that forest is called. I was captured by the slave team."
"It doesn't matter if you don't know." Karelian shook his head. "Sooner or later we will all forget. The sand pit of the arena will bury everything."
"It can't bury me."
"Perhaps." Karelian replied, his voice was very soft, with a kind of indifference. What followed was silence. None of them spoke anymore, but Kleist actually knew that many people were already awake and waiting on their beds with their eyes open.
The stone wall was quiet and not trembling. It was already late at night, they had no battle to fight, and the dignitaries had already left the arena...
Quiet.
But it's not so quiet - because, in the deepest part of the rock wall, everyone can hear a spreading roar.
"The Invincible." Karelian spoke softly, with a certain certainty in his voice. "It's him, it can't be wrong."
"Do you know him well?" Kleist asked.
"I've seen him five times, six times if you count the one three days ago." Karelian shook his head, turned around, stretched his body on the rock wall under the torch, and showed off his A rope of triumph wrapped around the waist.
It is not long, but most are red and only six are black.
Staring at it, Kleist fell silent.
The Rope of Triumph - A tradition among gladiators, it is a scar that starts at the lumbar spine and runs down the waist.
Before each fight, they would make a small cut along the previous scar. If they won, it would grow back naturally and turn red. If they lose, they will sprinkle some soil into the scar, so that when the scar forms, the node will turn black.
Karelian's Rope of Triumph proves that he failed six times, but he did not die, which means he was lucky - or unlucky enough.
Gladiators who escaped death again and again were also favored by slave owners in the gladiatorial arena, and those who were favored by them would not end well.
"Six failures?" Kleist asked.
"Six failures." Karelian turned around and nodded, his expression calm.
There was still that terrifying roar coming from the depths of the rock wall. He leaned against the rock wall and tapped his fingers gently in response to the roaring sound, as if accompanying the angry man. Watching his movements, Kleist suddenly felt an impulse that came from nowhere.
She jumped out of bed, found some scraps of food from the long table nearby, and picked out the edible parts. She poured them into a clay pot and staggered into the darkness.
middle.
The place where the gladiators lived was an underground cave dug by man, extending in all directions. Everyone had his own bed and room, but only one person could enjoy a separate room.
"Are you going to find him?" Karelian's voice came from under the torch.
"Yes." Kleist replied briefly.
"Then, I'll go with you."
...
...
After some time, they arrived at their destination.
Kleist didn't know how much time had passed. She just felt like she was going blind as she stared for the route in the darkness. Everything turned into blurry outlines in the darkness.
Even Karelian is the same. Fortunately, he was much calmer. He didn't say a word along the way, but he could always hold Kleist up when she was about to fall.
And now... they were standing at the entrance of a cave, with two torches burning quietly on the rock wall, bringing the only light. However, despite this, the darkness inside the cave is still deep.
"Anglonius?" she called. "I brought you food."
There was no answer in the darkness, only some kind of low and slow breathing, as horrifying as if a person was about to drown in his own blood.
"Anglonius?" Kleist continued to call, but still received no answer.
Karelian, standing next to her, shook his head: "That's not his name."
"What?"
"That's not his name," Karelian repeated, then reached for the crock of food and took over her duties.
However, he did not shout that long and complicated syllable, but instead shouted a short-syllable word.
"Angron." He called into the darkness.
Then - the ground began to tremble, Kleist straightened his back, and suddenly smelled an extremely strong smell of blood.
She stared closely at the darkness at the entrance of the cave, her eyes not blinking for a moment. The pain that had been invaded by sweat came back, even more intense. Seconds later, a giant crashed through the darkness and appeared in front of them.
His face was twitching nervously. Three days ago, Kleist couldn't see his face clearly, but she could see it clearly now.
She saw cables made of pitch-black iron, their barbs piercing deeply into the flesh of the giant's head and extending beyond. His eyes were a turbid light blue, sunken deep into the sockets, and the details beneath them were all submerged in blood.
His nose was bleeding, not in a trickle, but in a rush like a flood, turning his chin and entire neck into a scarlet red. His expression was a terrible mixture of threat and hatred, and he bared his teeth, like an evil beast waiting to gnaw his flesh and blood.
Kleist suddenly felt a sense of fear, but the giant known as Angron didn't even look at her.
"What are you doing here?" he asked in a voice that sounded like files scraping against each other. "I told you not to come to me again."
"Come bring you food."
Karelian raised the earthen jar in his hand - Kleist began to regret why he didn't pick a larger utensil. This jar was big enough for them, but it was too big for the giant who was standing in the darkness and bleeding. It's far from enough.
"I don't need food."
Angron replied stiffly, his face began to twitch again, and the cables that were deeply embedded in his flesh began to gleam, and the scarlet color flashed away. Kleist was quite sure that she had just seen them twitching, even though it was only for a moment, but she could not be mistaken.
"Did it bite you again?" Karelian asked.
"Asking knowingly." Angron sneered, but after this brief smile, he growled and raised his right hand to cover his face.
A low gasp followed, and a low, almost shuddering howl. Kleist's legs went weak and he couldn't help but kneel on the ground.
, terrified by that terrible sound.
After a while, Angron let go of his hand, grunted, and stared thoughtfully at his bright red palm, but did not speak, just silent.
After a while, he raised his head, with confusion in his light blue eyes, as if he couldn't quite understand what had just happened. Then, he glanced at Kleist.
"You're afraid." He said in a voice as heavy as a hammer striking iron felt. "But it's okay."
"Are you okay?" Karelian asked.
Angron smiled, his tortured face twisted and twitching, his teeth sticking out of his lips, looking extremely terrifying against the blood, and this was the limit of what he could do. He sat cross-legged and shook his head.
"It's never going to be okay," he said shortly, raising his hand to point at the cables that ran to the back of his head. "It's eating me up."
"Don't talk nonsense." Karelian stepped forward, facing the giant's ferocious eyes and handed him the earthen pot. "There's no way that thing can beat you, you're the undefeated."
Angron let out a low snort, as if he was mocking, but also as if he was just making an uncontrollable noise because of pain. He picked up the earthen pot and found a bone among the shriveled bread and sticky broth. He placed the bone in his mouth and cracked it gently with his teeth.
Click, click, click.
"Let's go quickly." Angron said between chewing. "If you don't want to end up like old Oinomouth."
Karelian sighed: "The death of Oinomouth has nothing to do with you."
"Relevant!" Angron roared lowly, not like a rebuttal, but more like a terrible sentence. "His death will be on me!"
Karelian shook his head, and he pulled Kleist up: "This is Kleist, the person who offered to deliver food to you."
Angron stopped eating and looked at her again. At this moment, Kleist felt extremely nervous. She stared into the giant's light blue eyes, afraid she would see a dismissive look in them, but she didn't.
She only saw a fleeting complex emotion, like sympathy or compassion - neither of which she could understand.
However, they only appeared for a brief moment. Then, there was only bloody anger in those eyes.
Blood threads climbed on it, and he let out a howl. His upper and lower jaws collided violently, broken bone stubble spurted out between his lips and teeth, and blood gurgled out of his nose again. He stood up with a roar, and Kleist almost thought he was going to lunge at her and kill her—but he didn't.
The giant named Angron simply turned around and walked back into the darkness, not before saying his name: "Angron!"
"Leave!" Then he roared, the sound was like the loud sound of a gravel hammer hitting the ground, so terrible that it could make people cover their ears without any echo.
Karelian sighed, said nothing more, and pulled Kleist away.
