A Dragon's Curiosity

The fight was over and the atmosphere calmed down while the two fighters vacated from the fighting pit.

A large portion of the audience vacated the bleacher and headed for the stalls and markets inside the building.

Nisha, Aaren and Tyne Pinewood remained in their seats, as the announcer called for a short break before the next fight would commence.

Eyeing the receding crowd, the elf was curious about their common goal to enter the building all at once.

“What are they doing inside the arena? Aren’t they here to watch the fight?”

“They’re eager to turn in their bets, of course. The main revenue for the arena comes from the betting pools.

You can look up information for both fighters beforehand according to the schedule, and the arena sets the official rates according to their estimation of the fighters based on past records.

Given that one of the combatants has a surge in strength and overturns the predictions, it’s possible to earn quite the sum here.

Ultimately, the arena still takes the biggest cut, as all gembling dens do.”

The [Eternal Warrior] remained half slouching on his seat, making no attempt to either peruse the food stalls or the gambling halls.

Aaren looked tempted to eat something, but ultimately they were here for a lesson and he did not have money to gamble away either.

Nisha relaxed somewhat as the number of humans around her decreased. Although she was not bothered by large crowds, it made the surroundings chaotic and sent her [Spirit Sight] into overdrive.

While it was not possible to monitor every movement inside the range of her ability, the elf was mostly aware of every major action happening anyway.

It put a strain on her mental strength when she had to split her attention into so many smaller parts to process everything, but Nisha treated it as training and continued to scan everything.

“If you do end up betting, make sure you stick to the Arena League and not the Blood Sands fights.

At least there’s a good chance to predict a winner as long as you look into the combatants for the Arena League.

Last Man Standing is a chaotic melee most of the time and seldom a simple one versus one match.

Either they throw in a bunch of people and scatter weapons throughout the pit to make things more exciting, or the arena brings in a bunch of feral monsters and has the fighters go against them.

The organizers do regulate the strength of both sides to prevent total massacres, although it’s hard to predict who will come out on top when fighters are thrust at the border of life and death.”

When it came to topics related to the arena, Tyne Pinewood showed more activity compared to his usual lazy teaching style.

Thinking back on the last two encounters they had, the dragon wondered if she ever heard the man speak so many sentences at once.

It made her curious about the arena itself as a result, if it managed to incite a powerful warrior to change his behaviour.

“Is it very common for blood to dye the arena sands when they named the fights after that?

The previous fight did have some nice points, but I have not seen them use any skills or inflict heavy injuries on each other.”

Even during the fight, Nisha wondered why neither side had used advanced skills to enhance their prowess.

The elf herself often made use of [Ember’s Touch] and [Shadow Clad] to power up her weapons with elemental damage when she hunted inside the Dungeon for the sake of convenience.

Even if the warriors from the last fight did not have access to spells to improve their ranged fighting capacity, they should have mastered one or two aura attacks at least depending on their luck with the Skill Library.

It was unusual to lack any techniques in a formal duel, as their might could have potentially changed the outcome.

Imagining herself into the place of a combatant, Nisha was pretty sure that she would not refuse to use her Skills to fight back.

Aaren looked surprised and started to think back on the fight, he was so lost in the euphoria of the crowd that he did not notice the discrepancy at all.

Only now, once the elf mentioned it, did it strike him as odd.

The [Eternal Warrior] did not reply straight away and hummed to himself.

Eventually, he ceased staring into the air and responded calmly.

“That’s one of the reasons for the name. In the Arena League, it is mostly frowned upon - though not forbidden - to use Skills.

Since it’s hard to predict what effects a particular skill can have despite belonging to the same element or rank, their effectiveness or the harm they might cause is similarly difficult to estimate.

Hence, the formal fights would rather forgo their usage and focus on technique and battle sense instead.

Some agree with that notion and say that it brought the quality of the fights up to another level, while others denounce the Arena League as a toothless tiger and only attend Blood Sands fights instead.”

With his reply, the man implied that the Blood Sands fights indeed derived their name from a bloody spectacle that involved injuries and death.

It astounded Nisha that such a spectacle was condoned within the walls of the capital, but it was not her place to prematurely judge the situation before getting access to more information.

Ever since realizing that she had an overly idealised view of the Thieves Guild and deliberately overlooked the dark side of it, the dragon grew cautious of making a quick judgement and closing her eyes to new information.

Since the crown allowed the arena to continue to operate, there had to be more than merely a lust for blood and profits from gambling going on.

The break seemed to end, as the stands began to fill up again with visitors.

Nisha spotted a couple of young adults quite near them, who each held a juicy bit of meat wrapped in a piece of bread.

In spite of the distance, the smell alone made the girl’s mouth water and now she regretted not paying more attention to the stalls inside the arena.

Nisha wondered whether she could manage to figure out the recipe and cook it at home, the concept was entirely novel among the dishes she knew and it challenged her inner cook.

Nevertheless, she had to tear her attention back to their teacher when he spoke again.

“It’s different with Last Man Standing. A win or defeat can mean life or death there.

The prisoners are encouraged to fight each other to the bitter end, so a crushing defeat usually means that the winner either grievously wounds the loser or outright kills them.

Besides clear massacres, relatively even fights still see harsh injuries and dire struggles.

No one is willing to give up a fight unless they are going to lose their life instead.

Although the losers might avoid outright dying, hardship still awaits them back in their cells.

Surviving inside the arena is a difficult thing.”

Another round of fighting was about to begin in the pit and the announcer introduced the combatants.

From the left, a rather tall man with armored gauntlets entered. He wore a mix of reinforced leather and light chainmail, showing off his defined but not overly large muscles, giving him a streamlined figure that oozed agility.

His opponent, entering from the opposite gate, preferred plate armor, although it also forewent maximum protection in favor of maximum freedom of movement by using less material and focusing on the vitals instead.

Slung across his back, a long spear swayed in tune to his steps, the weapon mostly unadorned and simple with a shaft of even thickness that ended in a leaf shaped point.

Though the man did not radiate the same sharpness and quickness as the fighter with the gloves, the long reach from the spear evened the playing field and he had to have his own advantages to get matched like this through the arena.

Neither side played to the crowd overly much, yet the announcer still managed to whip the crowd into a frenzy and hype the fight.

Some of the viewers went inside the arena building again to make a last minute bet, either impressed by the tirades of the announcer heaping praise on the fighters or trusting their own judgement to make the right call.

After the first fight and the lack of skills in action, Nisha was rather more interested in Tyne Pinewood’s insights on the mechanics behind the fights.

“Aren’t they glad to have escaped harm and continue living for another fight? I have heard that there is a set amount of fights they have to participate in before they can reclaim their freedom.”

“Indeed, staying alive and ultimately escaping their cells is the dream that keeps many of the prisoners alive.

But not winning is the same as losing in the arena.

And every loss makes it harder to reach your goal.”

His speech was cut short as the stands broke out into loud cheers, the fight in the pit had just begun.

Nisha failed to catch the combatants' names, as it was the second performance and she would much rather listen more to in-depth knowledge about the different fights the arena hosted.

Inside the pit, the spear wielder fell back as the swiftly approaching gauntlet fighter tried to get up close and personal.

To ensure his safe retreat, he also slashed left and right in a bid to stop his opponent.

The sharp tip gleamed dangerously while it cut through the air, and the approaching fighter was forced to stop repeatedly to duck and weave below the spear blows aimed at him.

At the beginning, the crowd still rewarded every move with loud cheering and excited screams, the noise level only lowered when the fight dragged on.

Before the [Eternal Warrior] had the chance to go on, Nisha wanted to satisfy a question that suddenly came up and aroused her interest.

“Have you fought in the Blood Sand arena fights before? You are very much informed about them.”

Aaren, who was quite invested in the fight occurring in the pit, also perked up at the sudden inquiry and turned to the side in order to not miss anything.

He imagined the lazy instructor fighting for his life and suddenly had a strained expression, desperately trying not to laugh.

The discrepancy between the two extreme images was too much and he did not want to risk the ire of their instructor by laughing about him.

Nisha was genuinely curious though and had no ulterior motive and was eager to hear more.

“Thankfully, no, I never had to fight in the Blood Sand pit personally.

Way back when I had yet to join [Silverveil], I travelled to the Terus Empire and stayed in the capital for a period of time.

I needed the service of a craftsman residing there and collected a bunch of materials from the local Dungeon, where I met a survivor of the arena, though I did not know that at first.

At first we got into a petty conflict due to some reckless words spoken without much thought, but through that fight we also became friends once the misunderstanding was resolved.

The locals treated him like a hero though, since he was one of the most popular arena fighters and often scheduled matches against other high ranked fighters, making him a star of the arena.

We had different reasons for delving into the Dungeon, I needed to collect materials while he sharpened his combat instinct through constant fighting.

Every time we returned to the surface, our temporary team celebrated with wine and a sumptuous feast until the sun rose.”

Similar to the enthusiasm when it came to the arena, Tyne Pinewood came alive and turned lively when relaying the tale of his past.

Although he did not mention the name of his friend or his exploits in the arena, Nisha and Aaren recognized that it must have been a very famous fighter and a strong warrior to be part of a team going deep into the Dungeon.

Recollecting his past memories, the instructor was lost in thought and neither of the two students wanted to interrupt his line of thought or the story.

The crowd went insane around them as the fight in the pit heated up again.

Gaining control over the range between them, the spear wielder no longer needed to retreat and established his domain on the sand.

Slash after slash connected in the air, forcing the gauntlet fighter to dance along with his blows. Even when the man deflected the long weapon with his armored fists, the next attack never left him enough time to close in and turn the fight to his advantage.

Despite being at a disadvantage, the gauntlet wielder did not wish to give up yet and tried different strategies to approach.