War God for Hire- Gladiator

by David Burke

  Kyle answered her in his mind, “No, the mage is only a mortal, as you say. He can’t have much essence left. I will outlast him.”

  “Oh, stupid godling. What if he has a reservoir with him? You probably don’t even know what that is.”

  Then Kyle felt the pain fade. The trembling in his body slowed down. His muscles felt like jelly but the electrical current running through him was gone. He had done it. He had outlasted the mage. In a final display of defiance, Kyle held up one hand and shouted, or tried to with a voice made raw by spasming. A weak cry of victory came out and then he slid off, falling unconscious to the ground beneath him.

  Beyond fourteen-hour days of intense physical workouts, Kyle was also busy learning as much as he could about the world he was in. He had mastered or remembered enough of the common language to speak it well after the first thirty days of tutoring. For the last four Verden weeks, he had been playing dumb so as to keep Nyda coming to his cell every night for language classes.

  If she caught on to what he was doing, she didn’t seem to mind. Her initial fear and hesitancy around him had long since faded, and he even got her to talk about her past from time to time. It seemed very painful for her, so he didn’t push. He learned enough to know that she had been captured in a raid and some people close to her had died.

  As for her life as a slave at the coliseum, she had only arrived a couple days before Kyle. The way she talked, most of her days consisted of cooking and cleaning, besides her tutoring him. There was clearly something that she was dreading, but anytime he tried to broach the subject she would nearly burst into tears, so he dropped it.

  He really did enjoy her company, and he could say with some degree of surprise that she was the first woman since his mother who had ever sat next to him on a bed while he wasn’t trying to get into her pants. It wasn’t that he didn’t find her attractive. Quite the contrary.

  She was gorgeous. Her hair was so unique, at least to him. He supposed there might be droves of elves with similar light magenta-shaded hair, but that didn’t make her any less gorgeous to him. The almond-shaped eyes, smooth skin, and the perfect hints of curves in all the right places could have driven him to distraction if he wasn’t so focused on his training.

  Still, she was a nice diversion. It was just that, this time, he found diversion in simple conversation rather than the horizontal mambo. She talked about simple things; about her life before being captured. The way her village was at the foot of a mountain, collecting water from the stream. Most of it was mundane, but she made it all sound interesting. Just the sound of her voice was worth listening to.

  Even her tales of the years after the cataclysm were interesting. A great pit at the foot of the mountain had opened up. She told him numerous tales of the different types of monsters which were released upon the land, and the ways her village could have been terrorized.

  Instead, the tear in the earth had exposed a massive nest of creatures known as gembores. They were creatures with cone shaped heads and four powerful limbs they used to tunnel narrow passages into the earth. As they consumed various minerals and rocks, their bodies formed scales made of precious gems. It wasn’t clear from her stories if this was some form of magic or a completely chemical process.

  Chapter 14 - Harsh Realities

  The weapons training had actually become quite enjoyable for Kyle. It put him back in the mindset of spring training. The physical work occupied his mind, and he learned a great deal about controlling his body. The trainers were surprised at how well he picked up each weapon they presented to him.

  As important as those weapons were, Kyle knew that it was not the bat, glove, or ball that played the game. It was the man. His body and his mastery of it were more important. To put it in the terms of his new life in Verden, he was the weapon, and the hammer, spear, or sword were simply extensions of his will.

  Kyle was more than a little excited about the increased control of his body. He mastered the ability to move at a speed that would have been beyond anything he could have done on Earth. His strength only increased by one from the weeks of intense training, but Hilde assured him that was because while this workload might be challenging for a mortal, it was nothing to a god.

  In contrast, his agility went all the way up to nine and was nearing the peak of normal human or elven limits. He still wasn’t as quick as Kierra or even Gilthan, but he was close to the elf and had blown past the human fighters they were training with.

  Saber talked a great deal about the changes he displayed with his stats and had insisted on testing him every week, just to see if Selma’s spell would show any change in them. Rarely was he disappointed. Kyle had been pleased with the progress but knew there was still so far to go.

  Name: Krig (Kyle Hudson)

  Race: Demi-god (War God/human)

  Stats: (Current/Max)

  Strength: 17/42

  Agility: 9/42

  Constitution: 15/45

  Will: 12/45

  Mind: 7/39

  Charisma: 4/29

  Essence: (Current/Max)

  War: 12/50 – Conversion rate: 1/second

  Raw Essence: 3,764

  Divine Ability:

  Rage Burst, 1 - 4 War

  In talking about it, the head trainer always seemed to marvel at his growth and credited it with him being an elemental. Kyle had long since learned what an elemental was from Hilde. It had led to a conversation which was far too esoteric for his taste. Essentially, if he understood it, an elemental was a manifestation of the concept of one of the eight essence types.

  She had explained that air elementals occasionally formed when different systems of warm and cold air would clash. The same with earth elementals and earthquakes. Along with sea elementals, those were the most common types. Others like, deceit and lust elementals, were only theorized.

  Undead monsters were thought to be a form of death elementals, but Kyle got lost when he was trying to follow Hilde’s explanation of how that worked. The one he was most interested in, of course, was war elementals. From what his angelic guide explained, they were born in the aftermath of massive battles when nations fought nations.

  Hilde didn’t seem to know for sure how elementals manifested, or at least her explanations seemed to be all over the place. When he had pointed that fact out to her, she devolved into the version of herself that liked to call him names. Sometimes Kyle could have sworn that she was less Jiminy Cricket and more nagging wife.

  One of the few things she admitted to not knowing was how half-elementals were formed. She theorized that they implanted a portion of their essence on unborn children, but according to her, no one knew for sure. When he asked how that could be possible for the gods to not know, he felt her staring at him even though she was just a voice inside his head. He could almost visualize her looking down her nose at him, as though to wonder what sort of idiocy was going to come out of his mouth next.

  Hilde even went so far as to scoff and propose that the gods were nothing more than extremely ancient and advanced elementals. She suggested it hesitantly, and he got the feeling that it was an idea that she truly believed, but worried might deeply offend Kyle. Maybe it would have offended Krig, but whatever part of him was buried within Kyle seemed to only come out during weapons training.

  As Kyle pondered his stat increases, he realized that even his Mind and Charisma traits had increased. Although they debated the reasons, Hilde and he both agreed that it was connected to his learning the common language of Verden. While Kyle was proud of the improved control of his body, Hilde chided him repeatedly about how mastery of his flesh construct was not mastery of his true self.

  As much as he wanted to disagree with her, Kyle couldn’t.

  He could feel that there was more to this. There was something inside of him that he wasn’t able to tap. He had failed to be able to trigger his Divine Ability, Rage Burst, since his capture at the quarry. They agreed that it was likely bec
ause at this stage, he was still only able to utilize essence if he was doing so instinctually. It wasn’t something that he could control consciously.

  Kyle kept telling himself that he needed to dedicate some time to learning it, but he still believed that learning to fight was a more immediate need. So, he had dedicated himself to that. Of course, sitting cross-legged on the floor trying to connect with some invisible energy inside himself couldn’t hold a candle compared to time spent with Nyda.

  One of the more surprising changes that he experienced was that Kyle found he needed far less sleep than he would have expected. Training fourteen hours a day, and then three hours for language tutoring, already left him short of his normal eight hours of sleep. In his previous life, Kyle had been radically committed to micro-managing every detail of his training regimen.

  That management included counting protein grams and general calories. It controlled the time and duration of his exercise, rigid attention to detail in his lifting, not only to ensure perfect form but also to track every detail for use in formulating the next week’s routines. Sleep was but another aspect of that control.

  Kyle had religiously insisted on getting eight hours of sleep every day. Since he was an early riser, that meant that, except on game nights, he was always in bed by nine. More than one girlfriend had complained about him not being willing to take her out at night. But he had never felt any loss from it.

  Now, though, it became clear that this new body didn’t need anywhere near as much sleep as his old one had. He was not getting more than four hours of sleep a night. Which was a good thing, because Hilde insisted that he spend at least two hours a night in a guided meditation of sorts.

  The celestial was trying to teach him how to access his essence at will. He agreed this would be useful, but it wasn’t something that seemed to be bearing fruit. Kyle was sure that he had touched on the power within him for a second or two at a time, but he could never hold it. Not even when he tried to peer into the void and see Hilde again. If getting another peek at her wasn’t enough motivation, then he couldn’t imagine what would be, short of a life and death situation.

  He had been counting down the days until the end of the month since it was soon to be the beginning of the open matches. At least that was what he was expecting if Hilde’s tutorial had been correct. By his count, it was only six days away and he honestly felt more nervous than right before opening day of his first season in the majors.

  This morning, when the ladder was lowered down, Kyle climbed up it quickly. He was pretty sure by this point that he could break out if he needed to. The guards seemed a bit more lax over time, but they still eyed him carefully and kept their hands on their weapons. Ironically, his training had not really included assessing other fighters yet, but he still instinctively sized them up and was confident that, even though he was unarmed, they were no match for him.

  It was great to start feeling confident again.

  Kyle noticed they were not headed straight to the arena floor. He also saw that there were more slaves in the hallways cleaning the walls and floors. It was easy to identify the slaves because all of them had a silver anklet similar to the manacles that had been placed on his wrists and ankles. He always noted that while some of the fighters had one on both legs, none of the others had them on both wrists and ankles, other than him. Well, and Skrug, but the half-troll could definitely be unruly.

  As he paid attention to what the slaves were doing, the beehive feeling increased. It was like when his mom went on a cleaning spree before company came for dinner. He assumed that something was going to be happening soon for this to be going on.

  They ended up in the room that he and the others had originally been tested in. All of the other fighters were there before him, which made him wonder why he was always brought in last. The three humans were kept in regular cells, not ones sunk into the floor, so it was likely easier to get them out. He knew where Kierra and Gilthan’s cells were since they were right next to his. Skrug only said he was kept in a pit, so Kyle assumed it was something close to that.

  It likely wasn’t important, but it made him curious. Now, though, what he wanted to know was why they were all here in this room rather than up in the arena training. Fortunately, he only had to wait a minute before Saber walked in. The man was dressed differently. Rather than his normal leather armor and dual versions of his namesake weapon, he was in something more like a toga. The only people Kyle had seen wearing anything like this so far, had been Darron and Soren.

  “Ha, I see you all staring at me. Like my fancy new clothes, do you? Well, Lord Soren wanted me to go to some luncheon set up to talk about you worthless lot. We will be having a few exhibition matches tomorrow,” Saber announced.

  Kyle couldn’t help himself. Up to this point, he had been a good little slave fighter, content to listen and learn. In part, it was because everything was so alien to him. The language barrier also didn’t help, and even though he had been able to operate without Hilde’s translations for a few weeks, he had kept his mastery of the common tongue to himself.

  Now, though, the question burst out before he could school his lips. “Exhibition matches? Who gets to fight? Who’s gonna be watching?”

  Saber smiled at him with a knowing look. “I thought so. Apparently, your language lessons have worked better than you let on. Well, since you asked so suddenly, I will tell you that the seven of you, along with a professional fighter, will be participating in three rounds of matches over the next three days. The first will be tomorrow night. After that, there will be an auction to see who wants to buy you.”

  Intellectually, Kyle understood he was a slave, but it was still shocking to hear the idea of purchasing intelligent beings so casually mentioned. Probably part of it was that he didn’t feel like a slave.

  He had regained much of his customary swagger over the past few weeks. The greater his comfort level, the more his confidence increased. Maybe the ticket was to think of this as being traded to a new team. It wasn’t something that had ever happened to him, but he knew dozens of players who had been shuffled around. Or had known friends that had happened to in his old life.

  “And who will be watching?” Kyle asked.

  Saber stared at him for a moment before answering. He could see that the man was weighing him in a new light. “Get the questions out now. I’m pretty lax compared to many of the old houses. Lord Soren is always telling me I’m too soft on you. But if you must know, each of the houses which own an arena team will be sending a representative, as well as House Marot which is looking to start their own team. They got permission from the senate to create a team, but they will need a minimum of five quality fighters to do so.

  “The rumors also say that they have hired a semi-famous personage to act as the captain of the team and a trainer of sorts. I don’t know if it’s true, so I won’t be spreading any rumors. You will just have to find out for yourselves. Besides, as I am always saying, a good fighter can react to whatever happens.”

  Apparently emboldened by Kyle’s questions, one of the human fighters, Burke, asked, “And what will the rules for the exhibition matches be?”

  “Now there is an important question,” Saber said. “Live weapons like in any of the matches, but just as in the open rounds and the Kon, killing an opponent is forbidden. Certainly, accidents happen, but are still punished. Lord Soren will not take it kindly if you kill his property.

  “There will be flesh mages on hand, though, so only the most grievous of injuries should result in death. Selma is a miracle worker.” As he said the last part, Saber held up his right hand as though he was showing them something.

  Kyle looked but didn’t see anything odd about it. A second later Saber said, “Can’t even tell, can you? Well, this hand was cut off in the finals four years ago, but Selma made it as good as new. Anyway, it will be live weapons and full armor. Today, we will be working on making sure each of you are prepared for the match.”
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  “And how will the matches be determined?” Burke asked.

  “You will find out tomorrow night when you enter the arena for your first match. The winners of the first round will fight the second night, and then the last two will fight on the third night. And don’t bother asking who the eighth fighter is, because I don’t know yet. Although I have my suspicions, I wouldn’t tell you even if I knew,” Saber replied.

  Kyle and the others all looked at one another.

  It was one thing, to see them as other fighters training alongside him. It was something different to know that very soon he would be facing them as opponents. And not just in some game, but in actual combat with live blades. As one of his old teammates, Sammy, used to say, “Shit just got real.”

  Seeing the way they were all appraising each other, Saber said, “Oh, and just to make things spicy, the winners will get extra rewards. If you lose, you won’t get to eat again until all the matches are over. If you win, you will get food, drink, and your choice of the pleasure slaves.”

  The thought made Kyle’s head spin. That sounded like prostitution, but if the woman was a slave, it was more akin to rape. He made no bones about liking the ladies, but he was equally proud that he had never paid for sex, and he sure as hell had never forced himself on a woman.

  Another thought made him go cold. He wondered if Nyda was one of the pleasure slaves. The thought of her being taken and forced by another of the guys made him sick to his stomach. Skrug or Gilthan, it didn’t matter. None of them were worthy of her. If winning, simply for winning’s sake, wasn’t important before, he now had another reason to win. He wasn’t about to let her get used like that by any of the others.

  “Now you will be working with the armorers and weaponsmiths to make sure that your gear is finalized. Don’t worry, Lord Soren already commissioned gear for each of you, based upon my specifications. All that needs to happen today is final adjustments. Then, your trainers will take you through some light exercise both today and tomorrow morning so that you can get accustomed to the new gear. You will be able to rest each afternoon,” Saber said.