- Waaaaah!!
In the swaying carriage, Riyan could feel the cheers of the crowd coming from afar.
A rough hand came down on Riyan's shoulder. It was Berka.
“How is it?”
“How is what?”
“Look outside. They're all people who came to see today's match. Why not give them a wave?”
Riyan's indifferent eyes swept over the streets of the Imperial Capital.
He saw crowds lined up along the main road to see the carriages carrying the gladiators. They were welcoming the procession in their own ways, scattering flower petals or whistling with their fingers in their mouths.
The responses varied accordingly.
One gladiator even stuck his upper body out through the carriage's roof hatch, caught a single rose that was thrown to him, and flashed a smile.
“Oh my! Look! He caught it! He caught it!”
“Eeeek! Good luck!”
Indeed, the gladiator who had caught the rose had looks worthy of the two women's cheers. Glossy, curly blond hair and a rose adorning his ear. He looked like something out of a painting.
Berka must have seen it too, as he began to grumble.
“That's a gladiator from the Berso Gladiator School. His epithet's the Rose Gladiator, was it? Well, he's a bastard who does more fighting in bed than in the Arena, but his title's grand beyond his station. Of course, sponsorships still pour in for him, so I can't really say anything.”
“Sponsorships?”
At Riyan's question, Berka snickered.
“Sponsorship's nothing much. Stuff like wanting to make a painting or sculpture to honor an imperial gladiator and using him as the model, or being so moved by his excellent swordsmanship that they want to invite him over to spar with the family knights and improve their skills.”
“That can't be all.”
“Of course not! None of that can be verified from the outside, so who cares what excuse they use? It'll all end up in the bedchamber of the noble lady sponsoring him anyway. Why, you interested too?”
Berka reached out, grabbed Riyan's chin, and began turning it this way and that.
Since it was more of a joking gesture than a rough one, Riyan just let out a small sigh and quietly let himself be led.
“Rugged, virile gladiators went out of fashion long ago. These days, pretty ones sell well, like that bastard just now—Rose Gladiator or Rose Whore or whatever he is. Someone like you could sweep up every noble lady in the Imperial Capital. How about it? If you're interested, I'll push you with everything I've got.”
“I'll pass.”
“Are you into men, by any chance?”
Slowly taking hold of Berka's hand and removing it, Riyan ignored him.
Berka didn't seem to mean it either, for he let his hand fall limply as Riyan pushed it away and heaved a sigh.
“Right. What does that matter? The problem is whether you survive today or not.”
Apparently not tired of it, Berka once again began ranting about how stupid the first slot in the Victory Streak Match was.
Having heard it so much that it now felt like a lullaby, Riyan indifferently turned his gaze. Not to the bustling crowd, but to the splendid streets of the Imperial Capital.
The fervent support of the masses.......
Right. He didn't need it.
Not yet, anyway.
Riyan tilted his head askew and touched his lips.
The masses were dangerous. Wasn't that the very reason he had died in his past life? The frightened king's betrayal came from the same place.
The masses create someone to serve and project their own will onto him, regardless of the intentions of the one being served.
In a way, even calling it serving was laughable. It was no different from an irreverent priest who places god within his own bounds and wields only its name.
But it was a force that powerful, and that was why Riyan knew.
That refusing it would not push it away.
Then he had to change his way of thinking. If he couldn't refuse it, he had no choice but to handle it well. In his past life, he hadn't, and so he had met his death; he couldn't repeat the same mistake.
So, not yet.
Right now, there was no need to inflate himself and put himself on display like that Rose Gladiator. The time would come naturally, and soon.
Meanwhile, Berka, unaware of Riyan's intentions, seemed to have lost his mood entirely and needlessly began taking it out on Haral, who was seated across from him.
“And you, what kind of bullshit is this, breaking your arm first thing in the morning on a day like today? Did you slip on the stairs in the rain or something?”
“No, this is from a spa.......”
“A spa? What?”
About to mention the spar with Riyan, Haral stole a glance at Riyan and then let out a shallow sigh.
“No, it's nothing.”
“Dull bastard. Anyway, how is it?”
“How is what, sir?”
“You were in charge of his training. How is he? Can he win? No, even if he can't win, he'll at least make it look good, right? It's got to be a hit at the very least. He can't just croak without putting up a fight.”
“Do you have to say it like that when he's sitting right here listening?”
“Look at this bastard? Since when did you treat slaves like people? And you bastard, where do you think your wages come from in the first place?”
“.......”
Unable to deny it, Haral rubbed between his brows with his uninjured right hand, as if a bitter taste had filled his mouth, and answered.
“Fine, fine.”
“So how is he?”
“How's that brat?”
Haral glanced at Riyan.
Riyan was still gazing indifferently at some distant point outside the window, and at that sight, Haral let out a small sigh and waved his hand.
“You'd better start sounding out the noble lords.”
“Sound them out? Why?”
“You'll need to sell him off at a high price, won't you?”
Sell him off.
Realizing that meant Riyan was Champion material, a small hope began to dawn in Berka's eyes.
***
The matches held in the Arena under the name of the Empire's judgment were a red, sweet pleasure that the Imperial Capital bestowed upon the Empire's subjects.
At the same time, they were also a play that made the masses focus only on who would bleed, and how, right before their eyes, instead of questioning the Empire's blunders, corruption, and errors.
- Kill him! Kill him! Kill him, I said!
- Dodge! My damn mutt's faster than you!
And the maestro who directed that play was the Arena Supervisor.
The Supervisor, with his ever-cantankerous face unchanged as usual, stood on an upper-level balcony that offered the best view of the entire Arena.
It was a secluded space. A thin, veil-like screen was draped along the terrace.
Not a single candle was lit inside, so it was dark, and no one outside could peer in; conversely, from inside, one could see everything outside clearly.
In the middle of that terrace, someone was looking down at the Arena, with the Supervisor standing beside him like a waiting stone.
“The opening is a hunt?”
“Yes. A pride of lions brought in from the grasslands of the Kormo region. We captured an entire family at once, so it's quite a sight.”
The Supervisor answered the question politely.
Six or seven lionesses and a single male lion.
The pride was evenly matched against the gladiators.
A clash of group against group.
But one side wasn't human. The king of beasts, known until now only through writings and oral tales, was actually roaring with its mane flying. Growls that gripped the crowd rang through the Colosseum from start to finish.
“The second?”
Watching the clash between the pride and the gladiators, the figure took a sip of wine and asked.
“A one-against-many fight. Seventeen criminals against one elite gladiator.”
“Seventeen?”
“Isn't it the seventeenth anniversary of my lord Marquis becoming a Standing Member?”
“You have a creepy streak sometimes, you know.”
“Thank you.”
GRRRRR—!
The pride had moved in perfect unison.
When the leader, the male lion, finally leaped in boldly, the gladiators' formation broke. A lioness pushed into the gap, sank her teeth into the nape of a gladiator's neck, and shook him from side to side.
At that, the crowd was swept up in excitement.
- You stupid bastard!
- Ahoo! Ahwoo!
Every time the lioness twisted her body, droplets of blood spurting from the carotid artery scattered in every direction.
Crimson blood.
The pride grew even more excited, and the match was decided as a victory for the wild.
All that remained was for the scattered gladiators to be hunted down.
Then, as things briefly quieted down ahead of the second match, Marquis Fenric Noveil, who had instantly lost interest, turned around.
At the same time, a slave who had been holding his breath in the shadows lit a candle. Then the slave disappeared back into the shade. As if no one must ever know of his existence.
Likewise, as though it were only natural, the Marquis casually laid himself down on the sofa and spoke.
“The last is the annual Victory Streak Match, you said.”
“Yes.”
“......And Yabrik will be in it.”
“Yes.”
“I have much on my mind.”
“May I know what is troubling you, Lord Treasurer?”
Treasurer.
The official title referring to the head of the Imperial Capital Treasury Office.
The saying that ‘he can starve a legion to death merely by stopping his pen nib’ captured in one stroke the power that title held.
It was also the foundation that allowed Marquis Fenric Noveil to serve for life as a Standing Member of the Imperial Arcana Council. He was, in both name and reality, a man of power who held every flow of the Empire's funds firmly in his grip.
In any case, the man who, according to popular opinion, had gold flowing through his veins instead of blood spoke while looking at the crowd spread out beyond the curtain.
“Well. What would you do? About that Yabrik. He aches, but if I pull him out now, I will not be able to chew anything. Just like a diseased tooth.”
“His popularity has waned recently.”
“He is too violent. At first, he was quite good for revenue, but he is increasingly lowering the dignity of gladiatorial combat. Yet I cannot simply have him fall from grace either. As you know, he even received a Masterpiece.”
“Indeed. In an arena where blood and steel are everything, and on top of that, a Masterpiece.......”
“Yes. Blood and steel. But it is a problem if that is all there is. Too idealistic, is it not? Utterly useless for collecting taxes. If only that foolish Minister of Military Affairs had not approved the Masterpiece, I would not have this headache. But what can one do? That is in the past, and what is to come is that the crowd, sick of Yabrik, will stop coming to the Colosseum.”
At the sight of him dismissing the Minister of Military Affairs—considered second only to the Grand Speaker of the Council—as foolish, the Supervisor shuddered.
But what could he do? The one holding his leash was the Treasurer before him.
“In any case, a catalyst will be needed.”
“Yes. A catalyst is needed.”
At Marquis Fenric's look, as if asking whether he'd said that because he didn't know, the Supervisor's eyes trembled.
“I will find a way as quickly as possible.”
“Do find it as quickly as possible.”
“Still, I believe today's Victory Streak Match may hold some fun that could ease your worries, Lord Treasurer.”
“Fun? What kind?”
“You recently lost a collectible you were fond of, did you not?”
“Ah, the monster? I did lose it. Because of a match assigned under your supervision.”
“......The feed that brought down your monster back then is participating in today's Victory Streak Match.”
For the first time, a small gleam appeared in the eyes of Marquis Fenric, who had seemed to have no interest at all.
“Do not test my memory. When it was reported to me, he was a mangy slave, nothing more and nothing less?”
“He was indeed, but it seems the Rhodus Gladiator School has whittled him into shape. In any case, he's been a box-office success. ‘The miracle slave gladiator who felled a monster—will he show another miracle against the Human Butcher?’ That's the slogan we're using to headline today's main match.”
“That makes sense. And the main dish?”
“The Rose Gladiator, naturally.”
“It is about time he died. He did not know his place, went in and out of noble bedchambers, and heard far too much. It would be quite a sight to see his head split with an axe.”
Marquis Fenric's head slowly nodded. It was, at least, a gesture of satisfaction.
It was just as the Supervisor was inwardly breathing a sigh of relief.
BWOOOO—!
The sound of a horn rang through the Colosseum, piercing the eardrums. The one-against-many bout had ended at some point, and it was the signal announcing the imminent start of the Victory Streak Match.
“The End of the Pickpocket and the Broken Rose...... Not bad as the title of a play.”
A match featuring the gladiator who had stolen the monster from his collection and the Rose Gladiator who had come to know too much. It was a small but modest pleasure, so Marquis Fenric rose.
In that brief moment, the shadow had come and gone, and his glass was once again filled with wine.
“It's beginning.”
With the Supervisor's words, the Colosseum began to shake with the roar of tens of thousands of spectators.
- Yabrik! You goddamn bastard! Croak today!
- Croak! Croak! Croak!
Taking that cheering of rejection on his whole body, a giant of a man, easily two meters tall, emerged through the opened bars.
It was Yabrik, his whole body covered in scars and tattoos.
A massive battle-axe, easily more than two meters long, rested against his shoulder, and though quite some time had clearly passed, the blood clotted on its blade seemed not to have cooled at all, its heat palpable.
Of course, that heat came from its crimson, dark-red aura.
A magic weapon, the Masterpiece Blood Wolf Axe.
True to its name, a carving shaped like a wolf wrapped ferociously around the joint where the axe head met the handle.
Moreover, the dark-red aura emanating from the Masterpiece flowed out through the wolf's pupils, as if depicting a wolf with glowing red eyes.
“Chilling, and.......”
Marquis Fenric's assessment came slowly.
At the same time, the bars on the opposite side slowly opened.
Soon, a young man whose white hair looked gray in the shade slowly emerged from the darkness.
“......pitiful.”
In plain attire, with a plain iron sword at his waist.