After the match concluded, the two victors were ushered back through the door through which they entered and then taken further into the complex until they arrived at a small, isolated holding cell.
The boy looked across the cell as Azarax cleaned his curved blade. For once, the boy could get a good look at the valiant man. He was fairly tanned, with black wavy hair that fell down past his shoulders and ended with a slight curl. His face was quite handsome, with individual features that complemented each other well: neutral brown eyes, a slightly hooked nose, and lips that had a grin etched at the edges. Due to the loose bright clothing Azarax was wearing, the boy could not fully distinguish his build, but he figured that Azarax was quite muscular.
As the blade shifted in his hands, the red gem on the hilt would catch the light of the nearby lantern. Unfortunately, since the boy did not previously own his blade, he was required to return it to the armory. There was not much to do in the cell, except listen to the occasional loud chants and cheers from the crowd.
And the boy was not in a talkative mood after almost dying.
But he did not want to sit still and do nothing. It almost felt like waiting for his death. So he thought back to his altered vision from earlier and shifted his view to see the fractured plane.
Looking at the only other living being in the room, the boy took a moment to study the various fractures on Azarax. Now that the boy was not in immediate danger, he could take a moment to study his ability and hopefully find a use he had missed in the heat of the moment.
He was fairly certain the fractured plane helped him win his last fight. He had a feeling the man's response to the shield throw was slower than it should have been, and from the distance the boy threw his shield, the man should have been able to block his shield and sword in time. Thus, the boy wanted to make full use of his unusual ability.
He briefly questioned if everyone had unusual abilities, but something stopped him from asking Azarax. Perhaps not wanting to be labeled as crazy.
Azarax's body did not seem to be injured, unlike the previous man's body. The boy noticed larger fractures around sensitive areas like the insides of joints, the neck, and parts of the face. The upper skull did not seem to be a weak point, so the boy concluded that his vision had limits; as a good strike to the head would most certainly be fatal.
Another interesting thing he noticed were fractures following snake-like patterns across his body, with deeper fractures along the sides of the neck and legs. The boy thought for a moment and concluded they must be what brought blood around the body, although he was unsure what exactly it was named.
The boy relaxed his vision and shifted out of the fractured plane dimension.
Now that he had explored his ability, he wanted to find out what the tug was from earlier. As he was not feeling a tug at the moment, he tried releasing his body as he had done before, but nothing happened. Unsure what to do, the boy tried creating his own tug to no avail.
'Damn, why can't this thing just appear?'
The boy shifted his head back in surprise as various glyphs appeared in his vision. This time, it was a list of various things in front of him.
{
Name: 0
Tier: –
Class: –
Blessings: –
Curses: –
Boons: –
Skills: [Optic Sight]
Spirit Level: –
Remembrances: [None]
}
The boy read through the list and was a bit dismayed to see that almost everything was blank. The only things that were not marked out were his abilities, map, and vie or energy bar. Focusing on [Optic Sight], it beheld the same description from before: "You have an innate understanding of the world around you. Thus, your sight is able to pick up vital points of living beings."
But, to his dismay again, the map was very small and only showed parts of the coliseum. Looking at the essence bar, he noticed it was slightly emptied. Curiously, the boy shifted his vision into fractured sight and watched as the essence bar slowly emptied itself further.
The boy dismissed his vision and was about to try and dismiss the words in front of him, but stopped when he glanced over his name again. He noticed that the characters used for his name were different from the rest of the empty stat lines. Rather, it was filled with a character representing nothing, an equivalent to zero.
'What a fitting name, I suppose.'
Zero sighed and mentally tried to dismiss the mix of characters and words in front of him. After not working, he swiped his hands at the runes and watched as they faded away. He let out a sigh and rested his head against the cold cell wall.
Eventually, the scraping of metal from Azarax's sword ceased, and in a hushed voice, he said, "Tell me, friend, do you wish to fight here? To the end? To bring honor upon yourself? To these people, you were a slave, and now they wish to give you honor in death? Is your heart truly content? Or perhaps you wish otherwise? Do you wish for freedom?"
Zero pondered what he said for a moment. He had never asked himself what he wanted to do, as he was too busy just trying to stay alive. But from the moment he was asked about his heart's content, he knew.
"I wish to be free."
A smile spread across Azarax's face as he said, "I knew we were alike. For now, all you must do is live. Perhaps a tall task, but you seem to have a strong body. Let us see how strong your will is."
'This guy loves to talk like he's giving speeches. What's it called… a motivational speaker?'
Zero nodded and leaned his head back against the wall. After some time, perhaps an hour or two, he heard a howl ring out. Then, a moment later, a couple of guards came to escort them back to the armory. It was time for another match.
This time, Zero had more time to choose his weapon. He thought back to his last fight and remembered how throwing his shield had helped him win the fight. Rather than losing an armament that coupled well with his weapon, he took a different approach. He still grabbed the shield, but this time he chose a spear instead.
The spear was fairly long and demanded two hands to wield it effectively. So, pairing it with a shield seemed inefficient, but Zero was just going to throw the shield anyway, so it did not matter much. Then he could turn all his attention to wielding the spear. Eventually, the sound of the bell rang out, and it was time to begin.