The crowd cheered as Ash rolled to her side, just before her opponent's heavy stone axe slammed down on the spot she had just been. The ugly brute didn't have time to raise it again as an arrow suddenly found it way through his neck, spouting blood like a fountain as he fell to his knees and slumped forward - dead on the sand. Blowing a strand of red hair out of her face she nodded thanks to her savior, the blonde archer Gigal. The woman reciprocated the nod and let her piercing blue eyes find her next target. There weren't many to choose from.
The brunette sisters Nerith and Nessa were finishing off one more opponent between their jagged bone knives while Indas, the towering and muscular giantess was busy choking the life out of her adversary - his legs kicking the air in vain as he tried to pry free from her grip. With a loud snap the kicking stopped and the broken body was tossed like garbage to the side, much to the pleasure of the crowd. Ash grinned as she retrieved her spear. These were her team mates. These were...
"The Sisters of the Sand win again!" exclaimed the green robed announcer from a high balcony, his skinny arms outstretched. "Surely their luck cannot hold out forever! Send in the next group!"
Ash cast the announcer a deathly sideways stare as the rest of her comrades regrouped around her. That name was something he branded them after their all female group happened to win a few rounds in the previous weeks. They weren't expected to survive as none of them started out as fighters. They were all slaves. Slaves gone "bad" in the eyes of their masters, and now just entertainment for the crowd. Even the lecherous Merzol and his gang of rapists - the ones now lying dead in the sand were just entertainment.
"Always time for a fuck," was Merzol's motto, and Ash heard it a lot in the shared slave pens beneath the arena. Women, men, girls, boys, dogs, rats, dead, alive - it didn't matter to Merzol. That's why she made sure to kill him first.
As she watched the next group of five men march in she knew their next fight would be a lot different from the last one. Different from any they had already fought. It would be their last. This was Scar's team, the reigning "champions" composed of barbarians and renegade soldiers. People who were adept at the art of killing. People who long lived in the underbelly of the bloody arena.
The bald, muscle bound leader signaled his men to stop just as they neared Ash and her girls. The crowd hushed in anticipation.
"Are you ready?" he asked in his usual deep, monotone voice. Ash looked to each of her friends and nodded.
Both teams suddenly sprinted in unison for the old, and often unused western gate of the arena. It took a few seconds before the onlookers cottoned on to what was happening.
"GUARDS!" yelled the green robed announcer. "THE GLADIATORS ARE TRYING TO ESCAPE!"
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