The three half-orcs cheered and grabbed their coin pouches to place bets on whichever side felt like a safe win.
On the overseer's signal, an announcer stepped up to take the center stage. With a lot of noise and fanfare, he started introducing the fighters representing the Veiled Dagger. At his cue, five figures walked out into the ring one by one, while the announcer called out their names to a massive roar from the crowd.
Right in the middle stood a tall, silent warrior. He was wearing a tight black leather vest over fine mithril chainmail with a high collar. His pale face was covered in thin, surgical scars, and his milky eyes never seemed to blink. Heavy brass coils were wrapped around his forearms and his fingers were holding glinting, razor-sharp wire.
"That's Vaelen 'The Iron Thread,' leader of the team and a senior executioner for the Veiled Dagger," Quickfoot whispered to the group. His nickname came from his body count, as he had cleared three rival guild halls without getting a single drop of his own blood on him. Whenever he stepped onto the ground, the betting odds instantly doubled in his favor.
To his right was Kenan the Unbroken,- a massive, towering former gladiator turned contract killer. He stood head and shoulders above the others, dawning a sceary spiked black-iron plate armor. Instead of a normal helmet, a solid iron executioner's mask with narrow eye-slits covered his head. He carried a heavy, short-handled war-pick built to punch straight through armor like paper. According to the announcer, Kenan was once a death-row fighter in Aethelgard who had slaughtered twelve armed guards with his bare hands during a prison break. The Veiled Dagger bought his execution contract and turned him into their unstoppable front-line tank.
To Kenan's right stood Corvus 'The Carrion', a hunched, bony man wrapped in a heavy, tattered cloak. He wore a dark leather beak-mask with tinted glass lenses to protect his eyes from his own dangerous mixtures. Leather bandoliers across his chest were lined with glass vials of bubbling, dark liquid. He was an exiled alchemist from Solara who had set up forbidden labs out in the eastern badlands.
To Vaelen's left was Sorsha of the Split Tongue, an elven rogue wielding twin curved obsidian falchions. She had fled to the Lawless Land after being kicked out of the Great Woodlands. Sorsha was known all over the criminal underworld as an untouchable duelist. In her last trial inside a smuggler port, she took down three armored mercenary captains by herself without taking a single scratch.
To her far left was Brother Malakor, a disgraced, fanatical ex-monk from the southern holy orders who had sold his soul to the assassins. He stood shirtless, his skin was covered in self-inflicted ritual scars and branded seals. Heavy iron wraps bound his hands and shins, and he dragged a spiked iron flail behind him.
When all five stood shoulder-to-shoulder, the inner fortress of Bozkar roared with cheers, and a wave of new bets flooded in for the Veiled Dagger.
Next, the announcer called for the champions of the Iron Fangs. Everyone who had bet on the Fangs held their breath, waiting to see who would step up to take the challenge.
Nothing happened. Silence dragged on. People started looking around at each other, whispering and wondering where their fighters were.
Finally, a single figure emerged- a massive, burly giant of a man. The crowd cheered, thinking this one powerhouse might actually be enough to take on all five assassins by himself. But before the announcer could even start reading his name, the big man choked and collapsed flat onto the stone floor. Thick white foam frothed from his mouth.
The spectators who had bet on the Iron Fangs started shouting and cursing at the fallen mercenary, while the rest of the crowd burst out laughing at the gang's complete humiliation.
A short, round man hurried into the ring and whispered urgently into the announcer's ear. The announcer blinked, looking confused, and walked over to ask the Overseer for a moment. He explained that the Iron Fang representative was asking for a stalemate and wanted to reschedule the match for another day.
The Overseer slowly walked over, stared down at the representative, and spoke in a cold voice that carried into every corner of the yard, "Two days... we've been losing money for two days because of you. And you have the nerve to ask us to keep Bozkar shut down even longer?"
An orc in the stands shouted out in support of the Overseer, but a Syndicate guard dropped him dead with a crossbow bolt for speaking out of turn.
The round man panicked, pleading, "The Veiled Dagger cheated! They poisoned my men before the match even started!"
The Overseer grabbed him by the collar, yanked him off his feet, and roared right in his face, "The rules of a fair fight only apply inside this ring! What happens outside is your own damn problem. It just proves how incompetent you are at protecting your own assets!"
He shoved the man hard into the dirt, "This match isn't just a pit fight. It's here to prove which faction has better leadership- inside and outside the battleground. And you just proved you have none."
"But my fighters didn't even make it in…." the man protested, but the Overseer pointed a finger at the blue, lifeless body on the ground, "Your team is already in the match. Your first champion walked out here and died on the spot! Still, I'll give you a chance. You have fifteen minutes to round up four more fighters."
The man's eyes went wide, "Four?"
"One is dead, isn't he?" the Overseer smirked, pulling out a small hourglass and flipping it over, "When the top glass runs out, you either have a team ready, or you forfeit. And if you forfeit, I'm slapping you with an extra fine because your uselessness is an insult to the cartel."
The representative opened his mouth to argue, but the Overseer raised a finger to his lips, "Shh... the sand is falling."
Desperate, the representative turned and shouted toward the crowded stands, begging any brave warrior to fight for his side. He tried appealing to their warrior honor and waving fat piles of silver, promising them anything they wanted. But nobody in the crowd was stupid enough to step up and fight the Veiled Dagger's terrifying lineup, especially with no idea who would be standing beside them in a hopeless four-against-five bloodbath.