A black-haired boy sat at the edge of a very long cage forged from intersecting iron bars. The cage was enclosed within a dimly lit metallic cell that smelled faintly of rust and sweat. It was divided to hold many more people but was vacant and contained only him.
The boy sat hugging his legs, with his face buried between his lap. He was humming a song in a deranged way, trying his best not to listen to the muffled yells and sounds coming from outside the cellar.
But reality seemed to want him to listen, since the door of the cell cracked open with a loud clank and swung wide, letting the loud hails and boos fill the cell.
The boy lifted his head slowly, his bright azure eyes falling on two figures standing in front of the door. They spoke to each other in what they believed were hushed voices, leaning slightly inward, but the boy could hear every word as though the noise itself carried it to him.
"This is the last one, sir," the first man said. He was bald, broad-shouldered, his build heavy with muscle, yet there was a tension in the way he stood. "What are we going to do if the honcho requests yet another show?"
The boy knew at this point that the second man would like to see this "last one," which apparently was him, so he dug his face back into his lap.
The second man glanced at him briefly, his eyes passing over the boy with little interest, before turning back. "Just bring him out," he said, then cleared his throat, "and let's hope it doesn't get to that, because if it does, then you might be the one to enter that ring."
The bald man swallowed; the fear from that statement was clear in his eyes. "Y-yes, sir," he answered with trembling lips, and then entered the cell.
The young boy in the cell acted like he didn't hear what they had just said, but deep down, his heart was slamming hard against his ribs. They were once twelve persons in the cage, and just like they had come to collect him now was how they had been collecting them until he was the only one remaining, and now they had come for him too.
The bald, muscular man unlocked the cage with somewhat trembling fingers, still visibly shaken from what the other man said to him.
"Get up, boy," he snarled, clearing his throat and doing his best to sound like a soldier. He grabbed the boy by his twiggy biceps and pulled him up.
Up close, the boy looked even worse, pale to the point of near translucence, his skin stretched lightly over bone, his frame narrow and fragile. His eyes lacked life, his neck sharp and hollow, the deep indentations beside it stark and pronounced. At a glance, anyone could tell he had been starved far beyond what a body should endure, just like the others who had once filled this cage.
They all were slaves.
"Where are you taking me?" Star, the boy, asked, his little voice ringing annoyingly in the man's ear.
"Shut up and follow," the man barked as he pulled Star out of the cage and shut the door with a deafening clatter.
He dragged Star out of the cell and into the long passageway that went both ways. Now the noise got sharper and technically had a direction from which it was coming. It came from the left, and that was exactly where the man was taking him.
As they moved forward, the boy stumbled slightly, his bare feet scraping against the hard floor, his body struggling to keep pace. Then, from ahead, two figures hurried toward them. They were men dressed in stained white garments, their clothes marked heavily with dried and fresh blood, and their faces hidden behind crude clown masks. Between them, they carried a long plank on which something heavy was resting.
When they got close, Star and the man shifted for them to pass, but in that brief moment, Star got a glimpse of what they carried.
It was a dead body, but not just any dead body.
Star recognized him so well. It was the boy closest to him in the cage, the one that was dragged out last. His form was barely recognizable now. He was covered in blood and deep scars, which obviously did not look like any injury inflicted by a human.
A sharp shiver thundered through the whole of Star's being. He looked at the man dragging him, and how close and fast he dragged him towards his death and wondered how he had even gotten here.
Of course, the past events had unfolded in a very fast and painful way that Star could hardly piece together.
It started with the raid of Woes on his kingdom, Throvarin, where he was a prince. These Woes, like their name implied, were beast monsters, demons, and different other monstrosities born from the agony, delusion, nightmares, fears, and other negative emotions of mankind, and they had destroyed every bit of his kingdom.
However, his mother had sacrificed herself for him and his sister to escape. He and his sister had survived the breakdown of the kingdom but did not make it far when the Woes came after them.
Star fought all he could, but in the end, his sister was killed before his eyes. Right then and there something inside him shattered beyond repair. After that, there had only been rage, then darkness. And when he awoke, he was here.
Speaking of here, a loud hail met Star as he was dragged into a very large room filled with people.
Everybody were shouting at the top of their voices, welcoming him like he was some slave celebrity. Most of them were bare-bodied but had covered themselves in paint. Most wore crazy-looking masks. Most of the ladies were half-naked, dancing and whoring around for coins and notes.
However, all the crowd were gathered around a circular ring, forming an arc.
Then in front was a raised podium where a huge man sat on top of a very huge chair. His face was stern and crooked, with an unsettling, and evil appearance. His neck was thick, and his body was massive and heavily muscular, giving him an overwhelming presence that terrified Star.
The man was surrounded by ladies that wore nothing but loin clothes tied around their waist. Their breasts were bare and were dangling subtly, as they all were hovering around the man, doing their jobs.
The man, no doubt, was the head, the honcho of the Vyerdners, and he was the one that had hosted whatever this was to be entertained.
Star was pulled forward. As he was dragged through the crowd, some rubbed their hands on his head, some yelled into his ear, "I'm gonna take your liver when you're dead," some even spat on him and cursed him, "slave!"
By the time they reached the ring, his body felt distant, like it no longer belonged to him.
The ragged tunic hanging loosely from his thin frame was torn away without warning, ripped clean off. Star flinched at the sudden action, but that action seemed to thrill the crowd, as a loud swell of hails tore through the whole place, louder than before.
Star shut his eyes as an unwanted tear rolled down his cheek. His whole body was shaking; his mind was no longer working. All it thought of, however, was this death about to befall him.
A sudden coldness spread across his skin, snapping his eyes open. Hands moved quickly over him, smearing a thick white substance across his chest and back, dragging it in the shape of a crude X before marking one of his eyes in a long streak that ran from his forehead downward.
He said nothing. What was there to say, after all?
After that, he was pushed into the circular ring, which was barricaded with thin wire gauze.
The ground beneath his feet was sandy and badly stained with blood; some parts were already soaked and clumped together.
Star stared around at the whole crowd, which continued yelling at the top of their voices. He wondered who he was fighting and desperately prayed it would not be the man that had killed the other boy.
But as though in cruel answer, the honcho raised his hand.
The next moment, a loud metallic clank rang out, followed by the grinding sound of chains dragging along iron. Slowly and heavily, the door in front of Star began to rise.
It kept lifting until, with another clank, it clicked and locked, leaving the door wide open.
Everybody was now very quiet as they waited, not wanting to miss what was coming.
Star swallowed. Though he was bare, sweat dripped from his body onto the sandy floor. His heart was louder than any drum, and his feet were trembling violently.
He stared into the dark doorway and waited.
Just then,
GRRRRRRRRRRR