Cold Night

Walking along the pedestrian street after being checked by the guards guarding the gate to the city is a man wearing a brown hooded robe, there's a dagger strapped on the side of his waist showing that he's armed and ready for a sudden fight.

Despite the night already shrouding the sky, there are still people walking down the street.

Most of the markets are already closed at this hour leaving only a couple of small Inns and brothels with ladies of all sorts wearing gowns calling each man that walked past them, including the man wearing a hooded robe.

"Mister, tonight is quite cold. Do you want me to warm you up?"

"You're not from here, I know you're tired from your journey. Why don't you come here and I'll help you relax with a massage? I am the best massager in the whole city! I guarantee that you won't regret it"

Upon hearing the ladies calling to him, the hooded figure stopped and glanced at them.

Finding that the hooded figure put his attention to them, the common ladies which is the polite term to call them instead of prostitutes become even more aggressive. But the hooded figure only looks down to the ground for a brief second while the common ladies try to seduce him.

Grabbing a pouch on his side, the hooded figure takes three gold coins.

"Buy some rums to warm yourselves, I'll pass on your offer for this night" the hooded figure said before tossing the three gold coins to the three common ladies that caught the gold coins hurriedly despite being confused.

But they sent him kisses as thanks for the gold coins which is a lot of money for them.

Passing the brothels the hooded figure reaches the market that is already closed, there are no traders or merchants that are still selling at this hour. Looking around warily, the hooded figure then quickly went inside the closed markets.

As he got inside the market, he silently went to the corner of the market.

Sneaking through the closed market carefully, the hooded figure saw three men chatting with each other while drinking. One of them is a man with red short hair and two earrings on his left ear, and that is the person the hooded figure is looking at right now.

Going to the side, the hooded figure disappears into the darkness.

"Man... this night would be perfect if we're drinking at the brothel, but a shame that I got no money to spare" One of the men lamented while looking at the starry night sky, fantasizing about the wealth he never had.

Upon hearing this, the man with red hair chuckled, "I got money, you want me to treat you?"

"Really? Since when did you have money, you're the one who is usually asking us for stuff" the man's eyes turn bright, and he instantly feels excitement coursing through his veins from hearing the man with red hair has money.

Chuckling lightly, the man with red hair stood up, "Don't worry about it, I got a transport job"

"Let's go to the massage parlor, I'm going to treat the two of you with the most expensive treatment! It's time to pay some of my debt to you guys" he added, and the other two men cheered and praises the man with red hair.

But as the three wanted to head out, a shadow sneaked behind them.

The man with red hair is walking at the very front cheerfully, but he looked back when he heard two loud thuds. Soon his eyes widened finding his friends lying on the ground unmoving, blood slowly drizzling down from their necks.

Upon seeing this, the man with red hair wanted to shout but quickly changed his mind.

A hot sensation can be felt near his neck as his body went stiff in response, he slowly looked down at his neck and finds a dagger with the blade sizzling red already an inch away from his neck. The man with red hair instantly paled in fear.

"A- A Mage..." he mutters in fear, the burning dagger shows that he was dealing with a Mage.

Raising both of his arms to the air, the main with red hair then quickly added stutteringly due to sheer fear, "I- I don't want a-any trouble, Sir. W-What do you want, I'll definitely comply with whatever you wanted from me. Anything!"

"You transport a man here, where is he?" the hooded figure asked whisperingly.

The man with red hair paused for a second when he heard this, "Please, anything but that. If I tell you then they'll kill me, I'm just a simple wagon owner, don't force me to say it" he replied with beads of cold sweats falling down the side of his face.

Both choices seem to be very bad for the man, and his terror-stricken expression shows that.

Without any sort of mercy despite the pleading of the man, the hooded figure kissed the man's neck with the blazing dagger, sizzling the skin instantly. Feeling the burn, the man yelped but his mouth got instantly covered by the hooded figure.

"Choose who you fear more, my dagger or the other guy" the hooded figure whispered fiercely.

Gulping harshly the man with red hair then yield lest his throat got jabbed by the scorching steel, he can feel that the hooded figure would definitely kill him without hesitation. "G-Gladiator School, S-School of Tyranny. He told me to bring him here, I'm not lying!!"

Inspecting the man's expression, the hooded figure finally lets him go.

Kicking the man and sending him stumbling a couple of meters forward, the hooded figure then said while killing the fire on the dagger and sheathing it, "Get out of the city, I suggest you go west if you want to survive"

Nodding his head in understanding, the man escapes the place frantically.

Both of his friends that the hooded figure killed didn't even cross his mind, the only thing inside his mind is to get out of the city and away from trouble. If a Mage is after him then he's dwelling in too deep, his life is definitely threatened.

Sighing lightly, the hooded figure glanced to the side, "I hope you're still alive, Ramero..."

~

The next day, the sound of iron bars being hit woke Ramero up from his sleep.

Ramero has spent his entire night doing the Main Quest and also gauging his newfound strength, he only slept around midnight which is quite late. Rejuvenation may satiate his hunger and mood, but sleep is still essential for him.

Despite the harsh condition, Ramero seems to be in a better mood.

How can he not be in a good mood when he realized that he can do 36 push-ups and squats in a row, 10 pull-ups are also not a problem for him, only the 5 km run takes quite a lot of time to complete as he needs a couple of rests.

It's clear that his strength is not the problem, his stamina is the problem.

But then again he's getting stronger rapidly and that's a good thing, he might only need to take a week to actually beat some of the Gladiators here. Or maybe if he really dares, he could challenge the strongest Gladiator here.

Although he's in a new body, his combat experience is still inside his head.

Ramero hasn't seen any of them actually fight with each other so he can't gauge his strength, but he's pretty confident that the Gladiators here mainly use brute strength compared to technique. Given the same strength, he's certain that he would come out on top.

Just like yesterday, he and the other Gladiators eat their breakfast quickly.

With a couple of hours of rest, they were thrown into the training ground once again, this is the daily life of a Gladiator it seems. Back at the training ground, Ramero is still curious about the incident he experienced yesterday.

'Okay, let's try going to the other end of the training ground' Ramero thought before nodding.

Something is just off regarding the size of the training ground, and he's determined to find out about it today. Waiting for the perfect moment, Ramero started making his way to the other end of the training ground.

Most of the Gladiators ignored him as long as he doesn't mess with them.

The only person that he needs to watch out for is the Gladiator that he hit on the nuts, Laughing Butcher, he glanced to the side and finds that exact Gladiator looking at him with hatred. 'Just wait, if my body is strong enough I'll take you on...' Ramero thought.

Upon reaching halfway through the training ground, a buzzing sound irritates his ears.

Ramero tries to pick on his ears but finds that the buzzing sound came from in front of him, and there's no Gladiator in front of him at all which is weird, there's still more space in front of him so seeing this space desolate feels odd.

Without thinking much, he stepped forward not knowing the Gladiators are looking at him.

Just as he takes the first step, his entire body got electrocuted.

Blitz!

"Arggh!" Ramero groaned as he got thrown back a couple of meters, his body is paralyzed due to the electricity that suddenly attacked him. Following this incident, the Gladiators laugh out loud witnessing something funny for the longest time.

Even Silver Fists who also saw this shakes his head before he focuses back on his training.

Ramero managed to recover from his paralyzed body about two minutes later, he sits up and looks to his front to find that there was some kind of invisible barrier, and this caught him completely off guard, 'A barrier? Wait, don't tell me... it's Magic?!'

If he's in medieval times then there shouldn't be any advanced technology here.

Even back in his home world, there's no technology that can create a solid invisible barrier, so there's no other answer except for magic. 'So the Mages that they referred to are actual Mages? Am I in a fantasy world?' Ramero thought in surprise.

Despite the situation being quite surreal, he was forced to accept it.

From the reaction of the other Gladiators, it seems magic is quite common here.

Looking at the magical barrier that slowly turns invisible again, Ramero now is certain that the other side of the training ground should be reserved for the 'Mages'. If this is really a magical world then what's stopping from having a Mage Gladiator?

Realizing that, Ramero quickly went back to his usual spot, away from the other Gladiators.

Maybe due to giving them a light laugh to ease the mood, none of the Gladiators messed with him today. Only a couple of bumps here and there, but none of them are brutal like yesterday when he was almost beaten to death.

A couple of hours passed, and Ramero finished the Main Quest one time.

If he wanted to then he can do the second set of the Main Quest right now, but he's still pretending to be hurt. Keeping a low profile is an absolute necessity right now, he needs to get stronger first and that is what he's going to do.

Ramero went on with his daily activities as a Gladiator inside the School of Tyranny.

Every day he dedicated his time to solely finishing the Main Quest by exercising and keeping to himself, there are a couple of days that he got bullied again, especially by the Gladiator that still bore hatred due to him elbowing his nuts.

One thing that he finds out is that the Gladiators are still way stronger than him.

Compared to the first day he was getting bullied, he's already four times stronger but the Gladiators still thought of him as nothing but a mere greenhorn. Ramero tries to fight back, but he got beaten black and blue.

Knowing that he got some skills underneath his weak appearance, the Gladiators are on-guard.

Not only Laughing Butcher who already experienced his fighting style firsthand, but the other Gladiators that are bored and decided to mess with him are also keeping their guards up. Ramero learned that they all have terrifying battle instincts.

If it were back in his home world, these Gladiators would definitely be special op level.

Aside from being beaten and bullied, Ramero heard one of their conversations start that the next performance is near. It's unclear what they meant by performance, but Ramero guessed that it was the day of the battle.

Because of that, Ramero has spent endlessly trying to get stronger before the day of the battle.

One day the Gladiators seem to be restless and impatient, and they let their temper out on Ramero that is the easiest target there is. The guards declared that the sparring tournament would be held tomorrow, and Ramero now knows why they are restless.

Silver Fists is forced to step in when Ramero almost died again, he came in right on time.

Ramero doesn't really know why but Silver Fists seems to have quite a reputation amongst the Gladiators, and Silver Fists' help managed to save his life again. Despite stepping in, some Gladiators still challenged him.

The situation escalated, and the guards are forced to break them up which saved Ramero.

It was a rough day, but Ramero is not going to give up.

Just as the night arrives, something unexpected happened. A figure visited his jail cell.