Navia’s eyes were shut as she was slowly coming back to her senses. First came the disgusting mixed smell of blood and sweat. Next was the sound of someone huffing and mashing. Opening her eyes, she saw in a blur a dark and empty place, barely noticing that she truly opened her eyes. Turning her head to the side, she could see metal bars and behind them a source of dim light. As her eyes slowly adjusted to the darkness, she saw a muscular man with long brown hair in the other cell doing pushups. His skin reflected the bit of light that came through the bars as he sweated from the training. Someone was hitting the wall between her cell and the other.
“Where… Am…” Navia whispered, not realizing that her thoughts had slipped through her mouth. “Where’s Mira?!” Navia shouted. She turned around to look for her, moving as if her body was possessed. “Mira? Mira! MIRA!!!” Like a lion, she jumped toward the metal bars and shouted the girl's name but no one reacted, they were too busy with their training or simply decided to ignore her.
Hearing footsteps, she shouted toward the person walking, “Let me out, or I’ll slaughter every single one of you!” Navia stepped away, a bit overwhelmed by what she said, as if she heard someone else’s voice rather than her own.
“Still didn’t lose that fang, Cursed Lioness.” The man with a torch in hand appeared by the door cell. His maniacal and confident smile remained the same as the one he wore in the fight with Navia in the auction hall.
“Where… Is… The girl…” Asked Navia, trying to hold her anger. Even though she lost the fight with that man, she didn’t fear him.
As Godan looked her in the eyes, he could see a lion in a cage, wanting to leave it and kill anyone who dared to lay a hand on her. “The title suits her well…” He thought as a smile from his own joke appeared on his face. “Lucius Strada bought only you. The girl is the slave of House Markiz.”
Navia didn’t answer; she turned around and punched the wall out of frustration. Cursing the pirate that got her in this situation. “Don’t you feel hungry?” Godan asked out of curiosity rather than being helpful. Navia didn’t answer so without any more wait, he asked another question. “Is your wound still itching?”
Navia placed her hand on her right shoulder, looking for a wound that hasn't healed yet, waiting for a painful itch from touching the fresh wound, but nothing like that happened. “How long was I unconscious?”
“Two days…” Answered Godan as if he was poking Navia with a stick to annoy her. But he didn’t lie, what he told was true.
“Don’t lie to me. This couldn’t heal in two days!” Navia shouted as she turned around to show her anger toward the man, but he still smiled. Unhinged even after a sudden burst of anger from Navia.
“Couldn’t heal in two days? And you’re not hungry after two days without eating? No… It’s more than two days… Am I right?” That question made Navia uncomfortable; her anger washed out of her, and she took a step away from the cell door. Worries of unknown building up inside her.
“How do you know?” Hesitantly asked Navia, narrowing her eyes in suspicion.
“I saw your black blood. The same as mine. We both got resurrected from death. ‘Stranded in a world of the living’ as they told me.” Godan closed his eyes and looked up, saying those words brought some kind of pleasure to him. “We are Stranded. The Voice guides us. It always gives me one command that I always follow. KILL. You heard it too? It says to kill! I do good work since it no longer asks me to kill as The Voice knows I’ll kill. Except for one time. When I fought you and was about to slice your arm off. The Voice said, ‘Don’t kill her’ and now I know why. We are the same.” Godan explained the voice like he went crazy, a lunatic whispering to himself.
“The voice? I heard someone while I was fighting that man. It commanded me to kill him… But when I wanted to kill Evan, it remained silent…” Navia tried to put things together, but even after hearing the voice in her head, she knew that the man in front of her was different. “Why did both of us get resurrected? Are there more people like me? Who’s voice whispers in my head?” The man gave her some vague answers but it brought more questions with that.
“See you in the pit.” The man said when Navia was lost in thought, she barely noticed him leaving from her sight.
Navia jumped toward the cell door and grabbed the bars, trying to look for Godan. She shouted, “Wait! Let me out! HEY! IF WE ARE THE SAME, THEN HELP ME!”
The echo of her shout slowly settled as she breathed heavily, anger boiling up inside her, confusion eating her mind away. The man who was doing push-ups stopped, sitting down on the ground he looked at Navia. “I feel sorry for you.”
“You’re locked up like me…” Answered Navia as she sat down and lay down against the wall.
“That’s true, but Godan The Bloodied is not interested in me. You know why that’s a bad thing?” The man asked as if he wanted to hear the answer but he quickly gave it to Navia. “He loves to fight, especially the strong. The stronger you are, the more he will be attracted to you… In a bad way. You’ll end up fighting him in the pit and die. While the weak are like pigs to him, a simple prey to hunt and kill time.”
“What’s that pit you’re talking about?” Navia asked, glad to talk to someone normal compared to her previous conversations with Evan and now Godan.
“Underground arena organized by the Strada family. Mainly, slaves and monsters fight. Occasionally, people in debt or crazy people like Godan.” The man explained, but the name of the crazy fighter was silent as he wasn’t sure if the man in question was still there.
“Then why is he a slave? I doubt they could stop him.” Her hand was on her shoulder where a deep wound previously was. The strength she barely comprehended as she fought against Godan.
“He willingly became a slave to continue fighting in the pit. Fifty battles and only one loss. People exaggerated his loss, saying that he lost both of his arms, but he still fights. So that must have been a rumor.” The man said with bitterness as he wished for that man to die.
“If what he said is true. That it wasn’t a rumor. He died and came back from the dead… Stranded in a world of living…” The words hung in the air. Navia was lost in thoughts, trying to put the memories of her death together, while the man in the cell next to Navia couldn’t believe that Godan had come back from the dead.
More footsteps were coming toward Navia’s cell. As the people passed her doors, she counted around nine slaves and Godan walking right behind them. No guard was around them as there was no need for one with him right there.
“They are going for execution…” The man in the cell whispered, and after a moment, he choked on his words as he realized that Godan had opened Navia’s cell.
“Your fight will be after mine. Might as well come and watch. You could learn a thing or two.” Godan said with no interest at all, knowing that this fight would be boring for him. “To get better for our fight.” He left those words for himself as he took joy from that idea. A fight with a strong opponent: “If she was able to hurt me… Imagine how fun it will be after she gets better!”
Navia left the cell and walked in front of Godan. She looked at each cell she walked past. In all of them were people with a strong body and many scars left from the fights in the pit. One thing was imprinted on all of their faces, a survival instinct. The stronger they get the longer they will live.
Her eyes moved around for a way to escape, but no matter what she saw, she felt an overwhelming presence right behind her. All her ideas for escape were burned like a paper by those wicked flames.
The pit was a circular arena with bars all around it so the people could see the slaves or beasts that were about to fight next. Twenty feet above were stands for the people who paid for the show. All of them were citizens of the Red District with scars and tattoos all over their bodies. Bandits and criminals alike. Coming to watch the bloodshed and bet on their fighters.
First, Godan let the nine slaves enter and pick the weapons from the ground. None of them were proper weapons: pickaxes, axes for cutting wood, hammers for nails, and long kitchen knives. Instead of shields, there were wooden planks with ropes between them to hold them somehow. No armor to protect the body. The pit was brutal. The sand was stained red with blood, teeth, and bone left by the previous battles accompanied by the grains of sand.