Chapter Thirteen: The Underground Coliseum
Night fell, and the slave trader had me taken to the venue where the underground coliseum tournament was being held. I was the only one going. I’d sent Raphtalia and Raph-chan to the slave auction, and Rishia was off elsewhere gathering information. And I’d assigned Filo to be Rishia’s bodyguard.
I’d taken a peak at the coliseum the slave trader managed earlier that afternoon, and it felt kind of like going to a baseball stadium. But this one seemed to put more emphasis on drinking and just having a good time. The spectator seating was sectioned off like an outdoor food court area despite being underground, and the coliseum itself was one of those fighting rings with the tall fence like you might see in a good, old RPG. There were slot machines and poker tables, too, so it almost felt more like an underground casino than an underground coliseum. Still, the coliseum was obviously the highlight, so the arena was what stuck out most.
I wasn’t sure what the current match was, but they were going at it. Let’s see . . . The odds were posted. It looked like betting ticket sales had already closed and the spectators were just watching the match. The match was between . . . Oh? Ohhh?!
“A panda . . .”
A panda therianthrope was fighting in the coliseum tournament. The opponent was . . . an elephant therianthrope, it looked like. What a crazy fight.
“Ha! That oversized body is all you have going for you, just like usual!” the panda yelled out.
“Hmph! At least I’m not the one just rolling around and running away!” retorted the elephant.
I wasn’t sure, but it seemed like the elephant might have had a slight advantage. I could feel the ground shaking quite a bit even from pretty far away. Was it using magic or something? I could vaguely feel the flow of magic coming from that direction.
The panda therianthrope must have been using magic, too, because the area around it turned into a bamboo forest. It looked like it would be slow, but it was jumping gracefully from one bamboo stalk to another, moving all around. The elephant therianthrope went about mowing down the bamboo, clearly irritated.
I looked over at the spectators passionately cheering them on.
“Go for it! That’s it!”
“Get him, big sis Larsazusa!”
“There’s your chance, Elmelo! No! You missed it!”
They looked like armed adventurers . . . mercenaries, maybe? There were several groups like that here. Of course, they were outnumbered by spectators that looked more like nobility or merchants. That’s the type that was sitting near to where I was. The bar area seemed pretty lively, too. So we’d be fighting in a place like this, huh? It was a spectacle through and through. Then again, the open coliseum had been, too.
As I was just sitting there thinking to myself, I noticed some guy that looked like he might be the barkeep glaring at me. It looked like not drinking would draw attention, I guess.
“Give me a pint of whatever you’ve got.”
Nothing happened when I drank, anyway. I’d never been drunk in my life. I grabbed the pint and went back to watching the match. A few moments later, I heard a commotion coming from behind me.
“Gulp . . . gulp! Aahhh! Come on, finish your drink already!”
Someone sounded like they were in good spirits.
“Gulp . . . I’m not finished yet!”
I could hear onlookers oohing and aahing excitedly. Whatever it was, it seemed just about as lively as the match itself. I turned around to look and there was a group of people gathered around in a circle clapping and calling out, “Chug it! Chug it!”
“Nnn . . . Not bad, eh?! Ugh . . .”
And then a loud slam echoed out, followed by applause.
“Aww! The competition is weak, as usual! Is there no one here that can give a gal a run for her money?”
The voice I heard had a slightly provocative tone to it.
“There’s no way anyone could beat Nadia!” someone’s voice rang out.
“Yeah! Exactly!”
“Boy oh boy, that was quite the performance!”
“There you have it! I’ll be taking this money, boys. Oh, and the drinks are on you!” Nadia replied to the crowd’s cheers.
They finished the exchange and the crowd dispersed, carrying away the loser with them. What a petty game. I’d never understand what people found appealing about drinking contests. I had gone back to watching the match, still thinking about such absurdity, when I heard a voice that sounded like the woman from the drinking contest.
“Oh? Here’s a new face. First time here? You don’t look like you’re having much fun now, do you?”
I glanced in her direction without moving. Standing there was a beautiful woman that had a Japanese air about her. She had long black hair, and her skin and facial features were on par with Raphtalia. She was in her mid-twenties, maybe. Her hair and skin reminded me of Glass, but there was something different about her, too. Glass’s facial features and expression gave off an air of seriousness and grace, but not this woman. She looked more like . . . the cheerful, big sister type.
A human? No . . . Her arms and legs were black. Almost like they were wrapped in rubber. She was pretty much half-naked with the clothes she had on. Her chest was wrapped in sarashi cloth under a vest, and around her waist was a . . . I guess you’d call it a fauld? Depending on how you looked at it, you might call it a loincloth. She had a harpoon strapped to her back.
I remained silent and looked away from her. She didn’t seem like someone I needed to waste my time with.
“Oh? Were you watching the match?”
She helped herself to the seat next to me and tried talking to me again, but she must have noticed the leave-me-alone vibes I was sending her way, because after that she didn’t show any further sign of forcing the conversation. But then an audacious grin appeared on her face, and she rested her chin in her hands and began speaking slowly.
“Today’s match goes to little Sasa. Little El hasn’t noticed yet, though.”
“Huh?”
The fighters were named Larsazusa and Elmelo. Sasa must have been some kind of nickname.
“Oh, could you not tell? Little Larsazusa is going to win today.”
From what I had seen, the elephant therianthrope—Elmelo—had been going all out rampaging around, and the panda therianthrope had been forced to go on the offensive. Honestly, taking strength and everything else into account, too, I couldn’t see how the elephant could lose, even if the odds were in favor of the elephant. But then . . .
“Hiyaaaa! Bamboo Claw!”
The panda thrust its claws into the ground while casting a spell and . . . the ground started shaking, and a massive stalk of bamboo shot up straight through the elephant and smashed into the ceiling of the coliseum.
“Gah!”
After a moment, the stalk of bamboo shattered and dissipated into the surrounding air. There was a loud crash and the whole venue shook. The elephant had fallen over onto the floor and lay there absolutely motionless as a pool of blood spread out from under it. Was it dead?
As the thought crossed my mind, a stretcher was brought out and a doctor began treating the elephant as attendants carried him away. Then the referee came over and raised the panda’s hand into the air.
“We have a winner! Larsazusa!”
The spectators cheered loudly, their oohs and aahs echoing throughout the venue. Considering the odds, anyone that bet on the panda would probably be really happy with the outcome. They seemed to be pretty competitive odds, too.
“Nice call.”
They began cleaning up the arena immediately and the panda went back to the waiting room.
“What can I say?”
I’d sensed that the panda recited some kind of magical incantation during the fight, but I’m sure the elephant had been on guard, too. In all actuality, the elephant had gotten off several whammies of its own.
“You didn’t bet on the fight then, did you?”
“Nah, I just came to do a bit of recon—see what this underground coliseum is all about.”
This woman . . . She seemed to know the coliseum pretty well. I got the feeling that it wouldn’t be a bad idea to talk with her a bit.
“Oh? So you’re interested in fighting in the coliseum, then?”
“I guess you could say that. Betting is a secondary goal.”
I wouldn’t worry about betting until our odds were set to make a big win.
“In that case, you should have come a bit earlier . . . The main event has been over for a while now.”
“Oh, really?”
“Yeah. See that monster they’re cooking over there?”
I looked over in the direction that she was pointing. They were right in the middle of chopping up and cooking some monster that looked like a dinosaur. The dishes were being served to the nobility, who were eating it like it was fine dining. Was that part of the spectacle, too?
“They’re cooking up the monster that was killed in defeat at tonight’s main event.”
“Those kinds of things fight in the coliseum?”
“Yep. That’s the specialty here—dangerous matches with no guarantee of survival.”
I guessed people wanting to see that kind of sensation is the whole reason entertainment like the coliseum existed, after all.
As I thought about such things, I looked over at the monster. From what I could see . . . Hmm, I wonder. What was the cause of death? It didn’t look like it had been killed with a blade or anything like that. It might just have been hard to tell—it had already been chopped up by the cooks—but judging from the head and the whites of its eyes and skin, it seemed like the cause of death had been some kind of magic. Powerful fire magic, maybe? That didn’t seem quite right, either.
“So what kind of coliseum match are you looking to fight in? I’ll tell you everything you need to know, darling.”
The woman continued on, cheerfully. She got on my nerves a little bit.
“Hey! Keep the drinks coming over here, will you?”
She was ordering me drinks without even asking! There was a whole row of drinks lined up in front of my seat now.
“You’re paying.”
“Am I, then? So what do you want to know?”
“Let’s see . . . Things to watch out for here. I’m especially interested in the next big competition.”
“I see. I’ll tell you all about it then, darling. The next competition is a team-fight tournament. The rules are generally three-on-three, no level limit, and you can bring your own weapons.”
“I already know that much. What I want to know are the nitty-gritty details of what to watch out for and things to be careful of. Then again, it’s not like I can really believe what you say.”
I was asking a complete stranger in a place like this. It was just for reference and nothing more. The woman was refilling my cup, again without asking. She seemed to be implying that I’d need to drink up if I wanted her to talk. Fine. I chugged a drink.
“Ohh . . . Let’s see, then . . . You’ll probably want to watch out for participants that send in wild and vicious monsters that have no monster seal.”
“. . .”
What would be the point in sending wild monsters into the coliseum? And without a monster seal, there had to be some kind of catch. We’d have to be careful. I looked back over at the monster being cooked. She was probably referring to that thing.
I wondered what participants would consider a threat. I’d heard that the maximum level for people in this world was 100. Anyone fighting in the coliseum would be high-level, I assumed. Well, the open coliseum . . . The coliseum that the slave trader managed was split into classes by level, but this was one had no classes or restrictions.
Wild monsters—that’s what would provide an element of threat to a bunch of max-level fighters. I suddenly remembered watching Fitoria defeat the Tyrant Dragon Rex a while back. Honestly, just how powerful had that beast of a monster been? It’s not like we hadn’t been able to put up a fight, but from what I could tell, “tough battle” wouldn’t have even begun to describe it, if Fitoria hadn’t shown up. If there were ordinary adventurers out there that could defeat that thing, then there would be no need for evacuations.
“I get it. Wild monsters have no level limit, and that means there are monsters over level 100 that they can send in.”
It would probably be easier to think of it in game terms. If you had three level 100 fighters and they were faced with a level 200 monster, what would happen? We weren’t talking about a rough fight, here. But if they weren’t careful, none of them would survive. There were monster hunter games where you had to fight in a small coliseum, and those were the really tough ones.
Of course, I couldn’t imagine there being anything on the level of the Spirit Tortoise. What would be the required level to fight that thing, anyway? I’d been able to stand up to it as a hero around level 75, but that was only because my hero adjustments essentially made me about four times stronger at the time.
Not to mention, the reason Raphtalia and Filo were able to put up a good fight was because they had my growth adjustments and had gotten all kinds of special stat boosts during their class-ups. Still, they wouldn’t have been able to defeat it without me. That thing was on the same level as a castle siege or a raid boss. We had Ost’s help, too.
If I had to make a quick estimate of the level required for a normal adventurer to confront the Spirit Tortoise head-on and defeat only the outside body . . . I wasn’t really sure what kind of abilities normal adventurers had, but I’d say level 250 would have been the minimum.
Of course, that was if they fought it alone. It would probably drop a bit if there were several adventurers. Even so, the level would still need to be high. At least 200, I’d say. And if we were talking about a bunch of adventurers that weren’t much stronger than Rishia in her non-awakened state, then they’d lose no matter how many of them there were.
Even if the monster were only around level 120, a single adventurer— no, even with three adventurers—knowing whether they could win or not would still be unclear. All said and done, you really couldn’t underestimate differences in levels and basic stats. You might think that level 100 would be similar for a monster and a human, but just looking at Raphtalia and Filo made it clear that wasn’t the case. And if you were faced with three of those monsters, then what? It was the kind of risk you could only find at the no-holds-barred underground coliseum tournaments.
“Bingo! Nobility from some country or another will send in recreationally caught wild monsters for the enjoyment of seeing whether or not they can be defeated.”
The woman went on drinking cheerfully. It was hard to believe she had just been taking part in a drinking contest from the way she was knocking them back now.
“It was only one this time, but the next competition will be team battles.
That means there will be three of those things.”
Hearing that made me realize just how scary these rules could be. So it was best not to assume that the opponent would be limited to humans or demi-humans. I would have to let Raphtalia and Filo know about this, too.
She refilled my cup again. I guess she had more to tell me.
“Other than that . . . Depending on the situation, there are times when they will change the terrain to make it more advantageous to the opponent.”
“Meaning?”
“When an opponent that can fly is sent in, sometimes they will prepare an iron cage around the arena so that the fight isn’t too one-sided.”
So the organizers would shift the odds in favor of one side or the other to keep the match interesting.
“That has to suck when that works against you.”
“Also, there is support from spectators. Spectators can pay to provide assistance to the opponent they bet on.”
In other words, spectators could shell out large amounts of money to help shift the outcome of the match in their favor and win big. What a pain in the ass. There was no such thing as foul play here. No fair matches. I guess competitive odds are what you got in exchange for that.
“The next competition is sponsored by the weapons merchant guild, so you can expect expensive weapons to be thrown at the fighters.”
So there are dangerous wild monsters and there is also the risk of opponents being able to swap the weapons they brought for even better ones.
“But hey, spectators attacking the fighters directly is strictly prohibited, so you don’t have to worry about that.”
“What about indirect support magic?”
“It’s possible if someone pays the right amount.”
It was probably best not to entertain naïve ideas like all you needed to do during a match was focus on the opponent in front of you. Thinking it over, I chugged another drink that she had poured for me. But seriously, how much did she plan to make me drink? I could hear it all swishing around in my stomach.
“That will be in the rule book for the match you participate in, so make sure to look that over and you should be fine.”
I looked at the section where the rules were listed.
The following support will be permitted during this match—
There it was.
“You can drink, can’t you? This is starting to get fun!”
She seemed to be enjoying herself as she watched me chug drink after drink.
“Yeah, alright,” I said.
“Anyway, that pretty much covers what you need to watch out for.”
“Oh yeah?”
There was nothing left for me to do here. I stood up, ready to leave.
“Oh? Leaving already, are you? Let’s have a few more drinks!”
“No more for me. But you gave me some good info. I’ll pay for the drinks as a sign of my gratitude.”
It was obvious that she was planning to have me, the newbie, pick up the tab in exchange for some information. Then again, I was stingy. Normally there was no way I’d do something like picking up a tab, but it was a fact that the information had been helpful. Considering what lay ahead, I could just think of the money spent as part of an investment.
“That wasn’t what I was after, you know.”
“Whatever you say. One final question.”
“What might that be?”
The next match had started, and it looked like they were being given the support that she had been talking about.
“How did you know who would win in that last match?”
I’d thought that I couldn’t tell because I wasn’t familiar with the rules, but that still didn’t fully explain it. As far as I could tell, the fighters in the last match hadn’t received any assistance.
“Intuition, maybe?”
“Seriously? Intuition?”
Then again, I knew that intuition couldn’t be underestimated. Watching Filo made the power of wild instincts painfully clear, for example.
“If you think of anything else, just come see me again, darling. I’m here every night, and I’ll be happy to tell you what you want to know.”
Her response was curiously lighthearted. So she really hadn’t had any kind of ulterior motive when approaching me?
“Then again, I can’t really recommend participating in the underground coliseum, either.”
Her parting words left me strangely uneasy . . .
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