Sitting on my window ledge, gazing at the crammed city I resided in. I focused on centring myself, breathing techniques passed to me by my ancestors used to clear the mind and settle the soul whilst being plunged into the crushing depths of battle.
Sometimes I like to imagine what it might have been like to ride into battle on horseback with purpose and courage rather than strolling onto a moulding stage with only one word clinging to my mind. Win. because if I didn't complete that same goal of each and every fight I'd be left to the streets once again. I'd starve and die either in the heat or in the freezing nights of winter. I'd lose hope that I might finally get out of this place and find myself a better life. One without violence, blood and loss, one worth living rather than one that left me barely surviving.
A petty wish, one that, as time went on, didn't seem like one worth wishing for anymore. I was trapped in an endless cycle of training, fighting and losing my head in drink and drugs to help soothe the raging noise that runs rampant in my mind.
My only anchor was the one scrap of hope that resided in a loose floorboard of my aged apartment, my winnings saved up over the last 11 years of fights. Whatever I didn't spend on washing my pain with alcohol would be hidden at the dead of night under the floorboard. All of the hope I had left was hidden under there. My chance at living all fitting under a plank the size of my hand. But it was enough, it was enough to keep me fighting those rotten men in the ring and the demons that taunted me in my dreams.
Train, fight, drink and when the time is right, run.
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FantasyMissing children and a corrupt royal family lead to a rising level of suspicion, but with the citizens too scared to be hung for conspiracy against their royal overlords, they remain silent. The world is feeling the initial tremors of a much bigger...
