RED HOOD ✔

17: GLADIATOR

Marshall's monologue had gone on for nearly an hour, reveling in his triumph at capturing us, and while most of his words were little more than self-indulgent drivel, one thing stuck: Apsychos had been a gladiator. And the worst part? He wasn't denying it.

The revelation sat heavy in my chest, like a weight I hadn't expected. Apsychos, my friend—the quiet, steadfast warrior at my side—had once fought for this monster, shedding blood for sport. I glanced at him, feeling the chasm of unknowns between us widen.

"Apsychos... you were a gladiator?" I asked, hesitant to hear the answer.

He nodded, his voice raw with exhaustion. "Yes... and I was the best."

I felt my fists tighten, disgust rising in my throat. "But you worked for him. That means you killed people, didn't you?" The thought of it, of the lives he'd taken, made my skin crawl. "How much did he pay you to do it? Those were people, probably with families. And you—"

"I didn't have a choice, Vincent!" Apsychos' voice cracked, his outburst sudden and desperate. His anger ebbed as quickly as it flared, and when he continued, his voice was thick with sorrow. "I came here after I fought with my father. Marshall offered me something I thought I'd never have again—acceptance. No one judged me, no one cared who I was. I could have left it all behind."

He paused, his brown eyes glistening with what looked like tears—could a puppet even cry? He brushed it away before continuing, as though embarrassed by his emotion.

"At first, it wasn't humans. I fought ogres, creatures and occasionally, beasts of lore. But then the day came when Marshall ordered me to kill another gladiator." He said with a extreme difficulty, the weight of that memory pressing down on him. "I didn't want to do it. He'd already given up. But Marshall... he had Anna."

I blinked. "Anna? What does she have to do with this?"

"She didnt deserve to be in a place like that, she was the closest to Marshall but was so far from being anything like him" he whispered, his voice trembling. "She was always nice to me, and was the only one who I let get close, and Marshall knew it. He held a knife to her throat and announced that if I didn't kill that man, Anna would die. So I did it." His voice broke. "I killed him to save her."

Silence settled between us, the kind of silence that feels suffocating. I stared at him, trying to process it all—his guilt, his sorrow, his impossible choices.

"And after that?" I asked, though I wasn't sure I wanted to know.

"It got easier," he admitted quietly. "Each time, it became a little easier. Until the day I fought a giant that was unlike the rest, Bovar the glutton, known for devouring his enemies after killing them, his fame had surpassed mine. It was an intense battle and under normal circumstances, would have been my last fight. He impaled me with my own sword." He paused as if reliving thatr experience.

"I thought I was dead, Vincent. But... I wasn't. I pulled the sword from my chest and killed him. They celebrated me like I was invincible, like I was some sort of soulless monster. That's when I got my name 'Apsychos'—lifeless. I wasn't human, so how could they take a life that wasn't there?"

His words hung in the air, filled with pain and self-loathing. "Eighty kills. I killed eighty people or monsters in that arena. But I ran after that. Anna begged me to take her with me, so I did. We escaped. And now... now, here we are."

I didn't know what to say. How could I comfort him when I couldn't even comprehend the horrors he'd lived through? But I knew one thing. "Apsychos," I said softly, "you're not a monster. You're more human than most people I know. You did what you had to do to protect someone you cared about. But... there could have been another way."