What stood in front of Eve could only be described as a better version of Slackjaw. No, a better one would be an understatement. He was the champion, after all; let's not diminish his glory without reason.
"Gladys! Gladys! Gladys!"
Gladys turned his head toward the people who prayed for his arrival. "Eve, right? Is that your name, worm?"
Eve bent down and picked Nightfall up from the ground, dusting it off. "Color me impressed, champion. Didn't know someone of your caliber would remember a worm's name."
The continuous yells of the champion's name were still ever-present. Yet the two of them had gotten used to it, barely hearing the noise anymore.
"I'm sorry if I offended you; that wasn't my intention." Gladys's gaze fell back on Eve.
Eve raised an eyebrow.
This guy doesn't act at all like a mindless brute. Why did Elyon say that?
"No offense taken, yet."
It was a weird thing for Eve to feel, but his presence was entirely calm. If she hadn't been standing in the middle of a blood-soaked arena, she almost wouldn't be on edge in his presence.
Almost...
What's his deal?
Now that Eve could take a better look at him, he looked like the perfect gladiator. Broad shoulders, barely any armor, and a face covered by a heavy helmet with many sharp horns protruding from it—a myrmillo helmet, if she remembered the name correctly. His weapon of choice was a lethal trident. But when Eve realized what lay right next to his feet, her face almost went completely pale.
A massive beast lay sleeping in the sand.
How did I not see it? What the hell is that?
It had paws that held razor-sharp claws, giant teeth that could shred flesh with ease, and a beautiful, thick mane framing the face of an apex predator. A king of the wild.
"Fancy dog you have there," Eve muttered, almost chuckling to herself. She wasn't prepared to fight multiple opponents. For a fleeting second, she had thought this Colosseum might hold some semblance of fairness in its rules, but remembering where she was, she quickly brushed that naive thought aside.
Gladys turned his gaze toward the sleeping beast. "I think it's more of a cat. They said it was a lion? I'm not entirely sure."
Eve's eyebrows shot up in surprise. "Oh."
Gladys nodded weakly. "Yeah. It doesn't look like a cat at all."
Eve shifted her weight from one foot to another, letting out a sharp sigh. "Why aren't we fighting?"
Gladys turned his sights back to the crowd. His right arm, the one not holding the trident, reached out toward the stands—just like Eve had done when her fight with the Defilement ended. But once his arm was almost fully extended, he turned his palm inward, clenching it.
"What's the point? We could stay like this forever, and they would still yell my name. Not even the announcer is excluded."
He was right; the crowd seemed almost... mindless. Fanatical.
"To survive. That's why we fight,"
Gladys pulled his arm back and looked at her. "Like I said... what's the point?"
Eve was growing incredibly annoyed with this champion. "So we can see another day."
"And what's so bad about embracing death?"
Eve pointed the tip of Nightfall directly toward him. "What are you trying to say?"
Gladys did the same, his trident leveling perfectly toward her chest. "Eve, right? What do you think humanity's greatest sin is?"
Eve narrowed her blood-red eyes, thinking for a brief moment. "I don't know. I heard a story one time about a girl biting an apple, and that turned out pretty bad. But I don't think that's what you're referring to."
"Humanity's greatest sin was developing its consciousness," Gladys stated, his voice flat and philosophical. "Gaining the thought process of making choices, and thinking about one's own life."
Eve's guard fell slightly, and she just stared at him in utter disbelief. "You are an idiot... champion."
Gladys lowered his guard as well. "Call me anything you want, but I am right. We, humans, are cruel by nature—the worst type of animals. Perhaps the Colosseum corrupted this feeble mind of mine, but I believe it with every bit of marrow in my body."
"Why?"
"Why? It's simple, really. We were never meant to hold this type of power. This lion next to me might be a king of some sort, yet he is nothing to a human. With enough willpower and adrenaline, even a normal human could kill it."
Eve remained dead silent.
"Hmm, no, I'm sorry," Gladys murmured, shifting his stance. "It has been a while since I talked like this with someone, so I might get my ideas mixed up. But we have all the time in the world to talk, do we not?"
Eve bit her lower lip. The blood she had held back in her cell when she was fighting the urge to cry... it spilled now. It trickled down her chin, hitting the hot sand below. She couldn't see his face beneath the horned metal, but she just knew he was smiling under that helmet.
"W-what are you trying to get at?" She spat the blood onto the sand, her irises turning a deeper, angrier shade of red as the seconds ticked by. She hated this guy. She hated him even more than she had hated the Defilement. She gripped Nightfall so hard that her entire upper body began to shake with pure rage.
"We only cause harm with our choices," Gladys said softly. "No one can truly love someone for who they are. We get used, and we get tossed aside if we are not useful or shown to have worth. And I'm not just talking about us in this pit. I'm talking about everyone."
As those words registered in Eve's mind, memories fractured to the surface—the harsh way her mother used to scold her, and the precious times her father would come to her rescue. A raw, blood-curdling sound escaped her throat.
"WHAT DO YOU KNOW ABOUT LOVE?!"
Gladys looked up toward the cloudless sky. "I know nothing of it."
Eve froze.
"So that's why I love everyone with all my heart," Gladys continued, his tone chillingly serene. "Even you, Eve."
"Fuck you, Gladys."
"But it's true. I love everyone with everything that I have. That's why I will free everyone of their sin."
Gladys let his trident fall heavily into the sand. The sudden thud woke the lion. The great beast stretched its limbs, yawning before unleashing a deafening roar. It caught Eve's scent, instantly growing hungry for her flesh.
But before the predator could even take a step, Gladys's giant hands clamped around its head.
"That's why I took it upon myself to become..."
The lion thrashed violently from side to side, its razor-sharp claws scraping against the sand in a wild frenzy. Its roar quickly morphed into a desperate, terrified cry for survival. Gladys's massive arms strained against the pulling force, his muscles bulging, yet his demeanor remained completely calm.
With a final, horrific cry of desperation, the lion's head was ripped completely off its shoulders.
The beast's massive body collapsed into the dirt, gushing a torrential wave of crimson everywhere. Gladys lifted the severed lion's head high into the air, letting the dark blood rain down upon his horned helmet, staining the metal and dripping directly onto his face through the narrow viewing holes.
"...To become a merciful being, to extinguish the flames of sin born in humanity's guts."
Eve took a sharp breath; she was ready. The fight would truly start now. Every nerve in her body was on high alert, her muscles coiled like springs.
"And yet you killed a being that can't even make a choice for itself," Eve scoffed, glaring at the champion.
Gladys carelessly tossed the lion's head to the side and bent down to retrieve his trident. "That's because, sometimes... I am quite cruel."
In an instant, Nightfall suddenly felt immensely heavier than usual.
Eve blinked, utterly confused by the sudden weight change in the blade. It felt unbalanced, pulling draggingly toward the earth.
She looked down, trying to adjust her grip, only to realize that she was holding Nightfall with just her right hand.
Eve looked down a bit further.
There, sprawled carelessly in the blood-soaked sand, was her own left arm, severed cleanly at the shoulder and spewing a violent geyser of crimson. She hadn't even felt it happen. There had been no sound.
And yet she doesn't realise that Gladys is behind her, ready to drive his trident through her head and elicit his mercy upon her.