Blood dripped from Brand’s nose thanks to his last match. He was supposed to win by a landslide, but the demon rooted man managed a lucky blow after being stabbed through the chest. The fight before that gifted him with cuts across his chest and right arm. Somehow, every match had been against a demon-rooted opponent, leaving him and Blood Beard covered in more of their own blood than ever before.

“I'm never coming back to this shit hole again,” Brand decided.

The money he earned was not worth the risk of Hoder doing this to him again. He was forced to kill three more people before the demon root wore off enough to end his fights in knockouts. That along with the injuries he'd be bringing back for Magna to see made the decision to leave an easy one. All he had to do now was lose the last fight.

The announcer came to the center of the sandpit spouting his usual dribble about the prowess and brutality of the combatants. Brand heard none of it. His mind focused on the sound that would mark the end of his long night.

Blood Beard mirrored Brand’s fatigued demeanor. All his fights had also been against drugged opponents. He had bandages wrapped around two stab wounds on both his arms and a badly bruised face. Still, like Brand, he could keep going for several more hours if needed.

As the announcer began the match, weapons were thrown to Brand and Blood Beard. Blood Beard picked up a decent-looking sword and wooden shield while Brand picked up a spear around six feet long, the last two feet ending in a sharp blade.

Brand couldn't help but smile at the weapon. Knives and swords were good, but he could deliver each strike with far less risk to himself with a spear than he could with anything else.

Pointing the shaft forward, Brand held the spear with his right arm. He then lowered his center of gravity taking a stand that looked like a runner at the start of a race. Blood Beard also readied himself, placing the shield on his right arm, and the sword in his left.

Once Blood Beard put his shield up in a defensive position, Brand started his attack.

He thrust the spear at his foe from so far away, most thought the charge a faint of some kind. Right before completing the motion, Brand loosened his grip on his weapon, throwing it now more than anything else. At the same time, he pushed his upper body and hand holding the weapon as far forward as possible.

Sliding down his hand, the spear sliced Blood Beard's left ear open before he even registered that Brand’s assault could reach him. Before the spear slipped completely from his hand, Brand gripped it tightly at its end, jerking it back before Blood Beard could swipe at it. He then, in a smooth motion, placed his weapon into his left hand and thrust again, in the same throwing-like manner.

Using the spear this way, Brand gained an incredible reach at the risk of the weapon being knocked from his hand if he was too slow to recover it. But in this case, there was no risk. His practiced speed stole any opportunity one might have of stopping his weapon. That, along with his solid grip, and good upper body strength, made it that only a slow, predictable, and powerful blow could send his weapon flying.

Brand kept up his lightning-fast attack, aiming everywhere but Blood Beard’s lower half; he had to lose after all. The cuts on his body protested with pain as sweat stung them, but he never relented. The form he used was as tiring as it was effective. Continuously letting Blood Beard block instead of stabbing him in his thigh or stomach would end in him falling over in exhaustion, so Brand changed tactics to keep the fight entertaining.

Coming up to the arena's edge, Brand jumped onto the hardwood barrier separating them from the excited patrons. Vaulting off his perch, he sent his spear out while still in the air towards Blood Beard narrowly missing his neck by a few inches.

Blood Beard, taking advantage of the opening Brand gave him, came in close swinging his sword at Brand’s stomach. Bending awkwardly, Brand avoided the bowel-splitting blade but landed hard on the ground.

He recovered quickly, but not before Blood Beard got in close slamming his shield into him. Using his weapon’s shaft, Brand stopped the blow and several more that followed. Blood Beard closed in, trading turns with his sword and shield, quickly gaining back all the ground he’d lost at the start of the match.

Brand backpedaled as fast as possible, then turned in an exaggerated movement to swipe for Blood Beard's feet as if trying to knock him off balance. Seeing the move coming, Blood Beard jumped up with a kick that landed on the side of Brand’s head. Pretending the kick was devastating, Brand fell over then got back up groggily, as if he had not moved with the blow removing any real damage it might have caused.

Seeing Blood Beard advance on him, Brand decided it was time to act desperate. He swung his spear like a club drunkenly. Blood Beard shield bashed the attacks away several times until he took a hit under his sword arm to hold the spear firmly. Brand gritted his teeth and accepted the fist he knew would come.

The blow hurt having just a bit too much force behind it or Brand not turning with it at just the right time, but he used the opportunity to lose his weapon and fall to the ground. He raised a finger in a gesture of surrender, finally bringing his night's work to an end.

Many in the crowd booed for the money they'd lost, while few cheered for the money they’d won. More still cheered because Hoder paid them a copper coin to make things seem fair. From somewhere deep within the cavern, some could hear the man laughing at the money he’d just made.

Blood Beard offered a hand and Brand gave a perfectly hateful scroll before knocking it away, playing his part as the savage outsider. At least he was done fighting in the pits for good and had enough silver to start looking for a good way to use it for him and his friends. Maybe by buying an apprenticeship or purchasing furs in the summer to sell in winter. He wasn't the best to decide such things, so he'd have to talk to Uhtred when he got back home.

As Brand mentally counted his coins, putting the pain he felt to the back of his mind, someone jumped from the second-floor landing thirty feet below on the sands. Brand looked over at hearing the resounding thump to see Rohaan walking towards him.

“Oh, shit,” escaped Brand’s lips as the nobleman came to a rest in front of him.

“You let him win,” Rohaan said, gesturing with a raised chin in Blood Beard’s direction.

Brand took many steps back, keeping his eyes on the noble's hands reliving the memory of the finger flicking shit of a noble. “I tried my best, Lord,” Brand offered in response. “If you have a problem, please take it up with Hoder.”

“The coin is no problem,” Rohaan said, once again pausing to find the right words. “What I want is you, in my house as-" the noble took a moment to find the words. "A fighter! Now show me your strength, Brandy.”

Brand brought his hand through his hair in frustration. “My name is Brand, not Brandy!”

Rohaan was only amused by his irritation and smiled. “So, your answer?”

Before Brand fully comprehended the question, Hoder’s putrid stench hit his nose like a hammer. He apparently made his way to the sandy floor the second Rohaan had jumped.

“My lord,” said the perfumed man, huffing and puffing from the exertion of running to the first floor. “What may I ask is the problem?”

“No problem,” Rohaan said. “I just want Brand to fight me.”

Hoder wore a confused expression. “Why fight him? He's not a cultivator. You'd kill him with a wave of a hand.”

“The point is not to challenge me,” said the noble. “But to see his potential. I'll make him a cultivator later.”

“I'll do it,” Brand blurted out before Hoder could get another word in.

Becoming a magic-user of any kind was a goal far above what Brand ever thought possible. It didn't matter what job Rohaan wanted him for. Any position as a cultivator would at least pay more than any work within the Nulls could. He may even be allowed servants so Astrid and Uhtred could work under him.

“Now listen here boy,” Hoder warned, right before Brand shoved him out of the way like a pest to address Rohaan.

“I'll show you what I can do if you promise not to kill me.”

“Then let us begin,” Rohaan said, putting his hands up without clenching them into fists.

Regardless of what the noble said, Brand would not trust that he'd hold himself back from killing him in one blow. The fear of a cultivator's fist stopped the burst of intense strikes he’d tended to use other fights. Instead, Brand started to tremble, unable to make the first move, fear rooting his feet in place.

“Why did I say yes,” he thought. “I can't fight a god's damned noble.”

Rohaan, stepped forward with such speed and strength the sand at his feet exploded into the air behind him. His right fist shot out towards Brand's face with enough force to shatter his skull like an egg, showering the room in brains.

Before the deadly blow found its target, Brand moved his head and body to the left, dodging it completely. He didn’t see the attack coming, know which way to turn, or how best to counter. All Brand knew at that moment was that his unbelievably powerful foe moved, so he would too.

In motions born of pure panic, Brand sent a left hook punch hoping to hit something. His fist found Rohaan's face causing them both to stumble back a step back.

There were no wounds on the noble's face, no reddening of the skin, no blood-drenched teeth, or pain to be felt. But he was caught unawares by the attack, thinking himself too fast to be assaulted by a mundane being. Brand, on the other hand, was stumbling because of one-part fear, one-part pain.

“It's like punching a stone,” he thought, agony dancing through his knuckles.

Brand ran straight for Rohaan not wanting to contend with another high-speed attack. Still stunned by receiving a blow from someone mundane, the noble's reaction was too slow when Brand sent one arm over his left shoulder and the other under his right armpit.

Locking his arms together, Brand kicked his opponent’s legs from under him forcing them both to the ground with his own weight. Releasing his hold, Brand grabbed Rohaan’s right arm with practiced speed holding it tightly between his thighs and wrist with both hands.

Rohaan started to shout in his native language, frustration in every word. He had no leverage, so strength alone was not enough to free himself from the iron grip on his arm. There were many ways out of the hold, but shock and anger clouded his mind.

Brand, on the other hand, felt satisfied with his performance. He was about to release the noble when an odd pressure passed over him. Immediately after the ground caved in, starting where Brand lay, sending him downward, letting Rohaan get off his back and onto his one free hand and both feet.

Brand released the arm then quickly made his way out of the growing hole in the ground. Climbing his way out of the widening fissure, he rushed to the edge of the ring. The hole stopped expanding a few seconds after he escaped its clutches leaving a depression in the arena eight feet deep and ten feet wide.

“What in the hells was that!” Brand yelled at Rohaan who was staring at the hole in panic.

Rohaan looked up at Brand, all the cockiness gone from his face. “You need to run,” he said in a cold whisper before sprinting away faster than any man Brand had ever seen.

“Crack.”

“What was that?” Brand said to himself.

“Crack, crack, crack.”

The sound came from the hole moving farther away with every crack.

“Crack, crack, crack.”

The noise was now moving past him up the walls to the roof of the cavern.

“Crack, Crack, Boom!”

The sound came from the roof, dust raining down on all.

“I should run,” thought Brand as the room fell apart with hundreds of tons worth of stone coming down on their heads.