Immortal's Odyssey

The ludus woke before the sun.

A wooden rod cracked across the iron bars of our cell and a voice barked in Latin so clipped it sounded like stone on bone:

"On your feet, meat!"

I was already sitting up. I hadn't slept.

The others rose slower. Some groaned. One vomited into a corner bucket, wine still sour on his breath from the night before. Twelve of us shared the cell. Straw mats. A piss trench. No names, just scars.

They didn't speak to me.

New ones died too fast to bother learning.

I didn't blame them.

I was still tasting blood from yesterday. The inside of my cheek had split open in the fight with Varinius. It hadn't healed yet. Not all wounds do, not right away. That's the cruelty of the curse—I regenerate, but I feel everything. Pain is the only promise that keeps.

We lined up in the corridor. Bare feet on cold stone. The smell of boiled barley porridge wafted through the training hall. A reward, if you lived to earn it.

The gates opened.

Another day in Rome's furnace.

The training yard was shaped like a crucible—oval, sunken, walls lined with spikes and hooks where weapons were hung like meat in a butcher's stall. The sand was thick with old blood, packed and churned into mud. Flies clustered where a dark patch hadn't fully dried.

Over thirty men were already there.

Veterans, recruits, old champions too broken to fight but still too dangerous to ignore.

Some wore leather practice armor. Others trained bare-chested, sweat glistening like oil.

Lucius Varrus stood at the far end, arms crossed, flanked by two doctores—drillmasters. One was the Thracian who'd greeted me with his spear. I saw the scarred chunk missing from his ear. He saw me, and smiled without warmth.

"We have a new bitch in the litter," Varrus called.

"Show him the teeth."

Two men stepped forward.

One was massive—a secutor with the blank-eyed stare of someone who'd killed more than he'd fucked.

The other was leaner, faster, with a Retiarius' trident and net. Arrogant grin. Hair braided like a Gallic prince.

They circled me.

I hadn't been handed a weapon.

No one said a word.

And so I moved.

The net came first—spun wide and low.

I dropped to my knees, slid beneath it. Sand burned against my thigh. The big one moved to flank me, mace raised.

I rolled. The netman lunged.

His trident scraped my ribs—shallow, but hot. I grabbed the haft, twisted, drove it back into his gut. He grunted, staggered.

The mace came down.

I caught it with my forearm. Crack. A radius snapped. I screamed. Real. Immediate.

But I didn't fall.

Instead, I slammed my forehead into the secutor's nose—again and again. Blood burst. He reeled.

Trident still in hand, I spun.

Not clean. Not graceful.

But when the dust settled, I stood over both of them. Bleeding. Breathing.

The doctores were silent.

Then one spoke.

"He learns fast."

Lucius Varrus nodded.

"Pain is the best tutor."

They fed me that night.

Barley gruel, burnt onion, a half-cup of sour wine. It was more than most days.

I sat alone. No one sat beside me.

But they watched me now. Not with camaraderie. With calculation. Wondering if I was a freak, or a threat, or just next.

That's the closest thing to respect a man earns in a ludus.

Later, while oiling my bruised shoulder near the fire pit, one of the older gladiators approached.

An Egyptian, tall and silent, with tattoos of jackals across his back.

He squatted across from me.

"You don't flinch when they hit you."

"Not anymore."

"You bleed slow."

"Not slow enough."

He studied me. Then spoke low.

"There are gods older than Rome."

"I've met them."

"No, you haven't. You've met liars with long memories."

I looked up.

He smiled. Not friendly.

"You're not the only thing in here that doesn't die right."

He stood and walked away.

I lay awake long after the others began to snore.

The pain in my arm had faded too fast. The break was knitting. That would be noticed.

Sooner or later, someone would try to carve me open to see what spilled out. And if it wasn't a sword in the sand, it would be something worse. Something religious.

But I'd made it one more day.

I had a name now.

A place.

And if the city wouldn't tell me its secrets willingly—

I would bleed them out of it.

One arena at a time.

At dawn, we ran.

Not for speed. For attrition.

Bare feet on gravel. Sand in the lungs. The doctores shouted in Oscan and Latin, whichever cut deeper. Behind me, a Numidian slipped in the dirt and vomited bile. The Thracian jabbed him with a spear butt until he rose again.

The smell of sweat, piss, and blood cooked in the rising sun.

We ran the perimeter of the training yard ten times, then were paired off. I faced a German with hands like shovels and eyes like slate. They gave me a dull rudis—wooden sword. The kind they train boys with.

The German got a steel gladius.

I didn't ask why.

You don't ask questions when you're being tested for slaughter-worthiness. You answer with bone and breath.

He lunged—heavy, not clumsy. I sidestepped, smacked the back of his wrist with my stick. It vibrated in my hands, rattling the bones.

He snarled. Came again.

The gladius sliced across my thigh. Shallow. But the pain licked hot, sharp. My leg buckled. He raised the blade for a vertical chop, aiming to split my collar—

I dropped to one knee and slammed my rudis into his groin.

He folded. I rose. Brought the stick across his temple—crack—then drove it down into the hollow of his throat.

He twitched.

Didn't rise.

The Thracian nodded once.

Then threw a real blade at my feet.

"You earn steel now, Novus."

I didn't smile. I didn't speak.

But I picked up the sword.

That afternoon, we were given water and bread. A single date each—sweet, overripe. The Egyptian sat beside me this time. Said nothing. Just ate.

Across the yard, Varinius watched me. His nose had reset crooked. Purple bruising ran down one cheek. His eyes had changed.

Before, he'd looked at me like a rookie.

Now, like a question he wasn't sure he wanted answered.

When the sun dipped low, the senior doctor—a grizzled Samnite named Pulcher—called for us to form ranks.

"Two weeks," he barked. "Two weeks until you pigs squeal in front of the crowd. Blood fights only. No play duels. No wood."

A murmur rippled through the ranks.

Pulcher silenced it with a look.

"Three will be selected to fight early. Trial bout. Crowd's smaller. Expectations lower. But death's the same."

He pointed.

"You. You. And you."

He pointed at me.

I felt it then—low in the gut. A twist, not of fear, but of clarity.

The arena would come sooner than I thought.

That night, the Egyptian spoke again.

We sat near the baths, cooling ourselves with splash-basins and stripped tunics. The scent of cedar ash drifted from the warming stones.

"Your healing's too fast," he said. "You fought yesterday. You bled from the arm."

"I heal well."

"No one heals that well."

I said nothing.

He leaned forward, elbows on knees.

"Do you dream, Novus?"

I looked up. Met his eyes.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean—when you sleep, do the gods speak to you? Or do you wander alone?"

That paused me.

"Alone," I said at last. "Always."

He nodded.

"Then you're one of the cursed."

"You believe in curses?"

"Only the ones that walk and breathe."

He stood. Left me with that.

In the dark, I pressed my hand against my thigh where the German's blade had cut.

It was closed now. Smooth.

Too smooth.

They were beginning to see.

It wouldn't be long before someone asked what I truly was.

Not a man. Not a god.

Something between.

And in Rome, between is the most dangerous place to stand.