Chương 57: 57：The Unarmed Master

The sight ahead made the ten slave soldiers leading the way tremble at the knees. A massive structure squatted across the bleak, frozen plains like a beast. This was the [Blood Colosseum]. Soren tilted his head up slightly. The defensive perimeter here was even more heavily fortified than he had anticipated. A solid ten-meter-high outer wall, constructed entirely of dense obsidian blocks, loomed before them.

Not only was the stone fireproof, but its surface was also coated in a highly lethal poison to deter climbers. Set into the center of the wall was a heavy, half-meter-thick gate forged from refined steel. Even a battering ram pounding it for an hour straight wouldn't put a dent in it. Atop the battlements, magical watchtowers jutted into the sky every thirty meters. Eerie, dark green crystals rotated sluggishly at their peaks—Eyes of Detection, the handiwork of High Shamans.

Rows of heavy ballistas were mounted to cover the defensive blind spots, their bowstrings already drawn taut with refined steel bolts as thick as a baby's arm. The terrain immediately surrounding the Colosseum was uneven. Soren's sharp eyes caught traces of recently overturned soil, dotted with a few inconspicuous animal bone totems. Thirty-two traps... definitely the handiwork of a High Shaman, he noted silently.

Patrolling and standing guard both inside and outside the high walls were hundreds of fully armed Black Iron Orcs. Clad uniformly in spiked black iron armor, they brandished broad-bladed battle axes and massive spiked maces, making no effort to conceal their bloodthirsty aura. This colossal structure existed solely to provide sensory thrills for the high-ranking Orc Warlords and nobility. More importantly, it served as a brutal training ground.

Here, newly minted Orc elites could build their courage and hone their killing techniques by tearing apart prisoners of war and magical beasts barehanded in the arena. Soren kept his head bowed, shuffling forward slowly with the slave soldiers. Against a defense of this caliber, if he had ordered his sixty-four heavy infantrymen to launch a frontal assault... no matter how elite his troops were, they would have been spotted by the magical watchtowers, bogged down by the traps, and shredded by ballista volleys.

They would be completely wiped out before even touching the main gate. A frontal assault was suicide. Internal infiltration was his only viable tactic. Finally, the group arrived before the massive refined steel gate.

"Halt! You lowly bugs!" roared an Orc guard from atop the gatehouse. Two Black Iron Orc guards, both standing nearly two and a half meters tall, stepped forward to block their path. They hefted long-handled battle axes in their massive hands. The scar-faced slave soldier leading the way flinched, shrinking into himself as cold sweat instantly soaked his tunic. Terrified of Soren looming right behind him, he nonetheless forced a groveling, sycophantic smile for the Orcs.

His knees gave out, dropping him to the dirt as he stammered in practiced Orcish:"M-Mighty Blackstone warriors! We were ordered to go out and capture prey... We're here to deliver the goods for the lords of the Colosseum..." One of the Orc guards stepped forward, casting a massive shadow over Scarface. Reaching down with a furry hand the size of a fan, the Orc grabbed Scarface by the hair and hoisted him into the air. He then cast a look of utter disgust toward Soren, who stood isolated at the back of the group.

Soren currently had his back hunched, his eyes glassy and unfocused. Covered from head to toe in foul-smelling, black mud, he looked exactly like a half-starved, thoroughly broken refugee from the badlands.

"Just this one piece of trash?!" The Orc guard angrily hurled Scarface back into the mud and spat a thick glob of phlegm.

"The Colosseum's consumption rate has been massive lately! The beasts in the pits are starving! And you useless human lapdogs only bring back one skin-and-bones monkey? Has every human in the Misty Swamps died out?!" The edge of his battle axe was pressed directly against Scarface's neck. Scarface nearly soiled himself.

His peripheral vision darted involuntarily toward Soren, but seeing that Soren was still keeping his head lowered in a numb stupor, he choked back his terror and begged, tears and snot streaming down his face:"M-Mercy, my lord! The refugees in the swamps have all gone into hiding lately, they're incredibly hard to catch... please, have some leniency..."

"Useless trash!" the Orc guard spat, roughly yanking a heavy iron chain next to him. With the harsh grinding of gears, a smaller iron portcullis beside the main gate slowly rose.

"Take him inside and throw him into Block C of the underground death row! Warlord Bakar is drinking on the high platform tonight, and he's complaining about a lack of appetizers." There were no interrogations, nor were there any thorough body searches. To the narrow-minded Orcs, a filthy, foul-smelling vagabond was no different from a pig being sent to the slaughterhouse. They weren't worth the effort to inspect. Soren's disguise had flawlessly bypassed their defenses.

With a heavy clang, the small steel gate dropped shut behind them. Instantly, Soren was engulfed by the suffocating stench of stale blood, urine, and feces. If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. The lighting abruptly dimmed, illuminated only by flickering torches mounted along the stone walls. Under the "escort" of Scarface's group, Soren was herded down a damp, narrow spiral staircase, descending deep into the underground dungeon on the northern side of the Colosseum.

After Scarface groveled and slipped a bone coin to the dungeon overseer, a heavy iron cell door swung open with a resounding clang. The slave soldiers hastily untied the slipknot rope binding Soren's wrists. They gave him a light push into the cell, then scrambled back toward the surface as if fleeing a plague god. The iron bars were locked shut once more. The underground dungeon was dark, damp, and awash in flowing sewage.

The massive holding area was partitioned into dozens of cages by solid iron bars as thick as a man's wrist. Every single cage was packed tight with half-naked human prisoners of war, their eyes hollow with despair. Moans and suppressed sobbing echoed off the stone walls. Soren stood up straight. His previously hunched spine snapped into a rigid, commanding posture. Standing amidst the putrid squalor of his holding pen, he quietly rolled his wrists, loosening his joints.

Just then, out of the corner of his eye, a figure hidden in the darkest depths of the cell caught his attention. Soren narrowed his eyes slightly. In his mind, his [Inspect] talent instantly activated. His gaze pierced the gloom, locking onto the very back of the iron cage. In that specific corner, there was no weeping. There was no fear. Even the sound of breathing was so faint it was practically nonexistent. It was a bald human man.

He sat bare-chested and cross-legged, maintaining a perfect, upright posture upon a bed of rotting straw soaked in sewage. The man's four limbs were completely immobilized. Four heavy, refined steel chains anchored to the wall had been brutally driven straight through his collarbones and ankles, pinning him ruthlessly in place. Yet, what made one's scalp tingle the most were the scars covering his body.

Blade gashes, puncture wounds, severe burns, and gruesome, mangled flesh left by the gnashing teeth of wild beasts... Hundreds of scars, large and small, crawled across his sculpted, bronze-colored muscles like a colony of twisted centipedes. Within Soren's field of vision, a Talent Panel popped up hovering just above the bald, muscular man's head: [Name]: Reyn [Identity]: Monk [Talents]: [Iron Skin]: Grants up to 60% immunity against standard physical damage. [Unarmed Master]: Requires no weapons.

Elbows, knees, and knuckles act as deadly blades. Capable of tearing through heavy Orc armor barehanded. Soren's breathing hitched for a fraction of a second. What an unexpected windfall. This was the very definition of finding something effortlessly after searching far and wide. During this crucial early stage where he severely lacked a frontline juggernaut, an elite warrior who could both tank and deal massive damage was just sitting here, locked up as a death row inmate?

"Your breathing is heavy." Suddenly, a painfully calm voice drifted from the corner. Reyn slowly opened his eyes. They were the eyes of a man intimately acquainted with life and death. He stared at Soren, his brows furrowing slightly.

"Your footsteps make no sound when they land. You've just been thrown into a death ward, yet your heartbeat lacks any trace of fear."

"You weren't captured. You walked in here yourself." The corners of Soren's mouth curled into a faint smile. As expected of a high-tier combatant. His intuition was frighteningly sharp. Bypassing any pointless chatter, Soren stepped forward. Ignoring the shivering prisoners huddled around them, he strode directly over to Reyn. Soren looked down at the chained juggernaut, cutting straight to the chase.

"I know what you crave. I can see the pain of those chains digging into your bones." Soren leaned in, his gaze as sharp as a blade.

"I'm going to give you a choice."

"Pledge your loyalty to me. Fight for me."

"In return, I will shatter those chains binding you. I'll lead you out of this Colosseum alive, and..." Soren let out a cold chuckle, his tone dropping to a deadly chill.

"... I'll show you how to butcher all five hundred of those greenskin bastards outside into minced meat." The air in the cell froze. Reyn locked eyes with the man standing before him—a man who seemed even more insane than he was. Locked inside a cage in the Colosseum, yet boasting about slaughtering his way through a fortress garrisoned by five hundred Black Iron Orcs?! It was utterly absurd. And yet...

the suffocating pressure radiating from Soren—an aura forged in mountains of corpses and seas of blood—could not be faked. Two years ago, his monastery had been razed to the ground by Orcs. His master and fellow disciples had been flayed and eaten. He had fought like a man possessed, slaying one hundred and three Orcs before finally collapsing from exhaustion and being taken captive. For two years, he had endured inhuman torture. He had clung to life for one singular purpose: revenge.