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Avan and the others walked into the arena with cautious steps, shielding their eyes from the midday sun that shone brutally down from above. In contrast to the training sessions the weeks before, which started in the morning, the eyes of the slaves had to get used to the blazing merciless sun.

"Join me in welcoming the brave men and women of today's battle!" Shouted the crier again, and Avan could finally make out the person. The person was standing on the balcony of one of the large private seating niches on the tribune, which were decorated with gold and red colors and flags. In contrast to the other niches to the left and right of it, which were also decorated with flags and the symbols of the noble houses, this tribune was gleaming gold and stood out powerfully. The tribune of the royal house, huh?

The man was a nondescript-looking human being, with short brown but slicked-back hair and a kind of megaphone in his hand to carry his voice to every corner of the arena. He stood directly on a ledge in front of the stands and waved his arms meaningfully as he pointed to the three groups of slaves.

Oh, only three groups? I was wondering how they divide up the fights...

To the left and right of Avan's group, which had come from the southern part of the arena, were also open portcullises, from which a similar procession of slaves marched out, accompanied by guards.

The eastern group was the one with the large muscular man who, with his cronies, had molested the woman in their midst on the first days. Said woman, Avan noticed in confusion, was no longer present. Wasn't there something...? he mused, suddenly clenching his teeth as a sharp pain emerged from the back of his brain. Argh... Fuck... he moaned, while holding his head with his right hand and swaying slightly. Timo, who was walking behind him on the right, just grunted disparagingly.

Something is wrong with me! What is it?

The pain throbbed violently in sync with his heartbeat. Slowly it dawned on him where he knew the woman from, and where he had last actually seen her. This is why this headache! You BASTARD! he cursed and gritted his teeth, but stood up straight again and continued walking, the first pain now over.

Avan's head had pushed the repressed memories and experiences of his torture into a remote part of his mind, and noticing the missing woman he had seen when leaving the torture chamber had briefly brought those memories back as well, and with them the mental pain.

He blinked and briefly increased the pressure of his hand on his head, as if he could suppress the stabbing pain with an external pressure, and noticed that all three groups had gathered in the center of the arena, while the guards were already retreating.

"Are you all right?" Whispered a female voice from his left, and Avan only now noticed Lea, who was watching him slightly worriedly from his left, and to her right even Nick was looking at him. Oh great, it doesn't look like a freak who suddenly has a seizure... He stated sarcastically inwardly.

"All good..." He whispered back with a sideways glance, and stood up straighter with a straight back as the throbbing slowly subsided.

"Today, for the first fight of the day, we invited some extra funny birds! These thirty slaves will open the games of the season against..." Shouted the man in the stands, making an acting pause to build up the tension extra, hold the breath of the spectators, and make some of the slaves present feel their hearts slip into their pants. "...CHOCS!" He finished his sentence, and the crowd went wild and stomped enthusiastically, while many even stood up and cheered loudly. Bloodhungry assholes!

"And to make the first fights more interesting, your king has decided to let the fighters fight WITHOUT weapons!" the man goaded the pack even further, which brought an even more deafening cheer from the spectators, and the ground shook slightly from all the stomping.

There were easily ten thousand people in the stands, and by now, less surprisingly for Avan, not a single non-human.

With the last statement, the bars on the opposite side of the arena, to the north, slowly rattled upward, and between all the angry mutterings of the slaves present and the euphoric outburst of the spectators, Avan stared solely into the black maw behind the bars.

He continued to stare straight ahead, and could gradually make out yellow dots of color that belonged to two meter tall creatures that were just making their way out of the darkness of the tunnel into the sun and heat of the sandy arena.

Do you want to make a fool of me? Avan thought to himself as he could now see the creatures in their entirety. "Fucking chocobos of death?" he whispered to himself, earning another confused sideways glance from Lea, who was still to his left.

The creatures that had just stepped into the sunlight sniffed the air cautiously and pawed at the sand with their clawed feet. To Avan's great surprise, these wingless birds reminded him of chocobos from the well-known fantasy games from Earth.

At first glance, they looked like graceful oversized chickens, but they had yellow feathers all over their bodies and muscular thighs. Where Avan would have expected a harmless beak, however, it was anything but cute and harmless as the leader gave a shrill cry and craned its long neck.

Between the white beak, two rows of small and extremely sharp teeth showed above and below, and Avan gulped once noticeably at the sight. If the beast bites my arm, it will be gone in one go! Oh fuck!

The other slaves also looked noticeably paler and many had involuntarily taken a step back.

After his cry for freedom, the lead animal had finally noticed the assembled slaves, and together with his four other companions, it took a threatening step towards the slaves.

Several of the other slaves stiffened momentarily, and a larger man from the eastern group of slaves made his presence known. "Defend yourselves! Semicircle formation! Dodge when they come and try to get on their backs and restrict their movement!" He shouted out orders, and judging by the visible relief of most, an order, or at least a command, was exactly what everyone needed right now.

Avan stood a little to the left of center, calculating what was happening and what he should do, while his cellmates also got up and fell in line.

Obvious: sharp claws, more than dangerous teeth aka beak. Getting on its back won't be enough, neck seems to be more than mobile and can certainly attack someone sitting on its back. The only way would be to somehow immobilize the claws AND the head. With several clutches perhaps? Or turn the neck around? Oh fuck...

He sighed loudly as his observations flashed through his mind in a precious second and most of the other slaves were already stumbling over each other more badly than they could manage, waiting in a disorganized line for the running opponents. Only the commander himself stood, strangely enough, a little further to the right, as if he did not want to put himself in danger. What an asshole. Am I surprised?

Sighing once again and not having a master plan ready himself, Avan joined Lea, who was standing in the middle of the waiting and tense line to the left of Nick.

The Chocs raced up. When the five birds of prey collided, cries of pain rang out as none but one of the slaves managed to avoid the monsters, and several of the defenders were torn apart by razor-sharp beaks and several centimeter-long claws. As soon as the birds were in the crowd of defenders, the rest threw themselves on the birds like lemmings and jumped on their backs, trying to crush the necks of the two-meter tall birds or each tried to somehow restrict the movement of the animals. The smartest among them, one of the western group, had taken off his linen shirt and somehow, in the heat of battle, managed to put a blindfold on the left outer bird, causing the bird to rampage around in panic.

Avan himself fought with others against the second left bird and had first let others take the lead, even if he was briefly ashamed of it at first. But survival comes first... it shot him under adrenalin simply by the thoughts and he pushed also this feeling in one of the many mental drawers, in order not to have to concern himself with it now.

One of the four board game players from his cell had thrown himself on the back of the bird and tried to slow it down, when the beast, as Avan had suspected before, turned its head in one movement and pecked several times with its beak in the face of the screaming man, who tried in vain to protect his face with raised arms when he noticed his mistake.

As if waiting for the sign, Avan instinctively jumped forward and let some mana flow into his entire arms from shoulder to hand and jumped up the back of the head facing away from him, using his momentum right around to twist the neck even further.

Amid the shrieks of the man who had fallen off the back of the bird and a Lea holding the legs of the Choc, there was a sickening crack and Avan landed sideways on the bird, which collapsed beneath him.

Another short and frightened female scream rang out, and a short time later Nick and the others helped a Lea out from under the bird, which had been holding its feet in check. She grinned mischievously at Avan and shook her head in disbelief, but had an amused glint in her eye until her gaze wandered over the other fighters and she immediately became serious again.

Avan, briefly chuckling slightly at the situation and the rush of success with the adrenaline in his veins, also looked around.

Two other birds besides theirs were also motionless on the ground, while the lead bird and its limping friend had retreated a bit and were screaming at a distance of ten meters and seemed to be snarling at the remaining slaves a bit like cats.

Briefly catching his breath and while the first adrenaline hit Avan with a brief feeling of weakness, he analyzed the situation and what the state of affairs was on their side of the defenders. More than half seemed to be lying motionless or screaming on the ground with bleeding wounds, while friends or others tried to help them, and some also used their linen shirts as tourniquets to stop some bleeding. Avan could even make out three of the dead with bitten-off limbs, and one of the survivors was screaming like a spit with a stump left where his left arm used to be.

The other two birds had been killed with varying degrees of effectiveness, but apparently not by breaking their necks as Avan had luckily tried, but rather with many blows to the head.

He took a step toward Lea and Nick to whisper his observations to them. "I would therefore try to arrest the big bird. At least two keep their feet and claws still, and maybe someone quick and strong should try to catch the beak, squeeze, and we'll wring its neck?"

Both nodded as they listened to his recounting, and Nick called over a grumbling Timo.

After a brief explanation and a short recalcitrant nod in Avan's direction on his part, they mobilized the remaining ten people around them, while the man from earlier had gathered the other six around him on the right and was also nodding his way to their group.

So both groups approached the two remaining monster birds and they responded as hoped.

Lea and one of the dark-skinned men grabbed their feet together, while Timo, running in front, had distracted the leader bird and was just able to avoid the beak attacks.

The other slaves together pounced on the entrenched animal and with their combined strength it crashed sideways onto the sandy arena floor. As soon as it was on the ground, they all jumped on it and tried with all their strength to keep the bird on the ground, while Timo ran to the head and strangled it in a screw grip from behind, and then turned it around with a jerk.

The lead bird squealed shrilly and tried to fight its way free, throwing itself around with its muscular body, but Timo just grunted and his own muscles popped out with veins, while he would have done a professional wrestler credit as he held the animal's head in a vice like this and then slowly twisted it around like an arm wrestle.

With an audible crack like the breaking of several dry twigs, the animal jerked once more, and then lay still.

Panting, Timo propped himself up from the vise and grinned triumphantly at the group, each of whom had fortunately made it without further injury, and some of the others congratulated him.

Avan, Lea and Nick just grinned and looked around at the other group, who were busy with the limping Choc.

How the hell did they do that??? Avan looked on in disbelief as the big guy, with his instructions from earlier, pounded on the bird's head several times, even though it had already passed away. Of the six people, two were sitting on the ground bleeding, and three others were lying dead or unconscious on the ground with various wounds around their heads and necks.

With a shake of his head, Avan only now registered the audience around him again, which he had unconsciously blanked out due to the first adrenaline rush, and was now loudly roaring and cheering, apparently satisfied with the performance and the bloodshed.

"What a fight! Out of thirty participants, these brave and courageous thirteen survived and emerged victorious from this first fight of the day!" Hollered the man in the stands now again, and the audience cheered again, while many of the thousands also clapped and whistled.

The slaves were led away again, and only now did Avan realize that one of the dark-skinned and one of the other board game players were also wounded, and were being taken away by healers, while someone else was examining a wound on Timo's arm, and then waving him on after a simple bandage.

The guards at the bars were already waiting for them and escorted them back to their cell without comment, where soup, bread, and wooden jugs of heavily watered down ale were waiting for them.

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