Gladiatorial Combat
The Vast Empire Great Sport.
The historical expansion and military dominance of the Kalamaran Empire bears witness to its citizens’ natural lust for excitement. For a few skilled enough, this desire for action manifests in adventuring careers. Others join the Imperial Legions. For those bold enough for neither, there is a seat at the local arena and the gladiatorial circuit.
Gladiators are an institution in Kalamaran life. Hardly a thorp or dorf exists in which one cannot find at least a crudely fenced corral in which the blood sport ensues. Larger villages have dug pits where the combatants can be viewed from above. Of course, these amateur brawls are a far cry from the intricate killing orgies at the Grand Amphitheater in Bet Kalamar, but they do reveal the sport’s ubiquity.
The public’s desire for this brutal sport has spawned an entire industry. At the most basic level are the gruesome bludgeonings conducted for a crowd of drunken hayseeds in some poor border province. The beginning gladiator usually gets his start here.
The stakes are high, not only for the participant’s physical well being, but also for the fiscal well being of the gladiator’s sponsor. If the fighter is good enough and lucky enough to survive his initial blooding, he can build a reputation and attract the interest of a larger arena – one with the resources to pay for the attraction of a veteran gladiator.
The fondest desire of anyone sponsoring a gladiator is to display his warrior’s prowess before the nobility of Bet Kalamar. The arena for this is the Grand Amphitheater. Kabori attends often and there’s no surer way of securing an invitation to the next palatial social event than to have a meritorious gladiator triumph in his presence.
Certain elitists decry such combats as mere entertainment for the twisted. They move for an end to the games and more civic uses of the various arenas. Unfortunately for these idealists, the majority of freemen does not agree.
Participants
Though most contestants are slaves, at times a desperate freeman (especially one facing the prospect of a sentencing to the debtors’ prison) may willingly enter the arena.
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