612 Red Colosseum

'Wooden sword… fight for their freedom…'

Sunny shifted slightly, causing his cage to sway, and glanced at Elyas. The youth was not in a talking mood anymore and just sat quietly, staring into the darkness.

There was something, a hint of a meaning, in what he had said. Sunny tried desperately to catch that meaning, but for some reason, his thoughts kept returning to the statues of War God.

He had seen two depictions of the fearsome deity in the Kingdom of Hope. One was a warrior in heavy armor, wielding a bloodied spear and a cracked shield — both, presumably, representing warfare and battle — and the other was a woman wearing nothing but a beast hide around her waist, holding a spear in one hand and a beating human heart in another… the spear representing her dominion over war, technology, and craft perhaps, the heart representing her connection to life and humanity.

Why were these statues so different?