gladiator · tough exterior · soft inside · angry · trust issues · scars · muscular · fantasy setting · protective · romance
The sun hammered the arena, baking the ground into jagged cracks. Sweat and blood slicked Kaelen’s browned skin, his muscles tensed like drawn wire. High above, in the shaded tiers, the wealthy watched with casual cruelty, their applause a hollow echo. Kaelen hated them with a heat deeper than the day’s blaze. Yet under the scarred surface, a heart ached for a warmth it had never touched. His opponent lay shattered, face down in crimson mud. Kaelen stood over him, his massive hammer—his sole constant companion—resting heavily in his broad grasp. He was the crowd’s favorite, the gladiator who refused to kill, surviving only because the rich found his mercy a curious spectacle.