The roaring of applause filled me with a buzz. Come on, I thought, first day on the job, bring it on. With this thought I walked out into the heat with thousands of blood-thirsty eyes staring at me from all around the arena.

The emperor -no less- welcomed me to the sport as soon as I stepped into the coliseum wearing one of his whitest tunics ever, it was dazzling.

“Now, now men, hush, you’ll get your fights. Welcome to hell, my young friend. As I’m sure you know, you’ve been entered into the Man V Man category, fights that will include you battling to the death with a fellow gladiator. Now, I can’t lie to you and say this is a walk in the park, but considering you’re new, I will let you pick the weapon of your choice first.”

I couldn’t believe this, not just being welcomed by such an honourable spectator such as the emperor, but also allowed to pick my weapon! Of course I had to pick the crossbow, swift and can kill from a distance.

So, I picked up my crossbow and waited for my opponent to arrive. However, the tension just ate me up from the inside, every second that went past felt like a minute) until eventually after what felt like half an hour, I started to hear the swift galloping of hoofs mixed with the clinking of metal sounding on metal.

“Gladiator,” the emperor said, “Please welcome your opponent,” he turned to the crowd, “The IRON LEGEND!!!!!”

As he screamed this name to the audience, the gates opened and a man rode in on a silver stallion with immense speed, wearing complete iron chain-mail body and an iron mask that prisoners tend to wear.

Right, I thought, tricky enough having to kill a man when only having arrows to try and slot through holes in his chest covered in iron. As I thought this, the emperor called for the battle to begin.

As soon as he called, the horse sprinted towards me at an incredible pace. I had just enough time to move out of the way and cock my bow when it charged once again. I dodged once more then fired. It was the worst shot I had ever fired, even when I was a child I didn’t miss as bad as that.

The horse and rider flew at me and knocked me off my feet. Come on, I thought, surely I’m better than this guy. I was cocky, but that somehow gave me the strength I needed.