Once, the country of Plethorie was known for its brave and seasoned fighters. Men with hearts of iron, nerves of spider silk and a great love for grain and harvest. The boldest and most proficient amongst them was Xianthippus of Kenck. He fought his way up from the bottom of despair, faced hardships, betrayal and great beasts alike.

I only met him once, but I observed his greatness many times and his adventures are well known, even beyond the borders of the great country Plethorie. This is how he came to fame.

Not much is known about the first years of Xinathippus’ life, though it is believed that he was born in the famous port city Kenck, which he was named after later in his life. Xianthippus grew up poor and lost his parents when he was still young and so the world around him became his teacher. He was tall and strong for a boy his age and his noble face told of his character and let the people treat the orphan with kindness rather than disdain. It is told that he was a kind child that only used its strength to defend and even later, he was famous for never pulling the first punch.

On one of those occasions where he defended a fellow orphaned street child, Xianthippus clashed with the city guards and though he would have had little difficulty in overpowering the grown men, for he had grown in strength and prowess in his years living on the streets, he laid down his weapons and went with them willingly. The Kings didn’t know what to do with the boy, as he was a promising fighter that already enjoyed some popularity in the city, but he was also a troublemaker that could not stand above the law. And so, they gave him a choice. Work in the swamp with other convicts to better his ways, or fight in the arena and win back his freedom. An easy choice for the young Xianthippus, who joined the ranks of the gladiators the same day.

In his first fight in the Arena, Xianthippus had been given a rather poorly made and dull weapon and no armour apart from an old and dusty pauldron. For Chionis wanted to teach the boy a lesson and show him what the men in his arena could do. Kallias was one of the oldest and most experienced gladiators and he wanted to take Xianthippus down to show him that raw strength alone would not always win a fight. So, after Xianthippus had defeated several of the other gladiators, killing two and injuring many others, he finally faced Kallias. Kallias wore a fine armour that he had assembled over many wins in the arena and that he was very proud of. Its bronze trimming shining in the warm plethorian sun as he greeted the young fighter with a confident smile. They started to fight and it became clear that they were almost evenly matched. Young Xianthippus was the stronger of the two, but he lacked the experience of a seasoned fighter like Kallias. Xianthippus suffered many cuts and was bleeding down his unarmoured shoulder while his blunt sword only gave Kallias some bruises and the crowd was starting to root for the young new gladiator with the grand face. Then Kallias decided to end the fight quickly before the crowd would turn on him and started to use dirty tricks, he had learned in the arena himself. He tried to disarm and trip Xianthippus and even used the sand on the ground to blind his opponent, but Xinathippus evaded all those devilries. He was not just strong, he was also nimble and quick and he finally showed his true colours in the arena. He quickly outsmarted Kallias and sent the man unconscious to the ground. He took one of Kallias’ shining bracers and donned it on himself. Under great cheering he won his very first fight, something that never happened before in Chionis’ Arena and had Xinathippus’ name in every mouth for weeks. The good people of Kenck were sure that Xinathippus was favoured by the great god Grom and that he would come to be a great warrior, which turned out to be true. In the end, Kallias admitted how impressed he was with the young man and he agreed to teach him. So, he became the first of Xianthippus’ masters.

In the years that followed, Xianthippus came to great fame in the arena. He trained diligently and he eagerly absorbed and mastered every advice and technique he came across. After some time, fighters from all over Seres came to Kenck to compete with the famous gladiator, but Xinathippus defeated them all. He always kept a piece of armour or a weapon from those he defeated and over the years he had gathered a curious collection of strange armour and weapons from all over the world. But he never fought without the pauldron from his very first fight. The dusty lion embellishment shining with new polish became the symbol of Xianthippus and before he took the name of Xianthippus of Kenck, he was known in the region as the Lion and later the Lion of Kenck.

He grew to become a handsome man, who many thought to have royal blood for his features were most noble and although he was a ferocious fighter, he always had an air of greatness about him. After five years in the arena, Xinathippus decided that it was time for him to seek his fortune in the world and left. No one could stop him, as he had won his freedom many times over in the arena, but not many people were happy about that. Xianthippus’ fights had become an important attraction for the city and many a heart was broken when he left, but that is another story that should be told another time.

Xianthippus only took his pauldron and a plethorian spear with him as he sailed away on a small fishing boat and it was not until another five years had gone by until he was seen in Plethorie again.

Many stories about Xianthippus’ exploits reached his home over the time he was gone. They came from the Latey Islands, the noble country of New Eluthea, the now gone lands of Amaritas and even the far and cold south of Waru. They were all astonishing tales of great feats. Some told of legendary monsters slain, some of daring rescues or displays of superhuman abilities. Some of the stories were so outlandish that people believed them to be the fabrication of overimaginative minds, but the good people of Plethorie new Xianthippus was capable of all of them. The fame of this extraordinary fighter grew over the years and let bards from the curious city Ember to travel far to learn and sing his tales. Kings sent parties to find him and ask for a favour and even the enigmatic people of the twilight nation were so curious, that a large group of wizards descended on Kenck and waited for years for the hero to show his noble face.

Xianthippus first sailed to the north of Latey, where near a small rocky island the famous sea serpent Kanara had her lair. She had harassed the people of Latey for many years and sunk plenty ships that had made their way down the Bold Current to trade. Kanara was an evil creature that fed not only on flesh, but on the desperate cries of her victims and there were many stories about her in the port city Kenck that were told to scare the children off deep waters and that was where Xinathippus had first heard of the beast. While he had never sailed before, Xinathippus spent much time in the Numa district of Kenck, where he watched the sailors and listened to their trade and so he had little difficulty commanding his boat and making his way to Latey. There he lay in waiting for Kanara to show her ugly face and while he waited, he made a plan to kill her. Finally, Xianthippus who was paying close attention to the water near the cave entrance saw a shadow moving beneath the surface and readied his spear. At the right moment he leapt into the water and started to fight Kanara. She was an old serpent and therefore long enough to wrap twice around Xianthippus’ ship if he had one and she was as thick as three tree trunks from the pathless marshes. Her mouth had gigantic teeth, as long and strong as Xianthippus’ well-toned legs and it was wide enough to swallow him whole, which she tried after Xianthippus bore down on her. They fought for a while, Xianthippus piercing her strong skin with his spear and deftly avoiding her venomous fangs, but it came to his mind that fighting Kanara in the water had not been a good idea, as he needed to come up for air regularly and the serpent tried to keep him down. With a swift swipe from her tail Kanara knocked the spear from Xianthippus’ hand and started to wind her long body around him. She squeezed the air out of his lungs and descended with him to the depth of the waters. As he was suffocating and drowning at the same time, Xianthippus came to think that this would be a bad way for him to die and that a true hero would not go down so easily. So, he doubled his efforts and managed to wrestle free from the evil serpent. Without his weapon, he pried the pauldron from his shoulder and rammed the pointy end into the serpent’s eyes. Blinded and in pain, Kanara tried to flee but Xianthippus grabbed her by her tail and pulled her back to finish her off. He gripped her by her vile fangs, ripped one straight out of her mouth and stabbed her with it. Kamara’s poison was so deadly, that not even she herself was immune to it and so she died moments after being stabbed with her own fang. Finally, Xianthippus broke the surface again and took a revitalising breath.

After he had retrieved his spear, he hauled the large body to the shore and started a fire. While he sat there to rest from the fight, a large figure approached him. It was a man unlike any Xianthippus had seen before. He was taller even than Xianthippus himself, his skin had a light greenish hue and he had small tusks protruding from his lower lip. But there was a distinct humanity in his grey eyes and so Xianthippus greeted the stranger with kindness and invited him to sit at the fire with him. The stranger introduced himself as Belag and he looked in wonder around the campsite. In one corner lay large chunks of pearly white meat, some of it was roasting on the fire and outspread to drain and dry was the large scaly skin of the sea serpent. Her scales were a beautiful colour of blues and greens, looking like the sea itself and they shone so mesmerizingly in the light of the flames, that Belag could hardly pry his eyes away. When his gaze landed on Xianthippus he saw a tall handsome man, covered in bruises and cuts, still dripping from his wavy hair and examining a large fang in his lap. After they introduced themselves, Belag told the story how he came to be stranded on this small island after Kanara had sunk the ship he was sailing on and that the closeness to her lair had prevented any ships from coming close enough to rescue him. So Xianthippus told the young half-orc how he had slain the beast and offered to take Belag to a harbour on his fishing boat. Belag was mighty impressed with Xianthippus and how he had defeated the evil serpent single handed, but he lamented how he was unable to pay for his fare, as most of his possessions had sunk with his ship. When he mentioned that he was a learned weaponsmith and offered to repair Xianthippus’ equipment as a means of payment, Xianthippus raised the fang from his lap and asked Belag if he could make it into a weapon. For the fang had shown its worth in the fight against Kanara and Xianthippus had the feeling it would save him again in the future, which turned out to be true. Belag was more than happy to be of service to the great fighter and while they feasted on the meat of the sea serpent, they talked until late into the night. When they later came to the famous port city Spree, the capital of Latey, they had become good friends and parting ways was never mentioned again.

Xianthippus and Belag journeyed along the coast of Latey while the story of the slaying of Kanara spread over the islands and onto the main land. Wherever they rested for the night, they were welcome and though the people seemed wary of the half-orc at first, Xianthippus would not allow any mistreatment of his friend and showed the people what a person Belag was, so in the end he became very well liked himself. One day the two were helping a local fisherman repair his sails after a storm when a young man approached Xinathippus on the beach. He was a short man with piercing eyes and a hardened line around his mouth. He disregarded Belag and the fisherman completely and introduced himself only to Xianthippus as Pedro. He asked if Xianthippus had really defeated the terrible sea serpent Kanara and after Xianthippus affirmed this and even showed the great fang weapon, Pedro did not believe him. Only after Belag joined the conversation and told Pedro how he had seen the dead beast with his own eyes and Pedro raised his hands against him, as he did not want a mixed blood speak to him unbidden, Xianthippus grew very angry. He got up where he sat next to the fisherman and only then Pedro realised how tall the man towered over him. Xianthippus told Pedro that it was not his way to need to convince a man such as Pedro, but as he had been very rude to his good friend Belag, he would teach him a lesson and maybe then, Pedro would believe Xianthippus capable of killing Kanara.

As they began their contest on the beach, many fishermen gathered around them and they started to make bets, but nobody wanted to bet against Xianthippus who was known to the small fishing village. First there should be a test to see who was the faster one. They set a course over some rocks that were protruding from the water and formed something like a path at the water’s edge. The two men started to race each other and at first, they were evenly matched, but Xianthippus knew the rocks to be slippery with moss and algae and he kept an eye on the path and was very careful where he stepped. Pedro wanted to win quickly and paid no mind to the rocks themselves and so he slipped near the midway point and cut himself on the sharp stone. Bleeding in several places he tried to catch up to Xianthippus, who won the race with a large gap between them.

The second contest should see who the stronger of the two were and it was decided to see who could push a fisher boat faster into the waters. Two of the boats lay almost next to each other at the beach and the two contestants lined up and after a signal tarted to push the boats towards the water. Xianthippus set his shoulder against the hull and slowly started pushing, always making sure to have a strong footing on the sand. Pedro thought to take a running start and tried to push the boat with strong bursts between stepping back and running at it again. Both boats moved, but while Xianthippus made steady way with his controlled movements, Pedro started to get tired fast and only managed to push his boat a little bit at a time. When Xianthippus’ boat reached the edge of the water, Pedro started complaining that his boat was heavier and still had some of the catch inside. Unceremoniously, Xianthippus dumped Pedro into the boat and started pushing both towards the other boat to the water’s edge. Pedro saw how quickly Xianthippus made way with his technique and had to admit his loss.

The third contest was to be a fistfight and Pedro eagerly threw himself into the fight to gain his first win. The two men fought for a while, but it was clear that Xianthippus was not using his whole strength to make the fight last longer. The fisherman started to mock the other man, as it was obvious to them that he had no chance against Xianthippus. That made Pedro very angry and determined to win the fight at any cost, so he tried to use dirty tricks to gain an advantage over Xianthippus. He did not know that Xianthippus learned many tricks in the arena from Kallias, so he could not be surprised by Pedro. Finally growing tired of the fight, Xianthippus ended the brawl with a single blow to Pedro’s head and without sustaining any damage to himself, he put the arrogant young man in his place. From his defeated foe, Xianthippus took the fine belt and removed the shining golden belt buckle as a price for himself. Later he asked Belag to attach the buckle to his new fang weapon and it decorated the sword from then on.

After he came to, Pedro had to admit his absolute defeat and now was convinced that Xianthippus really had defeated the great sea serpent Kanara. He was so impressed with Xianthippus’ display that he asked to be his student, but Xianthippus said that he was still learning himself and did not want to become a master yet. He invited Pedro to join him and Belag on their adventures though, for he admired Pedro for speaking so honestly and never giving up. To himself he thought traveling might teach Pedro a thing or two and may stop him from being so rude to people he did not know. Pedro accepted the offer and although he would keep his name as Pedro the rude for a long time, he grew to be a great ally and friend to both Xianthippus and Belag in the years to come.

(to be continued)