"Fine, fine," Shanna grumbled under her breath. "No stupid risks except the ones you tell me to take."<br/><br/>Was Cyprus complimenting her looks or demeaning her skills by saying she would fit in well with Azkadi prostitutes? Shanna decided to treat it as both. "Perhaps in terms of beauty," she couldn't help shooting back with a mischievous smirk. She was magnificently made and fed (no small feat in this dying age), and remarks that she belonged in a variety of harems as well as in the arena were nothing new. "I'm afraid I lack their talents in the bedchamber, though. I deal with swords of a much sharper nature." She fingered her sheathed longsword and grinned a predatory grin.<br/><br/>The gladiatrix strutted all the way up to the city gates with the swagger of a champion, offering a mouth-watering treat to many a passing young man with the way her too-short skirt flitted up and down, drawing the eye to the decorative frills of her stocking-tops and the occasional glimpses of her panty-clad crotch, snugly cupped in the white linen of her thong. Now, it's true Cyprus had told her to lay low, but she was after all a victorious gladiatrix on the day of her freedom. It was completely in character for her to have a little spring in her step and --<br/><br/>She saw the girl. A small girl, perhaps barely out of puberty, wearing a ragged shift with more holes than cloth in it. Their gazes locked, and Shanna remembered: remembered what it felt like to be in that line, under the merciless sun, with the same expression of desperate need. She had once been that girl, scared and alone, half-dead with no future, dumped here by a passing caravan that could not spare the water to take her to the next city. What fools had her parents been? It was nearly a sin to bring new life into this dying world. And somehow, through some miracle, she had escaped slavery in the mines and mills, a sweat- and cum-drenched life in a brothel and a bloody death on the arena sands.<br/><br/>This girl would not be as lucky. As she looked away, she was certain of it, and it chilled her.<br/><br/>For some reason, the sight hardened her resolve. If she didn't prevail on this absurd quest with its impossibly distant goal, their world and any hope of salvation for that girl and all the other little girls or boys that might come after her was gone.<br/><br/>Shanna said nothing else for the rest of the time she was in the line to leave the city -- and she didn't look anywhere near the direction of the new arrivals either.<br/><br/><br/><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">Character Sheet</div><div class="spoiler_body"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 14pt;">Shanna (https://orcpub2.com/pages/dnd/5e/characters/17592239534284)</span><br/><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 12pt;">Female Human Fighter 1</span><br/><br/><table class="bbc_table"><tbody><tr><td><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 14pt;">STR</span></td><td>    </td><td><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 14pt;">DEX</span></td><td>    </td><td><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 14pt;">CON</span></td><td>    </td><td><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 14pt;">INT</span></td><td>    </td><td><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 14pt;">WIS</span></td><td>    </td><td><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 14pt;">CHA</span></td></tr><tr><td><div align="center">16</div></td><td></td><td><div align="center">14</div></td><td></td><td><div align="center">14</div></td><td></td><td><div align="center">10</div></td><td></td><td><div align="center">11</div></td><td></td><td><div align="center">14</div></td></tr></tbody></table><br/><table class="bbc_table"><tbody><tr><td><div align="center"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 14pt;"><strong>Proficiency Bonus</strong></span></div></td><td>        </td><td><div align="center"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 14pt;"><strong>Armor Class</strong></span></div></td></tr><tr><td><div align="center">+2</div></td><td></td><td><div align="center">18</div></td></tr><tr><td><div align="center"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 14pt;"><strong>Passive Perception</strong></span></div></td><td>        </td><td><div align="center"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 14pt;"><strong>Max HP</strong></span></div></td></tr><tr><td><div align="center">12</div></td><td></td><td><div align="center">12</div></td></tr></tbody></table><br/><table class="bbc_table"><tbody><tr><td><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 14pt;"><strong>Proficiencies</strong></span></td><td></td><td></td><td><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 14pt;"><strong>Saving </strong></span></td><td><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 14pt;"><strong>Throws</strong></span></td></tr><tr><td><strong>Acrobatics</strong></td><td><strong>  +4</strong></td><td>        </td><td><div align="center"><strong>STR</strong></div></td><td><div align="center"><strong>+5</strong></div></td></tr><tr><td>Animal Handling</td><td>  0</td><td>        </td><td><div align="center">DEX</div></td><td><div align="center">+2</div></td></tr><tr><td>Arcana</td><td>  0</td><td>        </td><td><div align="center"><strong>CON</strong></div></td><td><div align="center"><strong>+4</strong></div></td></tr><tr><td><strong>Athletics</strong></td><td><strong>  +5</strong></td><td>        </td><td><div align="center">INT</div></td><td><div align="center">+0</div></td></tr><tr><td>Deception</td><td>  +2</td><td>        </td><td><div align="center">WIS</div></td><td><div align="center">+0</div></td></tr><tr><td>History</td><td>  0</td><td>        </td><td><div align="center">CHA</div></td><td><div align="center">+2</div></td></tr><tr><td>Insight</td><td>  0</td><td>        </td></tr><tr><td><strong>Intimidation</strong></td><td><strong>  +4</strong></td><td>        </td></tr><tr><td>Investigation</td><td>  0</td><td>        </td></tr><tr><td>Medicine</td><td>  0</td><td>        </td></tr><tr><td>Nature</td><td>  0</td><td>        </td></tr><tr><td><strong>Perception</strong></td><td><strong>  +2</strong></td><td>        </td></tr><tr><td>Performance</td><td>  +2</td><td>        </td></tr><tr><td>Persuasion</td><td>  +2</td><td>        </td></tr><tr><td>Religion</td><td>  0</td><td>        </td></tr><tr><td>Sleight of Hand</td><td>  +2</td><td>        </td></tr><tr><td>Stealth</td><td>  +2</td><td>        </td></tr><tr><td>Survival</td><td>  0</td><td>        </td><td></td></tr></tbody></table></div></div>