How could one fall from greatness to nothingness?

Dazai found it unfair. He was respected, acclaimed by all his fellow greeks. He lead his troops into the battlefield with pride and security, as their lead strategist it was a big responsibility.

So how could they fail? They lost, and with his troops he did too. The Romans found him and captured him after loosing the fight, they made him a lowly slave.

They degraded him, transformed him into a property; an object. Of course, he wasn't happy in the least with this outcome.

Dozen of masters bought him, dozen of masters threw him back in prison because of his lack of obedience and great laziness. He was an expert at driving all of them crazy; the marks of cuts, burns and beatings proved it on his body, marks that made him the proudest man in the world.

That is until his previous master got tired of him, he beat him up and then threw him back to jail where all other slaves were. The emperor already had him on his mind.

He was punished by the Roman emperor, names a gladiator and being sent to the Coliseum to fight for his life almost daily. It was horrible, the only thing he wished for was to die peacefully right now, but they wouldn't let him.

His only hope was that if he won and entertained this cruel society, roman society, maybe they'll let him free. Maybe, in a very sunny day he would be granted his rights back.

And his name grew known in Rome, to the point where people almost admired him because of all his victories in the Coliseum, due to his high intelligence. He wasn't the lead Greek strategist because of nothing.

Then there he was, in the one of the cells of the coliseum, waiting for it to be opened and waiting to see his opponent.

That is when the metal doors opened and his grip on the small dagger grew firm, getting up from the cold bench and walking towards the sand, towards the battlefield.

"Who may be my opponent this time?" He asked as the crowd cheered for him, his name being chanted as if he was someone in this city.