Chapter 815 Winner

Although Marcus was shocked and angry now, he had no ability to stop the people in the stands who were making noises, and he did not dare to stand up and interfere with Commodus' decision. He could only sit in the stands and stare.

He can only hope that Commodus will be fair and consider his losses. After all, he still owns Zhang Heng and only lends his gladiators to the Flavi Arena for performances. The organizer has the right to decide the life and death of the gladiators and whether to grant freedom to the gladiators, but after doing so, they must compensate the school behind the gladiators.

The question is how should Zhang Heng price it now?

In the eyes of Marcus, the current Zhang Heng is simply priceless. After Sisnatus, no, he is the strongest gladiator in the entire history of Rome. How much is this worth?

But the problem is that this is just his opinion, and generally this compensation standard is determined based on the price when the gladiator is purchased and the number of years the gladiator has performed, but Zhang Heng has very few of these two items.

According to Gabby, Zhang Heng was bought at an average price. This was because he was an Oriental, and the years of his performance were even worse. Zhang Heng’s rise was so fast that he changed from one person to another almost overnight. An unknown soldier became a household name. According to this standard, even if Commodus was kind, he would only have to pay him a few thousand sesterces to let Zhang Heng go.

But in this case, Markrus has simply lost money to his grandma's family. Even if it is conservatively estimated, the income Zhang Heng can bring to the arena in a year is more than 30,000 gold coins. Even if he only works for three years, it is still 90,000 gold coins. Having only a few thousand copper coins left with such a large amount of money is simply cutting the flesh of Mark Crus.

So Marcus was now the most nervous person in the entire Flavi Amphitheater. However, the little extravagant hope in his heart was shattered with Commodus's next move.

The young emperor held this gladiatorial performance just to win over the people. How could it go against the voice of the people? Moreover, Commodus himself was also worried about how to take Zhang Heng away from Marcus. It was rare that he had such a good opportunity now. As long as he After making Zhang Heng a free man, he can naturally take this Oriental into his own pocket.

Of course, if he lets a gladiator become his confidant, he will definitely arouse protests and dissatisfaction from the old antiques in the Senate, but this is not the first time he has done such a ridiculous thing, and his two current advisers are from different backgrounds. Not so good, and he recruits new people just to compete with the old guys and the old forces.

The empire is like an old man entering his twilight years, in need of fresh blood to rejuvenate it.

Commodus has always believed in this, so he doesn't care about the mood of the poor gladiator school master.

The young emperor took the training sword that symbolized freedom from his entourage, threw it in front of Zhang Heng, and announced loudly, "You have earned this for yourself."

His move also triggered a new round of cheers. The people seemed to be happy that their voices were taken seriously. The empire welcomed a good emperor who loved his people like a son.

However, this good emperor who loved his people like his son used only one sentence to make Marcus faint from anger. When he opened his eyes again, Zhang Heng had already picked up the wooden sword.

This also means that the latter has been freed and has nothing to do with Victor Arena from now on.

So Marcus, who had just opened his eyes, fainted again.

Obviously one second he was the biggest winner of this gladiatorial performance, looking forward to the new future of Victor Arena with great ambition. However, the next second he fell from the clouds and became the biggest loser in the blink of an eye.

Even for Sartonilos and others who performed poorly for some reason, most of them survived. After this battle, their reputation will definitely be seriously damaged, but it is not impossible to repair it, not to mention the tower that is weighing on their heads. The mountain is also gone, and they will still have a chance to regain the throne in the future. But it was miserable for Mark Rus, who won but lost the performer.

There are no greater ups and downs in life than this.

Perhaps the only thing that can comfort him is that the Germanic Bach performed well in this gladiatorial performance, and his performance was stable, second only to Zhang Heng and Telephilus, but how could a Bach compare to Zhang Heng's popularity.

…………

Zhang Heng was a little surprised when he picked up the wooden sword, because he also knew the rules of the arena. There were almost no gladiators like him who got free after just a few fights, because the audience would also think about the beloved gladiators. Want to see more of their performances.

And the timing of this call for his freedom is also very clever. Just as everyone was discussing what to reward him, the weight of those rewards continued to increase, and the crowd fell into a state of fanaticism. At this time, the most valuable freedom was thrown out.

So the crowd subconsciously started shouting along. In other words, this was actually a premeditated attempt to guide and exploit public opinion.

The question is who is behind this. Zhang Heng looked at Commodus first. Of course he knew that Commodus wanted to bring him into his team. This is what Zhang Heng has been intentionally guiding Commodus to do, so He was undoubtedly the beneficiary of this matter. However, through previous interactions, Zhang Heng's understanding of the young emperor was also deepening. Commodus' rank should not have reached such a high level yet.

This thing was done very cleverly, almost without leaving any trace. The mastermind behind it had very superb political skills and was good at leveraging the power of others to make the most of the situation.

Such a person obviously should not be a political newcomer like Commodus.

After Zhang Heng thought about it, the only possibility was probably the political force behind the Blade of Balance. According to the agreement between the two parties, Zhang Heng helped the Blade of Balance to do things, and the Blade of the Balance had to guarantee his freedom in the end, although it was after the matter was completed. , but it is not ruled out that Balance Blade saw the current opportunity and paid part of the reward in advance, which also facilitated him to get closer to Commodus.

If this is really the case, I am afraid it also confirms some of Zhang Heng's previous conjectures. The Blade of Balance is not as pure as it claims. It is to maintain the balance of the world. It is a tool in the hands of a certain political force and is just an organization. Members within the organization did not realize this, or some members like the old Persian trainer did not realize this, thinking that this political force was their help. Little did they know that the service relationship between the two parties was actually reversed.

In addition, Zhang Heng also received two long-lost system prompts. One of them is a reward of 100 game points for winning the gladiatorial performance, and there is also a reward of 50 game points for restoring the status of a free man.