Strong as an 0x
Submit weekly or proceed weakly
Hear now, O Muse, the roll of sinew and iron will!
RektDiomedes strides forth first among the mailed host: four hours at the pankration yard where leather sings and breath is hammered thin; one and one-half hours enduring the rain of blows like a shield-wall in a storm, learning the secret music of slipping and parry. He sets upon the house-post with five hundred thunder-kicks, shaping shins into cudgels, hips into catapults; thirty sets of iron toil to bind the craft to the flesh; a dozen miles to salt the lungs. This is training with the dust of the arena …