The Occitanian Arena

The Occitanian Arena is a massive dome located in the southern part of Occitan city. The arena is home to a number of blood-filled events all throughout the year. For example, there are gladiatorial games held a few times a week, on behalf of the local gladiator training schools.
These schools are referred to as "Blutiger Schule", which translates to "bloodied school". There are several of these scattered all around Occitan, and they all have the same goal. To win fame for training the most outstanding gladiators that ever lived.

Students at these schools are either slaves bought by the school itself from the slave market, volunteers who wish to earn fame and glory, or slaves belonging to an outside party who pays good gold to have their slaves trained, either to become formidable bodyguards, or to earn their masters fame and money in the arena.
These schools often brand everyone who trains and learns at them with their specialized coat of arms. The most common place for these coat of arms is on the chest or on the back.

The gladiators of Occitan are simply called "Kämpfer", which means "fighter".

The fights in the arena are arranged through a specific process. One bloodied school challenges another one to a tournament, with a specific number of fights, each fight with a specific number of gladiators on each side. For example, one tournament might be arranged to have 5 fights. In the first fight, there are 5 Kämpfers on each side, and for every fight the number decreases by 1. The final round is always a one on one.
This final round is where the best from each school face off in a fight to the death, with the winner being hailed as the champion of the tournament. The first few fights are just considered warmup. These are simply to please the crowd, and to get newer gladiators accustomed to the arena.

Every Kämpfer is allowed to choose his weapon before every fight. He can however not choose his own armour. The Kämpfers use armour which consists of a pair of leather boots, leather legs which run down to the knees, and a helmet. Each one of these are optional, and there have been cases where Kämpfers have chosen to fight naked.

When slaves are bought by bloodied schools, they are promised freedom if they fight well enough and earn their school fame and glory. There have been very few cases where this has actually come true, but many schools still choose to honour this promise. Most only use it as a means of getting the slaves to fight for the school.