Knock, knock, knock. "Xena? Time to wake up!"

Xena rolled around in her bed, faintly hearing knocking, but chose to ignore it.

Knock, knock, knock. "Ares has requested your presence in the training grounds." A young servants voice carried through the door.

"I'm up..." Xena said as she opened her eyes. She rubbed her face as she didn't feel like she had a deep sleep. The first thing on her mind was that blonde woman, she remembered her dream.

Xena got up and put on her leather body armor. She managed to put her hair into a tight ponytail and ran off to the training grounds within the temple. Sword at the ready.

"Good morning, Xena, I have a surprise for you." Ares said as he spotted Xena. A huge line of men stood between where Xena entered, and where Ares was. All warriors. There easily must've been 30-40 men, standing in silence, not making a move.

"What are you up to now Ares?"

"I call this the trial of pain. You must learn how to take a hit, these men are going to beat you up.

"What are you talking about Ares, I've been training for awhile now. I've taken plenty of hits." Xena said as rage began to build within her.

"True, but you've still got to learn how to accept defeat even when you fight against it. You must learn how to lose and be beaten." Ares said as she looked at Xena with a bit of a grin across his face.

"And then you're going to do something none of my previous protégés have done before."

"What's that?" Xena clapped back eyeing the warriors with fierce resistance.

"You're going to create your own weapon out of a special metal, the metal of Hephaestus."

Xena's attention centered on Ares, her jaw dropped somewhat.

"But there's also a special ingredient that goes into this that's not on the menu... It's a secret that only the Gods know, it's something the metal requires in order to make the weapon uniquely yours."

Xena peered at Ares awaiting the answer.

"Your blood."

Xena was stunned yet intrigued, she's actually heard of this metal in folklore, but she never imagined it could be real. She very much wanted to acquire this weapon because she knew the potential power it could wield. A weapon that could cut through even the strongest crafted weapon. A weapon so powerful that it could cut through almost anything. She already had an idea of what this weapon could look like based on how Alti described her in the future.

"Drop your sword and come to me." Ares commanded.

Xena dropped her sword and began to step into the line of where the warriors stood. A straight line, easy enough if she could make it, she thought to herself.

A slight movement from the first warrior ended in his fist in her face! The first blow stunned Xena as she was caught off guard. And then another hit came. She jerked herself back into position. A kick to the stomach, and then a blow from behind. Xena began to dig deep as to focus on the goal. She's gotta get through this to make her weapon out of one of the most cherished metals. She took another few steps closer.

Another blow to her face, and kick to the chest. Xena was beginning to feel it. Another blow to her jaw, this time blood flew into the air from her face. She let out a gasp as the hits were getting harder the further down the line she got. She was inching, almost stumbling closer to Ares.

Finally, she had it and she caught the next punch and looked at the warrior with fierce intensity. "That's enough." She said as she decked the warrior with such force the warrior flew back crashing into several warriors knocking them over. She looked on as she saw several men began charging her, she looked over at Ares who had his head down looking annoyed. She leaped into the air doing a front flip and then stood on a warrior who couldn't understand what was happening. She began bouncing off him and knocked him to the ground kicking him in the face and began leaping from warrior to warrior doing the same, knocking them down one by one, kicking them in the face and leaping to the next warrior as they charged her. She did this several times until she approached her sword and laying on the ground and landed on the ground. She kicked her sword handle so hard that it launched itself into the air and landed in her hands.

The warriors began closing in as they charged her from all areas forming a circle around her, and she began thrusting her sword above her head in a circular motion, decapitating some, as their heads flew off and began falling to the ground, she kicked the heads and they went flying against a few men, knocking them to the ground. She swung her sword again above her head in a circular motion, cutting a few men across their faces, scraping a few more through their chests, as she kept swinging in a circle, she bent down to the floor tripping the remaining men charging her. She stood up to face Ares as the men looked at her with awe and disbelief, those that survived anyway. The remaining men began to stumble to their feet and ran yelling, "She's too much for us! Run!"

"Forgive us Ares!"

Ares emitted a blue shimmer and disappeared from her sights. He appeared behind her with his sword drawn and stabbed her in her right leg causing her to fall to the ground. She turned around looking at the God of War with intense anger and rage. He disappeared again and appeared on his stage where he was before. A blow to her back, and hip. She winced in pain as more men began charging her once again, trying to endure the assault she was feeling, trying to hold back the pain with all her might. Another punch to her stomach and kick to the face, made her drop to her knees. "Eh," she winced in pain, squinting her eyes as she gasped for air. She'd been beat before, but this was brutal. Another blow to the side of her head made her disoriented. She began to crawl on the floor, her eyesight was beginning to blur. She took a moment as the hits stopped and, against what her body was telling her, GOT UP as she held her leg in pain as blood was dripping.

Another blow to her chest as she inched closer to Ares. She was nearly there, blood spilling from her head, running down her face. Her mouth was dripping and pouring out the red liquid with every blow. She had a massive cut on both of her shoulders, and another gash on her leg, opposite the one Ares gave her. There was one more warrior in Xena's sights, but her vision was so blurry she could barely make out the individual. She could make out long blonde hair. A woman? Was this the woman from her vision? She couldn't tell.

The woman broke rank and faced Xena. "Remember me, Xena?" She said in a dark tone, daggers in her eyes as she looked at the badly beaten warrior before her.

Xena not being able to do much, was able to let out a few words, "No, can't say... that I do."

The blonde bent down and with all her might dealt a final blow with an uppercut to Xena's face, Sending Xena flying backwards through the air, tumbling to the ground motionless.

"I've been wanting to do that for so long..." The blonde let out a high-pitched scream, that quickly turned into a dark mischievous laughter that echoed throughout the training grounds.

Ares walked up to Xena and popped open a vial and held it to her leg, pressing the wound as blood poured in. After gathering enough, he popped the cork in and walked over to his stage sitting on his throne. He waved at some warriors, and they came to gather Xena and took her away.

0000000

Xena woke up a few days later in her bed chambers as she felt a warm liquid against her face. She looked around to see a few women by her bedside cleaning her body off. She looked at the women, "What are you doing?"

"This is healing oil, it's accelerated the healing of your wounds." One woman said covered in peasant clothing.

Xena mustered enough strength to raise herself from her pillow and sit up in her bed. She saw the gash on her leg had almost healed, and she felt a few bruises on her face. "How long have I been here?"

"Two days, ma'am." Another woman answered.

"We've barely had to use any oil as your cuts along your face, stomach and back were already healing nicely. It was just the cut on your leg that needed tending too… Which is almost finished."

Xena nodded as she moved around and planted her feet on the floor from her bed. She got herself up and walked over to a mirror that was close by. She had on a long white cloth that covered her entire body that had small spots of red on it, clearly where blood had been. She raised the gown from her feet as worked her way out as she lifted it above her head, throwing it to the ground. She looked at her naked body as she had a few black & blue bruises, but no open wounds. The only wound that still had any red was her leg that Ares caused. "Well, that's going to leave a nice scar."