Blood sports are defined as those events wherein animals are fought or hunted for sport and most usually involve the death of one or more animals. Though this definition is the one still written in law, the majority of people also include the illegal fighting between animals and people and people versus people. To be succinct, most people refer to any illegal fighting for sport as a blood sport.

Blood sports are, to a one, illegal, and therefore anything to do with them is illegal. This most often includes betting on combatants, procuring fighting specimens, and owning the property the fight occurs on. Despite being banned, the practice of blood sports continues to stain the Empire. Gangs of miscreants often form what is called a blood sport ring, wherein the members act together to all make money off of hosting blood fights, taking a cut of all bets, and buying and selling particularly valuable fighters. Law enforcement has been known to give higher priority to breaking apart a blood sport ring than to a murder.

A well-known subset of blood sports is pit fighting. Pit fighting is usually the combat between a pair of fighters for sport. The term ‘pit fighting’ actually does not refer to a hole in the ground that combatants sometimes fight in but refers instead to the phrase “pitting one against another.” A pit fight may occur in a marked square hidden behind a grain field as easily as in a brick and mortared cavity. As with all blood sports, pit fighting is also illegal. However, care must be taken not to confuse pit fighting with trial by combat or certain cultural rituals.

Frequently, blood sports involving people tread into even more criminal acts, namely slavery. Indentures servants may be sold to a blood sport ring, which is still prohibited, but most often unwilling participants are abducted and forced to fight for their lives. The injured or dispirited are used to bait animals or even as live practice for other people. Some criminals enjoy fighting in the “pit,” whether for the taste of glory and gold or for the sheer brutality of it. The unwilling “slaves” are usually told that they can be free again if they will enough fights. Some of these captives can spend years locked away in these hidden pockets of filth and gore.

There is an ancient precedent for blood sports, though this by no means excuses the practice. The Princedoms of the Sand have seemingly always observed blood sports. The people there built great and elaborate stadiums solely to stage blood sports. They call these structures coliseums, and they are seen as a major focal point of their culture. Within these great arenas, the desert people can host titanic battles, sometimes in emulation of famous battles of times gone by, even including changing the terrain to match. Even to this day, one’s place in their society can be influenced by their performance in a pit or their ownership of a particularly fearsome warrior or animal. There is still a ruined coliseum in the Dyrsah Province from when the area was yet one of the Princedoms, and though it is often defaced, it is kept intact to serve as a constant reminder that the people of the Setab Empire are above such barbaric practices.