Chapter 8

Poliana flinched from his unexpected and rude question. She slowly replied in her normal voice, as there was no point in trying to hide her gender now. “I don’t understand the purpose of your question. Please just kill me.”

Was it a tradition in every county where a woman is asked about her virginity when she enters a military base? She suddenly remembered Sir Batre and how he smugly assured her that he didn’t take away her virginity. She trembled in anger and when she showed her teeth, the emperor walked towards her and explained, “In Acreia, we believe that if a virgin woman dies, she will forever haunt us and bring us harsh winters. I just gained my first glorious victory and I can’t have a virgin ghost to haunt me and ruin this success. If you were even an average looking girl, I or one of my knights would take you before your execution, but..”

He studied Poliana, who looked back at him in shock. “Your appearance is.. hard to tolerate. Your face is not acceptable, especially considering how Acreia is known for its great beauties.”

‘What the heck was this lovely man blabbering about?’ Poliana gaped in shock as she retorted, “W-who said that I was a virgin?!”

“Well, with a face like yours, it’s obvious. You MUST be a virgin.”

His verbal attack was effective. Poliana had difficulty recovering from shock. The words were particularly hurtful as they came from the most beautiful man she had ever met.

And what he said next was even worse.

“Get a fair looking man who’s good in bed to take her virginity before you execute her.”

‘Dammit! Why couldn’t he just kill her?’

“Just, just kill me right now!” Poliana screamed.

But the emperor didn’t look back and walked into his tent. She continued to make a scene, but the soldiers grabbed her and dragged her away. As they did, they looked at each other unhappily. The knight who slapped her said to Poliana coldly, “You better be grateful for his highness’s generosity, you b*tch.”

“Generosity? What generosity? What.. AHH!”

The knight suddenly slapped her again and this time, her nose started to bleed. She could feel that her nose sank, meaning that it was now probably broken. The soldiers roughly pulled Poliana and talked among themselves.

“I think she is going to be loud. Let’s gag her first.”

“Can’t we just kill her?”

The soldiers looked desperately at the knight. Clearly, no one wanted to rape her, and suddenly, Poliana felt hopeful.

Maybe none of them would be able to endure her.

But one knight replied firmly, “His highness’ order was clear.”

The soldiers, as well as Poliana, looked down in disappointment. She was dragged away to a far corner of the base and among the soldiers, a confused and desperate discussion took place.

A fair looking man who is good in bed was needed to take her virginity but no one volunteered to do it.

If she looked even half-decent.. Or if she at least had longer hair.. The soldiers felt like they could do it, but her hair was so short that her scalp was showing. On top of that, because she had been on the run, she was dirty and smelly.

And no one wanted to take a dirty ugly woman.

“Just kill me. It would be so much simpler,” Poliana murmured in frustration.

“We can’t! It’s the emperor’s order!”

“Long live Lucius the First!”

“For our emperor!”

The soldiers raised their hands to cheer, it was obvious that they were very loyal to their leader.

Lucius the First, the beautiful emperor has clearly been preparing for this war for a long time. The soldiers were well trained and they seemed to be used with military life. Unlike Aehas soldiers, Acreian soldiers had high morals and were well prepared.

“No one is watching, so just kill me! No one will know!” Poliana growled.

“Shut up, you pants-wearing b*tch! We know what you are planning to do! You are trying to die a virgin so you can haunt our emperor! We won’t let that happen!”

‘Bastards.’

Poliana watched the soldiers fighting among themselves in disgust. Then suddenly, one solider approached her from behind. They had to unbind her arms in order to get her armor off. The soldiers then surrounded her.historical

“Just get her naked and let’s have a look. Maybe she as a good body.”

“Put the helmet back on her. If her face is covered, it should be easier to tolerate her.”

“Where is her helmet?!”

“A woman is a woman, after all. Let’s just do this.”

Several men started to grope her and Poliana gritted her teeth. She could feel that one of her molars was loose, most likely after being slapped by that knight.

Did she work so hard for this? Was her life meant to end in this way?

Poliana’s limbs were pushed down as her armor was taken off, she tried but she couldn’t get away.

By the time her underwear was revealed, someone pushed her legs apart. The feeling of a stranger’s hands were rough and unpleasant.

“Who’s gonna be the ‘fair-looking’ man?”

“We will cover her face, so let’s just get it over with!”

“So who will do this? Who...?”

As the soldiers laughed among themselves, Poliana continued to struggle. A few soldiers pushed her down while the rest of the group watched with interest.

The excitement of their recent victory was still fresh and Poliana was a noble knight they captured. She was ugly but still of noble birth, so the lowly soldiers couldn’t help but become interested. They knew they would never get a chance to take a noble woman in their lifetime.

“Get.. off of me!” Poliana screamed.

“Shut up!”

“Gag her!”

“Where is the rope?”

The men panted excitedly as they took her pants off with their clumsy hands.

Poliana struggled and suddenly, her hand touched something. It felt familiar, and she knew immediately what it was. It was something she has held in her hands all her life, just the feel of it was enough for her to know exactly what it was.

Without hesitating, she grabbed it and jabbed it into someone with all her strenght.

“Gyaaa!”

“W, what happened?”

At one soldier’s scream, the other men started to panic and this gave her a chance to escape. She crawled out from the crowd and as she did, she was able to grab a new dagger from another soldier’s belt.

When the men realized what Poliana had done, their eyes sharpened.

They felt anger and resentment.

“That b*tch!”

Poliana knew instinctively that if she was caught again, she was going to be violently raped by all of the soldiers in front of her. It wasn’t going to be them following their emperor’s orders anymore, they were clearly furious and they were excited at the violent nature of this situation.

Poliana grinned, realizing that perhaps they were now going to also rape her with a knife or maybe, they would cut off all of her limbs and drag her body around.

All she had on was her underwear and a single dagger. She was practically naked while the Acreian soldiers were fully armed.

One thing that she was thankful for was the fact that Poliana didn’t expect all the men to attack her all at once. With most of her clothes gone, she now clearly looked like a woman and those men weren’t going to lunge after her altogether. It would be an embarrassment for more than a single man to subdue a woman.

Everyone was thinking the same thing.

On top of that, there still was the emperor’s order. They couldn’t kill Poliana until she was no longer a virgin.

Poliana wasn’t afraid of death, her life had no meaning and she didn’t even expect an honorable end.

The only thing that she wanted to keep was her dignity.

Only

Poliana lowered herself and held her dagger tightly. She briefly wondered if it would be easier to kill herself with the dagger but she quickly changed her mind. Only a coward and a weakling would do such a thing.

Just then, one soldier jumped towards her and instinctively, she stabbed him, leaving her dagger in his body.

And now, she no longer had any weapon.

Some of the soldiers walked towards her slowly, but as they did, they gave away their weapons to the other men. It seemed that they didn’t think that they would need them.

She had no chance in this fight. It was hopeless just like her country, Aehas.

From behind, another soldier attacked her but with all the strength she had left, she was able to throw him off. And one after another, the men came towards her, leaving her no choice but to fight.

“I won’t make it easy for you!” Poliana screamed.