TER𖤐 𐦍 ☾𖤓

XXVl

.𖥔 ݁ ˖₊˚✩.𖥔 ݁ ˖๋ ࣭ᰔᩚ.ᰔᩚ ⭑. ݁ ˖₊˚✩.𖥔 ݁ ˖๋ ࣭ ⭑
A Sickening Truth (2)


 

“— You can’t help it. It’s all to protect our kingdoms.” Viola didn’t know if her words could comfort the girl, but either way, Anne let out a small laugh and nodded.

“That’s right. We can at least find solace in the fact that even though we have become sex slaves of the imperial family we have protected our kingdom. If it weren’t for that, everyone would have gone crazy. Anyway, it means a lot to us that our kingdoms are safe at the expense of one body,” she shrugged, reconciled to her fate.

Viola remained silent. She had come to the enemy territory prepared, she had it all worked out. She would fail the training and be on her way home. It was as simple as that. It was only now that she realized she was living in a delusion. How naïve she was! There was no such thing as a trip back home. Should the crown prince not select her, she would be joining the other princesses. What she had just walked out of would be her future. She would end up just like them, drugged and defiled, and what’s more, all willingly.

No! She did not want to be like them. She refused to be trampled upon by those numerous beasts called the members of the imperial family … serving as a tool for sexual profligacy, and what not … She was absolutely unreconciled to such a fate. As the scenes of revelry she had just witnessed flashed through her mind, her stomach twisted and turned; she felt a stabbing pain in her heart … like it were being shredded to pieces by the sharpest knife ever.

She would rather slit all their throats, than let even one lay his filthy finger on her. How she wished she could sever each of their necks with a sharp sword this instance. Flay them alive, layer by layer …

The two beauties, who had been shoved into the depth of hell,  looked towards the sky and let out a bitter laugh. As it resounded in the quiet night, it should have invoked pity in anyone that cared to listen. Alas, pity seemed to have long forsaken them.

They stood quietly for a while when Viola suddenly got curious. She was puzzled as to why Anne wasn’t surprised by her who had snuck out of the imperial villa in the middle of the night.

“Am I right in saying that seeing that you aren’t surprised upon seeing me that I am not the only one who snuck out during the training period?” She queried.

“Yes, there’s one more.” Anne looked away from the sky and at her. “Come to think of it, the Queen of Koronis is from the Kingdom of Parus, right? Oh, then … you must be here to get news on Guinev,” she said, her eyes glimmering at her own deduction.

“That’s right.” Viola nodded her head unwilling to conceal her motives.

“Guinev … I was curious too. Unlike other concubines, we were close like sisters. We both entered the imperial villa at the same time, so we spent our training periods together. However, she suddenly disappeared the day before the final hurdle. She would also sneak out during the training period. I don’t know what she was doing but she would always come back flushed.”

Sneak out during training? That means that she either swam out along the waterway or that she knew about the secret passage. What on earth was Guinev doing?

“So what happened after? Do you have any idea?” Viola prodded.

“I don’t know. Rumor is that she fell in love with a man and ran away with him … Some say that they are dead, some that they are trapped somewhere. Nobody really knows, but since she was a potential Crown Princess Candidate wouldn’t the crown prince know? It would be more convenient to ask him personally … but we are trapped here, so I couldn’t.”

If it was a man in love perhaps … could it be the knight that was protecting her? The one who returned to the kingdom with a decapitated head.

“I see…”

Viola suddenly felt a presence nearby. Anne was startled.

“Quickly, go back. There are a lot of eyes watching the imperial villa because of the Guinev incident. It won’t be just you that could get hurt.” An anxious Anne hurriedly urged.

In the end, is it just faster to find out through Lune? She wanted to check whether she was alive with her own eyes but …

“Hurry now. You have to be careful during the training period.” Anne beckoned Viola with her hand to quickly leave the concubine’s palace.

Viola turned, not in the direction she had arrived through but the opposite. As Viola’s figure disappeared, a black-haired man came out, kissed Anne, and hugged her by the waist. The princess shuddered and gently pushed his body away. This only prompted the man to bury his head in her bosom. She grabbed the man’s hair and breathed flatly.

“It’s hotter when you are like this. Keep acting like a virgin.”

♛

Viola circled the building once and then headed for the spot she had parted ways with Lune. However, to her utter dismay, she discovered the security had been beefed up, armed knights now patrolled along the perimeter of the concubine’s palace. Not a soul could sneak in or out without alerting them.

She gritted her teeth at her rotten luck. Swiftly turning on her heels, she carefully went back into the concubine’s palace, but this time she took the stairs and made her way to the rooftop. With nimble steps, she was soon on the tallest rooftop, looking down at the ground deep below.

Whing-

Her dress fluttered as the wind mercilessly blew. But Viola was undeterred. What was the wind compared to the ferocious beasts of the wild? She took in her surroundings and gauged the distance between the roofs. Fortunately, it wasn’t much.

Deftly, she rolled her dress to look like pants and without a second thought, like a cat leapt in the air and over to the next roof. She relaxed her legs as she landed, making as little noise as possible. The last thing she wanted was to be discovered.