140AD - The Rise to Empress || [GxG] ||

Chapter 3

7 months later

Year: 140AD

Rebuilding Polis was one of the hardest things Lexa had ever had to do, it was draining not only physically but emotionally as well. At least half of the city's settlers were killed in the attack led by people that named themselves Azgeda of Atticus and up until this day, Lexa still didn't have much knowledge about the group of people. The best conclusion she could come up with was that they were likely a bunch of extremists, perhaps a group led by someone that proclaim themselves as a god. 

All she managed to find out for sure was that they lived in the mountains and had attempted to loot a few of the other small surrounding cities but not once came out victorious. Lexa really just wondered where all their manpower came from and why were they only attacking now? A group as such would take years and years, perhaps even a decade or two to form yet no one had heard of them until they started to attack multiple villages with absolutely no gains. What made it even more peculiar was that they seemed to have their own dialect that no one had ever heard of before.

The rebuild of Polis took just over five months. And after, Lexa found herself standing under the oak tree where her father was buried as she overlooked his once beautiful vineyard that was only now starting to flourish and regrow. She couldn't truly say she had anything left in Polis; she had shut herself off and avoided any sort of human interaction as much as she could. When she wasn't helping to rebuild homes or burying bodies the first fortnight, she was training, harder than ever before. 

Training distracted her and allowed her to momentarily forget her heartache; her heartache then transforming to rage as she would swing her sword at a tree, chipping away at the bark at first and then she would start chipping away at the hard word. It made the sword blunt quite fast but if she were to swing her sword at someone living, she would no doubt kill them because her self-control had left a long time ago.

Multiple times Octavia would try to reach Lexa, try to talk to her at least, and sometimes she would get through but very rarely. She knew Lexa needed time considering what she had lost. But even Octavia herself mourned Maximus because he was the closest thing to a father she ever had and he even treated her like a daughter, not like the nobody she actually was. She wasn't a slave and to be frank she doesn't even know how she ended up in Polis. Maximus had taken her into the academy when she was ten years old and living on the streets, just trying to scrape by and somehow find food. Lexa was her first friend since they were so close in age and she often spent time at their humble home because Maximus had a soft spot in his heart for her.

Octavia couldn't recall if she had a family or not. Her memories really only started after she was taken into the academy, when she was finally housed in a bed that would suffice for sleep and a warm meal at night. In her head, Maximus was her father and that's all she needed but like Lexa, she lost him too.
When Octavia did manage to speak to Lexa, usually at dinner, she mentioned that she was going to the capital. And that the festival's time was drawing closer and closer. It was clear that that Lexa had made up her mind; she was going to fight in the Colosseum this year and that was the end of it.

Lexa had taken it upon herself to take Maximus' place at the academy in the meantime. She trained The Dimachaerus herself now. Although she wasn't as vocal as Maximus was, the warriors understood and followed her orders when she did give them. Her training was harsh, much harder than Maximus'. She didn't use a sword on them though because she knew she would kill them, even if it was accidental. She used a wooden rod but still, she beat the absolute Hades out of them up until they were on the ground grunting in pain and loose dust flying up around them. 

"Next!" she would yell as she wiped at the sweat that formed on her face. A warrior rarely stepped forward willingly. The sun shined brightly and hot on most days but even when the sun didn't shine and it rained hard making mud cover the training grounds, they would still train and later return to their respective rooms wet and covered in grime but training in the rain proved to be more enjoyable.