The Uproar in Puran Village: A Beauty of the Century
It was the day before this horrific incident unfolded—exactly one day before the Imperial Knights arrived.
“My daughter is the Emperor’s daughter! How dare you lot oppress the princess so brazenly?!”
After receiving the Emperor’s letter acknowledging Seira as a princess, Puyor had regained her confidence. The Black Star Knights, dispatched under the Grand Duke’s orders to deal with her, were dumbfounded.
“What the hell did this bitch receive overnight to suddenly become so arrogant?”
“More importantly… is it true that Seira is actually a princess?”
Unfortunately, the moment Puyor attempted her escape coincided precisely with the arrival of Leif Beard—the most vicious knight among the Black Star Knights’ officers, a man whose cruelty rivaled even the Grand Duke’s—in Puran Village.
Puyor, whom even Niberia couldn’t properly intimidate, was an opponent Leif simply couldn’t handle. Even when threatened with burning the entire village and selling its residents into slavery, she didn’t so much as flinch. Mailer had no choice but to take drastic measures.
“Hey. This woman won’t listen to reason. Just tie her up and send her off.”
Just as he was about to load the bound Puyor and Seira onto the lavish carriage procession led by thousands of soldiers, one of Seira’s friends appeared and shouted.
“Let Seira go, you bastards!”
She hurled an egg straight at his head. Then the villagers swarmed forward, throwing fruits and vegetables at the Black Star Knights—the very men known as the living power of this nation.
“These filthy peasants have lost their minds!”
“Protect Seira!”
“Get out of our village, you traitors!”
The girl who had just lost her virginity in the barn while rolling around with the soldiers was none other than Seira’s friend—the same girl who had fearlessly thrown the first egg at the Black Star Knights’ black helmets. As punishment for that act, the knights tried to drag her into the fields to violate her, when suddenly a woman rushed from behind Leif Beard and began yanking out handfuls of his thick golden curls.
“Let go of my daughter, you bastard!”
Leif Beard’s rage surged to its peak.
“Tie that woman up. And we’re staying here tonight. No—let’s stay for ten nights. Leave a hundred men to plunder. The rest, move out.”
Seira, of course, refused to stand by and watch.
“You—what are you doing?! Let go, now! Mmph…!”
But the Grand Duke’s subordinates handled her roughly in that moment.
“Our apologies, my lady. This is all to ensure your safe transport. We’ll have to be discourteous just this once.”
After Seira—who was meant to walk only flower-strewn paths aboard the white carriage—was forcibly bound and taken away, the Grand Duke’s soldiers began their unrestrained plunder of the villagers.
* * *
The moment Leif Beard laid eyes on Bakers, he turned tail and fled. Soon after, all one hundred Black Star Knights either surrendered themselves for binding or fled the village in panic. The first reason was that the young knight who had stormed the barn unleashed an Aura Blade over a meter long, slicing through armored knights like cutting tofu. The second reason was that every knight who followed bore the banner of the Red Dragon.
Even seven-year-old children in the Empire knew the Red Dragon banner. It was that famous. Only two houses were permitted to use the dragon as their symbol: the Imperial Family and the Marquess of Kolmar, known for their friendship with dragons. The Imperial Family flew the red dragon on a golden background, while the Kolmar family used a white background. Thus, the hundred knights standing before them were none other than the Imperial Knights—each one said to possess skill comparable to the Black Star Knights themselves.
“How dare you! Do you still think you have the right to call yourselves nobles after this?!”
Bakers, commander of the Imperial Knights, roared with fury. He was appalled by the Grand Duke’s reign of terror. How could Niberia still claim to be the “Savior of the North,” the “Enemy of the Nobles,” and the “Hero of the Commoners”? While Niberia was famous for imposing reasonable taxes on commoners, she had used that pretext to illegally seize vast amounts of noble land.
Leif Beard barely managed to escape, but his adjutant, Mailer, failed. Trembling with fear, his body wrapped in layers of chains, he knelt before Bakers. A sharp crack rang out, and Mailer’s body was sent flying ten feet into a haystack. The impact was so deep that livestock dung smeared across his face, the stench of excrement wafting from his mouth.
“Ugh… urgh! Urgh!”
Struggling to breathe with dung up his nose, Mailer somehow crawled out of the haystack and tried to run toward water. But—
“Where do you think you’re going, you little shit?”
One Imperial Knight kicked him in the back of the knee. Once the first blow landed, the others joined in with relish, stomping down on him with their heels.
“Guh—graaagh!”
Mailer died a miserable death beneath their boots. The Grand Duke’s soldiers, who had been hiding and watching in terrified silence, heard Bakers’ next words.
“You lot will all be dragged to the capital and put on trial before the nobility. Remember that.”
The Grand Duke’s men turned pale.
“Please, my lord! I didn’t do anything wrong! I only followed the Grand Duke’s orders!”
“We’re actually just peasant conscripts!”
Bakers glared at them and spoke in a low voice.
“What kind of lord would equip peasant conscripts with Scale Adamantium armor and Chain Adamantium mail, then train them until their muscles bulge like that?”
“W-We’re from the wealthy northern territories…”
“And on top of that, you were ordered to plunder, torture villagers for fun, harass them, and even violate their daughters? Is that what you’re saying?!”
Bakers’ eyes burned with rage as he pointed at a pale-skinned girl being held by a woman who had just been whipped. The soldiers fell silent like guilty children. The girl trembled violently, staring into empty space as if driven mad by trauma.
“Just kill me… I’d rather die… Why… why did you have to whip even the villagers… Sob… sob sob sob.”
The woman who had been harshly whipped in the village square earlier embraced the girl, weeping.
“It’s over now, dear. It’s over. Come back to us.”
Bakers approached both the girl who had been gang-raped by thirty soldiers and the woman who had been brutally whipped. Both wore the Crown Prince’s outer garments and hard leather armor for the moment.
“Are you all right, madam?”
“Sob… I’m fine, but my daughter… she’s not herself… sob sob sob.”
“I will avenge you in their stead. Men! Gather all the Grand Duke’s soldiers here! And summon every villager as well!”
The Grand Duke’s soldiers grimaced as they looked at the very villagers they had treated like torture toys just the night before. The villagers still trembled in fear at the sight of them.
“Strip every one of these soldiers!”
“Yes, sir!”
After the soldiers’ pants were removed, Bakers ordered the gathered villagers to point out anyone who had raped them or whom they had witnessed committing such acts. Over eighty percent of the soldiers were identified.
“You disgusting beasts wearing human skin! In place of imperial law, I’ll let you taste judgment first. All knights—castrate the identified men at will! Cut their genitals in half! Slice them into sashimi! Cut them into ten pieces! Turn them into mincemeat!”
Cheers erupted from the villagers. Those who had lost daughters or whose daughters had been violated approached Bakers and pleaded.
“Please, Savior of Puran Village! May I take my revenge with my own hands?”
“Do as you wish. But there’s one condition.”
“What is it?”
“Make them feel what it’s like to live in hell.”
One villager shed tears of vengeance and gratitude toward Bakers. Then, eyes blazing with fury, he picked up kindling, a chopping block, tongs, and sharp needles before approaching the soldiers.
“Aaaagh…!!”
Leaving behind the tragedy and screams of Puran Village, the lavish bridal carriage procession carrying Seira had already reached the outskirts of Koban City.
* * *
“Sob… those bastards. Seira, when you meet the Grand Duke, listen to me. Don’t ever marry that evil man, understand?”
Watching Puyor’s sudden change in attitude, I was bewildered.
‘Did she really want to become a noblewoman of the capital that badly, Mother…’
Well, this game does favor the capital. But the place I’d been dragged to—Koban City—was said to be one of the Empire’s three great cities, rivaling even the capital itself. It was known as the City of Peach Blossoms, after all.