Hi. I'm really sorry for not updating daily these days, but I just had so much homework that I barely had any sleep. And for the sake of time, I'll skip the reviews. Sorry.

I was dragged, lifted by the arms, away from the woods, from my tunnel, from my home.

I struggled to get free, wincing whenever the guards who dragged me purposely drop me an inch deeper to the ground. I bit my lip as thorns and roots pierced through the fabric of my pants.

"Let go of me!" I shrieked, wishing that someone would wake up and save me from them. But we were in the deeper part of the woods now, and I don't think anyone was stupid enough to live in an area where wild beasts roam free.

The guards' nails sank into my flesh and I felt my arms going numb. I could've kicked them, I guess, but they were smart enough to tie them up before actually carrying me.

"Where are you taking me?" I demanded. When they didn't answer me, I started swinging myself, still demanding the answer.

"A place where you will be judged for the crime you did," one finally said.

My heart was thrashing around my rib, threatening to crack one. I was caught, in the middle of an illegal hunt, and now they were going to punish me for what I did. This wasn't a good thing.

But I wasn't going to show any sign of weakness. Not in front of anyone, especially in front of the people from the Class. I just wouldn't give them the satisfaction of seeing me cry. Not so easily.

I was just about to insult one of them of the hideous tights they were wearing when, suddenly, I was thrown into a large metal container about three yards to two.

They slammed the door shut and soon after that, the container started moving. To which direction, I didn't know. There weren't any windows or even a source of light inside the cabin. It was complete darkness.

To add to my discomfort, my teeth started chattering uncontrollably. It must have been at least 40 degrees in there – not to mention how the metal seemed to conduct all the heat away from my already freezing body.

"Hey!" I shouted, trying to get the attention of my captors. "Where exactly are we going?"

My voiced echoed against the metal walls, followed by nothing but silence.

This is it, I thought. This is how I'm going to die. I'm going to die a slow, horrible death with accented-people torturing me in methods unimaginable. I'm not going to be fed for days and days and I will lose more than half of my body weight and look like a skeleton even before my flesh decays.

Oh, God. This was bad.

Panic surfaced through the clouds of fear. I needed to get out there. And fast. Only, how? The container was sealed shut and I really didn't think that I could kick my way out of the thing. It must have been at least an inch thick, made up of the best metal – and conductor – known to man.

I brought my legs up to my chest and rested my forehead on my knees. I was not going to cry. I was not going to weep. I was going to be strong and show them that I wasn't a coward. No…

My tears burst out of my eyes like a volcano. And for a second, it really did seem like a volcano, because my face was so cold that tears seemed like boiling water on it.

How, I thought, are mom and Suzuna going to survive without me hunting for them? Sure, mom could knit and Suzuna could catch small animals that comes by often to eat the grass near our house, but that wouldn't last them a week. If it could, then I wouldn't need to hunt for food and money.

Then, suddenly, the container stopped.

My breaths became short and shallow as I knew we had arrived. The place where I would be sentenced to jail and, eventually, rot inside. Or maybe they would be kinder to me and just directly give me a death penalty, sparing me from the hunger, pain and embarrassment.

But, knowing how the Class worked, I highly doubted that.

The doors of the container opened with an audible creak and light and fog seeped in. Quickly, I rubbed away any evidence that I had been crying away and lifted my chin high. This was how I wanted to show myself to the judge. A strong, courageous woman that I was.

But the people who yanked me out of the container weren't the same guards that had thrown me inside it. They had this scent that suggested they weren't from anywhere near my valley. In fact, the scent suggested that they weren't from any of the valleys or cities in the whole land. Which could only mean one thing:

They were from the Class.

Either that or I was in the Class.

A new wave of fear, panic and hysteria washed over me as the forced me up to my feet, brought both of my hands forcefully to the back and bonded it with something that felt like a rope of thorns.

"A wench," one said in that accent I despised. "Wonder what she'll be useful of."

My brows furrowed and, if it weren't for my bonded hands and chained feet, I would've punched the lights out of that guy right there.

"A treat, I bet," the other one said, followed by laughter from both of them while pushing me from the back in an ungentle manner. "Move on, Missy."

I walked on the stone path leading towards a large mansion of some sort. It looked oddly familiar to me, but I could have sworn that I had never been there before. Maybe I saw a picture of it in school.

Wait. School only showed pictures of important places. If a picture of this was shown in school, then…

Oh, shit.

"Where am I?" I asked, by the off chance I was wrong.

The guards let out an impolite laugh, before saying, "Why, you're in the Royal Castle. Where do you think? Your house?"

And they laughed again.

I didn't get why they were laughing. His joke wasn't even funny – even in the Class I don't believe they would find it funny. But maybe that was because I was dumbfounded by what he said before that that his joke didn't register to my brain.

I was in the castle – oh, pardon me, the Royal Castle, as how the people here would say – where I would not only be executed in a way unimaginably cruel, but also be executed in public, like how they did with the last rule-breaker, as an example of what they would end up if they were to break the rules, too.

This was worse than I thought. Way worse than I thought.

Wench, never use that word in front of your girlfriends, boys.

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