PRINCESS LE-ANNE

THE PUNISHMENT BUREAU

When a person who cannot swim falls into the river, it is human instinct to fight the water... but the more the person struggles, trying to cling on to their life, the more they sink. This is ignorance of the logic behind relaxing oneself and surviving through floating.

The palace maids and their senior lady panicked when they heard about the punishment.

"Your Majesty, please have mercy!" they screamed. "Please calm your anger!" They cried all the way to the Punishment Bureau, where they were dragged to by the palace guards that Eunuch Nam summoned.

Each of them quickly got on their knees and kowtowed repeatedly as if it was possible that they would be set free. They cried loudly and hugged the ground. When they saw the burly, strong men approaching them with mattresses, they clambered away in fright, refusing to get wrapped up in the thin mattresses.

Le-anne watched on knowingly. Canning of palace women was done on top of mattresses to avoid gross bruising, only for the reason that any maid—whatever her ranking—was considered the emperor's woman and she had to be presentable at all times. Due to this, the male servants that were receiving their punishment at the far end did not have it any better as they had all their limbs strapped to each pole receiving their beatings.

On the other hand, Princess Le-anne was already tied to a stuffy mattress.

A big, muscular man walked towards her, his steps wide; most likely, he suffered from something that physicians called rickets. He wore hardly anything except for the dirtied white cloth that hugged his bottom. In his hand was a bamboo canning stick which was unbelievably huge; calling it a pole would have been more appropriate. He grinned in delight and laughed out loud, looking pleased. With so much egotism and haughtiness, he started beating his chest with the fist of his hand.

Thump. Thump. Thump.

With each pound of his fist against his chest, the princess heard the sound echo through her brain as it vibrated with her own heartbeat. She gritted her teeth in antic.i.p.ation. It was hard to tell what was more menacing; the emperor standing before her and threatening to have her killed or having a blood-thirst punisher readying himself to whip her.

An official that held a scroll casually walked over to them then patted the horrendous man who she now mentally nicknamed as, the punisher.

"Disrespectful maid," the official hissed. "Beat her until pertinent!"

Her punisher guffawed loudly, his belly jiggling and dancing to the rhythm of his laughter, and without looking at her twice, he raised his canning stick.

She already knew what was coming and expected it to hurt a lot, but nothing could prepare her for the painful blow that came from the first strike. Her whole body shook at the impact, and pain exploded everywhere.

'Huizhong! You will pay me back three fold!' She silently screamed.

It hurt; her whole body hurt. It spread from the place of impact to everywhere else, and all the pain resistance lessons she had received from Mistress Kei were thrown out the window.

She coughed violently, and her body shook in agony. She was trying to catch her breath before he hit her again. He pounded her body vigorously, the second impact bringing more torment. Pain pierced throughout her core as blood seethed in her veins. It was excruciating and she could not hold herself back anymore.

Rampant tears started to trickle down her cheeks as her body responded to the harshness though her emotions were still unwavering.

'I will not cry, I will not cry.'

If she started to cry, she would just as well quit the mission. Crying was a weakness she could not bear because once she started, she would not be able to stop. Comforting herself was one thing she could never do and neither could her mother.

"Hmph." The man huffed when he saw her writhe in pain; then he raised his arm again.

'I can withstand this… I am strong… I am…'

"How dare you?" someone shouted, and through the blurriness of her silent tears, she saw an unfamiliar middle aged woman run towards her before throwing herself on top of her. The punisher growled at the intrusion, his face snarling in anger.

"How dare you punish a woman of art? Do you wish to die?" she shouted.

"Hmph… Mo only follows Master's orders, so get off her or suffer along with her." His voice was obnoxiously deep and scary like the owner himself.

"How dare a lowly servant talk to me so informally?" The woman's chest was heaving with anger. "Do you know who I am?"