ABANDONED. A missing book

[Ashur]

Okay, so this may be vague but I didn’t read the whole book because it got way too much for me to handle since I was in the middle of a severe low with my depression, but here’s what I remember. It starts off with a peasant girl hiding in her house because some.. I don’t really know what to call them, soldiers or enforcers are going through the town kidnapping people for their Empire, which is apparently a really cruel and brutal military empire anyway. She is told to run out the back door by her grandparents to get away, but is caught by the leader of these soldiers, and it’s a big thing to note, theses officers wear metal masks that are.. melted or crafted onto their faces. He captures her and I forget what happens next. The officers are apparently really cruel and the nobles which is what all members of the military are, are known to rape women. Can you see why I couldn’t finish it? Anyway, I don’t remember what happens next, but the other main character is the son of the Headmistress of a super tough military academy known for it’s high production of exception officers that go on to high military positions. He shares his barracks with a few friends, one of which is a girl because all genders are enlisted and put in to platoons together. Anyway, he likes her, she likes him, and the others just want them to get together already. But he isn’t okay with all the military’s cruelty and wants to leave this life, but he can’t because they aren’t allowed to leave the Empire. His mother is really harsh and cruel as well, and everyone fears her. He has a party in his honor because he was selected as one of the candidates for the new emperor, and the party is with the other candidates as well, one of which is a cruel top ranking student named Markus and his little brother as well, who isn’t so cold like his brother, and is just afraid of his brother. Anyway, meanwhile the peasant girl has somehow ended up in the catacombs of some city and it’s where a rebellion is hiding basically, and gets captured. Her parents were big supporters and members of the rebellion before they were tortured and killed for treason by the Empire. She wanted to find them not knowing they were dead, but ended up captured by the rebels. She gets assigned to a secret spy mission as a mole and is assigned to the noble boy from earlier and his mother because his Mother has high ranking info about going’s on in the military and plots for the next emperor and stuff. Noble boy gets a crush on peasant girl, she gets crush on him, forbidden love, yadayada, blah blah blah. He starts the empire trials and teams up with the girl from his platoon so that one ends up the candidate and can assign the other as their second in command. They’re teleported our into the wilderness, he gets sent to a desert while she’s sent somewhere else. He finds the girl after surviving the desert, and she’s terrified because Markus said he was gonna rape her and take her in obscene ways, and he’s out there somewhere as he is in the competition too. They get ambushed by Markus+his little brother and the girl gets seriously injured, so the noble boy carries her through the challenge. Also a monk talked to him the night before the challenge giving him hope he could escape the military life he was born into. At least, I think it was a monk, and I think the other guy’s name was Markus, not sure. The peasant girl also went to a festival illegally before all that, and because she assigned as a spy under the cover as a slave she wasn’t allowed to go? She’s also torn between mister noble boy and one of the rebel guys. And there was a father figure relationship I guess between her and the smith she was sent to to place an order on the noble boy’s custom swords. He was really kind and all that stuff.

[Ashur]

I am so sorry that I didn’t post the in depth topic, my phone glitches out because of the verification email, and reset the topic and title to what is was before I went back to read the in-depth comment about making sure the topic and title aren’t vague or just something like “missing bio title”. I really do apologize, I didn’t notice until after I posted it

[Ashur]

*glitched out

[Ashur]

If it helps I’m pretty sure the book was published after 2000, so it’s not a really old one

[Nicole]

Maybe An Ember in the Ashes? I think there’s a Markus and the bits about a slave girl being a spy and the metal melded on the faces is definitely right.

[Kris]

Note: Ashur (OP) was last active on the site in July 2019.

[Kris]

No response, moving to Abandoned folder.

Ashur (OP) was last active on the site in July 2019.