My entry for the Totally Informal Columbia College Sketch Circle following ~Shozen's suggested theme of urban legends and folklore. I chose to pillage Chinese folklore for this, since they have so much of it, and did General Hua Mu-lan (or 花木蘭 if you're feeling ambitious). Her story is told in several versions in ancient Chinese ballads, as well as an animated disney movie costarring an annoying talking lizard that sounds like Eddie Murphy. In the version I read she disguised herself as a man and takes her elderly father's place in the army, then remains on the frontier for ten years without being discovered. She finally reveals the truth to her fellow soldiers after she returns home. The poem itself is very short and vague on details.

I didn't even try for historical accuracy on her armor, since digging up accurate reference material for 1000-year-old Chinese soldiers' costumes was way more work than I was willing to put into this.