Tulip woke up lazily and in a good mood, she hadn’t felt like this in ages. This feeling of freedom, of absolute power, made her feel as though she had been reborn.

“Ahhh….my first day as queen..” She got up and perused the room she slept in once more. There was no closet for clothes, nor was there anything resembling a place where she could clothe herself.

“Sigh...maybe I should’ve taken more care not to stain my only clothes…” Tulip stepped up out of bed and walked to the front door, opening it with a small click and looked outside.

There were two guards on either side of the door, wearing that same annoyingly shiny armour as the guys she killed yesterday.

She stepped out brazenly and asked the guard on the left of the door, “Call the maids, I want clothes.”

The guard had heard that the new queen was violent and forceful, and that she practically made herself queen after killing the king. But he had also heard rumours that she was devilishly beautiful. He thought she was still a girl at the end of the day, what could she do if he took a small peak at her?

A lecherous smile crossed the guards lips and he looked over to his right.

Before he could even see a glimpse of Tulip, she grabbed the spear of the guard on the right and used it to end his foolish idea right there. Through the neck. The guard collapsed to the floor with a thud.

The guard on the right broke out into a cold sweat, she killed him like it was nothing!

“Anyone else feel like taking a look? There’s a cute, young girl here you know?” Tulip mused rhetorically.

“N-no your majesty!” The right guard kept his eyes glued to the wall, sweat dripping down his forehead.

Cute?

More like evil!

“You’ll make a good enough guard yet then.” Tulip smiled to herself and repeated the order from earlier to the guard on the right, “Call the maids, I want clothes.”

////////////

A few minutes later, maids arrived at the door. They knocked a few times and made their presence known.

“Enter!” Tulip sat on the bed reading one of the books from the bookshelf on the wall, most of them contained information on the history of the country, along with some books about magic and a few diaries of the previous monarchs.

The book she was reading was a history book, if she was going to be a queen she should at least know some stuff right?

What a pain that turned out to be.

This country, Hadena, was one of the smallest countries in the continent! Not to mention the small population and lacking military, this country was surrounded by enemies on practically every side!

The only saving grace she could think of was that Hadena was a coastal country, meaning they had the ocean on their backs at least.

But they were still doomed to being flattened by the other countries, especially Vota.

Vota and Hadena has a bit of a bad history.

Well....”bit” is an understatement.

They were downright at each other's throats!

Apparently Hadena once agreed to a peace treaty with Vota, they worked together and for quite some time their countries were peaceful. Or at least peaceful enough for a country like Hadena.

But then some idiotic king of Hadena called “Jonan the third” Decided to kill off the Vota royalty when they came to visit!

Why?!

That idiot!

Now both of our countries are caught in a cycle of “You killed one of us so we’ll kill one of you!” And the fighting shows no signs of ending.

But then the demons came 5 years ago.

They quickly expanded and started devouring country after country for themselves, forcing the rest of the countries into an alliance. So lucky us, we won't be killed for a while!

The maids brought out a lavish dress made of gold and red silk, it looked nice but Tulip’s heart wasn’t in it.

She spared a glance at it and looked back to one of the maids, “Anything else?”

The maid jumped a little at being called on but still spoke quite clearly, “We have similar dresses in different colours, or perhaps you’d like a dress with frills?”

Tulip glared at the maid, paralyzing her legs to the floor.

“I do not do frills.” Tulip spoke without reprieve, “Just hand me the black one, I’ll get a custom outfit made later.” She sighed and moved over to put the black dress on.

“Allow us, your majesty.” The maids offered to put the dress on for her, what’s the worst that could happen anyway? Tulip let them do as they pleased.

////////////

Many horrible things happened.

This dress is a nightmare, it’s too tight on the waist and I keep almost tripping on the skirt.

And let’s not mention the high heels, fucking death traps labelled shoes.

“I have to get that custom outfit made as soon as possible.” Tulip winced as she walked towards the throne room.

////////////

Duke Ennith was a loyal servant of the king.

Well….the Ex-King.

He had received news only an hour ago that the king had been killed.

It was awful!

He had spent his whole life by the king's side, and now he was gone? Just like that?

It left a cavity in his heart, he would’ve been more okay with his death if the perpetrator was executed. But according to what he had heard, the king's killer crowned herself as queen after murdering the king?!

What the hell!

This is just getting ridiculous!

But there was nothing he could say about it outright since she came into power legally…

“Damn it!” Duke Ennith kicked a wall, he was frustrated. Angry. But there was nothing he could do about it, maybe he would stage a coup? No, the current king is still from the royal bloodline, staging a coup would simply have himself executed afterwards. He could never kill the prince, after all he was basically his second father.

Duke Ennith had hung around with Adrian whenever his dad was busy, which was a lot. Adrian was a son to him, a child he was never able to have. He didn’t have a family of his own so he treasured the moments he spent with Adrian.

They were his most fond memories.

It was a shame how he had grown up selfish but Ennith didn’t mind, so long as he was happy and healthy it didn’t matter to him.

He just hoped he was alright being married to that brute of a woman.

////////////

Duke Ennith stepped into the throne room after the doors covered in a white lacquer were pushed open. Pillars adorned the two sides of the room and stretched on until the end of the hall.

Guards laid spread across the sides of the room, not daring to speak or make their presence any larger than the guard situated next to them. A priest adorning a white robe made of silk stood by the side of the throne, very obviously disoriented by being there, and at the centre of it all, his grief, anger, and the room. Sat the newly appointed queen, looking down on everyone from her pillaged throne of blood and diamonds.

She sat on the throne, one leg over the other with her arms resting on either side of the throne. Her dark grey hair ran down her shoulders in a wavy form, there was a light grey streak that ran through the right side of her hair from the root to the end and a black eyepatch was strewn across her right eye, but her left eye was a beautifully dazzling shade of black with grey tints.

She wore a black dress with sleeves that had black gloves on the end, the gloves were fingerless except for the middle, which held a ring that was connected to the sleeves.

The skirt of the dress ran down to her ankles, and just below the ankles were pure white high heels. As beautiful as she looked, she seemed to hate the dress with a passion.

Duke Ennith wasn’t alone coming into the throne room, this was a royal meeting after all. There were barons, earls, viscounts, most of the higher nobles had gathered under the royal decree.

Once all of the nobles entered the room, the doors were closed and the meeting began.

“King Adrian is dead.” Tulip spoke loudly and without fault. Her words echoing around the room.

Duke Ennith’s blood stopped flowing.

He…..what?

He’s dead?

His mind twisted and wrenched itself apart with thorns, tearing and cutting at the flesh of his soul and plastering his thoughts with nothing but the fond memories of Adrian.

He can’t be dead! I-it's not possible!

Many of the nobles in the room were confused, “King Adrian? I thought the king's name was Astram?” One noble said.

“Ah yes, it seems a terrible fate has plagued your initial rulers…” Tulip stood up and signalled to the guards for them to block the exits.

“See...I killed that old one, Astram did you say his name was? Well anyway, he tried to enslave me so he wasn’t allowed to stick around.” She moved down the steps of the throne with a slightly awkward grace, it didn’t affect her intimidation factor however.

“And then me and…..Adrian? Yeah that was his name, me and Adrian fell in love.” Tulip put on a small display of theatrics, placing a wrist over her forehead and pretending to be stricken with grief.

“But alas! After me and Adrian went to our bedchambers last night, he slipped off the balcony and died!” A small tear ran down one side of her face, but the other side of her face hid a wicked smile.

“But don’t worry! As your new and rightful queen, I will strive to make this country as great as possible!” Almost all of the nobles looked downright disgusted with the woman in front of them.

She just offed the old king and married the prince to become queen?!

Then the prince “mysteriously” slipped off of a balcony while he was alone with her?!

The nobles weren’t idiots. They could easily guess what had happened behind the scenes, it was painfully clear.

The new queen twirled around and spread her arms out wide, a power hungry grin stealing across her face.

“Now who’s willing to be mine?”

The nobles had a choice to make.

A very, very important one.