No one remembers why it was founded, and no one remembers it’s original purpose, but the Imperial throne has been around long before the history books can remember. For many years a person of the old blood would sit on the throne as emperor of Jerrovia, the continent in which we all live.

For many of years the throne united the land, and for many of years all the nobles and kings of the united lands would come and feast at the imperial palace, and dance the festivals dances in the gardens. However, for the last couple hundred years this was not so.

The Throne slowly lost its influence and the kings of the land started to brood in their own affairs, and waged war on their neighbors. Slowly the throne fell into darkness as the land fell into the individual hands of the kings and nobles. The festivals of the imperial court stopped, and a sickly shadow fell upon the palace.

No longer did the Throne unite the land, and thirty years ago when a lunatic was crowned the Emperor of the Imperial throne, no one attended, completely shunning the emperor once and for all, an emperor who was found late to his own coronation, busy chewing on one of the great trees of the garden.

As a mad man reigns on a powerless throne, the kings lament. The throne that could unite the lands is kept warm by a lunatic, and a sickly rumor among the indigenous elves of the imperial province speaks of a dark and ancient force that favors this turn of events, waiting and brooding for the perfect moment to slither into action.

You take up the role of one of these Kings of the old blood lines, and nobles of the long decentralized land. You may do what you will with your kingdom. You may unite the land as your own bottom warms the imperial throne, or throw the land into further decentralization, maybe even marry the lunatics logical son or beautiful daughter and push your own claims. You have the power to provoke this dark force, or purge it, kill the lunatic, or support his mad rantings about purple chickens. Take the extremely valuable land that is the Imperial province and it’s limitless perks, or stay content with your own mundane landscape. This is your land, and you decide what happens to it.

But you will not be alone, and you will not be without challenge. A force favors the Lunatic, and other players may plot their own success on top of your grave. Who will rise as the Emperor, and who will rise as the Hero, or the Villain?

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A few Nudges and Winks to get ya thinking!:

The Imperial Incentive: Those who control the throne control the powerful Imperial army, one of the few standing armies. Emperors also control the Imperial Provinces, the richest, most arable lands around, brimming with resources and fancies to fill your coffers, not to mention De Jure claim and authority over all of the land!

The Lunatic Incentive: Who doesn’t want the man who hallucinates fuzzy pickles and giant red chipmunks on the throne? Unpredictable friends with lots of power are always great, right? Perhaps we can just support his relatives then, if you want to be so mundane.

The Religious Incentive: What’s all this about dark forces and supernatural crap anyway? Perhaps we should look into it, after all, cosmic battles and strange happenings near the mysterious ancient imperial provinces sounds pretty important. OR maybe we could focus our energy on glorifying our own religious power, sacrifice a few bodies to the dark one, maybe sing to the graces, let us see.

The Rebel Incentive: Wipe this slate fresh! Let’s decentralize the Imperial power once and for all and carve a new land out of this chaotic mess. Do what we will, when we will it!

The Loyalist Incentive: Right, so this lunacy won’t stand, we all know that, but rebellion and further decentralization is nigh suicide. We need to rebuild the once glorious empire, sit an able bodied bearer of the old blood on the throne, and wash away any doubts of the imperial power!

The Marriage Incentive: Let’s face it, this lunatic makes some pretty beautiful offspring, offspring with juicy titles and the endless possibilities that come with it.

The Nachtist Incentive: Why should we bend our knees to graces that fear to show their faces to us? Why are they better than us? The Stroms have butchered this land with greed and hubris, and the Tags just let them, but as soon as we speak of philosophy and different reasoning, suddenly we are shunned? We are the evil beings?

After a few grueling days along the precarious purple road, the announced and labeled safest path along side the Imperial forest the party of heroes were nearing one of the coveted Imperial Checkpoints. Stuck between the Achians and the forest the road squirmed through the dangers of both, giving merchants and pilgrims alike the most protection near and in the forest they could ever hope to get, and even then Imperial checkpoints were posted along it to ensure the terrible beasts of the forest didn’t spill in on the unsuspecting travelers. Several incursions of nasty and horrible creatures had slowed the way, but with the support of Freg, the group had finally arrived at the last checkpoint before they turned their backs to the safety of the road and plunged into the deeps of the Imperial Forest.

The checkpoint wasn’t too grand, but with the arrival of the Princess, the garrisoned troops and stationed employees of the small fort had done their best to fluff it as much as they could for the fanciful tastes of Josephine. The princess had found herself sitting in the nicest chair available in the middle of the courtyard, surrounded by tall wooden walls and platforms, as well as the stone keep of the garrison. Beyond the walls were the endless shadow draped trees of the forest on all sides save for the parting of the thick trees for the road to cut through. Tents and tiny straw huts were pitched and dotted around the spacious courtyard, as the homes of the wayward locals, mostly Tagschlict elves sworn to a life of religion or the lone Kafshe looking to escape civilization.

It was definitely a unique scene for the princess and gave a small feeling of helplessness, like they were just ignorant ants among a greater scheme, animals in the middle of the food chain. She did not let such thoughts get to her however, and instead waiting patiently on her chair.

She had been waiting alone, and for the first time in days, free from pants and back into the familiar comfort of a simple blue dress that fell to shoed feet; rather than the binding boots she had been forced to wear. A content smile seemed stuck on her red lips as she hummed softly to herself, thankful for once being able to relax and pretend she wasn’t on a dangerous quest into the fringes of civilization. The others had split up along the fort to do their own thing, but she, despite her relaxed appearance, had some business to take care of, and luckily she could do that business in a dress.

As luck would have it Josephine’s arrival was synchronized with one of the elven sages, although a tickling anxiety told her that maybe it wasn’t chance alone that allowed this. Chance or not, she had sent word to the sage and set up a time for a meeting. A lot of existential events have been arising suddenly and in quicker intervals, and Josephine had a well founded feeling that a man of the Graces might have an idea why; especially a Sage who is the named patron of the Grace of Wisdom.

Before long an elf with flowing robes of moss had settled into the grass by her feet. Pale eyes twinkled up at her past the darkness of a grassy hood. Josephine went to speak, opening her mouth, but was cut off by the aged elf as he raised a wrinkled hand for silence.

Josephine pursed her lips in anticipation for the elf to speak, but words never came. The buzzing of insects overtook the conversation as they sat in silence. The princess’s gaze darted back and forth, and finally she broke the thick red line of her lips and started to speak, “I’m glad you were able to come to audience.”

“You have brought the heralder of the end,” the Sage rasped in an elder voice, “and you seek the heralder of doom.”

Josephine scrunched her nose in confusion and raised her honey eyebrows, “what?”

“You seek the music player, do you not?”

“I do,” Josephine surrendered cautiously. She leaned forward, her dress crinkling against her stomach and puffing in a gust of cool forest air. “Do you object?”

“I don’t know,” the Sage of Wisdom said plainly. Josephine put on a polite smile, but couldn’t dismiss the irony of the situation. She shook her head, her hair brushing her shoulders, “what ever do you mean, you are the embodiment of wisdom.

“Wisdom isn’t always knowing, but sometimes, knowing not, doing this, but not doing such,” The elf riddled before huffing, “at the end of your path it has been made clear to me that you will find more than a music player with the artifact you seek.”

“Go on, please,” Josephine shuffled forward in her seat, until her bum was nearly completely levitating above the grass. The sage blinked his pale moon eyes and sighed, “I was there when your mother had passed, I was there when she was suffering from her sickness.”

“What does that have to do with anything?” Josephine defensively crossed her arms, feeling a prick in her heart at the mention of her late mother.

“She is the only reason next to your father to why you are sitting here with me,” The sage said sympathetically, “your blood was not chosen by you, but I’m afraid you must live to the inheritance.”

“What are you talking about?” Josephine huffed, nearly laughing at the barrage of riddles coming from the elf of wisdom and knowledge.

“Your father,” the sage said, pausing abruptly. He seemed to wince in the shadows of his mossy hood and continued, “your father was sick with grief, he didn’t want to lose both of you.”

“And he didn’t,” Josephine cut in, “my mother survived her disease, and gave birth to me, healthy as ever. It wasn’t until George-”

“No,” the Sage interrupted, frustration in his voice. He grabbed her arm roughly and pulled her close, so that a wrinkled nose pressed against Josephine’s soft button of a nose. Two full moon eyes peered blankly into her worried sapphires.

“You’re father traded himself for your lives, and now it is time that you repay his debt,” the sage hissed, “the graces yell and scream at me, Josephine, they tell me to tell you to finish your quest. The plead that you are fine, that you must.”

Josephine opened her mouth to speak but only gurgled in horror as the Sage pressed on, “but I see it Josephine, I see it, I see you bleeding, I see the darkness that veins and corrupts your soul. Your mother was killed, but she is not dead, you were born, but you do not live. The player, the bull, they herald an end.”

“An end to wha-”

“I don’t know Josephine!” The sage spat, spittle sprinkling Josephine’s cheeks. “They say trust them… trust them… then kill them. The Dark one smiles, but the Graces do not disagree. For once, none makes sense, for once, knowledge shrugs. I do not know, Josephine. I see a golden light in my dreams, Josephine, but it stands not next to the graces or the dark one, or even myself. It stands off to the side, festering, angry, upset.”

Josephine pulled back, trying to remove herself from the old Sages vice like grip. She started to shake, but the Sage tightened his grip, “hope! hope! You are the bane of this world, Josephine, and you will be forced to pay your debts, and your father to pay for his crimes against us.”

“Stop it please!” Josephine started to cry as she yanked her arm out of the man’s hands. The sage quickly grabbed her and pulled her back in, “your father… I was there… I told him not to do it, and now he knows more than any mortal should. He has seen the Dark one, and seen the Graces, he has corrupted.”

The Sage jutted a stiff finger into Josephine’s shoulder, “you… you hold the seed of his deeds.” The Sage’s finger trailed down until it nearly sank into where her belly button hid behind the dress, “you hold a key inside of you, you herald the end.”

“You don’t make sense!” Josephine said, swinging a flat palm against the elf’s hood. The elf didn’t see, phased as he finished his mad rant, “ask the music player, ask him what he knows… He can tell you, and you will hear. You are not Josephine, you’re all dead. You were all dead, I saw it “

Josephine shot up from her seat, eager to escape the mad rantings. The elf jumped to his feet, “blood trickled from your cold mothers mouth, dead from consumption, and your father cried over her. You were unborn and in her womb, as dead as she was, I knew it, I felt it. A dark curse, an evil spell formed from your father, and you both were alive again, but not the same as those who had just died. You are not Josephine, Sophia was not Sophia when she birthed you, and it was not your true father whose eyes saw your birth.”

“Just stop it!” Josephine yelled, slapping her palms to her ears. Her head was spinning, and as much as she believed she was listening to the mad ramblings of a man who mad grown insane in the forest, her mind seemed to bleed with belief and stressed his words as the truth. She choked on her breath and started breathing heavily, her chest pounding up and down. Her lungs started to burn with anxiety and her heart palpitated. She felt like she was going to float away into a spinning vortex. Her toes and fingers pricked with pins and needles as her chest grew cold, then all at once, she collapsed to the ground, her breath shuddering heavily to and fro her open lips.


The Sage stood over the princess as the troops started to pour in from the walls. The Elf pulled back his hood to reveal a wrinkled face, etched with fear and many sleepless nights. He pointed down at the unconscious princes and yelled at the troops, waving his other arm frantically, “They hold our strings in hand! This is their game! This is theirs!”

A guard raised a notched arrow and the sage jutted a palm towards the man, as if silencing him, “come take a look! but watch your steps! It’s not real! nothing is true!”

The elf started ripping at his scalp, “we’ve crossed the line, we’ve crossed the line.”
A trickle of red graced his bald head as he started to cry, “breath it in, suck up the lies, you fools! This isn’t real!”

He turned Josephine onto her back with his foot and looked down at her, “she will breach the lie, she holds the key.”

A ear splitting sound ringed in the approaching garrisons ears, forcing them to stop and scratch at their helmets to silence the piercing shriek. The Elves lips moved silently behind the screech as the guards started to fall to the ground. Blood began to drip from the nose and ears of the elf and dotted Josephine's dress as he continued his silent yell behind the ear cracking whine.

A loud crack rippled from the elf, and a wave of unseen force shoved the kneeling guards back with a powerful clatter. The sage's eyes rolled up into the back of his head and as he slowly fell to the ground, mouth agape in a silent yell, the screech subsided.

The elf's body landed next to Josephine's with a thud, and blood pooled around his head, and out from his ears. A soft gurgle still vibrated from his throat, as if fate granted him one last objection to his sudden death.

A soft warm breeze much like the forest's own summer gusts perched itself on Josephine's red lips. Her body remained unmoving aside from the soft ups and downs of her quiet breathing and swelling lungs. An eye flickered unseen behind her thin eyelids, and soon one fluttered open with a wave of golden lashes.

Her single eye dilated and refocused with the light pouring from the azure sky. The scene felt almost relaxing, if not for what lead up to it, or the quickly chilling body of a crazed elf laying beside her.

Her gentle sapphires looked up at Gennisberg who had rushed to her aid, a twist of worry tainted her sparkling eyes. The clambering of guards removing the elven body, and others yelling for the garrison medic cut the scene back into the state of panic it had started in. Josephine opened her mouth, but no words came out, and instead she lifted an open hand, grasping Gennisberg’s outstretched hand, and pulling herself up against him.

“ Are you sure?” the woman all but whispered with a labored voice parting her full lips. Gennisberg’s frown seemed to deepen at her sudden query. He embraced her closely, filling her chilled skin with his bodies rejuvenating warmth. His warm breath tickled her nose as he replied out of worry, “sure of what?”

Josephine blinked back a tear, doing her best to ignore the emergency around the two as she buried her face onto his shoulder, “are you sure that we should continue this quest?”

A deep sigh expanded Gennisberg’s chest and shrugged her face off his shoulder. The man looked down at his wife and nodded solemnly, “there is no turning back now, this is your quest, but we both will see it finished.”

The princess nodded in reciprocation and sucked in a confident breath, “you’re right, I will see it finished.”

“Will you?” A great voice bellowed like rocks down a mountain side, and the two spun to meet the gaze of the mighty minotaur, Freg. He stood hunched against his massive axe’s head, and his dark bovine eyes bore into the pair, shifting back and forth between the two with something Josephine suspected was skepticism.

“I will,” Josephine answered proudly, straightening her posture and hiding away the fatigue of her recent encounter with the Sage. A poof of air snorted from the beast's nostrils and he shrugged a cumbersome shoulder and lifted his own posture to one of three times that of Josephine’s. Freg swung his axe over his shoulder with a heave and nodded, “then I suggest we make our way, Hinan.”

Josephine watched Sir Gennisberg eye the beast suspiciously before walking off to collect his gear in silence. Her eyes quickly snapped back to Freg, and with her buzzing headache slowly retreating to the back of her head she huffed at Freg, “why are you so quiet, except when to judge?”

“We all have our duties, Hinan,” Freg stated simply between grunts and grumbles, “mine is not for speaking fancifully, so I say what I see.”

“And what do you see?” Josephine asked slightly less irritably. Freg’s mouth had struggled, and what was quickly becoming known to Josephine as a minotaur's replacement for a smile came into view, “I see hope.”

“Hope for what?”

Freg shook his head and gestured for the Princess to follow him, “in time you will see too, Hinan. We all see eventually; although some do not recognize hope until there is nothing else to grasp, you will see.”

The Princess swallowed Freg’s words, finding them as riddling as most of his sayings. Her head still spun from all that had happened and the rest of the day went by in a blur. Das had pulled her aside to say his own condolences, and a few of the others added in. By the time dinner had finished, she swore she had spoken and said “thank you” to every staff member and person in the checkpoint down to the stable boy and his younger baby sister.

Before long the generous captain of the fortress had stuffed their supply bags full until they were nearly breaking at the seams. Their beasts of burden were replaced and soon the leafy scent of the forest replaced the smell of the fortresses kitchen or the sulfur of the forge, and once again only trees greeted their march.

The trees themselves grew taller and the canopies denser, as this was the part of their journey Josephine had worried about in the pit of her stomach since she first stepped foot out of the comforting marble palace so far away; this was the part of the journey where they left the already dangerous purple road and ventured into the deep unknown of the mysterious forest that had claimed many adventurers before her and her heroes.

Even the birds sweet songs stopped ringing in Josephine’s gentle ear and the grinding of the wagons were non existent as the group were forced to walk through the seemingly unending wall of thick tree trunks and twisted branches. Having been forced into boots and pants once more, Josephine lamented at the sores forming on her feet as she marched alongside the seemingly unphased Das, who had picked up a lively whistle as he walked.

Josephine secretly admired the elf, and his carefree ways. She looked down at her pants; she had been picky and spoiled this entire trip, meanwhile this elf had taken everything the deadly quest threw at them with stride and grace.

Grace, Josephine repeated in her mind; this elf covered in rags of furs and the bearer of a vulpine smile upon a wild man’s face was who she found graceful, as if unbothered by anything that erupts beside him. The princess felt a small humility form in her chest, and perhaps, she decided, she might try a little harder to be as flexible as Das.

She parted her lips and broke her thoughts with a sigh of conclusion and turned to the elf.

“Das,” she started softly, eager to share her new humility with ironic pride. The elf’s amber gaze flickered to her for a moment before a baritone belch bubbled from his lips. He laughed loudly, drowning out the buzz of the woodland insects with his hearty bellow, “whew! been waiting on that one all day!”

Josephine’s nose crinkled in disgust and her tickle of humility receded for a moment, only to reemerge again after a forced smile, as pleasant as her honest grin. She shook her head, tangling her golden locks in tiny passerby twigs hanging from rough boughs, giving her the look of a forest queen.

“Ever the forward, Das,” she said, less eager than the first time. Das raised a brow and shot her a fox like smirk, “ever the skyward nosed, Josephine, what may I do for you?”

“Nothing I-” Josephine started, interrupting her own sentence with a purse of her lips into a red line, “I respect your vitality.”

Das’s jesters lips parted to spew wit, but instead he simply nodded, accepting the sudden change of heart, “thank you.”

Josephine went to continue but the gossip of the Imperial guards marching behind her pricked both hers and Das’ ears. The two shared a look of worry as they heard from the gossipers the same thought the two had questioned silently under the twisted and tangled dark atmosphere of trees and branches where not a life stirred or a bird chirped: Where was the infamous danger of the deep forest?

Das spoke as if he had heard her thought, “the banshees, the beasts of the forest, the creatures that make this land terrifying, we haven’t really seen any since we picked up Freg, have we?”
“No, we haven’t,” Josephine admitted quietly, putting up a gently palm to muffle her voice towards the elf, but it was in vain, and the mighty minotaur seemed to appear beside the two, marching as if he was always there.

“It is not of my doing, Hinan,” Freg bellowed, keeping sharp dark eyes on the twists and turns ahead, and his small bull whiskers twitching away the forest gnat or growing accustomed to the many sappy smells of the bizarre trees.

“What do you know of the silence?” Josephine asked before Das could object brashly.

“I know the forest does not protect the lute player,” Freg grunted, “she instead uses her illusions and magics to benefit us finding him rather than causing us harm.”

“Why?” Josephine questioned in an almost child like curiousity.

“The forest does not want what the lute player wants, so they are at odds and in your quests favor,” Freg answered.

“What does the forest want?”

Freg looked over Josephine and then Das before looking back to the way ahead. A hot puff grunted from his nostrils and he ended the conversation without a single word.

Das shook his feral hair and reiterated Josephine’s question, “what does the forest want?”

“You would not hear it, should I tell you,” Freg grunted cryptically.

“I ask you where you are from, and I cannot hear it, I ask you about your book and I cannot hear it,” Das frustratingly pointed to the massive book strapped to Freg’s back, “you speak in riddles as if you are bound by magic to keep everything you know a secret, that or you just really enjoy messing with our heads!”

Freg stopped with a crushing footfall and turned to Das. He lifted a thick finger and placed it between Das’ eyes, “you, Hinan, you.”

Das went cross eyed as he tried to look at Freg’s imposing finger. If the situation where less serious, Josephine might’ve laughed, but instead she cupped a hand over Freg’s finger and dragged it’s calloused fingertip from Das’ forehead.

As much as Josephine wanted to get to the heart of the minotaurs riddles, she had a feeling Das’ method was only going to create more puzzles, even though the minotaurs last words still rang in her head, and shook her curiosity with a chill that bit her bone.

“Perhaps,” she said in a stuttering voice as if suddenly embraced by a cold winter’s breeze, “we should just continue.”

“Continue where,” the silent Gennisberg suddenly piped up.

The princess whipped her gaze from Das and the minotaur, and as quickly as a fireflies flicker, the entire forest had changed around her. The deathly and cold shadow of the dark ominous trees that were twisted in the figures of arborian monsters had been replaced with shafts of warm spring light through emerald canopies that sat up high on tawny trees of amazing girth.

Her ears no longer suffered the loud silence of the forests anxiety but rather were filled with a soft hum of bees in the distance, working and tumbling about in the pollen of violet and scarlet flowers that bloomed across the grassy grove that rested in the center of the peaceful sentinel trees.

A cool breeze swirled in between the warm atmosphere of the scene, and tickled her skin through the fabric of her clothes. It brought a squirming pleasure dancing down her spine and relaxed her eyelids and slouched her shoulders.

The soft wind also tempted her small white nose with sweet aromas of flowers never smelt, and the rustic scent of reddened bark soaked by the spears of yellow sun that broke through the shaking green leaves, giving the illusion of a starry sky on a background of emerald.

Josephine felt the tug of sleep on the back of her mind, and if not for the sudden groggy shout of the equally relaxed Das, she might’ve fallen down onto the cushion of soft grass and let the land of dreams take over her mind.

She let her eyes lazily follow Das’s urgently pointing finger, and as soon as her vision landed on what he was accusing. All thoughts of sleep were forced away, and a heavy gasp exhaled the sweet breeze of the grove.

There on pillows of grass and a bed of flowers slept a robed man, dark and mysterious. By his sleeping head was an old lute of yew, with fresh strings and intricate letters of an unknown language written all about.

They had found the lute player, victim to the forests enticing treachery, that Josephine herself nearly had fallen for. A soft golden glint caught her eye and she crept silently over to the sleeping man, Gennisberg and the others following carefully with their weapons drawn and at the ready.

As she closed in on the lounging figure, the soft and gentle movements of the man’s chest expanding and shrinking behind the dark cloak told her that he was in a deep sleep. She anxiously bit her bottom lip as she leaned over the man and stretched out her slim fingers to snatch the shining object mostly hidden under the folds of the lute player's clothes.

Her fingers tangled around the cylinder object and slowly pulled it out from under the sleeping man. Instantly she stared in awe at the ceremonial knife that she held. Even if the shafts of sun barely speared through the shifting canopies, the knife shone like it was caught in between a desert and a calm shimmering lake under the sun. Intricate runes were carved all up and down the knife, and her sapphires followed them in wonder.

Her eyes strained and crossed at the runes. They burned themselves in the back of her minds eye and whispered words she could have sworn she had heard before, even if they did not translate into an understandable tongue. Her mind burned and her eyes froze on each rune, snapped to the next in an eager procession.

Josephine forced her lids shut and shook her head, breaking the tense she had found herself in with the knife. The words simmered out of her mind, and the instructions they held that itched her nerves cooled and dispersed.

She frowned, she felt like she needed to do something, but she had no idea what. Each second she kept her eyes shut, the more lost she felt in what she was forgetting.

A warm hand grasped her shoulder and Josephine jumped, sucking in a gasp. She turned to face the imposer and bumped straight into the chest of Sir Gennisberg. The man smiled and swiftly caught Josephine’s shoulders. His sensitive eyes bore into her and forced a smile from her face. He jutted a casual chin towards the sleeping criminal, “should we end him?”

Josephine’s crinkled her nose at the sudden harshness of Gennisberg. The man’s fingers slowly slipped the knife from her grasp as she stood there thinking his words over. Gennisberg flipped the knife around in his hands as Josephine thought to herself, and the more she thought, the more of a dark fear tickled her spine with anxiety.

A darkness seemed to form in the pit of her stomach, and it frightened her. Despite what she knew was right, a piece of her felt that this sleeping man deserved and perhaps needed to be slaughtered in his sleep without trial.

Das watched her think along with the imperial troops that accompanied them. Freg himself stood almost in between the party and the sleeping man, as if physically protesting the murderous idea, no matter how justified.

Josephine bit her lip and turned to sleeping man, slowly sidestepping Freg. The evil thought boiled and bubbled in her stomach. She looked over her shoulder and back at Gennisberg. The man lowered the knife from his gaze and gave Josephine an approving nod.

Josephine smiled weakly and turned back to the lute player. She gripped the cold leather that wrapped the grip of her sword and tugged on the scabbard that hung off her belt. She leaned closer towards the man, and the strong gaze of Freg seemed to pound into the back of her head.
The princess turned to defend her uncertain decision to the silent Freg, but as soon as her silken bare fingers fell from the grip of her blade, the cloak of the lute player whipped around as the once sleeping man hopped into action.

Josephine turned towards the man, but as soon as their gazes locked behind the dark shadows of the intruders hood, the lute player’s fingertips gently touched her cheek. The princess froze and the voices of her companions jumping to attack the lute player seemed to fade.

The world swirled and the bright colors of the glade meshed and mixed into a spiral of amorphous blobs. She was forced to shut her eyes from the sheer nausea of the powerful whirls of colors and figures pounding her eyes and head. A cracking headache formed in the back of her mind and wind howled by her ears and upturned her hair into a golden frenzy.

She clenched her eyelids tightly closed and slapped her hands to her face, to black out the strange phenomenon, but it ended as quickly as it had begun, and the scratch of leather gloves scraped her face.

Josephine cocked a brow and lifted her suddenly gloved hands from her face. She wasn’t wearing gloves before. Her eyes blinked and she noticed the light of the sun was gone, and only the winking stars and pale moon lit up the sky.

The sky! Josephine thought bewildered, where did the trees go?

Looking up there was only one canopy that blanketed the sky from her vision, and that canopy seemed familiar. As the shadowed green leaves rustled in the cool night breeze, it struck her mind, she was in the gardens.

A familiar voice edged her on, “well?”

Josephine hurriedly followed the voice to the chestnut eyes of her father. Her mind went light at the sudden gaze of her father and she stammered, “f-father?”

The emperor’s chestnut eyes seemed to cross with confusion, and the man clearly dressed for bed rather than a garden stroll pointed a withered finger at her arm.

She looked down at her arm, but it was not hers. Dark sleeves were rolled up a muscled forearm of a man, and a crimson stream tinted dark by the night rolled and trickled warmly down her arm.

Her eyes jumped back to her father and the Emperor merely jutted his withered finger again through the shady night to her other arm. Josephine’s gaze quickly followed Wilhelm’s gesture to her other arm. It was cloaked in darkness but at the very end her gloved hand held the knife of runes.
A chilled breath pulled itself into her unfamiliar lungs as she worriedly looked over her shoulder, sure enough that she was revisiting the night of the theft.

Her eyes peered from behind the lute players hood and a single tear dripped from her cheek as a hollow sorrow cut itself into her chest. Before her she saw herself, in a tattered dress, and covering in glass and red. She was sprawled across the grass, looking worriedly back at herself with darkened sapphires of anxiety.

Josephine choked on a second tear and her vision was forced upwards as the sound of her brother entering the gardens at full arms clanged and clashed into her ears. Her eyes slowly climbed the wall of the palace, up to a barred window that lead into the infamous room her mother had fallen from.

A sickening cackle replaced the sound of her brothers entrance, and a dark form bellowed loudly from the window. Josephine’s eyes widened behind the lute players hood and a red devil’s gaze shot from the dark figure that stood maniacally overwatching the events.

Josephine felt a cold chill freeze her unknown body and she shouted out, “stop!”

The glade stood still at Josephine’s command. Back in the grassy forest the princess stood with her arm outstretched, blocking her husband from the throat of the Lute player who stood silently, arms out to protect himself.

The sun twinkled behind the leaves of the trees and showered the party in a golden hue as they stood in wonder. Freg leaned on his axe and said nothing, but glanced at the fair Josephine and nodded for her to continue.

Josephine looked over Das who held fire at the ready, the guards who had their weapons pointed at the lute player, and her husband who was inches away from cutting into the man. She waved her silken fingers over her face, and glided her finger tips into every elegant curve and indent on her face, just to make sure it was her own.

She sighed a sigh of relief and waved her hand, “he lives, don’t kill him.”

The dark cloaked musician nodded a brief thanks and held out an outstretched hand, as if asking for the knife back. Josephine crinkled her nose but before words could pass by her cherry lips, Gennisberg grunted with frustration, “he needs to be put down, he clearly has cast magic over your decision, like the demon he is!”

Freg bellowed, “there is no demon with in the musician you seek, I agree with your princess.”

“Would be nice to at least know who we are dealing with,” Das said as he tugged lightly on a fringe of the lute players concealing cloak.

“I do not think that would be wise,” a musical and masculine voice trumpeted from the Lute Player, “please, give me the knife, and let me go.”

“Let you go?” the darkness bubbled in Josephine’s stomach once more, “you deserve death, you should be thanking me for my sudden mercy.”

“She’s right,” Gennisberg quickly agreed, “after what you had done to her and her father.”

“I have done nothing,” The lute player defended, “please, hand me the knife.”

“Nothing!” Gennisberg exclaimed incredulously as Josephine sunk in her place, her mind flickering back to the image of the dark figure standing over her broken form in the gardens as she looked on.

“Perhaps, we give him a fair trial back at the capital,” Josephine offered.

“We all know what he had done, we all saw it,” Sir Gennisberg turned to Josephine, not believing her fickle opinions.

“But…” Josephine sighed, unsure of how to defend her offer.

“What one pair of eyes may see, it will miss what another sees, if it does not stand where the other looks from, “ the Minotaur filled in for Josephine with a his usual grunts of cryptic riddles.

“Exactly,” Josephine agreed hesitantly after a second of thought, “maybe we missed a detail.”

“Missed… a detail?” Gennisberg said with his eyebrows cocked in disbelief.

Das waved his hands and grabbed everyone's attention, “woah woah woah, this is all too confusing for my head, I’m hungry, and I want to eat something. Can we all just agree to unmask our villain, keep the knife for ourselves, and just go back to where there is something hot to nibble on.”

All but Freg opened their mouths to object, agree, or adjust Das’s deduction, but before a breath could escape from their mouths the elf had already grabbed a handful of the Lute players cloak and with a mighty yank, threw it aside from the musicians figure.

The black cloth fluttered to the side, revealing a fit figure underneath. A plain white tunic stretched across the musicians chest and fell to white trousers that in turn fell to plain leather boots. Jutting from the shoulder sleeves of the tunic were two masculine arms with horizontal scars going up the biceps and strange runes similar to the knife’s carved in dark letters over strange golden skin.

The golden figure blinked two sun light irises, and dark hair fell past the chiseled and rune covered jawline of the well crafted man and a dark beard hung off it where the runes did not sear into his skin. In every proportion his golden body was perfect, and his features symmetrical without flaw.

The group took a few steps backwards in wonderment, all but Freg who leaned silently on his axe.

Instantly Josephine’s eyes darted from rune to rune on the man, and each letter seemed to burn in the back of her head similar to the runes on the knife. It spelt something, what it was she didn’t know but it sat on the tip of her tongue and perched it’s vague definition on the edge of her mind, slowly peeking into her understanding. A soft piercing screech started to form in the back of her mind

The minotaur swiftly threw the discarded cloak over the being, and interrupted Josephine’s transe. The burning runes in her minds eye vanished along with the screech, and she crinkled her nose in confusion.

“What are you?” She almost whispered, attracting the attention of everyone else, who had seemed to have been just as affected by the sight as Josephine.

“He,” Freg grunted with a warm snort from his nostrils, “he is a precursor, hinan.”

“Precursor?” Das mimicked in wonderment next to Gennisberg who stood grinding his teeth for whatever reasons unknown or noticeable.

Josephine mouthed the familiar word before nearly leaping a step forward in recognition. Reginald had said the word before back when she was a little girl being school, it was the name the old servant used for the mysterious founders of the Empire, and again in ancient mythos for the overseers of mysterious events of yore.

“The precursors had vanished before written history, why- how are you…” Josephine trailed off, unsure of how to approach the precursors sudden presence.

The precursor shook the cloak into place around himself and spoke behind his replaced hood, “do not worry about it, just please, give me the knife.”

“Strange myth or not,” Gennisberg said, his voice a sudden softness as he looked at Josephine, “we need to take him in as our prisoner, and return the knife to it’s place.”

Josephine glanced at her adamant husband and nodded, “you’re right.”

“Please,” the strange being trumpeted, “you do not understand.”

“And they will not understand,” Freg bellowed, receiving a glare from the lute player.

“Which is why you shouldn’t have brought them, Freg,” the precursor quickly retorted.

“It was by our guiding hand or the hand of the dangerous one,” Freg quickly retorted right back, summoning a silence from the precursor.

“What are you talking about?” Josephine nearly shouted out of a confused frustration.

“What she said!” Das added.

Freg snorted hot air from his nostrils and leaned forward on his axe. His grizzled whiskers that gruffed his snout twitched and he grunted, “your Empire is in danger, hinan. We must bring both the knife and the precursor to your father, and let him decide on what to do, only he has the power to reverse what has been set in motion so long ago.”

Josephine took a step back from the minotaurs words, “what kind of danger?”

“The kind you cannot hear,” the precursor trumpeted, “the kind only your father can know about, I will say no more until I can speak with him.”

The lute player paused and added, “I am sorry.”

“Very well,” Josephine started hesitantly, disliking the vagueness of the answers. Questions whirled in her mind and left an uneasy queasy knot in her stomach, but despite the dark boiling of skepticism, a softer melody played in her mind to trust the precursor in this, and to allow him audience.

“What!” Gennisberg exclaimed, “it might be a trick!”

“I suppose we will see than,” Josephine hissed.

Das folded his arms, “and are we going to approach the question to why these two know each other?”

“Good question,” Gennisberg eyed the minotaur suspiciously.

Freg stood up straight and towered over the group, “you always knew I knew who he was, for I offered to show you the way to him. Only now that you see your target that you second guess my presence, which I find foolish.”

“Well he’s got me there,” Das surrendered.

“Soldier,” the irate Gennisberg barked, and a metal clad man silently saluted him. Gennisberg pointed over at the lute player, glancing only seconds at Josephine’s confused face, “clamp that criminal in irons, it’s time to move out.”

“I’m the leader,” Josephine huffed, “I say when it’s time to do things.”

She crossed her arms, half defeated in what to say next. “Let’s move out.”

---

Despite how quickly it had taken the group to reach the sunny glade where they captured the lute player, their cautious foot steps only landed on unfamiliar ground, the forest ever shifting around them as their prison. Their journey seemed never ending, and if the thick canopies of the deep woods did not blot out the sky, Josephine might’ve sworn it had been days since they had captured the lute player.

Fatigue wrestled her eyelids and the thought of disorientation crinkled her nose as she walked on. Her boot crunched on leaves and twigs as the group slowly made their exhausted way through the dark pillars of trees, not knowing where their next footfall might land past the shadowy cloak of the forest.

Darkness stung the princess tired eyes, and she could barely see four feet in front of her. A familiar hollow wind however told her that they have revisited a small dark clearing they had passed many times before.

She sighed, feeling the tug of defeat in the back of her mind. Josephine let her arms slap the the sides of her form for effect as she halted, “let’s make camp here.”

“Finally!” Das blurted before diving into a lump of leaves, kicking dirt and fragments of dried leaves into the air. A wide grin flashed behind the darkness of the forest and he guffawed.

Josephine shook her head, shaking out small bits of the forest that had tangled in her golden hair. She couldn’t help but smile at Das’ antics as the elf rolled in the leaves like a happy puppy, looking for the best spot to fall asleep.

Gennisberg’s voice snapped her attention of the Kafshe and into the worried eyes of the man.

“I don’t like this darkness,” was all he said. Josephine agreed, but she also knew that they needed to rest, for all they knew the darkness could just be the night, and their bodies over due to slip into the dreamscape and rest.

The two stared at each other, and in silence they both knew that this was the only real option besides walking until the night forcefully took them.

Josephine crinkled her nose in thought and turned to Das, who was all but engulfed in the leaves. She squinted past the darkness and made out where his head laid buried face first in the itchy cushion.

“Das,” she started, “mind giving us some light?”

The elf groaned and flopped up into a sitting position, his amber eyes shone like a cat's through the night, and he flickered his tired gaze around the clearing. His eyes eventually fell on an old rotten stump that jutted from the center of the small clearing.

The elf flicked his wrist and a ball of flame burst from his fingertips. The glowing orange orb splashed onto the stump and with a crackling roar it ignited into a fire.

“Just kick me when the food is ready,” Das yawned as he slumped back into his wild bed.

The new light illuminated the circular clearing, giving the space the look of a bright amber sanctuary surrounded by imposing dark bark covered pillars that held back the pitch darkness of the unknown.

A night time chill tingled and shook it’s way down Josephine’s spine at the thought of what could be lurking behind the curtain of light that the fire had created, and she folded her arms as if to warm herself from her cold thoughts.

“Stay by the light of the fire, and do not leave the camp, and no harm will come to any of us, “ the bellow of Freg grunted behind Josephine.

She spun to meet the bovine gaze of the beast who seemed to always have an uncanny way of sneaking up on her despite his enormous size.

“How can you be so sure?” Josephine questioned out of doubt.

“The forest granted you access to find the lute player,” Freg said as he pointed to the silent prisoner who stood chained and guarded by the soldiers accompanying the princess.
“But it does not want us to leave, this much his clear,” Freg continued, “I feel it is leading us somewhere, so should we stay together by this light, I feel such a patient action would prolong our lives as we figure out how to escape this labyrinth.”

“Where could it be leading us?”

“Not where we want to go, Hinan,” Freg snorted.

Josephine frowned and turned to Gennisberg who was standing, idly studying the golden knife in his hands.

“Could you order the soldiers to begin to set up the tents, and to chain the prisoner somewhere stable?”

A coarse hand gripped Josephine’s shoulder and Freg bellowed once more, “do not leave the light of the fire.”

Gennisberg glared at the minotaur until the beast released Josephine to tend to his own resting spot. The man slipped the knife into a satchel that hung off his hip and took Josephines gentle hand in his own, “do not worry, my love, we will be safe until morning, I promise.”

Josephine’s red lips curled and she tightened her fingers around the man’s hand.

“I know,” Josephine whispered happily at the man’s touch, even if the warning of Freg still deluded her mind.

Soon white tents were erected among the flickering orange glow of the fire that so vainlessly fought the encroaching darkness. The smell of the sap and leaves of the forest were contested with the lovely smell of meat boiling in a tin pot that sat hung over the crackling fire.

The robust aroma attracted Das to sit on a stone by the fire as he rubbed his hands in anticipation next to the chained lute player and soldiers who held wolfish appetites for the finished meal.

As Das lead the patient charge against the food, Josephine and Gennisberg rested in their own tent that swirled with the scent of the food as well as the rich smell of scented candles burning.

“You even camp like a princess,” Gennisberg commented with a smile as Josephine rested her head on the sitting man’s lap, the two relaxed on a thin feather mattress. Her hair wildly splayed from her head, giving her a golden halo as she sighed, “I was never one for resting in piles of leaves.”

Silence fell upon the pair as Gennisberg threaded a few fingers through his wife’s hair. He closed his eyes peacefully and leaned his head back against the canvas of the tent. Josephine however kept her eyes wide open in thought.

“Hey,” Josephine sighed, not fidgeting her gleaming sapphires off of her aimless stare. Gennisberg looked down at her, and watched the candle light flicker off her pretty visage. He patted her shoulder “hi?”

Josephine squirmed and clasped her hands together underneath her ear as she lounged, “what do you think is going on?”

“What do you mean?” Gennisberg said plainly. Josephine rolled onto her back and stared up at her husband with crossed eye brows and a stern slant on her lips, “you know.”

“The magic, the lute player, the giant bull man, the sage, the forest, everything!” She huffed, folding her arms across her chest.

“I don’t know,” Gennisberg said in a low soft tone, “I’m about as lost as you are.”

This time Josephine sat up and swung her trouser covered legs under herself, and crossed her ankles. She stared for a moment before pointing an accusatory finger to the golden knife that was so carefully placed next to their pillow, on top of the book George has given Josephine the day she decided to start her long journey.

“That knife,” Josephine started, “is special, somehow, I mean… all this, from that!”

“Well that is why we came to get it,” Gennisberg stated simply, forcing a frown from Josephine.

“But why!” She nearly shouted, “what is it!”

Gennisberg laid a gentle hand over Josephine’s and slowly wrapped his fingers around her’s, which she in turn locked her own fingers around. Her chest inflated and fell with a exhausted exhale and her lips pouted as her breath escaped.

“The sage,” Josephine exhaled in a exhausted defeat, “he said it was all because of me, or something. And and… the forest according to Freg wanted us to find the lute player, who knew Freg, and Freg knew him, but the same forest doesn’t want us to leave? Why?”

Josephine’s words all came out in a single breath, spewing her thoughts out to the silent Gennisberg who just nodded sincerely and scooted closer.

“The lute player is a myth, a precursor, and he wants this knife,” Josephine went to pick up the artifact with her free hand. Before her fingers got around the seemingly welcoming hilt, Gennisberg grasped her other hand in a gentle embrace and pulled her into a warm hug.

“Don’t worry, my love,” Gennisberg said sweetly as he tightened his hug, “I have a feeling everything will become clearer soon.”

Josephine hugged the man tightly and laid her chin on his shoulder.

“You do?” She said meekly.

“I figured everything is drawing to an end soon anyhow,” Gennisberg said, curving his lips into an encouraging smile, “and we wouldn’t have gotten here if not for you. You did amazing, and I’m proud of you.”

Josephine’s frown started to flip into a slight pink smile, “you’re right, thank you.” She closed her eyes and nuzzled the man’s shoulder.

“I think perhaps it’s just all this confinement that has been getting to you, between the tent and the forest, I can relate,” Gennisberg continued brushing a kiss onto her soft cheek.

“Perhaps,” Josephine agreed thoughtfully, the softness of sleep in her voice.

“My own head feels cloudy to be honest,” Her husband frowned, erasing the encouraging look he had given her.

“Oh?” Josephine questioned, pushing herself off the man to study his face with a tender gaze.

She laid her palm against his cheek and the man smiled bashfully at her sparkling eyes and silken white skin. He leaned forward and caught her red lips against his own, and she pulsed a soft kiss against his.

“I love you,” Gennisberg smiled. Josephine blinked her eyes and smiled wide, “and I you.”

The man fidgeted in place suddenly and his smile turned into an uncomfortable slant, “Do you think…”

“What?” Josephine asked worriedly once more. Gennisberg gave a weak smile, “do you think we could go for a short walk? Not far, it’s just I feel restless.”

Josephine thought for a moment on Freg’s warning, but as she peered into the concerned eyes of Gennisberg her heart opened to the idea and she nodded quickly, “yes, yes, we can do that.”

She turned to where her boots stood and snagged them. As she was slipping her feet into the boots and pulling them up her shin, Gennisberg quickly snatched the golden knife. Josephine cocked a brow as she laced her boot, “what are you doing with that?”

“I don’t trust that horned beast not to snag this while we are out,” Gennisberg quickly answered with conviction, “he is too full of riddles for my trusting.”

Josephine nodded slowly as she finished tightening her boots, she figured he did have a very valid point.

The two slipped away from the camp easily. The soldiers were busy staring down the precursor along with Das who chewed with a full mouth, and Freg was leant up against a tree, the orange light of the fire flickering over his grizzly haired body, and his eyelids were closed tightly.

The fresh night air filled Josephine’s nostrils and sent a giddy chill over her skin. She turned to Gennisberg and the man smiled as he took her hand, and began to tug her gently to follow him.

Leaves hidden by the pitch of the night slapped the couple as the glow of the fire disappeared behind the trees they left behind. The forest muffled their escape and by chance their foot falls missed every twig or dry leaf, and only the soft splosh of moist dewy leaves mashed under their feet.

The giddy giggle of a child escaping her parent’s all seeing eye tickled inside Josephine as Gennisberg picked up his pace, looking behind him to see if anyone was following them.

The very trees seemed to shift around the pair as they walked, and the leaves underfoot started to be replaced with a sucking moist soil unseen through the darkness. The two walked on, slowing their pace to almost a crawl as Josephine clung to Gennisberg’s arm.

Her giddiness was replaced with anxiety and she tried to look at her husband , but despite their closeness all she saw was black.

“Love?” Josephine whispered, her arms locked around his idle bicep.

A soft grumble rumbled from her husband’s body and he answered, “yes dear?”

“I think we should turn back,” Josephine said as goosebumps formed on her arms, “Freg said we shouldn’t go into the woods anyhow.”

“Freg?” Gennisberg suddenly stopped.

Josephine loosened her vice grip on the man and nodded as if he could see her, “yes, Freg.”

A baritone rumble shook the pairs feet and Gennisberg instinctively grabbed Josephine’s hand. The sound of trees smashing and branches being ripped aside made the hair on Josephine’s head stand up and a spooky cold to run down her arms.

“Run!” Gennisberg instructed loudly as he pulled Josephine alongside him, bursting into a sprint. Josephine’s legs whipped through the cold night air alongside Gennisberg. Branches whipped in response to their speedy escape, and twigs scratched and cut their bare arms and faces as they rushed.

The rumble turned into an avalanche of sounds and crashes as it chased them. Josephine’s heart pounded into her throat and she forced back tears forming from the wind and many cold slapping leaves that assaulted her cheeks. The boom grew louder and she strained her legs to move faster.

Dirt from the palms of the ferns stung her pores as she continued to run, and her lungs started to burn with exhaustion. A cramp formed a knot under the back of her knee and she gritted her teeth to keep up with her husband.

The forest floor under her feet seemed to shift from the muckish soil to sudden tall grass. The dark wet blades doused her legs as they climbed up to her thighs. The thick brush slowed the pair down to a jog

Just as worry of the crashing monster catching up to them surfaced in Josephine’s mind, her ears reported silence. Gennisberg stopped in his tracks and tugged on Josephine’s hand.

She stopped and turned to the figure of her husband, this part of the forest allowed ambient moonlight to fill her sapphires with enough light to make out his features. He leant on a strange stone pillar that had the looks of a piece of a ruin, “I think…” he said before swallowing a breath of air, “I think he lost us.”

“He?” Josephine said, hiding her panting as she too went turned to lean on something. As she traced her fingers around her surroundings she soon felt the cold rugged skin of a tree. A soft pulse was felt under her fingertips and she crinkled her nose, her heart must have really been pounding, she thought.

As she embraced the tree for support off her burning shins, Gennisberg continued, “I saw him, it was Freg. He had his axe, and he looked eager to use it.”

“Freg?!” Josephine exclaimed, feeling a pit in her stomach as she suddenly felt perhaps she shouldn’t have been too surprised. Gennisberg nodded, “I knew he was trouble.”

The man slide the golden knife out of his pocket and he flashed it, “I bet he was looking for this, and got upset to find out we had taken it with us.”

Josephine pressed her back against the tree, it’s strange bark seemed familiar as she did, but worry filled her mind more so than botany, “how will we get back if he is out there looking for us?”

Gennisberg smiled and approached his wife, “don’t worry my love, everything will be okay.”

Josephine slanted her red lips skeptically, “are you sure? How could you know?”

“I think the forest helped us escape,” Gennisberg mentioned idly as he played with a golden lock of Josephine’s hair. He placed his playful hand flat against the tree behind her and gave her a quick kiss on her worried pouting lips. Josephine pecked back instinctively. Her husband’s close and protective stance gave her the feeling of a sudden comforting warmth that filled her tired chilled limbs and anxious chest. Her expression turned into a smile and she gave him another press against his lips with more enthusiasm. She felt safe.

“You make me feel-”

A sudden rip cut off her sentence followed by a thunk from the tree. Her stomach felt cold and a raging pain screamed up from her abdomen. Her chin wobbled as her mouth opened in surprise. She hung her head down to see her husbands hand gripping the end of a golden handle that stuck out of her belly.

The warm trickle of her very life started to stream from her stomach as a crimson flow. The warm liquid passed fluidly over her cold body and dripped into a puddle by her feet. She weakly tried to move, but the knife had sunk through her and into the tree behind her.

Her sapphires gleamed with pained tears as she looked back up into the eyes of her husband, the look of shock still frozen on her face. Her eyes caught his pearly smile, and heard blurred and groggish words as her vision faded and ears failed her. A dark cold stung the back of her head as the freezing cold stemmed and veined from her stomach up to her face.

She shivered, the only warmth being the blood that flowed out of her. Her eyelids fluttered over her dimmed eyes and she slouched as the darkness too her consciousness, and the dizzying pull of void captured her.

Gennisberg laughed to himself victoriously as he watched her slowly fade, stuck against the massive tree. The tree screeched loudly and it’s tenure pierced his ears. Blood began to drip from the sides of his head and pooled the ground with Josephine’s.

The screeching grew and grew. The tree sounded as if it was about to burst into life, and it’s bark pulsed and cracked. Gennisberg fell to the ground as the screeching overtook him and his rolled, laughing as he held his throbbing ears.

“I’ve done it!” He yelled hysterically over the brain shaking screams of the tree and loud cracks and bangs of it’s bark shifting.

“And I, too late, Hinan.” An angry grunt snorted from Freg as he appeared behind Gennisberg.

Anger seemed to flicker and lick the sky like flames from his eyes and his mighty axe was alive with flames like a desert sun. Gennisberg looked up at the beast in horror as Freg reached down.

As the tree still screamed, so did Gennisberg. Freg quickly grabbed Gennisberg’s skull in one hand as the man struggled. He lifted the man into the air, his neck crackling from the pull of his unsupported body hanging midair.

The minotaur slowly approached the convulsing tree that now flashed with light as large lighting-esque cracks formed on its surface.

Gennisberg hollered and screamed, and with one loud crack that was only drowned out by the deafening screech of the tree, Freg slammed the man’s head into the magical tree, popping his skull like a grape in a wine press.

The minotaur grunted and dropped the grim remains he had in his hand. With one swift movement he ripped the knife out of the tree, keeping the blade inside of Josephine as he retrieved her limp body.

Freg looked back at the tree as it now twisted and shook. He huddled over the body of the princess, keeping her head from the ground with his hand as his back took shield against the tree.

Then, with one final screech, one final bang, the tree exploded. Wood flew in every direction and the shrapnel bounced off Freg’s book covered back. His bull ears shifted backwards at the loud noise and he closed his eyes, pressing the princess close to himself protectively.

A loud whoosh replaced the echoes of the explosion and Freg’s vision flashed bright pink behind his eyelids. He opened his eyes to see the entire forest illuminated by a raging fire. Smoke choked the atmosphere while the fire cooked it. He snorted heavily and lifted the princess in his arms as he rose to his hooves.

The sky above him swirled the color of Josephine’s blood on a pitch void and pulsed with the dances of fire. Streaks of yellow balls of flame seemed to fall from the swirling void above. The balls of fire hit the trees and splashed more flame upon the already crackling and burning wood.

A golden winged figure covered in inscribed and thick glowing plates of metal broke through the scarlet inferno and laid sunlight eyes on the minotaur past a shining helmet. The two beings locked eyes and Freg grunted his words at the angelic man, “the seal is broken.”

“The war resumes,” a powerful unearthly voice boomed behind the helmet, challenging the flames to roar louder than his own voice.

Freg looked down at Josephine’s stomach and back at the figure, “your blade.”

The angel waved a steady dismissive hand that sparkled with the arc, knowing the knife stopped what was left of Josephine’ blood from spilling.

On the other side of the ruined glade of hell-fire a shadow stretched from the fiery boughs of the trees, somehow extinguishing the light of the fire yet keeping it burning with utmost hunger. A cold emptiness challenged the hearty glow of the angel, and the armored figure turned to Freg, clenching his thick gauntlets into a fist, “move quickly Harnian.”

The minotaur looked back as the trees began to disappear into the growing shadow, and the fire’s flames began to grow taller. Eyes began to peek from the darkness and a hollow wind screamed from the void as the sky now turned a blood red.

"Good luck once more, Dov Hinan," Freg snorted as he held the princess close to him.

Freg’s chest grew wet as Josephine continued to bleed. He silently lifted his elbow in front of his face, closed his eyes, and with a powerful kick of his hooves, he dashed through the walls of fire that caged the glade. The cacophony of an army clashing amid the screaming wind and roaring explosions sounded behind him as he made his escape into the forest of fiery pillars.


------

A sudden shout broke George from his reverie. Soldiers rushed around, escorting a large figure from the trees that cloaked the purple road and surrounded the encampment. George stood up and flung his cape off of his arms.

A shallow breeze spilled over the canopies and fluttered his cape. The acrid smell of fire in the distance polluted the wind and stung the inside of George nostrils. He rubbed his itchy nose as a feeling of worry made his head freeze cold.

The dark figure’s being escorted came into view under the strange crimson sky. It was Das, an Imperial guard, the lute player covered in chains and shackles, and lastly a strange bull man carrying someone.

“Josephine!” George cried, ignoring the strange parade. He kicked away the moist forest soil as he ran to the minotaur. Tears started to well in the back of his eyes as he feared the worse. A knife’s handle glinted and George bit his lip in anxiety as he sprint slowed into a nervous walk.

As he got closer and closer to the pale figure of his sister, his legs felt more and more weighted by lead with each step. A pit formed in his stomach and he felt like spewing up his breakfast from the last to the first.

A trembling hand reached from the prince and laid itself onto his sister’s forehead with gentle care. Her pale skin was warm to the touch, yet it sent a chill down George’s spine. The minotaur stood speechless as George examined his sister with great care.
“Get a doctor!” George yelled at nobody in particular, and the soldiers surrounding the group scrambled hastily. Das pursed his lips into a line and bowed his head in sorrow as George let a hot tear travel down the bridge of his nose.

“Give her to me,” George barked his voice cracking from a command to a soft request on the final words.

Silent Freg gently laid Josephine’s body into George’s waiting arms. Dried blood peeled from the fur of the great beast and sleek crimson shone as it started to leak onto the steel covered arms of George.

The prince’s heart seemed to stop in terror as he held his limp sister’s body in his arms. A tear burned out of his wet eyes and plopped onto her cheek as he looked her over, his eyes traveling down to the gilded handle of the knife that protruded from her stomach.

“She can still be saved,” the shackled precursor admitted hopefully.

As the words of the hooded man teased George's mind, he felt a pulse in the body of his sister, and hope reentered his heart.

“How?” George demanded, choking back heated tears. His fingers curled into fists as he held his sister closer, “how!”

Before the precursor could answer the prince, a soldier came running through the maze of tents, a tired horse clopping behind him. On top of the purple clothed horse slouched the figure of Reginald.

George’s heart thumped again and the pit in his stomach thickened, “Reginald!?”

“He had ridden hard for three days, Sire,” The soldier saluted. Reginald stirred up in his saddle and looked over the scene with tired eyes.

“Prince,” Reginald huffed urgently as he slumped forward on his chestnut horse, “The capital has fallen.”

--------

The twisted figures growled and barked through toothy grins and pumped their bloody arms and clawed fists in victory over the gruesomely destroyed bodies of the palace guard. The once emerald grass of the Imperial gardens gleamed a wet ruby as their twisted toes and blackened armored feet pounded the wastes of the dead into the moist soil.

Their deranged figures were human like only in shape and size, as a dark ebony colored plate armor covered most of their bodies, save for dark blemished skin and bare leathery flesh that escaped the cover of the gruesome metal. Eyes of red peeked from their hairless heads, and the look of a predator deviously pulsed from their visage.

Horrific screams could be heard gurgling and screeching for help all around the beasts as they hollered in a macabre victory and danced a sickly dance. Fire licked from the windows of the palace. The auburn and red leaves of autumn that dressed the many trees of the gardens only complimented the gore and terror of the situation.

The whole scene caused Gregory’s breath to swallow in his lungs like a cold winter chill, and frost bit his bones. The cold eagle beak of his metal helmet was nearly pressed against the glass of a window that looked out into the gardens, and his grip twisted and tightened around a mighty war hammer. He exhaled and flexed his muscles, feeling the burn of adrenaline force away the chill of a battle to come.

His body was covered in thick armor, dressed to fit the high title of Imperial Marshal of Stromism, with purple ribbons over gold gilded plates, which in turn hid his powerful body.

His booted heel turned and he looked upon the frightened faces of the Empire’s finest, the Imperial Palace guards. He nodded in understanding but then quickly gnashed his teeth as he roared, “Jerrovians! Stand tall! This is it!”

The small army of guards that had massed in the halls behind the Marshal sucked in a great breath at once, echoing the dire of the situation. Then all at once the guards stamped their feet and square tower shields, mustering their courage as they shouted back at the Marshal, “For the Empire!”

A proud smile crept across Gregory’s face and shouted back, “For the Emperor!”

He hefted a mighty shoulder and swung his hammer straight through the window he was looking through. After all, he thought as the wind of the gardens rushed past his face, doors were for peacetime.

A rumble trembled his throat and turned into a mighty roar of battle as he lead a charge of the guards from the window and into the forest-like gardens. The dark creatures who stood like man but wore twisted faces of flesh and bone snarled wet growled and bared sharp teeth at his attack.

They started to swarm, clinking heavy alien armor and heaving crude swords and serrated axes. Before the evil creatures could form a solid line of metal and twisted muscle, Gregory and his wedge formation of elites slammed into the mess, dodging thick trees and vines as well as the deadly swipes of the enemy.

Gregory’s hammer came raging down as he struck into the scattered line of the enemy. It’s blunt and heavy head crashed into the skull of one of the beasts, spouting a black icor and a inhumane gargle as the body was forced to the ground.

The marshal’s boot clamped it into the moist soil as he rushed over it, swinging his hammer with skill as he pierced through the ear of an unsuspecting enemy with the hook on the opposite side of his blunt weapon. He strained his muscles as another monster rushed him with a blood crusted sword, and ripped the hook back out of the shaking creature he had just lobotomized, and sent the flat end of the hammer into the arm of the approaching enemy.

The beast's arm snapped at an unnatural angle and a white bone speared out of the leathery skin. The creature howled in pain, but was quickly silenced by a powerful whack to the face with the hammer.

Gregory smiled past bits of gore that speckled his eagle mask, and he let another great roar rumble from his mouth. The troops stabbing and shield bashing the monstrosities behind him roared in reciprocation at their advance into the enemies lines.

Gregory’s cry was cut short as he felt a sudden vibration shock up from the ground and to his knees. He wobbled and the enemy's eyes glew a dire red. He clenched his teeth and took a clumsy step forward.

A loud bang blew the leaves of the trees and the swirling red and black void of a sky raged as if it was about to storm and rain. The Marshal clenched his hammer defensively as the advance halted and another boom sent a cold wind through his lines. The evil creatures seemed to slowly slink away from the fight as the boom vibrated.

The second boom tore apart branches and splintered the lines of troops with bits of wood, and if not for their steady stance, would have knocked them all down as it did the smaller trees. The troops swayed again at the vibrations of a third boom and gust of frozen wind.

Gregory felt something wicked watching him, and it’s gaze chilled his bones and he growled, “show yourself!”

The whole garden cracked and creaked as all the trees bowed down in the direction of the one great tree of the gardens to reveal the swirling sky. The tops of all the trees kissed the ground and their bark snapped and rejected the idea loudly. After the vortex of void and red sky was revealed, with only the mighty tree that centered the garden standing to point up at it with great canopies and branches, a powerful female voice boomed.

“Behold”

“My love”

A dark sphere floated above the tree, and it sucked in the wind. The evil creatures bowed with the trees in it’s direction, muttering grim gibberish like the croaks of toads at its sight. The sphere whistled and pulsed until it swirled crimson and finally, it broke with a flash of light. The explosion blinded Gregory temporarily, and his eyelids flashed with pink as his vision glittered with the negative of the scene.

There floating where the orb was, was a slender female figure levitating high above the tree, next to the balcony to the infamous training room. Her skin was peach and her eyes dark coals. Her midnight hair floated all about her as if she was submerged under water, and her bare figure was wrapped in silken ash colored ribbons.

Gregory fell to his knees at the sight, a powerful emotion urging him to lay down his weapon. He felt the need to bow and grovel much like the enemies that he was just fighting were. Something allured him to her and he nearly felt the need to cry.

His soldiers quickly followed him to their knees as she bobbed in the cool breeze that felt like a calm motherly embrace.

“I have seen your plight, mortal,” She sweetly said, as if kissing the words gently into the minds of the listeners, “and I have seen how my spawn treat you.”

“Damn them,” she hissed. The evil creatures bowed and shook in fright at her words, raising hands in defense to her.

“Now my children, my mortal babies, come home to your master and mistress, let us live as one once more,” a wicked smile crept across her face, but to Gregory, all he felt was a sweet love permeate from her every word.

“Come home, dispose of your mortal bodies and ravage the mortal world, so we may remake it as our heaven, this is your purpose. We can start anew, we can recreate a new world, a world of love.”

Gregory found himself nodding to her words, a single spark in his heart burning in rebellion at his heads agreement to her verses. The slink of one of his troops blades cutting its owners own throat in suicide did not remove Gregory’s eyes from the floating woman’s eyes, neither did the thud of the body slapping the ground..

“I am the Kind One. The One of Love, come home, come-”

Her words were suddenly shattered as was her trance on Gregory. The marshal lept to his feet as he witnessed a lone figure running across the roof of the palace. His eyes darted in anxiety, relieved to be saved from his trance, as well as hurt to be removed from such a powerful embrace.

His eyes refocused on the rushing figure and his mouth opened wide. The evil creatures roared in hatred and the troops behind Gregory hollered in surprise.

“The Emperor!”

Wilhelms boots crashed heavily across the tiles of the roof as he huffed hot breaths. Hatred burned in his eyes, and a long blade was held in his hand as he rushed in the segmented plated armor of a palace guard. His wild golden hair waved all around him as the night wind twirled around his heroic frame.

He gritted his white teeth in defiance to the floating liar, and a burning passion of revenge warmed his spirit.

“AHHHHH!” He roared so loudly his chest pounded with thundering heart beats, and sent forth a invigorating vibration to his troops down below.

With a powerful stomp, the Emperor kicked off the lip of the roof. The wind caught him as he flung through the air towards the Dweller. Before the floating woman could react outside of her surprise, Wilhelms blade sunk deep into her chest, through her beating heart with a slinking wet sound, and the two plummeted to the ground. Wilhelm screamed angrily in her ear as he rode her down into the gardens below, the wind howling around them as they rocketed down.

Gregory looked back at his troops as the two figures slammed into the ground with a tremendous bang. He cocked his head, “For the Emperor!”

The guards lifted their weapons and roared to the skies and continued the battle as the evil creatures leapt from their bowing stances to aggressively fight back the renewed guards.

Gregory expertly weaved through the scattered enemy forces, slamming and spiking the heads of the beasts with his mighty hammer, eager to reach his emperor.

The enemy horde started to thicken and the Marshal’s brow furrowed with worry as he continued. He hacked and he stomped on the fallen bodies of the twisted beasts. He dodged serrated axes and swords, and duck under thrusted spears and darting arrows. He stepped to the side to avoid enemy charges, and he rolled under swings of halberds.

Gregory managed to fight his way into the epicenter of the battle, and after dispatching a crazed enemy, he looked upon the crater which had formed under the might of his emperor's attack.

The very dirt and rock that formed a bowl in the once grassy ground seemed to be on fire as a stench filled mineral splattered all around the crater.

Brimstone Gregory concluded as he rushed past an enemy’s swing, returning the blow with a slam of his hammer into the cracking ribs of the beast, sending it flying into a tree.

He turned his gaze back onto the crater, and his heart sank at what he saw. There in the center of the bowl of rock and brimstone, his emperor laid still, a blood covered sword in hand.

“Go to your bride, my Emperor,” Gregory whispered sadly.

“Foolish mortals,” a masculine voice taunted from behind the great tree, catching Gregory’s attention. A mighty armored humanoid stepped out from behind the tree. Thick horns curled around its thick enclosed helmet and crimson soaked spikes menacingly jutted from its armor like blood thirty thorns.The figure was massive and as pitch as midnight, with flames erupting from every opening in his helmet, and a mighty sword of fire in his right hand as a shield of brimstone covered his left. Its very appearance looked like death.

“I offer love, and this is how I am repaid,” it trumped in an angry shaking baritone, “so be it, if you will not come to me, I will come to you.”

Gregory spat at the massive being and lifted his hammer, speechless. He inhaled deeply and as his lungs filled with the stinging fire that rose from the crater he shouted a blood boiled scream of rage.

The great Dweller raised its sword and Gregory kicked the ground as he charged. The two clashed as stromist magic swirled around the Marshal in golden ribbons. His hammer swung powerfully, cracking the armor of the demon.

Fire spat from the cracks and melded the armor shut. Gregory refused to lose and swung his hammer again with an explosive crack, shattering the shield in two, but the shield quickly came to be once more and Gregory clenched his teeth.

Gregory rolled under a burning swing of the sword and leapt up with a powerful slam of his hammer, resounding a massive crack as the hammer struck the otherworldly being with a golden flash of might.

The Dweller reeled backwards, and Gregory swung his hammer in reciprocation of the first blow, flashing the scene golden once more. He struck the Dweller again, and again, with each mighty swing knocking the Dweller to it’s knee. But the being would only stand up and laugh at the mighty attempts of Gregory. The creature teased him, and Gregory continued his onslaught.

Explosive crack after pounding boom, Gregory fought, but each time, the Dark One would recuperate as if he was never attacked. Then with one grievous swing of the flaming sword, Gregory’s world grew dark, and his hammer fell to the floor of the gardens with an echoing clatter that every soldier of the palace could hear over the rushes and grunts of battle. In all their minds they knew it to be true, the capital has fallen .

This is it, diplomacy has failed, and an ancient evil has been revealed! Otherworldly forces threaten our very existence and plummet the entirety of Jerrovia into total war.

Why has this happened? How can we stop it? What in the Graces is going on? That is up to the story to answer. Immerge yourself in the ever changing landscape of Brimstone, take control of your own nation under the Empire’s banner, perhaps a single faction of mercenaries or wayward priests, or simply take up arms as a single character, the choice is yours.

Treachery, war, intrigue, drama and comedy await you in this realm. You decide what happens to the land and the fate of the people, what will you do?




We started with the wedding of Imperial Princess Josephine to King Escaen of The Delta, as well as the issue with the fact that the Empire of the entire known world was a lunatic who by this point has done many many things to prove this point, on top of a possible murder allegation of his own wife, the mother of Prince George and Princess Josephine.

The night of the wedding, after doing the deed, Josephine was awoken by a strange dream that showed her getting stabbed through the stomach in a strange forest. Unable to sleep again and with the image of a knife on the throne burned into her mind, she took to the halls of the palace.

A strange cloaked man is found with the knife and the Emperor, performing a strange blood ritual next to the large tree in the garden

It is revealed to be the lute player from Josephine’s wedding, and at the sight of eveyone coming to stop his strange ritual, he vanishes in thin air.

George finds references of strange musicians popping up in Jerrovian history and tells Josephine.

Josephine against George’s wishes gathers a band of heroes to hunt down the lute player and the stolen knife

While Prince George fights a rebellious king in Aaldorenfeald, Josephine traverses the Imperial forests in search of the musician

Josephine, Das (Kafshe Achian elf hero of the dwarven wars), and Gennisberg meet and follow a massive bull man, a mysterious stranger who seems to know everything and carries a giant book on his back. The minotaur claims to know the way to the lute player

The bullman (Freg) leads the group to an Imperial checkpoint (This is where the connector post picks up)

(George defeats the rebels in Aaldorenfeald but spares the king with a sentence of exile instead of execution. His march home is interrupted by Reginald randomly showing up, this is where the palace post starts.)



A ancient seal has been broken and the sky has lost it’s color. Swirls of red and black paint the sky and the summer is at it’s end and autumn has begun. Evil disfigured humans appear out of pitch black shadows that seem to levitate just above the ground.

These beings of corruption and chaos pillage, kill, and destroy everything you hold dear (or perhaps you feel like they have a good thing going and want to capitalize on this). Either way, from the Imperial forest the bulk of this dark army marches, and word of isolated incidents of small roving bands of evil creatures dot your nation’s landscape. Should you do nothing, they will destroy your nation and conquer your lands.

On top of all this, the Empire is in danger. The Imperial province is a hive of war and evil, and the heir (George) is lost in the fighting to do any real administration beyond the flaps of a battle tent. The Emperor is missing alongside the Imperial Marshal, the Capital is under siege by the big baddies, and Josephine is possibly dead, things do not bode well.

Note: the bulk of the dark forces are composed of void skinned beasts with disfigured limbs of corded muscle and twisted faces.

(check out in the original OP in the NRP thread)

(Special thanks to Isotope and Solamelike

This land marked as Aaldorenfeald was player created, and then used by myself to forward the plot in the long post that connects both parts. As it stands currently, I no longer have any need for the country of Aaldorenfeald, and I’m offering a unique opportunity for new players: namely the chance if willing, to roleplay as a lord in Aaldorenfeald.

As a lord (or even a peasant upstart) you will be taking control over one of its provinces and then doing what you will with it, be it taking the Aaldorenfeald crown, supporting Imperial control over the land, or what have you. It will be interesting to see what some people if any do in a ruined kingdom, and what advantages are taken.

Everyone knows about the Empire of Jerrovia, simply because we are all apart of it, whether we like it or not, you are apart of it as well.

No nation remembers when or how they ended up apart of it, but we all have our theories and suspicions. There is no archeological evidence of anything to point to any reason the empire was formed or how each nation became apart of it, save any recent changes. In short, we are all the Empire.

That said, there is much more to the Empire than land supremacy. These are the waning years of the Empire, as it’s authority has fallen, so has it’s old laws. Once there were internal peace laws to keep the nations from fighting, backed by a massive army, now nations fight as they please with only the fear of the forty thousand standing army left under Imperial control (however luckily no nation has to this point taken advantage of this besides the Dicordian and Shahdom wars)

So with the Empire slowly withering away, we should take a look at the original Empire and it’s rules and demographics and compare it to today's Empire:









Sadly with the army of the Empire busy with the terrible plague of otherworldly invaders, the military might that kept most fickle vassals in check is too preoccupied to pay attention to their actions, that with the added bad news of the Imperial Capital under siege, the vassals are nearly on their own, and what becomes of the Empire is in your hands.

Shall we return it to it’s greater glory and reverse the scourge of evil together so that we may band under one flag once more as mighty Jerrovians? Or will we separate and do what we will, and possibly form a new idea of what our continent should look like, Jerovia be forgotten!

No min-maxing

No God modding

No power playing
Be active (I do expect some level of commitment to getting regular posts in)

No fighting in chat or ooc

No meta gaming

No all that usual stuff that’s a no

If you have a question,ask

PM the GM if you are having an issue of any sort

GM has final say
Realism is our goal in story telling

Things will die

This is a mature RP, there will be violence.

This is a mature RP, I expect punctuation (albeit I didn’t use much of that when writing these rules), I expect basic writing skills, and the ability to write coherent paragraphs as well as develop characters and plots.

This is a mature RP, please refrain from one liners and single paragraph slivers of half posts… if it is unavoidable, I suggest a collab with whom you are interacting with for a fluid and standard sized post.

What is a standard sized post? I really have no idea, I just know that it is more than one paragraph, and portrays an event with detail and writing finesse. Although I will say the average post was three pages long in part one, and the largest was twenty (a collab).

A collab is slang for a collaboration post in which two (or more) players work together on one post. I encourage these.

This RP will follow all the guild rules, so keep all full on lustful sex scenes out of the RP (innuendos are fine as are fade to blacks, but you should know the rules)

Be respectful of other players creations and do not control them without their permission

Be respectful in general

Technology level is classic fantasy middle ages (plate is expensive and reserved, levies are peasants with sticks, so on and so forth. Classic feudal.)

NO gunpowder for nations at any time, or characters (we’ve all been downthat road already, I’m sorry). But seriously you have kick ass magic, you don’t need it.

No bitching, unless you have a valid point in which case present your bitching to me specifically in PM and spare the others, so I can handle it.

Treat others how you would like to be treated.

Use this to talk to other players, but use the OOC for important RP stuff, as that is were I will post important things, and so should you. Use this only as a downtime lobby to get to know each other.

Combat will be handled a few different ways:

For player combat, I leave it up to you to be fair and not god mod or be super epic 360 kickass never get hurt #rekt.

Small story driven combat, I expect the same, as well with isolated incidents.

Major battles between players and nations can be handled one of two ways:

One: I can trust you both to figure it out story wise and write it like any other post with the utmost realism in the matter as you two collaborate to write the battle out (I will step in if needed)

This continent has a species of bird known as the twitter, it carries letters up to sizes of 140 characters due to it’s own small size, but it is rapid and quick at communicating matters of importance.

Everyone is able to use these birds, and every now and again depending on the constitution of the Empire, I will be sending continent wide Twitters to vassals with news and reports.

I will also make worldwide posts now and again that detail an event happening in a specific area or worldwide.. to keep things interesting.

Character kill count: 9(James Conrad, Johnathon, Gung, Flint Whiteshorn, Sesal, The Ox, Zach, Gregory, Emperor Wilhelm)

Shortest Life: Gung

First to die: Johnathon (@solamelike Page 1)

Top Main Character Killer: The Dweller

Lust counter: 6

#1 Lady's man: George

#1 Lord's woman: Skyler

Liberal Magician (most intentional use of Magic): Das

Master Marksman (most use of ranged attacks): Fay

Melee Monster (the most aggressively physical): Nicia
Liar(Biggest Liar): Dayton Osgar

Angel(Most Honest): Reginald

Jester(Most Jokes): Das

Pure Evil(Most deemed Evil Actions): Skyler

One Classy Broad: Mardene

For old players: Please create a summary of what your nation has been doing in this time (around a month)

The first IC will be made by me, and it will fill in on everything George had been doing in Aaldorenfeald. It will also explain how the hell between the Josephine posts and the palace post it suddenly switched to autumn.

Before PMing me any questions (always open) please make sure that it isn’t answered in this OP.

Please pm me all sheets for acceptance!

Once all or most pre-accepted players acknowledge this OP I'll get us a new IC to post in.

- In the connector post it states Gennisberg as Josephine's husband, that is a tricky mishap. I wrote it that way because Escaen is truly Josephine's husband, but he is a player character, so ICly disregard Gennisberg's romance, but do not disregard the plot stuff (you know what I mean). ICly Escaen is Josephine's true husband. OOCly, feel free to feel what you will about.. Gennisberg.

-Some maps are being held off until the IC stats

-


Oh! I forgot to mention. I HAVE GUIDES FOR POPULATION AND MILITARY! So if you want your military numbers, please PM me the following information: Population, Recruitment (levies, standing, caste), and who in your population can fight (men, women, etc).

- PM me completed sheets