Is this inspired by that one post on r/showerthoughts?

This is literally just the plot of the Renegades series by Marissa Meyer

The sorcerer was quietly sipping tea and reading through the newest Arcanist’s Monthly when the door whooshed open and banged at the wall. He raised an eyebrow as the witch marched across his living room before taking a seat opposite of him. The man put down the publication in his hand on the wooden table and poured the middle-aged woman a cup of tea. He also picked up a cupcake from the plate and gave it to the weasel that helped close the door after her grand entrance.

He also didn’t miss the toddler in the basket that she was carrying with her.

“I was deceived!” The witch hissed. “He promised me his firstborn would be a cure for the queen, but all he gave me is… is this! A worthless brat!”

The sorcerer tried very hard not to roll his eyes. He warned her… There was a reason that their kind rarely rose to prominence in the aristocratic landscape. Despite their arcane powers, few of them were well-versed in the arts of diplomacy and deception. However, she insisted she could hold a kingdom ransom by putting their heir under her control. Her plan worked… She got a child from the royal family. However, she had overlooked something.

“Start from the beginning, you old hag. Don’t make me waste my Mana on trying to read your mind,” he said to the witch as he glanced at the weasel climbing up the table and then looked at the baby curiously. Meanwhile, the baby was still fast asleep as he lay in the basket, not knowing that his royal parents had already sold him off to an old witch.

As the witch rambled on, the sorcerer finally pieced together what happened. Long story short, the king of a queendom approached the witch in order to find a cure for a magical disease that was afflicting the queen. The unsuspecting witch asked for their firstborn son, completely oblivious to the fact that the son would never become a ruler since the king omitted to tell her he was from a queendom. That was how her plan completely fell apart before it even started.

“Curse the aristocracy and their game of words!” The witch faked a spat.

“And what should I do with this brat right now? I can’t just leave him out in the wilds!” The witch sighed. She may be a witch, but even she had standards. Harming children… Especially a toddler… it was something she would never consider. She always had a soft spot for children. However, she also had little patience for crying, children… And she expected the toddler to cry as soon as he woke up from his sleep.

“Why not adopt him?” The sorcerer shrugged. “He has royal blood inside of him. He will make a mighty sorcerer if you can ignite his Arcane Spark.”

The witch stared at her long-time companion and the latter could feel a chill down his spine as she broke into a wide grin. “Oh, my old buddy, old pal…”

“No, nope, stop. I don’t want to hear a word you’re going to say from this second onward…”

“Come now, you won’t leave an old friend in the rut, would you…?”

17 Years Later.

A tearful witch bid the youth farewell as he strode off into the sky on a phantom steed. Even the weasel was waving goodbye with a handkerchief in its hand. “Can’t he just stay home for one more year? The world’s such a dangerous place… And he’s still so young…”

The sorcerer could only roll his eyes as he heard the witch as she blew her nose. “You didn’t sound sad when you left him with me all those years ago.”

“I didn’t know that he would grow up to be such a considerate and kind boy back then!” The witch retorted, even as she wiped the tears off her cheeks. “He’s the only one who ever gave me a flower…”

“Alright, alright… Stop crying, 'mommy.' He promised he’ll send us letters whenever he reaches a new town… He’ll be fine. He learned from the best.” The sorcerer voiced out his confidence in the boy that they raised together. Of course, he would never let her know he had secretly inscribed a rune on the boy’s back that would always inform him of his whereabouts…

> This is my first time doing something like this, but it seemed like a fun idea so what the hell?

Caroline Coleman, better known to the world as the infamous Doctor Vengeance, sat cross-legged on the cold, harsh concrete floor, facing the wall of her bare holding cell. So many lofty plans, and they had all led to this dead end, deep within the super-max security wing of the South City Stockade. As she lowered her head the greying black strands of her hair fell over her furrowed brow, her crows feet intensifying at the edges of her eyes as she glowered, and she felt the familiar sting of the bile rising in the back of her throat that told her the superhuman rage was building within her.

Caroline's thoughts were interrupted by the angry beeping coming from the metal collar clamped around her neck. She struggled to calm herself, her body rigid with tension as she held herself in place. Her knuckles whitened as she gripped her knees, nails biting at they pressed in 'Deep breaths. In... out. You're at the playground. It's a beautiful day. The sun sparkles in your daughter's eyes as she runs towards you. Chocolate smears the edge of her wide smile, the remnants of her birthday cake. The last time you got to see her be that happy.' The beeping stopped. At least she managed to not get shocked by the collar this time.

Outside Caroline's cell was a loud buzz and a metallic thunk, followed by the groan of a heavy metal door swinging open, then a definitive slam shut again. "Is that you, Captain Fantastic?" Caroline asked without turning around. "Come to gloat again? Well you'll forgive me if I don't join in with your childish games."

"I bet it just burns you up inside that they caught you, doesn't it?" Said a decidedly not Captain-Fantastic-like voice. "THE Doctor Vengeance, reduced to this. Sitting alone in a cell while they pose for photo opportunities and mock you on the evening news."

Caroline slowly got to her feet and turned to face the speaker, shrouded in the shadows at the edge of the room beyond her cell. "What do you want from me?" she growled, and the collar once again beeped, reminding her to calm down.

"What do I want?" The figure asked, slowly stepping forward. Light glinted off of a pair of glasses, before revealing a slight young woman in a bland suit, auburn hair tied up professionally in a bun, a laminated ID card dangling from a lanyard around their neck. She held a notepad in her hand and a pen in the other. She continued "I'm Viera Vallery, from Bayside Beugle. I want to tell your side of the story. Give you the chance to set the record straight and be heard by the people of South City."

"I'm sorry, what? This is a joke," Caroline almost laughed, taken aback. Whatever she had expected, this was not on the list.

"I'm serious," The woman insisted, slightly flustered. "Contrary to popular belief, not everyone in this city just blindly believes everything they're told on tv. There's something wrong in South City, something rotten. We both know that. And the people of this city need to know it too. I can help you with that."

"You want to hear my story?" Caroline scoffed incredulously as she stared at the young woman, intent on berating the young woman for their audacity to attempt to manipulate her, telling her what she wanted to here so they could use her for some cheap headline to advance their own career. Doctor Vengeance doesn't do interviews, that would be ridiculous. It was beneath her... wasn't it? But as she stared into the reporter's eyes in what was to be an attempt to intimidate the woman, she saw in her eyes and intensity and zeal that was all-too familiar. "Sure, why not? I'm not going anywhere."

"I'm sure it looks pretty fitting, the horrible Doctor Vengeance locked away in a cell, but I'm not the one who really belongs in here. You already know the beginning. Talented doctor loses her daughter tragically, the spirit of vengeance awakens within her. She becomes overwhelmed by the tremendous desire to exact vengeance and right any wrongs they encounter."

"Sounds very noble," The reporter says. "What about when you beat Mr. Vincent Price to death for cutting someone off in traffic? Was that a fair punishment?"

"Hey, no one said anything about fair. I'm possessed by a spirit of vengeance, not a spirit of cool-headed and reasonable justice. A wrong was committed, I righted it. But, you know, I've been working on my anger issues. Doing meditation and stuff. It's been a long time since I've killed someone who didn't truly deserve to die."

"Right..." The reporter moved on. "So anyway, what was with the rebranding? Dressing up in a hood and cape, calling yourself The Retributor?"

"What can I say, it gets tiring being hated by everyone in the city. And I would always see all these heroes doing pretty much exactly what I was doing, but everyone loved them. I thought that maybe if I didn't look like Doctor Vengeance, someone who they've fought and hate, I could fit in. And it was kind of nice, you know? It felt good being liked and actually helping. People on the street were happy when I arrived. I just had to control myself. I told myself it would at least make for a funny story; one of the worst villains at large in the city, walking around right under their noses and invited into their corporate headquarters. And it worked too, for a while."

"But something went wrong?" The reporter asked.

"Of course it did," Caroline let out a dry, sardonic laugh. "Something always goes wrong. Or, in this case, someone. I was brought in to the League of Supers to be a probationary vigilante. As part of the initiation, I had to meet with their chief of branding and marketing, Harold Hughes. I knew right away. The spirit within blazed, more intense than I'd ever felt before. This was the man. This was the driver that killed. My. Daughter." The metal collar crackled to life as Caroline seethed, shocking her violently and dropping her to the floor. After a little longer than was probably necessary, the collar died down. Caroline lay on the floor twitching for several moments, before taking a few breaths and collecting herself.

"Are you okay?" The reporter asked, a look of concern on her face.

"No," Caroline answered, slowing picking herself up off the floor. "No, I'm pretty damn far from okay. Just ask your questions."

"Okay," the reporter leaned forward. "So what happened next?"

"I couldn't have held back even if I wanted to. We both needed vengeance, and nothing was going to stop us. Nothing, that is, except for Captain Fantastic. I consider myself to be pretty powerful, as far as Supers go. There's not much that can stop me if I don't want to be stopped. But Captain Fantastic, he's on a whole different level. He stopped me dead in my tracks. I begged and pleaded, told him Hughes murdered my daughter. It didn't matter. Apparently it was far from the first time something like that had happened in the League of Supers. But Hughes was valuable, irreplaceable. And I was not. So they revealed my identity and threw me in here. That's my story. I suppose you're going to go and report it or something now?"

"Well, not exactly," the woman in glasses smirked. She clicked her pen three times, and a static sound came out of Caroline's collar before it fell to the floor. "I said I was going to help you tell your story, but I never said I was going to report it. You're going to go out there and share it yourself. Come on, we've got some vengeance to take."

[removed]

Reborn with the knowledge of how things really were and off the radar of the "Heros".

Round 2 and this time a few more "villains" might be helping out. >:-)

So you go undercover so deep that you end up a villain again anyway? Lmao.

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The cat looked at the shrouded body, sitting in the open grave. It was small, much smaller than it had been even a decade ago. But then, as he had come to understand about humans, they often shrunk in their old age. This one was no different.

Inside, he felt a peculiar emotion that he wasn't terribly familiar with. At first he thought it might be anger, but then realized that wasn't it at all. He was familiar with anger, this had a distinctly... different feeling.

Was he hungry? No, that wasn't it either. Besides, hunger wasn't an emotion. The human had kept telling him as much, even though the cat didn't agree with him on that point.

He knew the emotion, but it was hard to remember what it was. It was almost like... part of him wanted to jump outside his body and run away. He felt a strange sort of pain inside, and didn't like it one bit. He turned to his compatriot, who was standing silently beside him, staring into the grave.

"Hey, Plastic Percy. There's something wrong here. I'm feeling something and I don't know what it is."

His friend turned. "Are you cold? I could get you a jacket."

"No, numbnuts," the cat replied. "Not like, a body feeling. Like an inside feeling. Something ain't right."

His friend stared at him for several seconds quizzically, unsure what to make of the comment.

"It's like... part of me is hurting. And I don't know why. I just want to make it stop."

"Ah," the compatriot said, turning back to the grave. "I believe you are experiencing something called 'sadness'. You are upset over the death of our friend."

"I am?" the cat asked. "That doesn't make a lick of goddamn sense!"

"On the contrary," his friend replied. "It makes perfect sense. He was our friend, and now he is gone forever, surrendered to the Earth. It is also significant that he was the last human being in existence, after all."

"Pfft, he was only barely one at all," the man on the other side of the grave said dismissively. "If you ask me, he was more of a walking garbage disposal than a man. He would eat foods that might kill an actual human. I should know, I watched him do it, like some kind of piranha deliberately trying to commit suicide itself by gorging itself to death.

"Oh shut it, smeg-for-brains," the cat snapped at him. "He wasn't that bad, for a human."

"No, he wasn't," the other compatriot agreed, picking up a handful of dirt and throwing it onto the body below.

"So... this pain?" the cat asked. "When does it stop?"

"I do not know," his friend replied. "It may never stop. Or one day you may just wake up and stop thinking about it. It's hard to tell."

"Oh, wonderful," the cat muttered. "So his last trick from the grave is to make me miserable. Figures."

He leaned over the grave, pointing a finger at the corpse. "You're just doing this to me because I tried to eat your fish. Thanks a lot."

"We shall miss you, Dave Lister," his friend said sadly. "You were the finest human being alive."

"He was the only human being alive," Rimmer quipped. "The very definition of 'victory by default'".

"At least he was alive, you glorified walking mannequin," Cat quipped.

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[removed]

The End of the World

​

<> <> <>

At the end of the world, nothing had changed. The phylogenetic tree carved into the tall, serpentinite wall of the museum still told the same tale. And what other tale was there to tell? Every story was fundamentally reducible to the same story about the lurching endeavors of humanity, man’s grasp gradually falling shorter and shorter of his reach.

The domed roof had caved in. Blue-green rocks fuzzy with moss and discolored by chemical decay had crumbled into slanted heaps. Magenta clouds swirled in the exposed sky above. Cracked Greek columns guarded the side walls of the main gallery, dark brown foliage creeping between the interstices.

“Not much of an inheritance, is it?” The old man’s voice croaked as he plodded through the rubble, his staff thundering as it hit the ground.

I sat on the stairs beneath the giant mural, chin on hand, studying his weary body as he approached. “I had never expected blooming meadows, but it is quite pitiful, father.”

“Ahhh-kh-khhh.” His voice scraped his throat. “So it misquemes you, does it? You’ll find a way. You have to.”

“And if I can’t?” I asked, but he didn’t reply.

The steady clack of his staff pounded in my head. His robe was muddied and rasped as it dragged across jagged stones like the injured wing of some flightless bird. He was on the steps now. Ragged breaths and long pauses. Beside me now, he perched a wrinkled hand on my shoulder.

“No alchemist, no ecologist, nor geneticist can save us now,” he said, gazing up at the wall.

“No historian will again steal through the night to save our story,” I said, rising and turning to face the tree.

“No inventor, no scientist, nor engineer will blueprint a machine to light us with glory,” he said, climbing with me, our hands around each other’s shoulders.

“And no poet,” I said as we reached the platform, “will ever travel to starless caverns before we have.”

“We were the first.” He retracted his hand from my back.

“And the last,” I finished, letting my hands fall limp.

Rain began to fall. Drops trailed and diverged on the grooves on the wall like a thousand splintering meteorites. At the root of the tree was a single node from which all others branched. Within it was etched a lonely word: Human.

Days after he passed, the sky burned black for the first time in months. Falling ash stained my teary cheeks and I collapsed on the gravel of the road. My cheek rubbed against coarse particles and I tried to find meaning in the pebbles, warring and internecine like TV tuned to a dead channel. I thought I saw his face traced there like lines in a zen garden, his smile shining brightly, but it was just pareidolia.

Months passed before I found another, her eyes wild and red and feral. She crawled like an animal and bared her teeth when I approached. When she saw what I was, she choked and convulsed. Her growls fluctuated as she struggled to fight the animal she had become. Not wanting to see her suffer, I turned to leave.

“Ple-laease, stayyy.” She managed to whisper, but I didn’t look back.

Years passed. Long years stretched by spasms of involuntary memory, lost somewhere in the overgrown streets of dilapidated cities. Short years ripped away from me like the health of the earth, flickering past like the pages of a cheap flipbook. I had more time for reflection about my father, about the dying world he and his generation had left us. More time to detox the bitterness from my heart, more time to let time let heal it. Our suffering wasn’t in vain; it only felt that way because the silver lining of it belonged to the people of the past. They had squeezed blood out of the heart of the world for their pleasure at the expense of the children of the future. It was that simple, nothing personal. We had been left for dead by a people who had never known us.

I trudged up the snow blanketed hill, wondering if he could see my growth. It hadn’t been his fault, I had realized. His generation was handed a world hardly better than we were. All was forgiven, even that which I could not bring myself to forgive. I focused on the distant horizon, listening to the crashing waves of sludge. The vortex of darkness parted like a dead eye opening, iris still white, at the end of the universe where crimson shafts of light spilt past the edge and mirrored off the toxic ocean and scattered into a handful of eyes that were still alive in a dead world or dying in a world that might still yet live.

[removed]

What happened next?

Andrew isn't what you'd call a "typical roommate."

He never eats, no matter what. Not even when he cooks the food.

He's very particular about how laundry is folded. I can't count how many times we've gotten into arguments because I don't fold laundry in just the right way.

We mustn't forget how he fails to grasp that like most people, I need to sleep.

He's one of those that has no concept of how different we really are.

I will say, though, that it would be unfair to say that he's totally at fault here. He is an android after all.

Even so, he still manages to add interesting moments due to being synthetic. It's because our experiences are different; we literally experience the world differently. Emotions, imagination, even just the ability to feel pain.

He's missing out, and he doesn't even realize it.

Then came last Tuesday. I remember it was Tuesday because Andrew's annual diagnostic was scheduled for the next day. I was lying on my bed, reading when he came up to my door and knocked softly.

I know it's weird, but I know Andrew; he has whatever's a few steps from a cop knock. Something was up.

He wasn't in usual stance when I opened the door. Normally, he would carry himself- Well, like a human. I know, I know. I know all about how androids are almost exactly like humans. But you look me in the eye and tell me that you wouldn't expect a walking junkyard to have stiff moves.

This time, his head was down. He lightly wrung his hands in front of him. What was really strange, though, was the lack of eye contact. Weird as it sounds, I'd say he was worried, maybe confused.

"Samuel?" he asked. I keep telling, it's Sam. But he "prefers" proper names for now.

"Yo."

"I think I'd like to have one of those talks again."

"Another one? I thought we did this two weeks ago!"

That's right, even though he's an advanced android, there still some things about humans he doesn't quite get. So I help when I can. Last time, I got to explain why the space battles in Star Wars aren't portrayed scientifically accurately; I even had to Google some of his questions right in front of him on my phone.

"That is correct, and I just want you to know, I really appreciate you helping me to get the bang of things."

"That's 'hang'," I sighed.

He quickly realized what he'd said. Only after he swore up and down that it important did I let him in.

"Okay, Andrew. What are we talking about today?"

He gave a heavy sigh, not that he needed to.

"Samuel, I-." I don't know how the hell it was happening, but I could swear he was stammering. He's good, but he's not that good. "I wanted to ask you about death."

Have you ever had that dream where you have to take a test that you haven't studied for? If so, you probably understand why I was now the one stammering. Unfortunately, finding my voice wouldn't be the solution I though it would be.

"Wow," I said. And for a solid minute, that was all I could say. "I have to admit, I wasn't expecting this. What brought this on?"

"It's Sylvia," he said. She worked as maid for a family a block away from us. A hacker managed to crack Sylvia's firewalls and take control. She had already gotten mom and oldest son, and was going for the youngest. For her crime, she took a .45 hollow point through the head, courtesy of the man of the house, himself. It was the reason androids were now, essentially, second-citizens.

I only said, "I heard."

"She's offline now. I never really understood it, anyway. Not even when it was just humans. But Sylvia was an android. We're supposed to live forever. But now that it's happened to one of us, I-- I don't what to make of it. What to do."

"So, what are you asking?"

"I want to know, Samuel," he said, turning to face me. "I want to know what death really is."

If you ever decide to cohabit with an android, they make you take a test make sure you're safe for the android to be around. They didn't train me for this.

"Well, it's kinda-- It's hard to explain," was how I started. "It's when a person just stops living. Or, if you want scientific accuracy, all organs cease to function." I had to fight off a chuckle at that.

"I am aware of that, Samuel," he replied. There was a faint frustration in his voice. "But what happens, exactly? How does it feel to die?"

"Depends on how they die, I guess. There are a lot of ways to die. There's disasters, injuries, illness. Some people die from just plain being old. There's too many ways to count."

"So it hurts?" Andrew asked. Now, I know I heard a quiver in his voice.

I decided in the moment that he did deserve the truth. "It can."

"How?" he asked me.

"If they're injured, the pain can be really bad. Sometimes it's more than the body can handle. Sometimes, when people are sick, it can cause pain in their body. Sometimes, when people get sick, the sickness destroys them."

"And murders," he added quietly.

"Yes, Andrew," I agreed. "That too."

He thought for a moment, and he said, "Do you think Sylvia was hurt"

"She wasn't in control, Andrew," I said. "We don't know what all the hacker was doing. Maybe she was in a kind of pain, I guess. But she's not hurting now. That pain is gone."

"What do I do now?" he asked me.

"Most people have a funeral. It's to honor a person when they die. They meet in church and then they bury the body. The idea is to always remember them."

Andrew absorbed what I'd said, and thought on it a moment. This was a rare moment of deep consideration. Then, he stood, thanked me, went back to his room.

It was about 2 in the morning when I heard Andrew's usual knock. I had to be at work in five hours, and he knows this. So I open the door and ask what he wants.

"Samuel, do you know how I can arrange a funeral"

Loved it. Thank you for writing it.

Geezus. With everything going on in the world, the death is the expected outcome.

The life afterwards is the hoped outcome.

&#x200B;

Thank you

[deleted]

The appalling violence of the Great Super War, lead by the United Supers Front, was tolling on the American society. Anyone who spoke out against it, was consequently targeted by supervillains, and then a superhero would destroy the whole area to kill one villain. As destructive as the policies were, people thought that they were being kept safe, when in reality the Super heroes had gambled away any possibilities for a sustainable society.

I'm the Gnome Guardian, a garden gnome brought to life by magic, and a verifiable super hero. This story isn't about me, but the one who liberated all of us, Red Mask. Red Mask, or Red, was a detective vigilante, and bonified humanitarian. See, Red Mask used to be an expert marksman. He would quickly end hostage situations, and stopped crime without killing a person.

After the War Red mask stopped using his sniper, and started a shelter to feed and house indigents. Red Mask was able to direct large charitable donations, and began to start a job program for the unemployed. He provided resources for all the criminals in the city, and my lawn was looking happier than ever.

Soon the U.S.F notice a decline in the budget provided by the government. It seemed to them that because crime was going down, less resources would be needed to allocate to the USF. That was when the Super Villain Marauder Hijacked a nuclear missile and begin the nuclear apocalypse.

Everyone watched in horror, the meeting was called for all Supers to report to our headquarters. Everyone was there, except Red Mask. We saved the world, and Marauder was brought to justice.

The Super Hero Captain Stan, head of the USF, was making an announcement. " People of America, the world is safe, and it is all thanks to God. He lead us to the evil Maurader and guided our hand in striking him down. So I ask everyone, is the USF not the good that we can give to the world. Is it not obvious that God has given us a sign." He looked up to the sky, and suddenly a recording came on, "Get Maurader, tell him plan Delta is a-go, launch the Nukes!, Woo Hoo. Ah, after this, those sheep will triple our funding."

A moment of silence came to pass, coordinated to the microsecond, across a distance of a light day. At the same time, the transmission of the live event began to emanate from its location. For some these 2 moments seemed simultaneous. For others it would take the full Earth day for the signal to march its way out to their position. Those furthest out would experience this Earth day lag, but not for many years.

It was an important event to this civilization. It was a testament to their progress and past. They knew, even if they could not trace their lineage to this person, that they all were born from humans like this. The funeral of the last organic human was an occasion to witness.

Their name had been Priya Li. Priya had grown up in a time remembered for difficulty for the human species. The environment that had nurtured their society began to falter from their appetite. There were struggles, wars, disease, and death. But humanity, society, and knowledge had managed to cling to survival. The race that emerged managed to make great advances in adapting themselves to this new world. Priya would benefit from the fruit of their progress. They would live nearly half a millennium.

That was impressive, even for a modified organic. But ultimately a risk that all other entities had long left behind. Transhumanism had paved the way to hybrid and then full synthetic existence. It ushered in an incredible era of exploration that flung colonies beyond the solar system and left behind the notion of the genus, Homo.

Despite the opportunity to join in this new metamorphosis, Priya had been one of a few humans who had elected to stay close to their prior form. In an interview late into life, Priya had expressed two notions for this decision. The first was a feeling of connection to the predecessors, their way of life, and their struggle. The second was that death was a symbolic act of life and had expressive value in this new age of eternity.

Of course, many thought this antiquated, short sighted, or needless waste. But no entity could deny that they didn't mark the event in their minds.

And so the last of the species was interned into the Earth that bore them.

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I too enjoyed The Boys

"As I give you my firstborn son, I pray that you raise him well and shape him into a fine young man, so that when he comes home he will be recognized as a fine leader."

The last matriarchal kingdom I had visited was the Churai Kingdom, ruled by two queens of good nature. They both had said that to me as I took their son, a prince, and set off to my home, Anschrukh Castle, or as it was also known, the Palace of Royals. There, he was properly taken care of, given lessons by the other princes, kings, emperors, dukes, counts, marquesses, barons, viscounts, and lords, soon becoming one of them. Whatever title they were given by their parents did not matter, as they were each equals, brothers from different kingdoms, empires, and dynasties.

I was known as the Witch Queen. As payment for helping the kingdoms, I only took their firstborn sons, raising them and allowing their parents to visit them, helping with a sort of co-parenting. However, as I asked for the same payment after helping the Dazaken Empire, an abnormally strict matriarchal society, the Empress scoffed at my demand, looking down on me.

"Take the little shit. He serves me no purpose other than to be executed after his twentieth birthday to commemorate the royal family's rule. Once he is outside these city walls, he will be exiled."

I was taken aback by her harsh words, and as the princess walked into the room, hearing the commotion, I turned away before producing a long, thick, golden blade with a jeweled handle and striking off the empress's head. It was only too late that I saw the princess escorting the prince into the royal hall in chains, yet she only released him, giving him new robes—emperor's robes, complete with crown.

After their coronation together, I took him home, where he was welcomed with open arms, cheers, and comrades. This was what I loved for. I was a matriarch who cared for thousands of patriarchs, raising them to be fine leaders. This was my ambition, and I loved every second of it, so why not go for more?

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