You choose war. You have a reputation to uphold after all, and you reason that it’d be good to overthrow the abusive rulers of the neighboring kingdom and put an ally on the throne. For purely selfish reasons of course. Just a means of expanding your empire, nothing more. And luckily for you, you have a guest who will likely be more than happy to help if you were to ask her.
But that can wait. Your guest is tired, jumpy, and understandably in need of time to rest and recover. You won’t need her help for the warfare aspect anyway. You ensure your demonic servants will protect her with their lives and make her feel safe and welcome. Then you set aside some time in your busy schedule of conquest to check on the poor girl. Purely to determine whether she’s in prime condition for manipulating, of course. Your future puppet ruler will be more likely to cooperate if you build a solid foundation of respect and trust, after all.
Years of serving as the Dark Lord have taught you that your minions work harder when you treat them well. So you provide your young guest with everything she requests, within reason of course. She says she hasn’t slept well lately because her stuffed animal was left behind when she fled home. You ask if there are any other things of hers she misses from her old home. With a now completed list, you send your most covert operatives to the enemy palace to execute a most wicked heist of a stuffed animal and the princess’s dog dubbed Sir Meatball, as well as a few books she would read for comfort. You congratulate yourself on how evil it is of you to steal a dog. And just for good measure you have your minions perform reconnaissance on the palace. You’ll have to invade it soon anyway. May as well multitask.
The interesting thing is the hero the enemy sends to fight you. The chosen one it would seem, although it continues to baffle you how young he is. Young and impressionable. He barely knows how to hold that magic sword he wields. It’s barely light enough for him to lift. You send your winged minions to carry him toward your evil castle of dread and terror. You greet him at the landing pad on the roof. He insists on dueling you, even as his sword shakes in his sweaty palms. The prophecy says he will defeat you in a one-on-one duel. Very well, you decide. If something goes wrong you have medics on hand. You wouldn’t want someone to die from a friendly duel. He’s no match for you, you soon find. You humor him for a while. He obviously came a long way to duel you after all, and you can tell he’s trying very hard to hit you with that sword. You give him a few passing tips as you fight, and he thanks you awkwardly.
Then the princess interrupts your duel. “Maximus!” She chides, “you promised to take me dragon riding this afternoon!”
You turn to your dark secretary of doom, Jerry, who squints at the evil schedule of hopelessness and cries out. “Ah! She’s right, my lord. My sincerest apologies.”
“That’s alright, my faithful minion,” you say while holding the tip of the chosen’s sword between two fingers. “This whole duel thing was a bit of a spontaneous thing, and I should have looked at the schedule first.” You look down at the boy. “I’m sorry, child, but it seems I have a commitment to fulfill with the dear princess. Can we reschedule this duel for a later date?”
“Wh-what? No! The duel has already started, you can’t just back out like that!” He says, trying with all his might to pry his sword free from your grip.
“Very well,” you say with a sigh. “In that case, I forfeit, and you win the duel by default. There, that fulfills the prophecy. Would you like a ride home?”
The chosen one blinks with shock. “I-“
“Oh, what am I saying? You’ve come all this way, you must be exhausted. You ought to stay for dinner later. We’re having doom chicken soup of eternal darkness! It’s absolutely to die for.”
The boy looks at the princess quizzically. She assures him it’s just normal chicken soup. You vehemently deny this, saying you’re evil cook of evilness Frederick is supernaturally good at his job, and to refer to the fruits of his labor as “just normal soup” would be an insult to all the work he puts in.
You take the princess dragon-riding, and later that evening during dinner the chosen one breaks down crying. You ask him what’s wrong. He opens up about his confusion. He’d spent his entire journey up on this point dreading the responsibility thrust upon him. He’d barely survived several encounters with monsters and demons and now that he’s here, he’s questioning his entire perspective. After all, he says, you’ve been treating him better than anyone ever did back home and despite the spiky black armor you seem so genuinely kind. He doesn’t know what to do, he confesses.
You reassure him that no one expects anything of him, and that he can stay as long as he’d like, or he could simply go back home in the morning. You won’t stop him. He says he still has to fulfill the other half of the prophecy, freeing the princess from those who would cause her harm. The princess assures him that she is not in any danger where she is, and that if he really wants to fulfill the prophecy he ought to help you overthrow her parents.
And so you adopt kid number two.
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