These are the usual protagonists. Though for this, the only important ones are Matthew and Aezera. This isn't necessarily a continuation of the worst end for Matthew as the boys are still alive and the DL is dead. It's more like an alternate ending where either due to Aezera's hypnosis, Matthew's madness or both, Matthew managed to take the throne. Instead of killing his brothers, he simply banished them. So... yeah, they don't really like him anymore.
The change in this case is that I wanted to explore putting Matthew's other option in Mika's role. Yall remember Marigold?
Mari is a half dragon-half succubus that managed to land herself as a Matthew lover.
Okay so what happened in this world? Well, going through the usual events of the Talia/Marigold timeline, Talia meets the boys, falls in love with either James or Damien, gets dragged to the demon world a year earlier than expected and it ends with her and Matthew being violently shoved down into a cavern. Marigold finds them both, Talia dead and Matthew barely holding onto life.
One thing led to another and Marigold managed to bring them both back, Talia now as a demon.
But, what if, instead of Matthew convincing Marigold to go back to the human world with him, the events of the King Ending happened?
With the Demon Lord dead and the other brothers gone, Matthew takes control of the largest kingdom in the Abyssal Plains. Word of that wouldn't get back to Marigold for months. She had gone back home to continue her pottery work. She would only know who the new Eastern King is when he shows up on her doorstep, not to kidnap her (he's not that insane yet) but rather to talk to her.
He spends a few days catching up and bonding with her. She's just as lovely as he remembered, and he's just as fun as she remembered, if not a little more... manic?
Finally, at the end of his stay, he asked her to come back with him. At first, she refused. He was sweet, she wouldn't mind spending more time with him but she didn't want to be involved with all the politics of the harem. He reassured that there would be no politics. There was no harem—not even a queen— to fight with. He wanted no one else. And, if she wished, she wouldn't be a concubine or queen. Rather, she could be a part of the decor department as a ceramicist. She would just be a worker.
She thought on it. Did she really want to be involved with the royal family? And more importantly, did she really have a choice? Matthew insisted that she did but wasn't sure. Tentatively, she looked at her nomadic style and lack of really anyone who would notice or care if she vanished and, she agreed. He couldn't be happier.
And sure, he promised to make her into a worker... but he never said anything about curbing his favoritism. Most quickly figured out that this supposed new girl was a lover of his, much to her annoyance.
Finally back to the point i was before i lost hours of writing earlier today
I'm mostly sad because if it wasn't for that lost work, i would probablg be finished with this fic right now
But oh well, c'est la vie, que voulez-vous
I ain't mad about what i wrote to replace the lost parts and i will never be able to compare the two so i have decided to be proud of my writing instead
