An Empire, Long Divided, Must Unite! (Warhammer CK2 Myrimidian Quest) Fantasy (2024)

Turn 24

2538 IC

Outside of your kingdom, a world burns as war ravages. Mannfred Von Carstein, master of the vampires, raises up in bloody minded rebellion against the Mortal rulers of the Empire, countless bodies risen up to serve him. More and more flock, every day, to his banner as Stirland is placed under brutal and bloody siege by the undead; and the whole of the Empire rises to war against him. Tens of thousands have already perished despite the brevity of their encounters thus far. Dwarf runes burn against the undead, and all is woe but for the sacrifice of life on a scale hitherto unforeseen.

And in Bretonnia? A kingdom weakened by Civil War. For finally an heir to Mallobaude, slain on his father's own blade, has been found. Carloman has taken up the black-and-gold, a squire once to the Black Knight now leading his armies once again in revolt. And this, after the Year of Woe and the Storm of Chaos and the battle with the Iron Orcs and the Liberation of Athel Loren ended in the deaths of so many good knights. The kingdom is mighty, yes. Indeed it ever has been. Its soil is rich and its Damsels wise; but none can lose so much life so often and be in the greatest condition. The noble flower of Chivalry is bled white.

And you can do nothing. Every wound you suffered under Vizra aches when you move at more than a walk-- it was a miracle you managed to lead Verde in the single fight you had last year-- and even now the surgeon's guild and the Emerald Wind Seekers are trying to heal you with all manner of experimental potions and treatments, with limited but certainly not enough, success as your body needs time to fight off the weaknesses produced in it by the minotaur's blade.

So you do not focus on that.

Instead you turn to your youngest daughter, sitting in the study with you as you scribble out some paperwork and try to make some kind of plan, some kind of contribution, something, anything to make sure that these undead do not spiral out of control and slaughter your people soon enough.

She giggles, her hair black in the sunlight. She looks eerily like you, but for the eyes, black and dark as an eagle's, more akin to Ines than to you in that regard. It had taken so much effort-- conversations with your son to spread your version of events, letters from priests, La Aquila Ultima's own assurances and more-- to convince the world that she was safe; and even now you hear in the Empire that they whisper of a beastmen lover, a mad king.

This is better than they say in your kingdom. If you could duel, there would be many fewer nobles attempting to say such things because they would not have throats or tongues with which to speak by the time you were finished.

She giggles in that way only an infant that has amused herself can.

"You are worth it, you know." You are speaking to your daughter, even though she is by far too young to understand anything you are saying. "Because you do not belong in a forest, huddled around a fire, trying to rip a bit of meat away from the savages. You belong with your family, here, as the princess you truly are."

For indeed she is. While some may claim vile things, as the story has spread those with wisdom have recognized what has happened as a miracle of the greatest order indeed, a victory in the flesh and in the blood over the Great Foe. A sign that for all their power and all their might, in their unthinking arrogance they have failed. They sought to sew despair in your spirit; and instead they have been made the fools they ever were.

Martial: Walther has stepped into his roll as your Master at Arms admirably, though in fairness he did inherit your brother's work. Having finally replaced your arquebuses with muskets, he is very interested in increasing the number of artillery you have around. Both in terms of raw quantity and in variety. He is in fact growing rather insistent on the point.

Increased Defenses: You already built small fortresses to protect the coast from raiders. However, as they rather strongly proved last year, raiders can (with ruinous losses for themselves, admittedly) make their way through the fortresses you established and attack further inland, if they are serious about the matter. This is not overly shocking as they are, by and large, camps with walls. But you could improve them, and significantly, by placing several mortars in each camp and therefore allowing you to rain heavy fire on the Norscans. Admittedly placing them as exactly as you would like will be difficult, but it should have high effect on any invader coming from the east.

- You originally planned only to add mortars. But with the wickedness stirring to the north, plans have changed. Simple wood walled camps no longer suffice for the foe that seeks to test themselves against you; and so you have done much, much more. Stone walls rise up high, earthern ramparts ensuring any attempt to rush them on foot is a fruitless endeavor, filled to the brim with alchemic concoctions by the Guilds; the least potent of these mixtures burns and burns and burns, no matter what attempts to smother it, if lit. Emplaced cannons are sighted along the coast and about the walls to allow heavy artillery fire to rain down like hell from any position, and a small arsenal of basic crossbows and grenades have been established so that any villagers fleeing can be turned to the defense, shooting down from the, admittedly somewhat thin walls or the single tower they all hold. What was already and unpleasant fight with simple geometry becomes like trying to storm hell itself, any camp capable of holding off ten-times its number. Capable being the operative word there.
Reward: Increase fortifications along the coast

Bretonnian Intervention: The Army of Granoa might be deployed to aid the Bretonnians. Their king has shown remarkable leniency to foreign mages, and it is his word that is law in such a matter. But their pride is wounded, and deeply. Duke Huebald was in dire enough straits, in a serious enough situation, to look beyond this; but whether others of Bretonnia will is more of a question.
Needed:30 Rolled: 91+10=101

- There is a stalemate, at first. The Bretonnians are tired of foreign intervention in their affairs. Tired of others testing their dedication to their oaths and vows and codes. Tired of all of these things and more. The Duke of Carcassone and of Aquitaine are in agreement; but the squabbling nobles of Brionne, with their duke dead and no heir found, are less convinced.

"I will lead them."

Your son says as much; and that gets the Bretonnians even angrier. He was a rival to several of the barons' children, friendly for a certain quality of the word but nevertheless. And so they insist that he be allowed to lead his ragtag band of infantry so they can show him how true warriors fight. He leads well, fighting from the front and with good advice, his pride seeming to allow him to crush any dissent under sheer force of personality. So, the Bretonnians march to Brionne, and within weeks have made a good accounting of themselves.
Reward: Bretonnian Intervention

- Effective communication is key in war. Any great martial deed demands coordination on every level, from the lowly officers to the commander of the force entire. With it, you can despite being outnumbered by twelve-thousand and your formation scrambled by giants manage to eke out a victory. Without it, you can end up with your singularly unbeatable force split into two easily crushed portions, and thousands of your abominable army dead on the ground with nothing to show for it except a sign saying "I got used as a patsy by the Skaven, come and call me a dumbass." So, working with your daughter, who spends considerably more time with the lower officers, whether Cabo or Sergento Mayor. Through this, you can convince the lower ranks of the wisdom of your plan; and through them, you can speak more effectively with the higher ranks. And through that, you shall coordinate and crush.

Office of the Navy: Your brother, Alessander, has taken quick, effective control of the Office of Master at Sea. With a full contingent of thirty-five ships he has become someone to notice on the seas.

The Bay of Quietude not only has direct access to Javea, but also to your capital, Magritta, but it is wide open except for the armed merchant ships that ply it. Rather than tolerating this potential threat, you may establish citadels, settlements, on the narrow points where the west and east shore are not more than twenty-five miles apart. It will be expensive, but it will also make attacking your capital from sea particularly unpleasant.

- Construction continues, with small gunpowder stores finally established.

The Druchii are poking around Tilea and, by extension, Estalia. Whether or not they mean to attack you is mostly up to them, but you can slow the matter by thwacking them a good few times at sea. Of course, with your luck they'll pull a Black Arc out of nowhere or something else out of the mind of some mad god; but if it works it should make them rethink a few things. They are starting to send more; if you want to fight them, now would be good.
Needed:50 Rolled: 34+10=44

- The druchii are tenacious, and further manage to slip past your patrols. Months of effort turn up nothing, and yet stories of villages on the coast of both Estalia and Tilea disappearing into the ever-hungry maw of the Witch Kingdom fill the air with a palpable dread. You don't fight them and lose-- you don't fight them at all. Embarrassing and enraging in equal measure. The only ones who report any kind of success are the Bold Bowmen, by virtue of getting to fly, and even that is mostly letting you deploy men a few times before they land, making them sail off rather than disembark and risk getting set on fire by what your Iris Guild is calling "Myrmidia's Blood." Nasty stuff.
-FAILURE-

Maria is a loving, kind, noble soul, who knows how people think, what they desire, and how deep runs that desire. She also has an unhealthy lust for the elves. Her taste in men is sh*t, but then, people said the same thing about your mother and that produced you.

You should have sufficient production to sell weapons abroad for the foreseeable future, your brother having finished his gun shop. Not the most advanced stuff, certainly not at first, but arquebuses and mortars, at the very least, ought to be easy sells. You no longer have such easy clients as Pavona, instead you will have to actually compete with the accursed Talabeclanders, may their bones be crushed under the weight of their fat heads.

- There are any number of cities currently in need of weapons. Teshert, in Araby, stands easily poised to be crushed under a wave of orcs or Skaven, whichever one should win their current war in Karak Drazh. Mortars and muskets-- artillery to blow up hordes, armor piercing firearms to ensure any that survive won't for much longer-- are carried on your merchant vessels, where they rapidly see use against the vast hordes of the enemy.

In Praag, they have a constant need for guns, but not just any: reliable, well tested blackpowder weapons are worth their weight in aluminum, so terrible is the weather; better a gun they believe can shoot than a more advanced one that won't. So arquebuses and falconetes, highly tested systems that, even under the blizzard, function more often than not at worst, which is high praise for an Estalian gun maker.

And in Tilea, Trantio, for all it has decided to throw itself behind the League in spite of its being established by their traditional rivals, Pavona, has not forgotten that "traditional rival" part and wants to have an ace in the hole, better than just their Eagle Guard. So you send them the works.

And a whole bunch of money makes its way to you.

You are not anywhere near the limits of your production, but you could see them over the horizon, in fairness.
Reward: +1,200 Gold per turn in trade from selling guns to Teshert, Praag and Trantio

You will need to spend a great amount of effort convincing the Bretonnians and the Imperials to let you help them, if that is indeed your desire. It's farcial, but it's also a fact of life.

- Your son goes on a whirlwind tour of Bretonnia and the Empire, carried by merchants, where he meets and speaks and delegates and makes promises with a hundred-hundred nobles of both, carrying your seal. "Isn't this what we exist for, to fight evil?" "Isn't that the duty?" "Does not Sigmar demand we send the wolves back to their lairs?" "Does not the Lady demand Chivalry?" "Does not Ulric demand battle against evil?" Under the sheer weight of his personality, his pride and prowess with the written word, those who continue to try and argue simply fall apart against a man who has never thought he was wrong in his entire life.

With any sources of potential dissent silent for the moment, the Emperor and the King alike can be more willing to let you interfere and trust in your good intent without having to worry about the aristocrats, though the worry does still exist.
Reward: Increase COS for Imperial/Bretonnian Intervention

Intrigue: Catalina is a thing of plot, shadow, deception, and cruelty, who hungers for revenge against the upper crust who betrayed and ruined her and her life. Having found it in serving you, you can be reasonably sure that she is loyal, for whatever value loyalty has when speaking of a matter which you are no fit hand in; though far from an incompetent, too. She has cautioned you, however, that you may, especially with the new stakes you are playing for, never have absolutely perfect, trustworthy information. Catherine has already settled in and offered her services to Catalina, her agents merging well with the already present and, furthermore, with her mad efforts ensuring the kingdom can do more with its time. (Advisor bonus increased to 15)
(Pick 2, gained +1 action from your daughter in law)

The Skaven holds of the countryside are, to all appearances, entirely minor ports, rest stops really, for clan Sleekit; small places where their vile fleets could rest, waiting for the day you no longer paid attention, then usher in an era of verminous death.

Well it will not be.

You hope to start this subtly: sneaking in agents, windseekers particularly, to assassinate, infiltrate, purge, burn, and otherwise render these holds unusable. As secrecy is their security this is possible, if difficult.
Needed: 40 Rolled: 32+15=47

- It comes down the grapevine from the High Elves. The Skaven are starting to actually toss a few accurate names in their cloud of "who do we need to worry about and try to kill" particularly as regards the Wind Seekers, who do have a bad habit of leaving a mess behind them. You think this year you will need to lay low when your daughter-in-law drops a plan on your head. She calls it "Operation: Sea Gull." You give the okay.

Six months later, sailors, pirates, mercenaries and adventurers, paid a copious sum of money, attack various Skaven operations within the city: known informants, warpstone peddlers, supply points where their few tunnels still stand. The attacks are brutal, explosions of violence that rip throughout the city and the countryside in a storm of lead and steel that leaves many dead.

Casualties are relatively light on both sides, but then immediate dead Skaven was never the goal. No, the goal was to create enough noise and distraction for your hammer, to shatter their glass:

Bombs.

It will be very, very dicey but you could have your Silver Wind Seekers journey to the Empire and Bretonnia specifically to assassinate necromancers where they can, throwing the enemy force into disarray. Of course, vampires will also be targeted where possible but their mortal servants are both considerably easier to kill and considerably more permanent in the dying.
Needed:40 Rolled: 92

-Your Silver Wind Seekers and Inquisitors are dispatched, under alias, to the Empire and to Bretonnia. They are not to be seen using their magic.

Their goal is simple: to kill necromancers.

And by the gods, they kill necromancers. Candido the Rotwood, wielder of the Living Deadwood Staff, heir of Sycamo? His Charneval is swallowed by living mists, and his body is simply not found by his apprentices. The Coven Throne of the Red Tide explodes in a burst of gunpowder and magic, half of the thing swallowed in a conflagration of prismatic fire fueled by the Winds themselves. In Stirland, the Black Tide Coven find their leader dead and his body hung on the walls of Vorderbergen, left dancing the hangman's jig from the tallest tower they have. Bombs, fire, magic, all are turned towards the war against the undead and their necromatic slaves, relieving a great much of the pressure within both the Empire and Bretonnia.
Reward: Improve anti-Undead rolls

If the Inquisition wishes to have power over the lives and deaths of others, then they should have to justify themselves and well. But there is something to be said, as well, for knowing what demands the duty they take on places on them. Catherine, therefore, suggests establishing a Branch within the Inquisition itself, staffed by outsiders but advised by senior, trustworthy members, to examine suspicious behavior so you may more efficiently question them when things go wrong.

- Corruption. The Inquisition was founded to seek it, to hunt for it and to find it. But that does not make it immune to it itself. A more mundane kind, the sort of general malaise established when men are given power and authority, even if not so much as they might receive...elsewhere. Or ground down, turned to mindless cynicism, by the weight of the job and the awful things it so often demands. You need some way to make sure these men do not slay your subjects, your people, in paranoia; but by that same token you must ensure that they are not so paralyzed by fear of consequences that they do not discharge their needed and necessary duties, insofar as they exist. So you set to work establishing an office within the bureaucracy dedicated to that and that exactly. It will take time, but it should exist soon enough.

Beatrice is an architect, and a pretty good one at that, at least when she isn't feeling...experimental. The problem, of course, is that that happens surprisingly often.

While they are, no doubt, arrogant, rude, and sure of themselves even by the standards of Elves, the blacksmiths of Caledor are, without a doubt, the finest in the world (and yes, that includes Dwarfs) excepting Estalian swordmakers, of course. Though they are loathe to leave their mountainous home, they are even more loathe to owe a favor to humans; and so the craftsmen of Caledor are willing to come and instruct blacksmiths in your land for a time, increasing both their quality and quantity in considerably less time than it would have taken you to do it.

- So it turns out, the best way to make the Caledorians act normal is to meet them with an unhealthy amount of your own pride. The blacksmiths of Estalia, especially Magritta, have ever produced the finest swords in the world; and so they are willing to barb back when the Caledorians, in their arrogance, try to insult them. You've heard blow outs you would have thought meant murder was on the horizon, only for the elf and erstwhile not-quite-apprentice to later visit the inns and coffeehouses together.

In any case, with this new Caledorian wisdom your blacksmiths are starting to creating more armor and weapons fit to the task of matching your swords. They are still far from done with their education, however, with more to learn from their Caledorian teachers.

The world is full of things that merit killing. Orcs, goblins, Skaven, all merit a swift, painful death-- though either quality can be forfeited, if necessity demands it. You happen to craft the weapons which are necessary for the deadening of things-- having invested, and heavily, into the blacksmiths of Buraviz you now have, well, not an infinite stockpile to sell, but enough that it should be quite some time before you have to invest in more smiths to do the job.

- There is always a need for weapons; and so you will fill it. The Bretonnians of Parravon, under Cassyon, are searching for a source of weapons and armor to arm the vast groups of men at arms and cavalry marching to Mousillon, and with your production they can. Fine Estalian swords and sets of armor make their way north to the chivalric armies, where are used by Knight and common alike to present a firmer wall in the face of the enemy. And of course, they want crossbows too.

The Remans, meanwhile, to prove their investment into the League, are attempting to spread their Eagle Guard throughout the League. But for that they have a need for weapons and armor. The flamboyant protectors of VIPs within the Senate, and the Alta Aquila, nevertheless they are highly trained and highly deadly, having stood many times outnumbered and yet ensured the safe passage of their charge.

And finally, in Kislev, Tzaritsa Katarina seeks weapons and armor to arm the troops she is recruiting for her new forts all along the Eastern Oblast. Finely made shields, painted in the colors of Kislev, make their way north. Axes, shiny-bright under Myrmidia's sun and both light and strong, feed into the new armies. Sets of mail harness, which shifts and moves with ease and yet will stop the arrows of the Kurgan raiders, is adopted readily and quickly by the Kossars, no doubt eager to have more protection. All of this and more makes their way to the Tsardom, to stand against Chaos.
Reward: +600 Gold, begin selling weapons to Kislev, Tilea, and Parravon

Your brother is a genius, no doubt about it, with a mind greater, perhaps, than even yours, and now that Anja has calmed him down, he is even tolerable in large doses. He does still need some real, larger facilities for his work, though. But then he always does. He is actually starting to feel a bit more content, you think, with a wife and family. There is nothing greater than to live for another, after all.

Having constructed her fiery statue which may be used to draw in Aqshy, Natalina would now like to begin working to improve it by crafting a similar device though, rather than merely drawing in extant Winds, it will shift the unaffiliated winds to Aqshy, making them more available for use by your Ruby Wizards.

According to Natalina, the High Elves already have various devices which can do this. As they owe you more than a little, at least by their own accounting, they would be willing to allow her to study one.

- As Natalina said, the High Elves do indeed own such a device. The Dragon Mages of Caledor, to help ensure they always have Aqshy with which to feed their dragons, have created such places. Loathing more the idea of owing the humans than the idea of sharing what is, to their mind, a trifle, one of the Dragon Mages visits the Ruby Guild Hall, and together he and Natalina work out how to convert the thing to function somewhere that isn't Ulthuan, where the air is syrup-thick with magic and every baker knows enough magic to maintain the thing.

What they come up with is, essentially, a wagon and, in the case of Natalina, a brazier filled with a mixture of oil and charcoal that has ancient runes of elvish inscribed on it, though obviously the other guilds will require something else. Pulled by a team of horses, it moves slowly, carefully, to ensure the fire does not accidentally spark and set the thing on fire, though the leaden lining should reduce the issues in this case. The Winds of Magic...look, it's all rather over your head, you aren't a wizard, but the long and short of it is, the fire within burns as the fire without. Similar vehicles will have to be designed and created for the other Guilds, though with the already extant model to work off of and with the Dragon Mage's possible help it should take considerably less time than it would if you were doing it without.
Reward: Mystic War Wagons, mighty, ponderous but mobile hard points of a specific wind. They ensure a reasonably consistent supply of the wind is available.

Though it would take a considerable amount of time and effort, Natalina could help produce a statue similar to her Ruby construction for her fellow Guilds. This would allow some of their wizards to be considerably better in battle.

- Made of pure ivory, the stuff of bones ripped of corpses, the thing they make is a massive sundial that seems, in your case, to always point towards the height of noon even as others speak of the little hours of the morning or the blackest depths of night. You have a few theories of what that means, you hardly need to be a wizard to figure out what it's gesturing at, but you prefer not to speak of them. Unlike the other Guilds, who have placed their statues of power within the deepest places of their Guildhalls the Lilac Windseeker have placed it right in the antechamber, on a balcony overlooking the world guarded day and night by apprentices and, no doubt, others you simply have not seen. It is a solemn place in the darkness. The wizards who study it emerge changed, and more the terrible.
Reward: Increase COS for targeted assassinations, +1 Gale Caller (Dispatched to the army of Buraviz) Wind Hunters 7->8 per Tercio

Even the lowliest of peasants and Norscans, obvious exceptions aside, understand that it is healthier to be clean than dirty. So why some surgeons seem to believe they do not need to wash their hands before they operate will never not be beyond you. Whatever the case, you cannot find it within yourself to give a damn. Pay a whole bunch of money to more reasonable members of the guild and watch as your people's health skyrockets.

- You begin a campaign, tossing money to surgeons who are willing to argue in public with those who do not believe in such cleanliness, putting up posters advising people only to seek business--whether as barber or surgeon-- from those willing to perform this basic hygienic maneuver, and on and on. Not, of course, that these stubborn idiots seem likely to break quickly; but as money dries up and business goes to more cleanly individuals, they should find it within themselves to look beyond their idiotic pride and just give themselves the quick once over such work really does demand, gentleman or no. By this time next year either they will have gotten with the program or they'll be out of business and replaced by someone better.

Arcantose has returned in glory. Whatever you may think of him for going awol in the first place, it is hard to be mad that the Undead were slain; so you will let it fall like rain from the feathers of your eagle.

Temples, Temples Everywhere: Right now, there is only one truly great Temple of Myrmidia in Estalia: Magritta. All others fail to meet her grandeur, her splendor, her glory and absolute honor! Therefore, you will build these righteous temples, and make plain to all the World, and all Estalia, and all the nations her glory! Rather than forcing your sister to spend all of her time and effort on these matter, you will hire local architects.

- Construction continues.

The Morrites of Tilea, where they have their capital, are rearing to march to the Empire and to Bretonnia to smite some undead. The problem, of course, is that they are currently busy trying to rebuild after the massive amounts of warfare that have struck the peninsula of late. But your priests of Morr are of a less marshal bent, with a surprising amount focusing on Morr as the god of dreams rather than death and all. Still, they could take care of the Tileans' duties, allowing them to march north and east.

All you'll need to do is convince the priests of Morr in Estalia of that...

- The Priests of the father are still rather unhappy with you. You catch it from all corners as they lecture you day and night and night and day for the sheer irresponsibility of enabling these heathen to violate the realm of Morr. By the end you can spout their main points blindfolded and half-asleep; not, of course, that you would ever disrespect a priest in such a way. But eventually they stop bloviating and start listening to what you are saying, rather than attempting to relitigate last year's mistake at you again and again and again. Though they do have to convene inside of Magritta, by the end in a vote of 10 yeses, seven noes, they agree to dispatch priests to take on the duties within Tilea and allow the Cult in Tilea, as dominated as they are by Morr as god of death, to head North where you very rapidly start to hear of priests ensuring the dead stay dead and within their graves, or of course, smiting the undead.
Reward: Priests of Morr in Tilea head north to battle the undead, improving anti-undead rolls

You have duties to yourself and to your family, as well as to the Kingdom.

You can overwork yourself, sacrificing personal time for getting a bit more done. If nothing else you can do more paperwork for your advisors, freeing them to focus on actually important stuff, like doing their jobs. You know, that thing you pay them for?

- You, having nothing better to do, help a great amount in preparing the Army of Granoa to march without you.

Your daughter is attempting to work the carcass of the beast she killed into something more useful, for all that the matter is somewhat grim. Already she works tirelessly, day and night, with explosions of roiling mist and bright lights constantly appearing in her laboratory window, but with your patronage she could make an earth shattering work.
Rolled: 100+7
- You spare no expense in feeding your daughter resources, mystical reagents, experimental metals, all of this and more make their way to her as she experiments with the beast's carcass. In the end she creates a mighty talisman, an amulet of power, created from the thing's heart. As a beast of raw tyranny and of power, it seems it should not have much connection to the subtle whims of Ulgu according to your daughter, who you are generally inclined to trust. And yet nevertheless she twists the power of his tyranny to strike at the confusion-inducing fear ever present within the thing's nature. He fed on dread and dominance and so sewed the sort of chaos, disorder and raw confusion that only such power can create to sew fear, dread, and a sense of bafflement among the foe.

And so your daughter has turned to that and made it so that this thing causes a general aura of fear. The effect is strong when desired, though it weakens as more targets are trapped within it-- a hundred men are filled with a general dread and malaise. Ten are afflicted by shakes and tremors as terrors seem to spring ever more to life. One man, trapped within it, might fling himself onto his sword. The thing itself is a diadem of silver, worked to appear like the wings of some beast emerge from to hold aloft a precious gem.

In fact, that-- the gem, that is-- is the thing's heart.
Reward: Cristina creates the Diadem of Despair, sewing confusion, discord, bafflement and fear among the foe to varying but great intensity depending on how many people she uses it against

You did not kneel and bow and beg and scrape to save one daughter, only to turn away from the other. Ines hurts. Offer her what comfort you can, talk to her, at least make her aware that whatever else happens you are her father and you will stand with her no matter what.
Needed:??? Rolled: 29+7=36

- You find your daughter staring out the window, looking out at the great city.

"So..."

"I'm not normal." She turns to you, and you can see that the past months have been harder than hard upon her. There are bags under her eyes, her hair is left undone and a mess, there are wounds all across her body from training to try and ignore what she is thinking, what she is feeling.

Not that you'd know anything about that, of course.

"Normal is grossly overrated." You hug her and she lets you. "If I were a normal king, we wouldn't be having this conversation."

"Not all abnormality is born the same, father. You were abnormal in your ambition, in your need to forge a country, in your willingness to welcome magic, in how you have turned your power to benevolence rather than as its own end. I enjoy hurting people, feeling flesh split under my sword and hearing their cries. This is not the same thing."

"Yes, and I enjoy power for its own sake because I deserve it. I stare down demi-gods because I can't...not...do it, I keep getting myself beaten like bread-dough because nobody else could ever measure up to my skill. If you are not normal, girl, it is because no-one else in this family is."

"Holding an over-inflated opinion of your ability and enjoying not just sweet victory, but the coating of viscera on you, the screams of pain and the cries that follow are not the same thing. I was not born to be a mere murderer, I have been told this since I was a child so why does something in my very soul seem to enjoy it? Why, in the face of others' woe do I find myself exulting in it? I do not know." She shakes her head and pulls away from you, back towards the window. "I don't know. But I swear by the time I have returned from Bretonnia, I will find out."
Reward:???
--
Family Events:

Stillborn:

Pregnant: Your sister in law, Anja, is now with child.