[Queens Paradise: Prologue - The Faceless Queen]

[20:40] <!Emilybroshoujo> [Queens Paradise: Prologue - The Faceless Queen]
[20:40] <!Emilybroshoujo> A solemn silence fills the streets of the capital.
[20:41] <!Emilybroshoujo> For the first time since the beginning of the Queen's arrivals the citizens have been issued a forced curfew for their safety.
[20:41] <!Emilybroshoujo> Aldeas stands alone in the town square as a cart pulls up in the eerily quiet city.
[20:42] <!Emilybroshoujo> In the back of the cart is a large pottery vase with a lid.
[20:42] <!Emilybroshoujo> The vase is bound in chains and covered in magical seals.
[20:43] <!Emilybroshoujo> This Queen alone was given very specific travel conditions in order to allow her to participate in the peace talks.
[20:43] <!Emilybroshoujo> The Queen of the most common and feared monsters.
[20:43] <!Emilybroshoujo> The Queen of Slime... Jubilei.
[20:44] <!Emilybroshoujo> Her spawn feed mercilessly on humans sapping them of their seed and digesting them.
[20:44] <!Emilybroshoujo> Mindless... all but the most ancient of them anyway... and eternally hungry.
[20:45] <!Emilybroshoujo> Jubilei herself is unique in that she is the only Queen with absolutely no authority or control over her kin.
[20:45] <!Emilybroshoujo> It was to Aldeas' surprise that a half digested courier pigeon being controlled by a tiny parasitic slime brought a request to join the peace talks all the way from the slime pits.
[20:46] <!Emilybroshoujo> All of these precautions were taken to ensure no one was injured until Jubilei's intentions were clear.
[20:46] <!Emilybroshoujo> And now... she's in the heart of the capital.
[20:47] <!Emilybroshoujo> According to myth and legend Jubilei was turned to slime by the very first monster lord for reasons long lost to history.
[20:47] <!Emilybroshoujo> After she became the first slime over the millennia she grew in power learning to control her new amorphous form.
[20:48] <!Emilybroshoujo> Each offshoot of the slime family was born from her.
[20:48] <!Emilybroshoujo> She is worshipped by dark cults as an all consuming goddess of gluttony and avarice.
[20:49] <!Emilybroshoujo> However as she's been isolated in the dreaded Slime Pits for all of written history her true story remains unknown.
[20:49] <!Emilybroshoujo> It is Aldeas' intent to find out that story today...
[20:50] <!Emilybroshoujo> In the Throne room Lucia is intently guarded by Kendrick and his Acolytes, Zephros perched high atop the palace prepared to back up Aldeas at a moments notice.
[20:50] <!Emilybroshoujo> Sir Bradly and his men fill the streets prepared to die to protect the citizens.
[20:51] <!Emilybroshoujo> Aldeas steps forward and extends his hand unbinding the magical chains and dispelling the seals on the container.
[20:51] <!Emilybroshoujo> The lid slides off to reveal a bubbling vat of green ooze...
[20:51] <!Emilybroshoujo> [Intermission]


[20:55] <!Emilybroshoujo> [Intermission Out]
[20:56] <!Emilybroshoujo> "Huhuhuhuhu~" Echoes from the bubbling ooze in a distorted clearly inhuman voice.
[20:56] <!Emilybroshoujo> "Greetings, Lady Jubilei..." Aldeas says with a guarded expression.
[20:57] <!Emilybroshoujo> The slime raises up and begins to take shape.
[20:57] <!Emilybroshoujo> "I didn't think you'd actually allow me to attend." She says in her twisted gravelled voice.
[20:58] <!Emilybroshoujo> The slime forms into a very solid, albeit translucent, humanoid form with defined legs.
[20:59] <!Emilybroshoujo> Not nude, she has "clothing" formed of slime, a short skirt and top, as though to maintain a sense of modesty. Or at least the appearance of one.
[20:59] <!Emilybroshoujo> Her voluptuous form is still without a face as the slime swirls and undulates where her head would be.
[21:01] <!Emilybroshoujo> "Is this form approachable enough for you to converse with me, Human King?"
[21:01] <!Emilybroshoujo> "Your natural form was fine, though this one is much easier to look at." Aldeas smiles.
[21:01] <!Emilybroshoujo> "What a charmer." She says.
[21:02] <!Emilybroshoujo> "I assume you're curious why I wanted to participate in your peace conference."
[21:02] <!Emilybroshoujo> "I am." Aldeas says bluntly.
[21:03] <!Emilybroshoujo> "I require an audience with the current Monster Queen." Says the Slime Queen.
[21:04] <!Emilybroshoujo> "I won't ask why, but I'd like to know why I should trust you to be less hostile than your lesser kin." Aldeas continues.
[21:04] <!Emilybroshoujo> "Shall I start from the beginning?" She says.
[21:04] <!Emilybroshoujo> "Please." Aldeas sits on the stairs of the palace.
[21:06] <!Emilybroshoujo> [Interlude - Sins of Conscience]
[21:07] <!Emilybroshoujo> I was an Aplet, a primordial type of monster with a solid core and an amorphous body that was otherwise indistinguishable from humans.
[21:07] <!Emilybroshoujo> I was unremarkable as far as my people went but I enjoyed my life.
[21:07] <!Emilybroshoujo> This was in the time before the emergence of the first Monster Queen... Lillith.
[21:08] <!Emilybroshoujo> As I'm sure your myths tell you she was a tyrant, but you don't know any of her specific acts of horror. So I'll tell you.
[21:08] <!Emilybroshoujo> Lillith is responsible for shifting the nature of all monsters.
[21:09] <!Emilybroshoujo> Monsters, long ago, were a type of what you'd now call "Outsiders" native to this world.
[21:09] <!Emilybroshoujo> We were separate from humans but lived alongside them.
[21:09] <!Emilybroshoujo> Each type of monster had a given nature.
[21:10] <!Emilybroshoujo> Earth, Fire, Love, Healing, Magic, Faith, Courage, Anger... each of these aspects of life were encompassed into a single race.
[21:10] <!Emilybroshoujo> The Aplet were creatures born of Adaptability.
[21:10] <!Emilybroshoujo> Lillith was the first monster ever born of Lust.
[21:11] <!Emilybroshoujo> Her power was unremarkable but she had a unique ability... she could directly convert the energy in semen into magical power.
[21:11] <!Emilybroshoujo> She used this gift to store up a tremendous amount of power.
[21:12] <!Emilybroshoujo> Not just from human men but animals and male monsters as well... yes, in that age we still had our own men to breed with.
[21:12] <!Emilybroshoujo> Lillith's power grew rapidly, but she lusted for more... as was her nature.
[21:13] <!Emilybroshoujo> She reached out to greater powers... and she stole from the Archdevils and Demon Lords all of their power through temptation.
[21:13] <!Emilybroshoujo> Then she used that power to tempt the Elemental Lords.
[21:13] <!Emilybroshoujo> Then she used that power to further still tempt even the Lords of Heaven.
[21:14] <!Emilybroshoujo> All creatures were drained of their power by her until she was unstoppable.
[21:14] <!Emilybroshoujo> Then she declared herself Queen.
[21:14] <!Emilybroshoujo> She polluted all other monsters, not just of this world but of all worlds connected to this one.
[21:15] <!Emilybroshoujo> She corrupted all other aspects of nature with Lust.
[21:15] <!Emilybroshoujo> That was the first of "Lillith's Seven Sins"
[21:15] <!Emilybroshoujo> Pride. She remade the world in her image.
[21:16] <!Emilybroshoujo> There was no one who could stop her.
[21:16] <!Emilybroshoujo> She corralled all the men of the monster races. They were hers and hers alone.
[21:16] <!Emilybroshoujo> That was her second sin.
[21:16] <!Emilybroshoujo> Greed.
[21:17] <!Emilybroshoujo> She fed on them to fuel her ever increasing powers and desires... until they all died.
[21:17] <!Emilybroshoujo> That was her third sin. Gluttony.
[21:18] <!Emilybroshoujo> She searched and searched for a food source and finally realized that human men could sustain her. They vitality of humanity was such that it could never be fully drained away.
[21:19] <!Emilybroshoujo> Humans were made up of every aspect and thus lust alone could never consume them.
[21:19] <!Emilybroshoujo> And human women had all this deliciousness to themselves.
[21:19] <!Emilybroshoujo> That was her fourth sin.
[21:19] <!Emilybroshoujo> Envy.
[21:21] <!Emilybroshoujo> She tried to steal them away from their wives.
[21:21] <!Emilybroshoujo> But she could not. Fidelity was a very strong trait in early man.
[21:21] <!Emilybroshoujo> Lillith became consumed by her own aspect and developed a physiological need to breed... this was her fifth sin.
[21:21] <!Emilybroshoujo> Lust.
[21:22] <!Emilybroshoujo> Lillith created the curse of "desire" and implanted it in men to counteract fidelity.
[21:22] <!Emilybroshoujo> Even you must feel the thorny grip of that curse.
[21:23] <!Emilybroshoujo> There's no shame in it... indeed no one could blame the men who ravenously ravaged Lillith.
[21:23] <!Emilybroshoujo> But her curse was too strong.
[21:23] <!Emilybroshoujo> The desires of men were too much.
[21:23] <!Emilybroshoujo> Lillith could not please every man in the world at once, she could not reap what she had sewn.
[21:24] <!Emilybroshoujo> This led to her sixth sin.
[21:24] <!Emilybroshoujo> Lillith spread the curse of desire to all women of all races.
[21:24] <!Emilybroshoujo> In monsters it created our biological need to breed with men or suffer great illness and pain... even human women developed the curse, though in a much weaker sense.
[21:25] <!Emilybroshoujo> Lillith's sixth sin, was sloth.
[21:25] <!Emilybroshoujo> Monsters began to conflict with human society.
[21:25] <!Emilybroshoujo> We needed men, but the desires of the human women led to outcry and churches forming, claiming that to mate with a monster is sin.
[21:26] <!Emilybroshoujo> Jealousy, the fruit born from desire came into the world.
[21:26] <!Emilybroshoujo> And it was the cause of every conflict in all of history.
[21:26] <!Emilybroshoujo> Lillith no longer had the will to rule, she was growing old and tired.
[21:27] <!Emilybroshoujo> She chose a single human man and carried him away with her to the realm the monster queen resides in even now.
[21:27] <!Emilybroshoujo> There she stayed with her one mate.
[21:28] <!Emilybroshoujo> That's all desire truly requires... one mate.
[21:28] <!Emilybroshoujo> I'm sure you understand the implications of this, your majesty... but I digress.
[21:28] <!Emilybroshoujo> Lillith's final sin came when she found her human lover with another woman.
[21:29] <!Emilybroshoujo> She didn't care that they had fallen in love, she didn't care to hear their side of the story, she didn't care that the girl would have been totally happy living together with the two of them...
[21:30] <!Emilybroshoujo> She acted in rage.
[21:30] <!Emilybroshoujo> What happened to the girl... well you can probably guess.
[21:30] <!Emilybroshoujo> But the man was killed by Lilliths final sin.
[21:30] <!Emilybroshoujo> Wrath.
[21:30] <!Emilybroshoujo> As he lay dying in her arms Lillith realized what she had done.
[21:31] <!Emilybroshoujo> She had not just slain a mate, but killed the man who had become the sole object of her desire.
[21:31] <!Emilybroshoujo> She had killed her true love.
[21:31] <!Emilybroshoujo> Her heart broke.
[21:31] <!Emilybroshoujo> Literally and figuratively Lillith had suffered from the very first broken heart.
[21:32] <!Emilybroshoujo> Her will to live shattered and she, like all omnipotent beings who lose their will to exist, simply ceased to exist.
[21:32] <!Emilybroshoujo> Not in a bang, but on the tail of a gentle breeze she vanished.
[21:33] <!Emilybroshoujo> She left behind her remaining power, not that there was much by her standards... but that power gave birth to the second monster queen.
[21:33] <!Emilybroshoujo> And the lineage has passed down all the way to the current one... the eighth.
[21:34] <!Emilybroshoujo> The daughter of the one that fell in mutual destruction with your father.
[21:35] <!Emilybroshoujo> I bore my curse at first... but with each new man I fell in love with a new mindless slime was born from our union... for each slime family that exists there is a man I loved, and hurt, and had no choice but to leave behind.
[21:35] <!Emilybroshoujo> When I could bare the pain of my curse no longer I isolated myself... but my sin still scours the world feeding on unsuspecting men who had nothing to do with the infidelity my first lover and I committed.
[21:36] <!Emilybroshoujo> A wrong I wish to right now that you have given me a chance.
[21:36] <!Emilybroshoujo> [Sins of Conscience - End]
[21:36] <!Emilybroshoujo> "There you have it..."
[21:37] <!Emilybroshoujo> Aldeas stands across with a look of solemn grief in his eyes.
[21:37] <!Emilybroshoujo> "May I look upon your true face, your grace?" He asks, his voice clearly choking back tears on her behalf.
[21:38] <!Emilybroshoujo> The slime settle... it forms into a beautifully unremarkable face with short hair.
[21:38] <!Emilybroshoujo> her expression is heartbreakingly sad... but also stoic and full of determination.
[21:38] <!Emilybroshoujo> Aldeas kneels.
[21:38] <!Emilybroshoujo> "I welcome you to our peace conference, Lady Jubilei. I am humbled by you in so many ways."
[21:39] <!Emilybroshoujo> The silence is palpable as Jubilei stands smiling... and it begins to rain.
[21:39] <!Emilybroshoujo> [The Faceless Queen - End]