The journey so far had been peaceful enough on the road to Howla ’tmuhn but suddenly on the third day of the journey all that changed.

“The Princess is in there,” a strange voice howled. “Maybe she’d like to join my party.”

A stranger (and he was very strange indeed) wearing a soup put on his head and armed with a ladle came dashing out of the undergrowth, and made a beeline towards the carriage. Now usually whenever a Princesses carriage is rushed a guard is easily able to handle it. But then assailants aren’t usually wearing a soup pan helmet, baking tray breastplate, and waving aloft a bloody serving tool. (At least not if they are over the age of ten.) They also don’t usually run headfirst into the side of the carriage at full tilt, damned near knock themselves out, then stand up for another run at it. Especially not the side with a complete absence of door when even on the side with the door in it the door opens outwards.

“Don’t worry princess, I’ll free you yet” he ranted, trying to peel away the side panel, which would probably have worked better if 1. The panels weren’t reinforced, 2. he didn’t make grandfather time look like a young whippersnapper, and 3. He didn’t have the muscle density of a particularly wimpy single strand of rice noodle that had definitely not been cooked in spinach.

Then of course complication 5 hit, in this instance complication 5 going by the name Sir Leeroy, and the hit being literal. The attacker went down in a single hit, and was carefully restrained on the roof rack.

“Send a message to my father please Addy, I was hoping for a break this leg of the journey, but as per usual it seems circumstances have conspired to take that away, AGAIN. So there’d better at least be a place to swim at the next place, a swimming baths or something.”

Once the intruder was properly secured they were off again, but it seemed that a peaceful trip was not on the cards, as they were beset by dozens of people calling themselves “heroes” armed with the most outlandishly ridiculous weapons imaginable. Who seemed determined to rescue her from her own guards. (How the hell apart from the armoured guards these weirdos figured out Mibbet was a Princess was a mystery for the ages. Yet somehow they did.)

Once captured (upon regaining consciousness obviously,) they ranted and raved about a “system” and a mission. Insisting on absolute nonsense reasons why they could be tied, while insisting that once they were free they would wreak vengeance, as the system had now told them that she had turned to evil. (Which was news to Mibbet, who still felt bad about hurting a gargantuan tentacle beast that had tried to eat her because “it seemed nice”, so her conversion to evil must have been part of an unbelievably subtle conspiracy that even she was not privy to. That or as seemed to be the more likely answer in the circumstances they were driven completely doolally by something, and would probably believe in a conspiracy run by kiwi fruit if this “system” whatever the hell that was suggested it.)

Three attacks, two harem invitations, and one person running off to slay a dragon, clad in the holy armour (most of us call that particular apparel tighty whities, and they were decidedly unholy to behold) later the city was finally in sight, and it was truly breathtaking to behold.

It was probably not advisable to take a breath though, as the prisoners seemed like they had been out in the woods for a few days, without the benefit of hot water. As they drew closer they were forced to push through several more wannabe heroes armed and armoured in everything from actual plate, to a pickle barrel, and all manner of wild and wonderful things in between. More than once a “hero” charged the horses, who with a contempt that even Rascal had to admire (when a cat admires your contempt you can safely call it a professional review,) unfurled a wing each to smack them aside. Those less fortunate got a lesson in how many directions a horse can kick, bite, stomp, or poop in, (answer is all of them and they are really really good at it.) Before eventually they drew close to the gate.

However this posed a problem, as the weirdo’s actually formed bigger and bigger parties, and the titles they assigned to her grew more and more elaborate. So far Mibbet had gone from Saintess, to Princess, to Corrupted Princess, to Demon Touched Princess, to actual Demon Princess, to Demon queen, to Prophesied demon queen who will one day destroy the world. All because she was trying to get into the city.

“Addy perhaps tell my father there’s some kind of mass hysteria here, we’ll figure out a way in and investigate”. Mibbet said, as Addy did just that. She also tried to get a message through to the residents explaining they were coming in, but there wasn’t a single construct inside the city. So that really wasn’t an option here.

As they stood in the shadows of the gate itself they noticed something, this was a city of humanoids, yet so far every one of their attackers thus far had been human, or near human with not a single Garuw in sight.

“I don’t like the look of this at all” Errol muttered, and a few moments later his words were proven justified, as from a side gate a large and heavily armed squad of Garuw emerged, levelling their weapons at the carriage.

A small and officious looking Garuw, of the Chee wawa clan, clad in armour rather too bulky for them strode forward. “State your business” He snarled, (it was a good snarl too, most impressive. The Garuw do have a natural advantage in this field.)

“Princess Rosalind Von Harmsworth, here on tour of the domain.” Mibbet replied calmly.

“Well lah de dah, this one fancies herself a Princess, that’s a new one.”

Mibbet’s only response was to reach out and unfurl her official diplomatic papers, featuring rather prominently the royal seal.

Seeing that the compact commander went pale, he really didn’t think that as career directionality want that causing a diplomatic incident was conducive to advancement. “Oh PUDDLES” he muttered to himself.