Lord Joyde The Madman: Heylo, everybody! How are you all doing?

Ohai there!

How are you all?

I'm doing pretty fine.

Already cooked up a 1k+ days character in Mount And Blade: Warband.

Alice Pendragon just hit level 42 in the game and conquered her 6th castle so far!

Lets see if I can manage to use my experience to the benefit of this story!

Don't mind me guys and girls! I'm just a line break...

A few hours later... - City Of Marrowdorf - Alice's Point Of View...

Having finished up the battle, I've decided to set up a temporary camp near Tibalds city of hunters. It held true to his description of it, as many of the city's inhabitants wore thick leathers instead of cloth and nearly every third person in sight had a long hunting bow strapped on their shoulders. Women all seemed to be carrying bloodied butcher knives and cleavers alike, with young men hauling freshly killed wildlife of all shapes and sizes.

This was the city closest to the battlefield and, much to Tibalds displeasure, it would serve as a staging area for me to make sense of the mess that was a battle of this size. I was currently seated at a makeshift throne hastily carved out of the nearby woodland trees. It looked more like the throne of an Orcish Jarl than anything else."Milady, the young prince has demanded to meet you quickly. It would appear that he is terrified of what might happen to him and has mostly resigned himself to his fate at this point." One of my retainers said as he entered my war tent.

"Then bring him in. I have several thousands worth of antagonized men and women alike to deal with... might as well be rid of the Princeling first." My words sent shivers down the mans spine, most likely due to the fact that he misunderstood my intentions. Soon after, Ulfo was brought into my tent."Hmm... how refined is your cruelty, your sadistic persona that you wish to let these.. peasants see how you punish me? Cheh, might be better to die here than live long enough to marry you." He spat on the ground before my feet, his aggressive antics earning him some respect.

Though others may find him arrogant and vain, I find it... charmingly brave."You've demanded that my men bring you to me first, even when I have much more important business to deal with than you right now. I should assume that you actually have something important to say, something to tell me that might just save your life. If so, then stop with this frigid and time-wasting behaivor and speak!"

Ulfo appeared to be taken aback."... not the response I was expecting." He seemed to mutter something in a low tone but I was unable to catch it. Taking in a breath, he sighed and finally began to speak."I.. I don't have anything to tell you that would make it so you spare my life but perhaps you have the time to hear my story? After all, unlike what you told your soldiers before the battle, I do actually have a reason to do what I have done.. or well, tried to do, anyways."

"That I am interested in... but I suppose you would want us to converse somewhere more private? So that you can make good use of that little dagger you have hidden beneath your velvet shirt." Ulfo blinked in horror, a blank look upon his face which was suddenly drenched in sweat. One of my men quickly disarmed him and then bowed."Apologies milady, the fault is mine alone." The guardsman rose from his bow, expecting punishment of his own yet I waved him away."Its fine, soldier. No harm, no foul."

"How in blazes did you know that I had a dagger hidden in my shirt?" Ulfo questioned me with an inquisitive glance as I blinked towards him."The way you asked that question indicates that you yourself forgot it was there."

He remained silent and looked away in shame."So you did. Wonderful."

I rose from my throne and forced him to look at me in the eye, his masked face not managing to conceal his emotions."Before you tell me your story, how about we remove this mask of yours?"

"N-NO! Please! Y-I.. in a more private location, please!" His entire body suddenly shook with panic as I shrugged and promptly removed his mask with a slap. Ulfo fell to the ground in shock and I found some black liquid staining my right hand."Ugh.. how horrid!" One of my female guards suddenly exclaimed in a tone of utter disgust and revulsion.

A maid rushed towards me and cleaned my hand, taking great care to wipe each finger clean of whatever blackness currently coated it. Dread washed over me as I turned my head around to finally face Ulfo, as he truly looked."You..."

"Its called the Kulum Pox." He immidiatelly began to explain as I continued to stare at his face. His otherwise young features were immensely marred by large black pustules and sickly, pale white skin... I mean, my skin was ghastly pale as well but it also appeared healthy.. Ulfo's did not. No, it looked like it was about to rot off his face and what wasnt covered in pustules was scarred, indicating that he may have been roughly or wrongly treated before.

Kind of like what I just did with that slap of mine."Its a fairly dangerous type of Pox. One which forces all the filth in your body to coalescent, forming pustulent growths which can easily become infected. They also slow down the natural healing of a persons body, which means that whenever you try to empty the pustules, you'll usually end up with a horrible scar to remember it by."

As he said this, he extended his right hand towards the guard who disarmed him and pointed towards the dagger we took from him. The guard, realizing what the dagger is used for, threw it away from himself quicker than lightning. Ulfo took the dagger and promptly cut out the rest of the pustule which exposed the insides of his mouth, rotten and infected teeth filling every remaining crevice... those that he had left, anyways.

Shaking my head out of my stupor, I immidiatelly went to his side and channeled healing magic into the wound which was startlingly free of blood. Either the pox devoured his blood or he simply didn't have enough to actually bleed... both are equally horrifying."You know healing magic?"

"I am a student of Sorcierre." My casual reply made him nod and store the dagger back under his shirt, revealing the flesh of his torso. It appeared to be equally scarred as his face, with disgusting white patches of skin covering everything, yet it was also devoid of any pustules which was a good sign, right?"I see... thats good."

Shrugging towards him as he cleaned off his fallen mask and put it back on, I sat back down onto my throne."Continue your story."

And so he did."Well, as you might imagine, being born with this pox made me quite the unwanted child and sibling alike when it came to the royal family. Just by existing, I was a liability to my entire dynasty... or well, to most of them. Father was always kind to me and always supported me whenever he could but if my brothers are anything to go by thats only because he was mostly away fighting wars and so he didn't have to look at my ugly mug every day." He laughed at his own misery as I waved my hand, indicating that all of my servants should leave. There was really no need for peasantry to hear this kind of talk and what they've already heard will allow my soldiers to forgive Ulfo for his mistakes.

What kind of monster beats the diseased, right?"Anyways, somewhat recently I finally got sick of all the bullying and mistreatment and so I decided to use my position as a Prince to lure greedy individuals to my side. Supporting a weak Prince like me was a highly risky endeavour for sure, but it also meant that the people doing it could enforce their own will far more easily and gain power far above their station."

He took in a breath."So I began going around, meeting all sorts of people and recruiting them. Peasants who wished to seek their fortunes in wars, lesser nobles and merchants who quaked the second you held a sword to their neck... And most importantly, powerful nobles who either returned from fighting alongside my father or just never joined the millitary expedition in the first place... each of them had a reason to get rid of selective soldiers who were either against leaving the war fronts or were pushing their cowardly lords into action. By the time I reached the twentieth village, I already had a minor horde following behind me. True, most of them never held a sword in their entire life, but it was good enough for what I sought to do."

"And that was?" His work so far is very impressive, mostly for the many things he isn't telling me. Persay, how exactly did he manage to feed this horde of his? How many villages and towns did he consume in his wake?... no, just raiding wouldn't be enough to feed a warband of this size. He must have prepared supplies beforehand."To kill you, Alice."

I quirked an eyebrow at him."Oh? And for what reason would you want to kill me?"

He smirked and let out a laugh."You may not know this but our marriage isn't something that my father wanted."

"Uncle Rudolf didn't ... one of your brothers forced you into this." Ulfo nodded and then continued on with a grim undertone."Father speaks highly of you, Alice. You are the daughter of his best friend and he would never doom you to marriage with a man who probably cant even make you pregnant, much less one so ugly and diseased like me."

I said nothing to that, for anything I say will be used against me."No, it was my eldest brother Guldman, who forced this marriage to happen. He despised your dad and the freedom your dynasty enjoyed as one of our kingdoms highest ranking vassals. You may not hold much land but the soldiers that the Duchy Of Axilar produces are usually highly trained and well-paid, unlike most other retinues. In short: you are vital to this kingdoms warmongering nature."

"And your brother wanted to make you some kind of trophy husband to me or what exactly? I don't see the point of this all." My confusion made Ulfo let out a massive sigh."There isn't too much of a point. Guldman wanted to use me as a way to introduce himself and one of his sons to you... hopefully, you would catch the eye of one of the sons who would then wait for me to become sixteen and challenge me for your hand, potentially killing me in a duel and ridding my brother of an annoyance."

"The way you are explaining this to me feels like someone, persay Guldman, explained it to you beforehand and you are just repeating everything he told you would happen." Ulfo nodded towards me with another sigh."Yeah, my brother despises me for my weakness. So, as a final act of defiance, I did all this in an effort to kill you and spit on whatever plans my brother has for the future."

He rose his eyes in order to face me. I sincerely wonder what kind of face I'm making right now... can't be too pretty to look at. I let out a massive sigh of my own as I realized that he was waiting on me to finally tell him his sentence."Well Ulfo, do you happen to have any peculiar hobbies?"

"I... I like to draw.. that is.. I'd like to say that I'm an artist or a painter but I don't really have much actual skill..." Closing my eyes in though, I think for a few moments before giving him my reply."Then you'll be spending some time under house arrest inside of my castle. Perhaps, if fate finally decides to be kind to you, you wont become a master painter by the time I start making sense of the situation."

He blinked in shock and awe."You.. wont kill me?"

I shook my head in negative."Ulfo, to be perfectly honest, I think that you are a genius. If I was anyone else, your plan would have worked and you would have had the last laugh."

Now his jaw was on the floor."I-uh, I think you are prett-I mean, you are a genius yourself Alice, not just anyone could have pulled this off, even if the enemy was just a disorganized horde."

Rising from my seat with a little bit of red on my cheeks, I pulled him up from his seated posistion and said."Then lets combine our genius instead of wasting it like this, Ulfo. I may have won this fight, but victory has left me with an insane amount of angry, terrified and manical prisoners who may or may not cause even more damage than they would have under your command unless we deal with them all soon and we cant let them go free because that is just a perfect recipe for a bandit disaster."

Ulfo swallowed down hard and coughed into his fist."W-well... you are constructing a castle city, yes? Maybe you could make them work in exchange for their freedom?"

A blink. No, make that several."Thats a great idea, Ulfo!"

"It is?" He sent me an inquisitive glance."You do realize that you still have to feed them, right?"

"My county is currently suffering from overfarming the land. We are producing much more food than we eat, something which can be easily diverted to feed the horde." He nodded and then sat onto a nearby chair."That'll work for the peasantry but not for the actual soldiers I've gotten my hands on... They may be much fewer than the peasants but there are still a good two thousand of them.. or well, there was two thousand of them."

"Hmm, I guess I'll imprison some within my castle and the rest I'll just execute." He seemed taken aback by my proclamation yet again."Execute them?..."

A nod was his answer."In fact, thats something I'm going to have to do first in order to terrify the rest of the horde into submission."

"How are you planning on processing them? I mean, even if you hire most, others wont be worth the effort, right?" This question gave me momentary pause, but then I remembered how Yvain decided to sit out this little fight instead of helping me directly.. and he is a guild master."I'll have the city Guild Masters and whomever else they bring along process the people. Surely, they are able to differ actual workers from frauds. As for those who they dissapprove off, well I'll either kill them or have them sent home should their homes be close enough."

"Okay... so as the battle didn't last too long, a lot of my men survived. I'd say around four thousand people in total. We can easily deduce that only one thousand of these are actual soldiers which you will either imprison or execute. The next two thousand will become workers in exchange for their eventual freedom, be sent home or killed should they prove worthless so what will you do with the remaining thousand?"

"I'll give them to the orcs." This revelation sent shivers down Ulfo's spine."Y-you.. you do realize that the orcs will most likely eat them or skin them or worse?..."

My sadistic and savage grin caught Ulfo extremely off guard as I cracked my knuckles and prepared to go outside and issue my orders to the troops."I'm counting on it."

He swallowed down hard as he picked himself up and began to follow me."So what are you going to do first?"

"First? You assume I'll stay here to help process the horde which I will not. No, this will be left in the capable hands of my councillors and commanders." He tilted his head in confusion."... and you'll be doing what exactly?"

A grin etched itself upon my face."One of my cities, namely Kilnchapel, is currently fighting back a ratman infestation. I'm going to be forming up an entourage of elite soldiers, a warband of about eighty people, prefferably a combination of orcs, heavy infantry and magic users to wipe out the rats."

"Without resting? Aren't you exhausted after all of this?!" His question gave me pause. I.. didn't feel tired at all.

The essence of those you slew during the battle has rejuvenated your body and mind, mistress.

You won't feel hungry or tired for a long while.

Ah. Well that makes sense."Nah, I don't feel tired at all." My casual response made him chuckle."Your soldiers probably wont be feeling the same way, though."

"The ones who fought alongside me in the battle will most likely be tired yes, but thankfully I have a bunch of fresh reinforcements coming in from Hail's End. They'll do just fine, right?" He shook his head out of a stupor, swallowed down hard once again and nodded."You sure you need me around? Looks like to me that you've got everything figured out on your own, Alice." His joking tone echoed throughout the war tent.

I offered him a light chuckle in response."That sounds like you almost wanted me to kill you today, Ulfo. Too bad for you that I don't plan on letting you die anytime soon."

He blinked in momentary confusion."Somehow, I get the feeling that what you said just now should not be seen as cute or flattering."

A savage grin formed on my face."Oh? Well you should trust your gut on that one, Ulfo. I won't kill you, but with the amount of physical training that I'm planning to have you do daily, you might just wish that you were dead."

He didn't follow me out of the tent after hearing that.

Don't mind me guys and girls! I'm just a line break...

And thats it for this chapter of Destiny: Infernal!

I sincerely hope that you've enjoyed it!

As per usual, I shall stay online for a time to edit out mistakes and answer early comments!

Anyways, read and review! And Good Morning/Day/Night to you all! ADIOS FOR NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!