Chapter 653 Royal Basics
"Anger management, magic, combat training, weapons skills, and dance. How did those become the standard training regimen for Royal Demons?" Nimue asked with a hint of confusion.
The Queen's expression went distant as she remembered something from her childhood.
"You should know that our standardized Royal education predates me. And that's saying something, since I'm the oldest of my siblings by quite a bit. It started out as just anger management and magic so that we could safely and effectively communicate with the other Royal Families, and nobody would die. But then we found that they liked to dance, so we added that as well.
The problem was that all of those courses are boring, and the trainees would snap, but they did a lousy job of it and the other Wrath Demons would laugh at them. So we added weapon skills and close combat training into the daily rotation in my great-grandmother's time. Then we developed the most well-rounded of all the Royal Families, and things started to run much more smoothly.
So smooth, in fact, that the Wrath Kingdom is one of the best managed trade nations in the entire realm."
The Queen was obviously proud of that accomplishment, and with good reason. Her nation was bordered by incredibly hostile volcanic mountains, with even more volcanoes spread through the rest of the land, which was barely able to grow enough food to support the people who lived there, but they had managed to turn it into an economic powerhouse.
That alone was worthy of respect, but they also treated their people well, tempering the violence with strict honour laws so that the innocent weren't harmed.
"I suppose that is for the best, but I don't really have a temper. I mean, I get mad when people chop trees for no reason, tear up the grass or waste food, but not like wrathful mad." Nimue informed them.
The Queen smirked and tapped a red glowing amulet on her wrist.
"Did you know that all Royals wear lie detectors all the time. I know you're an angry little Demon when it's justified." She laughed.
Wolfe saw the flicker of rage in the hybrid Demon's eyes before it vanished behind the placid and peaceful mask of her dryad heritage again.
"Interesting. The two sides of you balance each other out, so you only get uncontrollably angry when both of them are in agreement. That should at least make things easy for your anger management teacher." Queen Jasmine noted.
"A dryad should be able to dance as well. I've never met a Fae that didn't love to dance, even if the rest of us didn't understand their enthusiasm or even hear the music." Wolfe added.
"You speak like you know a lot of Fae?" Nimue asked.
"There are hundreds of them in my hometown. I had my people grow a Fae Forest around our hometown as a defensive measure, but as the name implies, the Fae Forest attracts Fae, so they are everywhere. You should see the Pixie tag games that go on in the evening when the sunlight is sparkling off their wings.
Then there are all the others hanging around. The forest trolls are quite the pair, they like to guard the entrance to the forest at the river, it gives them a sense of purpose. I hope they're not too upset about having to move when the forest expanded."
Everyone else in the room was staring at Wolfe with wonder as he paused his story.
"But today isn't about me, and Nimue will learn about it soon enough if she's intent on following me. Now, you said that all of your family were killed in battle when you were born, but you were raised by the caravan, right? I'm sure that Queen Jasmine would love to hear about that. Especially since you didn't know that you were a Royal, or that you were half Dryad. The Caravan members must have known." He continued.
Nimue stared at him for a moment. "Yes, they must have known. They knew me all my life. My first memories were in the caravan, and I never left the caravan until very recently. When it became obvious that I wasn't going to advance and gain rank as I grew up, they kicked me out. So, I came here looking for work. Well, I looked for work all over and ended up here.
But nobody ever mentioned anything about my heritage. If they knew my parents, they must have known. All sorts of people are recognizing me as a Royal without even seeing me, and Wolfe knew just from the touch of my magic that I was part Dryad.
Come to think of it. They always had me cover my hair in public. It's a pretty normal sort of light brown, if you ignore the fact that there are always leaves in it.
I used to pick them out, but lately, I just keep my head covered because plucking my leaves hurts."
Wolfe nodded. "They're part of you, like your hair or your ears. Pulling your hair out by the root would hurt as well. It's best to just leave them while they're still growing back properly, and you haven't caused permanent damage."
"Would you mind taking down your hood?" Queen Jasmine asked politely.
Nimue reluctantly pulled her hood down, revealing her flowing mottled brown hair, looking very much like Maple bark, complete with the pale yellow maple leaves mixed in. Her face was red, but not the deep red of the Queen and her guards, more of the bright red of leaves in autumn before they fell.
"You are lovely. No wonder they wanted you to hide yourself away. It must be a nightmare to brush through all that hair with the leaves, though." The Queen commented.
"You have no idea. I usually braid it, but pulling it tight only highlights the leaves, so sometimes I just leave it loose since it's under my hood anyhow." Nimue agreed.
"She has your cousin's eyes, though. Just identical to him and his brother." One of the guards added, making the little demon smile.
"My Uncle said the same thing. He's kind of scary, and I'm not great with strangers, but he seemed like a decent guy." She agreed.
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