"Nothing ever ends poetically. It ends and we turn it into poetry. All that blood was never once beautiful. It was just red."


In the time of ancients, the mighty nation of Blathye knows riches unparalleled, palaces carved from gold-veined marble, roads paved from precious stones. Fruit grows fresh, fat and gleaming. Wine flows freely, red as blood. But the more lovely the façade, how much more terrible must the truth beneath it be?

The taint, the shadowy chasm cracking through this venerated empire, is said to lay within its very heart. The royal family, their lineage great and long and rife with madness, murder—and worse. Savages in silk, creatures in crowns. They are cursed, or so goes the story.

The King is dead, senseless, senile Atlas. Atlas who threw away tradition—the Selection—and married his own cousin instead. Atlas, the warmonger. Finally, finally, he is dead. But the promise of peace proves to be illusionary, for Atlas threw away tradition—the line of succession—and disinherited both his sons.

The mighty nation of Blathye waits with bated breath to see this duo of displaced princes dance, to see them threaten to cleave the state in two. Asra, who is the older and perhaps the wiser, war-ready, blooded. And August, the one who sets snares with smiles and words, the one whose lies are golden spun.

But a pair of uncrowned princes are disposable, worth nothing.

To sit on the throne, one must be a king already—and for that, a queen is required. The old promise of peace, of heirs to come. Tradition demands a Selection. Two princes, two brides that, in the end, must be whittled to one.


This is a Selection AU. Indeed, very little, except for the monarchy and the unrest and the concept of a Selection itself, comes from canon material. The setting is medieval-adjacent, fantastical, vicious and a little violent. Do not proceed if you're uncomfortable with dark themes—if you do, you have been warned.

The form is on my profile. It's not first come first serve, nor is there a deadline for the time being. If you have questions, about the world, the form—anything—please shoot me a pm.