Author's Note: Almighty then, little bit of lighthearted filler to break of all the doom and gloom before we start the next arc. Read, Review, Favourite and Enjoy!

Chapter 66: The Princess of Melromarc

Naofumi had given Raphtalia his recipe booklet before she returned from the other world, currently Kuro was making up the 'ideal food for promoting growth in adolescent bodies' the cream stew. Lean protein extracted from the Spirit Tortoise corpse that Katarina and the other heroes stuffed into their weapons, combined with High Mineral root-type Bio-plant vegetables that have been reinforced numerous times, pressure cooked in a broth made using Minotaur milk and high grade medicinal spices all prepared by a Hero who have maxed out their cooking bonuses through the use of multiple reinforcement techniques and on top of that was using mage craft to further boost the quality of the meal. The Mirror reinforcement method was very clear, the higher the grade of what you are eating the stronger that you are going to get, and there was going to be a lot of that going around soon.

Tanya and the others didn't have the time or resources to take the mass of slaves and refugee's that they had gathered together and turn that into a proper fighting force to deal with the remaining Directional Beasts, until now that is. Maple's return had bought three month's worth of time, as for resources...

"Here's the last of them." Melty explained as she passed Tanya the last of the documents that she needed to sign. "You're completely okay with this right?"

"Why wouldn't I be?" Tanya asked in reply as she finished the paper work. "I've said from the beginning that I have no real attachment to my old world. Besides isn't it the desire of every orphan to be adopted?" Tanya explained to her new 'sister.'

It was all pretty simple really, the Queen wanted a way to tie one of the heroes to the royal family, Melty couldn't marry one of them and produce a child with them so she instead looked at the possibility of adopting one of them into the royal family, and of them the bow Hero was not only the only orphan but also the one who didn't want to go back to her world.

"In any case let me know when the paper work is filed." Tanya stated as she went to conduct more work.

"Right. Mom will want to use you to conduct a press release soon announcing your status as part of the family." Melty explained simply.

"Let me know when we leave for the castle town." Tanya replied as she looked at the next report and with that Tanya's new sister had already left and was replaced with their resident accountant.

"We diversified the Bio-plant variants and sales are starting to go up." Elena explained looking down at the papers in her hands. "The monsters we bought at the trader's recommendation are doing well to till and fertilise the field." The last wave was apparently the last straw for Elena, the moment she became aware that there was a opening in the administrative department she leapt on it. With aggression. "Sales of Maple's accessories and potions are going good too, particularly among the Demi-human adventurers though they're also apparently quite popular with the general populace as well."

"Good, is the first group of combatants ready yet?" Tanya questioned looking at Elena brow raised. To achieve the best results in body building one has to start at an early age, thanks to the directional beasts Ho Oh and Ost two tribes in the top four had already sent their kids over to be trained and levelled up. Similarly to achieve the best results with growth bonuses it's important to start from as low a level as possible. So yes after rescuing an entire army of slaves and two tribes worth of Demi-humans Tanya basically ordered them to send every Demi-human child over for branding and training.

"That's Rat's department. Speaking of which she wants to know where we're at with Shieldfreeden." Elena stated pointing to the door behind her. It was a short walk from the repaired Seatto Mansion to Rat's laboratory. It had undergone some expansion, the remains of Takt's body farm and Kyo's laboratory was both transported inside and had seen additional expansion when Rat combined the materials from different monsters into a Bio-plant to expand it into a full blown Bio-plant fortress.

"This had better be worth it you mad woman." Tanya snapped directly into a eyeball that was situated outside of the front door.

The door in question opened. Tanya saw the people that Rat had been overseeing the growth of as they finished getting dressed. As Tanya understands it Rat was having them pose naked for her so that she can monitor their growth under the influence of the growth bonuses.

"Go find the old woman." Tanya ordered glaring at the half dressed children. "You all have combat training to tend to." By which Tanya meant that they were going to the mountains to drink questionable potions Maple made for them, get beat up by the old woman, Filo and Atla, hunt monsters and get blasted by magic.

"Rat. Where's our battle armour?" Aranaya had that department covered, row after row of Tyrant Dragon costumes had been prepared, not the Kigurumi that they were all familiar with, Aranaya had been studying the Tyrant Dragon Footie Pyjama that Maple had brought back with her from the other world and was using it as a reference point, because odds were good that they would have to go back over there one of these days. Aside from that though Rat had also taken apart and the mechanical chunks that were on the Tyrant Dragon Boss at the time of it's death and was being examined by experts from Faubrey.

"These'll work for your 'Bare minimal Standards.'"

Tanya's first priority was to bring the combat power of everyone up as far as possible, and the Dragon Boss set those standards pretty darn high, but there was something missing.

"The weapons?" Tanya questioned because if you're gonna mass produce humanoid monsters with opposable thumbs then she wanted to give them weapons to wield.

"Able to shift between un-transformed, therianthroped and enhanced?" Rat replied cocking a brow in amusement. "Oi! The boss wants to know how the weapons are coming!" One of the engineers who had been examining the mechanical parts from the dragon boss had been so rudely called over carrying charts and schematics from the tech they had been looking to take apart.

"Did this really come from another world?" The engineer asked looking at the blueprints for the machines with blatant confusion.

"It came from the wave. What about it?" Tanya asked glaring with blatant suspicion.

"These are Hydro-Chemical Tub-" Tanya raised her hand to stop him from talking.

"Simplify." Tanya stated bluntly.

"Huu. Muscles work on expansion and contraction." The man flexed his arm to prove his point. "When you bend your arm or your leg your muscle is contracting pulling the top part of the arm back thereby bending the arm or leg." Then he stretched the arm back out. "When you extend your arm or leg those same muscles expand pushing the limb forward. These work the same way." The engineer led Tanya and Rat over to a large hose on a table. "A small amount of water is in this hose. It's made out of a durable stretchable material. Lightning magic is run through the water converting it from a liquid to a gas which because it takes up more space..." The engineer activated the current which caused the hose to stretch out with the sound of compressed air filling a hose. "The gas is flammable, when burned it turns back into a liquid which because liquids take up less space than gasses..." Fire was entered into the hose causing it to retract back to it's original size. "Take those, make a bundle of them attach it to two solid length's of sufficiently light weight material." The man led them to a giant arm and with the lightning and fire magic expertly manipulated the arm including it's fingers. "And you have yourself a limb."

"Okay." Tanya understood the principle, it sounded a little more advance than the hydraulics they used in her original world but Faubrey had thousands of years to come up with this stuff too. "What about it?"

"It's the same as what we use for Faubrey's Mech units." The engineer stated exasperated.

"Yes I'm aware." Tanya replied bluntly.

"You're aware?" The man did not look all that amused by the revelation.

"The monster took the design from Maple while she was on the other world who in turn took it from you guys when she weapon copied one of your mech armours." The Engineer blinked stupidly for a few moments. "Your job is to come up with a way to adapt the technology as armour and weapons for shape changing Demi-humans."

"Mech suits come in two sizes." The Engineer continued as he led Tanya over to the machines in question. "The Motor Series." The first of the two looked a little bigger than your average suit of knight armour. "This can be powered using a regular person's magical power, it uses the Hydro-Chemical Tubes to provide a significant strength enhancement which also help manage heavy armour plating to increase defence. This is the biggest we can make it with the components here." Which led him to a much larger model. "The Knight Series. It's been built and designed around a artificial magical generator that uses a dragon core as it's main component in order to supplement the mana costs. The size and weight of the generator demands a much larger body in order to carry it around, hence why it's so big. The parts we took off the boss? That weight class is closest to the Theoretical Emperor class unit."

"Emperor?" Tanya asked for the sake of clarification.

"No one has ever built one before, the resources demanded could be used to make twenty knight class machines, not to mention that it would be a huge target for ritual magic." So their job was to take these three sizes and give them the ability to switch between them as they go from a normal demi-human to a transformed to a enhanced beast transformation.

"That would be my job then." Rat stated as she led Tanya away. "The average animal body is a assembly different purpose built parts often times with radically different tissue compositions that came together through endo-cellular-"

"Simple Terms." Tanya was midly displeased she had to state this reminder twice in one night.

"Millions of years ago one cell ate another, instead of one destroying the other the two worked so well together that they formed and kept that relationship. This process was repeated hundreds of times until the earliest animals were born in the process." Rat led Tanya to the tanks where she explained the methodology to her madness. "I am attempting to recreate the necessary components of this process one by one using the Bio-plants as the basis and combining them with different materials and infusing them with different magics and skills via metamorphosis magic." A process that Rat should still be relatively early in, considering how recently she received the orders to make this madness happen.

"The eggs?" Tanya asked recalling the other end of the project. "I assume that you have a plan to get what you need from the so-called dragon prince?"

"Kuro helped us work out the technical details." Rat stated dismissively. "Still going to be more monster than demi-human at the end of the day though."

"So is Filo." Tanya hadn't forgotten that particular moral dilemma either, the fact that they were raising child soldiers, or the fact that she was one either, a sore point for her even if she did volunteer for the job. "Huu. Inform me when you've made progress." Tanya went on her way throughout the village, still so much to do, and so relatively little time to do it. She still had to report the castle town to make her adoption official too.

"Speaking of which the old lady wanted to talk to you too." Rat stated as she left to do her work.

It was imperative that the Heroes use these three month's to get as strong as they possibly could. Weapon transformations, Levels, Dungeons and reinforcement methods? All massively important but so was learning the Hengen Musou style and the Dragon Vein Magic.

"So why isn't Kuro coming with us again?" Maple asked as she finished putting the supplies she made up into her shield.

"Because I'm a cheater, and I already learned both Hengen Musou and Dragon Pulse magic." Kuro stated sounding quite proud of her self. Take the weapons used by Atla and Sadeena for instance, in one case we have a prodigy with the Hengen Musou style, in another we have a prodigy with the use of dragon pulse and magic.

"In compensation for that though she's making all of the food for the slaves." Once their explosive growth period is over and their consumption of food goes down the plan is for Kuro to scout the remaining country with a dungeon inside of it and assess how viable it is going to be to try and get inside of both the dungeon and the country. From what they can understand they're not exactly fond of strangers.

"Chloe Von Einzbern master chef away!" Kuro posed triumphantly simultaneously conjuring a chef's uniform plus hat together with a stone for her to victory pose on.

"I'm going to hold you to that master chef." After the three of them got their food for the next few days they went into the mountains to train. According to the old lady all the stone in the mountain meant that Ki was in especially high concentration, couple that with the performance enhancing effects of the Ki potions Maple supplied and the Ki exciting effects of Maple's Aura Spell and they all proceeded to spend a few days getting a grip on the style before Tanya was called to the castle to meet with the Queen.

Tanya was escorted into the throne room where the Queen had been waiting for her.

"Reporting for duty Ma'am." Tanya stated clicking heels together and giving the Queen a Salute out of reflex prompting a questioning look. "Sorry. Force of habit." Tanya relaxed her posture. "Good afternoon Mother." Satisfied with Tanya's informality The Queen walked over to her as she let the escort lead the way.

"I assume you understand what is needed of you for this occasion?" The Queen asked directing her gaze down towards her third daughter.

"You intend to parade me in front of the masses in order to officiate our new family dynamic and flex your political might on the other countries to get them to listen to you." Tanya hazard a guess.

"You're not wrong." The Queen admitted while making sure that she told Tanya nothing of any real substance. "But you missed a few key details."

"Explain please?" Tanya asked brow cocked suspiciously. "Occasions like this demand some formal attire." The Queen stated indicating Tanya's uniform. It was still as clean and crisp as the day she came here in it, a fact which she attributed to Eli and his infamous cleanliness obsession and the presence of Aranaya a expert tailor who even provides her own high quality supplies to the issue. Near as the Queen could tell she wore either it or Aranaya's duplicates every day which only highlighted the current issue. "Formal attire that doesn't belong to someone else's country."

"Good point." Tanya stated taking a moment to look at herself.

"Glad you agree." And like that the Queen sprung her trap.

Inside of the room the Queen had been leading them to no less than three of the best tailors from the castle town had been waiting for them, all female. Before Tanya could offer any resistance the women grabbed her by her arms and all but tore off her clothes. If the way that she squeaked was any indication she never wore a corset before, nor was she exactly use to sitting still while needles are used to pin fabric into place, nor does she find the concept of being waxed and scrubbed clean very comfortable. The next three days were a nightmare of lace and poof with occasional breaks for very light meals and very brief naps, when Tanya was seen again she was sitting next to the Queen and Melty in a yellow princess dress being recorded, the big smile on her face directly contrasting, and thereby highlighting, the wide eyed look of horror in exhausted eyes.

"Being X, Waves, Fitoria, Ho oh, other Directional Beasts, if any of you would show up and put me out of my misery right now you will have my deep and everlasting belief for the rest of my current life and all of my future lives." A pause while Tanya waited for one of the aforementioned entities to respond. "Please!" After being made to suffer through that torment for half an hour the Camera man finally saw fit to finish his recording and pack his equipment up.

"Is it over?" Tanya asked, she would be sighing in relief but the corset might kill her.

"After the Parade is done." The Queen replied prompting Tanya's eyes to some how go even wider in horror.

"We're family now why do you hate me!?" The parade in question saw some delays, the pagoda meant to carry the new royal family had only three people available when it was meant to have four, that was something that demanded answers.

"Where is Malty?" The Queen asked looking at the servant that she knew she assigned to supervise the castle's newest maid during her training. "Well..." Among the commands the Queen had programmed into Malty's seal was 'do not even think about harming the legendary heroes or the members of the royal family.'

"RRREEEAAARRRGGGHHH!" As one might've been able to guess Malty was not following orders very well.

"How long has she been like that this time?" The Queen asked holding her hand over her face in exasperation.

"Three hours. A personal best." The supervisor stated mildly impressed.

Why Malty insists on being impressive only at times like this was beyond her. Then the Maid stopped screaming prompting the Queen to sigh.

"Have her report for her duties." The stated as she turned around to leave.

"That might be problematic ma'am. She seems to have lost consciousness." The supervisor explained as he dumped a bucket of ice water onto Malty.

"RRREEEAAARRRGGGHHH!"

The Queen smacked herself in her face and held her hand there for a short period of time, clearly 'Palace Maid' was too difficult work for her daughter.

"Send her to the brothel. Oh and invite the various people my daughter has offended over the years to pay her a visit, no need to pay any real concern to rank, needless to say we'll need healers on standby, and her visitors will have to be checked for weapons before they're allowed to see her." Now than to find a suitable replacement.

"Your Majesty, the Bow Hero's party is outside of the gates looking for her. They say it's urgent." And so naturally the Queen went outside to meet with her daughter's party to find the source of this problem.

"Your Majesty." Eli stated letting out a salute. "Otto and Aranaya have received a message via slave seal from Officer Degure-er-Melromarc. The command was 'HELP ME!' Over and Over again for the past few days."

"Oh." The Queen stated as if the thought was only now occurring to her.

"Well as long as you're here." And thus Tanya's party ended up carrying the royal family for the parade in the Castle town. All. Day. Long.

"Are you sure this is going to work?" Viktoriya asked looking at their traumatised leader.

"With the sleeping potion we gave her she'll just think the entire thing was a nightmare she just had and wake up non the wiser." Otto explained having already swapped out Tanya's princess dress for a tailor made Melromarcian military uniform.

"We already burned the dress, all we have to do now is play the edited footage for her and never let her see the original for as long as she lives and we should be good." Eli explained and Tanya picked that moment to stir awake.

"Officer Melromarc are you alright? You passed out as soon as the parade was done." Viktoriya stated immediately making use of the pre-prepared lines they had planned to make use of before.

"No." Tanya stated looking down at herself. "I think I just had a nightmare."

"Come on let's go and get you something to eat and help you get your mind off of it." They almost succeeded, but then the unedited footage from the parade played right in the middle of the village and Tanya just froze her brow twitching like a over wound spring on a bear trap.

"Oh lala~! I'm Tanya a pretty princess!" Kuro waltzed below the footage having conjured Tanya's dress for herself to wear and a matching parasol umbrella. "I like wearing pretty dresses and drinking tea because that's what pretty princesses do~!"

'Bow of Wrath/Pride II Unlocked!'

'Bow of Wrath/Pride III Unlocked!'

'Bow of Wrath/Pride IV Unlocked!'

"C'Mon Tanya can't you take a joke!?" Kuro shouted as she dodged another combination Tungston Ballista/Cursed Bow Gravity enhanced Meteor Shot from Tanya that successfully managed to delete a chunk of landscape the size of a village.

"Why aren't you laughing Kuro!?" Tanya shouted as she released another small-village-worth-of-land-deleting shot at Kuro flatly erasing a chunk of mountain in the process. "You couldn't stop before!" Tanya snapped releasing another WMD class shot from her bow. "I'm having a blast! Literally!"

The Queen was currently sitting on one of the castle walls watching Tanya's countryside erasing rampage with her daughter.

"Shouldn't we stop her?" Melty asked looking at the ensuing carnage being unleashed.

"It's fine. The powerful miasma she's giving off has trapped her in a spatial distortion so all of her damage is relatively contained. We'll just use magic to fix the environment and buy off monsters to replace the lost bio-diversity." The Queen paused to drink from her glass before she continued. "We did the same thing with your father back when he was first starting out as a hero." Tanya had gotten off easy compared to Mirellia, at her age her parents made her sit through that little exercise over and over again until she had an entire wardrobe full of dresses. Over all she would say that this was a rather successful breaking in ceremony, it was something that they skipped with Malty, at the insistence of her father, and look at how she turned out? Speaking of.

"How is my daughter doing. Does she show any sign of correcting her behaviour yet?" The Queen asked the nearest attendant who opened up a crystal ball, heard the sound of crackling slave seal and screaming, closed it again and shook her head in the negative. "It seems that we're going to have to prepare an IV drip of health potions after all." Mirellia would like the employ the carrot and stick approach, she really would, but thus far Malty showed no signs of anything that warrants the carrot.

Review Section:

RonaldM40196867: True. Also True. As I think I need them.

Captain Imaginat: The Realisation that you murdered your own sister and left her flesh and blood children orphans does have a way of changing people. I hope you enjoyed more funny moments of Tanya losing her shit at the other heroes.

Galeon82: Glad you liked it.

Maglad: Sorry for the Filler.

Nightshadegirl: *Crosses Fingers*