The state of affairs in the Demon Kingdom was bad.

Though Ichigo didn't say so aloud, she couldn't help but wonder just how many wars the people of the Demon Tribe and the human race of their world had been forced into by nearly constant rising tensions and hatred between both of their kinds.

And to add fuel to the fire, literally.

The absence of a ruler for the Demon Tribe had caused them no end of grief.

There had been countless attempts at coup d'états. Rebellions and civil wars caused by terrible politics and greedy government officials trying to make power grabs for the throne, etc.

All in all, it sounded like the people were desperate for some relief. Or at the very least their ruler to come to their world and assume authority to somewhat put a stop to some of the things that had been happening.

Ichigo could empathize. But at the same time, she also wanted to cringe.

It all sounded so... What was the word? Oh, yeah. Horrifying. The affairs of the demon kingdom sounded utterly horrifying to her. And again, she couldn't help but wonder how the kingdom itself hadn't been destroyed already from all of the conflict.

Granted some it was more horrifying than the rest, but whatever. She'd deal with it.

Reaching up to run her fingers through her hair, she paused upon feeling it pulled back and wanted to bang her head on the table instead. Conrad and the other two were watching her like a hawk as they waited for her to respond to the information that they had just given her. She could feel it by the way her skin prickled a bit under their eyes.

Finally, after several seconds of careful thought, she turned her head to look at her dad.

"Dad..."

Isshin had been listening quietly the whole time wanting to know as much as he could about the place that the three men were wanting to take his baby. Knowing all the while that Ichigo wasn't going to shrink away from this task regardless of what they may ask her.

She had just come back from a hellish war. She didn't want anyone else to go through something similar. Which was understandable. However... he didn't like the fact that his baby was leaving her family again.

"You don't need my permission, Ichigo." He said.

"I know that, but I feel that I should apologize. Especially since I'm not sure how long this will take. Or if I'll even be able to come home at all once I'm there."

Isshin's lips quirked up at the corners in a wry smile. "Then just don't."

"Huh?" Ichigo said looking startled by his suggestion.

"Either do this and put your all into everything. Or don't. I can't make the choice for you. And neither can they." He said motioning towards the three men with one hand. "A queen has to be able to sacrifice things important to her for the sake of her people. To make difficult and even heart-breaking decisions daily for the better good of those that she rules. Can you do that?"

Isshin expected his baby to hesitate. To balk at how ominous his words sounded. And yet, he wasn't the least bit disappointed when she didn't do any of those things and replied firmly. "I can."

Isshin's expression became shuttered as he said. "Good. Then from now on, these people are your family. Protect them as you always have our family. As a father, that's all I feel I can say now." He slowly stood up, from his seat then. Careful so as not to disturb his empty dishes and wine glass as he did so. And then moved to stand next to Ichigo's chair.

She blinked up at him as he took a second or so to simply memorize her face.

His heart hurt. It hurt almost as bad as knowing that she had gone to fight Yhwach before the war had started in earnest. Only this time it felt worse to him because he may never see her again even if she remained alive in the other world.

"Dad?" She said questioningly.

"Be a good queen, Ichigo. Help your people flourish and thrive as you have everyone else." He said as he leaned down and kissed her on the forehead. To Isshin, this was a bittersweet moment. One that he had always hoped would never really come. The time to say goodbye to one of his precious babies.

Ichigo, no matter what happens or where you go in life- you will always be my daughter. He thought as he told her subtly that he'd pack some of her things and bring it to her while she hashed out the rest of the details with her new friends. He didn't thank Conrad or the other two men for the dinner, though he did bow to them before leaving the house.

The moment that he was gone, Yozak couldn't help but blurt out in confusion. "Well, that was weird."

Conrad and Gunter however didn't think the man's behavior was strange. The two had seen such goodbyes between people before and were concerned by the fact that their Queen had yet to react to what had just happened. But then, they also couldn't help but wonder if she even knew what had just happened as well.

Neither man was looking forward to explaining it to her if she didn't already know. They also weren't looking forward to the emotional fallout either at the moment.

Dealing with crying women had never been their strong suit. Yet even so...

"Highness?" Conrad asked worriedly. "Are you alright?"

Their Queen had been sitting so very still and quiet for the past few minutes, her expression was closed off. As if she were reluctant to show any weakness. Or perhaps she simply didn't want to deal with what had just happened? It was hard to tell.

Finally, after what seemed like too long, she seemed to move again and replied. "I'm fine. You don't have to worry about me."

Except that only seemed to make the men worry even more.

"Are you sure that you're alright?" Gunter asked as he fretted from his seat. Ichigo blinked at him and then smiled.

"I'm sure. Don't worry about it." She said, trying to assure them that she was really okay.

And she was to an extent anyways. Having her dad tell her not to ever come home again was something that was difficult to hear to begin with. Especially since he had always been so very understanding about things in the past. But then...maybe this was just his way of trying to encourage her to throw everything that she had into ruling the Demon Tribe well.

"I should probably figure out where I can stay since I can't go home now." She muttered thoughtfully, as she went over the various names of her local friends. After all, she couldn't exactly go out of town to stay somewhere without her guards hanging around.

That would just drive them nuts. And she didn't want that for them.

Conrad managed to be leaning in a bit and heard her mutter and got an idea. "Highness," He said as he reached out and laid a hand on one of her shoulders to get her attention. She turned her head and looked at him as he suggested. "Why don't you stay here with us. We have plenty of room in the house. And it isn't as if your being here will bother any of us. In fact, this will also give each of us a chance to get to know one another better before we leave for home."

"I don't want to be a bother."

"You aren't a bother, your majesty." Yozak said easily as he got up out of his seat and leaned over the table towards her as he added. "Besides, it'll be easier for us to do our job protecting you if your closer to us."

Technically, the man wasn't wrong, and Ichigo knew that. But at the same time, she worried about getting underfoot and other stuff. After all, they had things other than protecting her to do. Right?

She hummed and then looked at Gunter at get his opinion since she already knew Conrad and Yozak's. But the man was crying again and talking out of his head.

"Oh my! Her highness will be staying with us. I'm so excited that my heart is aflutter. I need to go and tidy up my room!" He declared loudly as he got up and went tearing upstairs, startling her.

"Aww, he's into one of his fantasies again." Yozak said with a grin of amusement before asking Conrad, "Should we tidy up our rooms too?"

"Mine is already spotless so do what you like." Conrad said as he leaned back in his chair with his wine glass in hand as he asked Ichigo. "Highness, which room would you like to use while we're still here?"

"Oh, I don't need a room. I can just sleep on the couch so I'm not stealing anyone else's bed. I don't mind." Ichigo said, hoping that they wouldn't be upset by her suggestion.

But they were upset by it. And she had no idea how to defuse the situation. It didn't help anything that Gunter had returned from tidying up his room and was once again chiming in with his thoughts on certain matters.

"What?!" Gunter shouted as his hands came down onto the table hard enough to make the dishes rattle. "Absolutely not!"

"Majesty, you can't sleep on the couch." Conrad said in a disapproving tone as he set his wine back down and shot her a look that made her want to squirm.

"Conrad and Gunter are both right your highness. The couch is uncomfortable, and you wouldn't like it there. One of us can take it instead." Yozak chimed in. Trying to be a voice of reason where there seemed, at least to her, to be very little.

"Then I could probably sleep in a tree outside." Ichigo mumbled after a second or so. Her voice so low that she hoped no one could hear her.

Of course, that didn't happen either. All three men heard her easily. And flipped out again.

"No, no, no, no, no! Our Queen will not sleep in a mere tree!" Gunter chanted as he violently shook his head.

"I'm afraid that I agree with my friend," Conrad said as he crossed his arms over his chest and stared her down as he tacked on in a firm tone. "You cannot sleep in a tree, your highness. What would happen if you fell and broke your neck?"

Ichigo didn't bother answering that particular question despite the retort already resting on the tip of her tongue. Instead, she merely scratched one of her cheeks and tried to look like she understood his reasoning.

After all, it wasn't as if he were wrong any.

"Conrad and Gunter are both right, majesty. You shouldn't do that either. Trees are stiff and unyielding. You would wake up with a serious crick in your neck, and your back would hurt. You would even be covered in nasty bruises-"

"It would also be difficult for you to move-" Conrad chimed in again.

"No, no, no, no! I simply cannot allow it!" Gunter chanted as he looked her in the eyes. His expression was a mixture of anger and frustration as he went on to say, "You are a delicate, flower of a young lady. You will sleep in a bed like one."

Ichigo blinked at him, idly wondering what he was talking about. Delicate? Flower? What the hell? Since when had she ever been those things? She was neither delicate nor a flower. And she had half a mind to give these three idiots a piece of her mind to show it.

But for some reason, as miffed as she was at them for not letting her sleep somewhere comfortable to her- she also didn't want to argue with them any further.

She'd sleep in the damned floor and fuck their silly opinions; they couldn't stop her anyway.

"Since this argument has been settled, her highness can take my room." Conrad said, his tone practically screaming 'I'm pulling rank'. So, no one bothered to argue. "And on that note, I'm sure that you will want to wash up and settle in for the evening."

"Oh, right!" Ichigo said, suddenly recalling that her dad was going to bring her some of her things. "Dad said that he'd bring some of my stuff over for me. So, is it alright if I wait for him to do that before I settle in for the night?"

"Of course, it's okay highness." Conrad said easily as he studied her before tacking on. "You don't have to ask our permission to do so."

"I kind of feel I should though." Ichigo said awkwardly, wondering if they were going to argue with her over every little thing as she explained. "It can be difficult sometimes, especially with new people, to tell what their boundaries are. And I don't want to be any more trouble than I already am, ya know?"

Conrad hummed thoughtfully as Gunter started crying again while he dramatically talked about how benevolent and thoughtful she was. Which was starting to freak Ichigo out because to her it was simply common courtesy and good manners. While Yozak mere peered at her from over the rim of his wine glass. For the moment having no opinion at all about anything.

"I think I understand," Conrad finally said. But you still don't have to ask. At least not about something so small anyway."

She was about to open her mouth to tell him that she couldn't help it. She was a guest in their house after all. But before she could there was a knock at the door to let them know that her dad had come back with her things.

"Oh! Saved by the door." She chirped as Conrad got up and shot an amused look her way as he went to collect her things from her dad.

It only took a few seconds. And once he returned, he had three duffle bags with him. Two big ones and a smaller one.

"Would you like me to put these upstairs or someplace else so that you can go through them and make sure that everything is there?" He asked her.

"Uh, the living room should be fine. I'll make sure that he didn't miss anything and then I'll go and get cleaned up."

"As you wish, your-" Conrad started to call her 'majesty' again but Ichigo cut him off with a quick.

"Please don't call me that here. My name is Ichigo. Just... plain old Ichigo."

Conrad blinked his brown eyes at her as if he were puzzled for a second but then nodded his head slowly in understanding. "Very well. We will call you Ichigo while we are here. However, there is nothing plain about you."

Ichigo frowned as he walked off to put her bags in the living room and then turned her attention to excusing herself from the table. "Yozak, may I-" She asked as she pointed in the direction that Conrad had gone.

"Sure, high-" She sighed and stared at him as he quickly backtracked and corrected himself. "Uh, I-Ichigo. Please, go ahead."

"Before I walk off, are you guys going to need help putting things away and washing the dishes?"

Yozak gave her the most horrified expression that anyone had ever given her before in her life after that. It was almost as if he couldn't fathom anyone with a royal title ever bothering to touch a dirty dish, much less wash one.

And she watched him in fascination as he quickly got up out of his chair and begin to snatch dishes up randomly and practically hugging them to himself as he did his best to keep them out of her reach while rambling, "Don't worry about a thing, sweetheart. We can handle it. So don't worry your pretty little head any!"

Gunter, thankfully by then had snapped out of his poetic funk and began to help the younger man grab things and then they both disappeared into the kitchen where she could hear one of the muttering, "What the hell was that? Kings and Queens don't do dirty dishes. They have people to do that stuff for them!"

"I believe her highness was simply being polite in her own way."

"I saw my life flash before my eyes. And not because she was being polite. But because Conrad would have torn off my head if I even dared to allow her to even touch any dirty dishes."

Ichigo stopped listening after that since none of it made any sense to her. And it sort of hurt her feelings a little bit to not be allowed to even do the simplest of small tasks when she grew up doing them.

Did these people really just expect her to sit back and do nothing but look pretty? How useless.

She had just stepped into the living room when she ran into Conrad and nearly jumped out of her skin in startled as large warm hands gently caught her by the shoulders. "Whoa, are you okay?" He asked in concern.

In truth he'd never had someone of the opposite sex so jumpy around him before. Especially someone under his care. So, he was starting to wonder if his Queen was usually skittish around men or if there was something else wrong. Maybe it had to do with her scars?

He fervently hoped that that wasn't the case. But if it was... He was going to show the offender/offenders exactly why he was called The Lion of Luttenberg back home.

"I'm fine! I just wasn't expecting to run into you, that's all." Ichigo said automatically and he nodded his head and plastered that same smile he seemed to fall back on, onto his face and then motioned towards her bags.

"Once you're finished going through them, I'll carry them up to the bedroom for you."

"Oh, um, thank you..." She muttered politely but didn't say anything more as she carefully brushed past him.

He absently noted that she made sure not to invade his personal space again and fisted his hands at his sides so tightly that his knuckles turned white for a few seconds before he unfisted his hands and simply watched her drop to her knees on the floor next to the bags and begin to go through them.

All in all, the process seemed to only take several minutes. He would say this for his Queen, she seemed to be very efficient in her actions. Leaving nothing unsearched as he moved to make himself comfortable in one of the chairs not too far from her so that he could continue to watch her.

From his vantage point, he had a much clearer view of her back. As well as the scars that covered it. And he was taking his time going over each one, his keen eyes knowing automatically what a defensive wound and what was created by torture. As well as the weapons and tools used on her.

Some of them were much harder to place. Mostly because of the unnatural shape and size of them. But one thing that seemed to be common with many of them was the fact that they were killing blows.

Killing blows specifically meant to tear her body apart both inside and outside. Blows meant to gouge her flesh and muscle from her body by fistful's. Blows that would have ripped and torn her very organs apart and caused her terrible agony and irreparable harm...both inside and out.

Yet all of them had utterly failed for some unknown reason to kill her.

He didn't understand it. All he knew was that he was looking at a living breathing miracle. A survivor of such strength and will that she wouldn't allow anything to get in her way or stop her. No matter how much she was broken or damaged.

Oh, but she would be an unstoppable force as their Queen. He just knew it.

I would gladly follow such a person into hell with a smile. He thought passionately. Bloodlust rising up within him despite the fact that he tried to squash the feeling quickly. However, he must have failed because several things happened all at once.

His Queen suddenly stopped looking through her things and turned her head to look at him with suspicious eyes. There was also the sound of fine China shattering in the kitchen and Yozak came running to see what had triggered such an intense feeling of bloodlust in him that it could be felt by everyone in the house.

"Conrad! What the hell-" Yozak stopped speaking as soon as his eyes locked on their Queen's back. His voice abruptly dying in his throat as he visibly paled at the sight of her exposed skin and muttered in an utterly horrified tone, "Holy shit."

Well, that explains the reason for the bloodlust. The ginger haired man thought as he stood beside his captain's chair, fretting for a moment before finally laying a hand on one of his friend's shoulders and then leaned down to hiss in his ear.

"Knock it off before you send everyone in the area running in terror. Including her majesty."

Conrad reacted to his words automatically and was finally able to reign in his feelings of bloodlust. Though he still had a bit of difficulty doing so immediately. But once he did so, he awkwardly cleared his throat and then asked Ichigo in an effort to pretend that his slip up hadn't happened.

"Do you have everything that you need, your highness?"

"I...have enough for the moment," Ichigo replied as she eyed the two men warily. "But I'll have to go get another bag or two worth of stuff. Maybe I'll do it tomorrow sometime."

"Excellent! We'll go with you then." Yozak said.

"You don't have to." Ichigo grumbled with a slight slump of her shoulders.

Both Conrad and Yozak blinked at her. The two men didn't like how she seemed to think that she should do everything on her own without any help at all. But they were also reluctant to say anything about it due to how independent Ichigo seemed in comparison to their last Demon Queen.

"It's just going to be a boring shopping trip to get more clothing and other necessities since I might want a few extra things to take with me to your world. Especially since I'm not sure that I'll be able to come back again."

Conrad sighed and leaned forward a bit in his seat as he said. "Highness, you do realize that you don't have to take extra things with you-" He didn't get much further than that before Yozak quickly covered his mouth with his hand and smiled.

"All the more reason why we should go," The ginger haired man said jovially as he glanced between his captain and Ichigo. There was a strange light in his blue eyes that was hard for Ichigo to put her finger on. "You might want to have some extra hands to help carry stuff. And you can get lots more since there are three of us to help."

She frowned at them, obviously still not liking the idea much for some unknown reason.

"Don't girls usually like dragging handsome men around and making them carry their things?" Yozak asked, deciding to try a different tactic. Instead of agreeing like he thought that she would Ichigo merely let out an unlady-like sound and turned her back to them.

Not bothering to reply at first before finally saying loud enough for the men to hear her, "I'm not like other girls."

Conrad and Yozak didn't say it aloud, but they were starting to see that she wasn't like other girls. The question was, how much wasn't she like other girls? Because they were feeling sort of lost.