Isaac let out a deep breath as he pulled the trigger. This was his last bullet so if it missed then all of his effort over the last month would be for nothing.

A month ago Isaac had been packing his things for a hunting trip with his childhood friend. Most of the essentials were packed, his guns, trail rations, camouflage, a dedicated music player for audiobooks, a couple solar charges and, perhaps the most important, an electronic encyclopedia.

Isaac’s brother affectionately referred to Isaac as “fucking nerd” when they were younger. Oddly enough this stopped after Isaac picked up HEMA. The nickname was still accurate as Isaac devoted a lot of effort to his various survival plans.

The enchanted bullet thrust across the battlefield like the divine spear it was not striking the demon lords horn. After a painfully long instance the horn snapped off and began flying through the air leaving its body. Aegis, the title us by Isaacs companion and bodyguard, began to turn the tables against the weakened demonlord. Isaac’s war was over. He rolled over onto his back and smiled at Hime

Hime was Isaac’s name for the crown princess of the Kingdom of Valor. They had met on the day that he was summoned as an otherworldly hero to slay the demon lord. The pair had a strained friendship. On the one had she was a prominent member of the family that used an ancient and forbidden magic to drag his soul from earth to this other world, on the other hand she was the only member of her family who would admit that he had been kidnapped.

The summoning had been a disaster for everyone involved.

“Who are you?”

It had been a simple question and had the King of Valor answered the question things would have gone much differently.

“I am the King of Valor.”

“Great, I don't care about your titles. I want to know your name.”

The king’s court lost it.

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“Insolent? I’m insolent? All I did was ask for a basic courtesy. If you are such barbarians that you can’t even offer me your names then I see no reason to deal with you.”

Hime covered her face and began to cry. The war was over and if she had lost more than she could have imagined fighting it she knew she had managed to protect her home, her family, and her closest friends.

“It’s over Hero. It's finally over.”

The end of war is not the beginning of peace even, or perhaps especially, when the war is one of annihilation. War reparations and land were extracted from some kingdoms in the name of war merits, taken and given under threat of further wars. When it became clear that no one could send Isaac home to earth one such fiefdom was granted to Isaac.

Under the blessing of the King of Justice Isaac was granted the now independent county of Demon Hold by way of an enforced marriage to the sole heir, a woman known to most as Demonqueen.

Officially Isaac received the land through his marriage. The story told of his honor and forgiveness, how he married Demonqueen to redeem her actions in the war. In reality King Justice simply put some of his problems together and hoped they would go away.

Justice needed to be seen offering a suitable reward to the hero of the Dethroning of the Demon Lord. He needed to fairly handle The issue of Demonqueen, who had sided with the demon lord out of necessity as a means to protect her life and her people. He couldn’t simply tell her story as women were ‘properly and justly’ excluded from rulership. Finally he needed a border state between Kingdom of Justice and the increasingly volatile Kingdom of Valor.

Two months into his life in the other world Isaac found himself the prince of a puppet state, married to an unhappy and unwilling bride, without hope of seeing his home again, in a world that lacked many of the luxuries he had been raised taking for granted.

Isaac’s welcome in Demon Hold was less than celebratory. For all the disadvantage she possessed for being a woman Demonqueen was able to read between the lines and knew that Isaac was to be her jailer.

They could have said nothing to each other that entire day for barren their conversations were. They exchanged pleasantries and words of ritual and ceremony to seal the marriage. At the end of the day they retreated to their chambers with the given goal of becoming familiar intimately.

Demonqueen stripped for the act and lay, glass eyed, on their bed. Isaac stared at her naked flesh and sighed. Demonqueen wasn't what any man would call ugly, though the description was more apt than beautiful, and the defeated look did her no favors. Isaac sat down next to her and looked away.

“I see no reason we shouldn't get to know each other Lady Wife. How should I think of you?”

“... Father called me Precious Flower.”

“I see…. Lady Flower then.”

Isaac took his unwilling wife’s hand and employed a trick her had learned while hiking with his family in his youth. He fell asleep in an instant and slept till morning.

Lady Flower was gone when Isaac woke the next morning.