Long ago, there was a little princess living in Gin’s palace. Her mother was a shrine maiden, and her father was the king’s brother. Despite genuine love, the girl’s parents couldn’t be married—and because the girl was born a bastard, she was not allowed to take the throne.
Her father still loved her, however, so she had everything she wanted. Her stepmother—through whom the princess had a half-sister—grew jealous of the attention. At first, she merely tried to restrict what the princess could do, but her husband caught on and forbade it.
The stepmother quickly resorted to rumors and spread lies about the princess.
“She’s cursed!” she cried. “The girl will bring nothing but misfortune.”
It spread quickly, due in part to other murmurs of a bastard girl, to a point where nearly everything about her but her father was revealed through cruel gossip. The father had no choice but to send his daughter and her mother away.
It gnawed at the princess at first, why any father would shun his own child, for she was too young to understand that living among such rumors would only give her a horrible life. Then, in a matter of years, it merely became fact.
Over a decade passed before the princess was allowed back in the capital, at which point she no longer wished for any of the lavious lifestyle she was born into. The princess left at her mother’s insistence, who was deathly ill and wanted her to see her extended family once more.
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The princess became the aide of none other than her half-sister. They grew close, the older faintly remembering a time when the younger one was a babe.
Life had a set routine until the king suddenly died. None of his children, nor his brother’s children, were able to please Lady Aimiki and take the throne; the bastard princess was not tried, since her heritage had been hidden from the public.
A war broke out, but the bastard princess remained strong and steadfast, even as her family around her fell apart.
The princess kept the younger children optimistic and aided the townsfolk retain normalcy. She helped set up festivals and made a name for herself as a helper, all without the title of true royalty to add to her reputation.
In a matter of a year and eight months, the princess was the last of her family to live. In her despair, she called out to Lady Aimiki to make an exception based on her heritage. The kind goddess agreed, and gave the princess the silver-white hair of a queen.
She was the first queen of Gin—although Kuro had queens before, they were rare and were brutish. The new queen, by contrast, paid delicate attention to her peoples’ needs, and they adored her because of it.
The queen was very beloved by her people, Lady Aimiki, and her family. With Lady Aimiki’s blessing, she lived for another fifteen years before meeting her untimely end. Her murderer was never found; even former rebel leaders had no motivation to kill her.
Ever since, each king and queen of Gin after her come to the throne with grim determination to better themselves and the nation, all so her sacrifice would be remembered. Should they stray like the royalty of the first queen’s time did, Lady Aimiki will be unable to save them.