Princess Potty Mouth
Now the Empire of Oglodin was a bright and rich land. Well, had been. Until centuries of slowly surrendering territory to the invading marauding monster tribes had reduced both its people and its lands to mere ruins of their former selves. Of course, there were many solutions proposed. The Sergent At Arms made his soldiers run 10 cubits carrying ten extra stones to toughen them up. For nothing makes fighting men fit as fitness. On the other hand, the clergy and scholars of the land undertook to make them less crude, more subtle and intelligent. Cursings were banished, cussing was forbidden, swearing verboten. Kinjiru in Japanese. Outlawed. And the nobles and knights and soldiers and priests and princesses all spoke with a grace and softness and dignity that wowed all of their people, doing much to improve morale.
However, though every prince, princess, knight, soldier, old hunter, poacher and smuggler with a heart of gold had been put to the battle line, still the empire kept losing. Finally, in desperation, the emperor called for every last man, woman and child capable of fighting to come to the imperial capital.
Now, Princess Priscella Andrea Ponopolis was not from such a great tribe. While most of the nobles wore their sunday best, she did as well and most thought she'd brought her tuesdays. In fact, her father's kingdom had degenerated to the point that it was a shaky barony more than the proud royal house it had been 500 years before. Still and all, noblese obligese and all that, one did one's part and so Princess Pap came to the war.
At her first posting, a minor border fort she got her first taste of combat. Ogres hurled goblins over the walls, and then helped orcs climb up. While the little monsters kept up a constant stream of horrific invective that paralyzed the troops until the base had fallen. At least most times. The first goblin came over the wall and said, "Yer muthers are all so fat they take two trips ta haul arse" and those soldiers and princelings with overweight or even mildly chubby mothers broke down in tears. The second goblin over the wall said, "Yer daddys were all a bunch of cowards and cuckolds, mostaya 'er bastards, i's plain to see." And anyone who'd ever doubted their father's masculinity or mother's virtue collapsed into broken, weeping sobs. Next an orc came over the wall and bellowed at the top of his lungs, "I'm ten-the-man any ten of you un-men are. You better run like the whipped and sewage leaking curs you are." And any man who'd ever questioned his masculinity or fitness to be a soldier collapsed in a fever-fear-sob.
Well, it's got to be held, this isn't the way the great tale goes, but Princess Pottymouth was quite stunned for a few moments. Paralyzed to inaction, as it were. Because even in her tiny spec of the empire, proper folk just didn't speak that way. Fortunately, Princess Pap had never quite figured out why anyone would want to be proper folk. And thus, for the entire 12 years of her life, she'd been savoring certain words, words she was never, ever ever, allowed to say. Even thinking them was apparently severely frowned on by adults. Still, in defiance of all social norms, she leapt upon the wall as the orc crested it. "Your mother is so ugly that your daddy takes her everywhere with him so he doesn't have to kiss her goodbye!" As she kicked the ladder over and clotted him a firm clomp with her tinsel and bell-bedecked spiked mace. She leapt upon a goblin, clearly carolling at the top of her lungs, "Come here you ugly little fungus-face, I'm going to slap you so hard your stupid falls out." As she backhanded him off the wall with a swish of the red tinsel ribbons on her mace.
A cartwheel that allowed her to cross the corner of the fort, to close with the final goblin, ending in a back-flip. "Come on you flat-footed, foul-breathed, funny-looking, duck-fluffer!" She shrieked as she charged with her goblinoid-gore covered mace. Though the tinsel and ribbons and bells seemed mysteriously unharmed, as is appropriate. She smashed it down on the head of the goblin, sending him hurtling back into the army of his fellow below. "All of you stink! NO ONE LIKES YOU!" She yelled out. "People are only nice to you because they feel sorry for you!" And continuing, "You don't have any real friends. They all hate you and secretly think you're a dork and fat." "If they were really your friends, they'd be there for you when you need them. Have they ever done that for you?" About this time two ogres going into an argument, because she's right you know, about who had paid off the outstanding gambling debt between them last.
"Everybody here hates you too. We're not your friends. We think you're stupid. And ugly. And rude. And you smell bad. Really bad. Plus? Your clothes are horrible. Every time you come over the wall? The whole cavalry brigade shudders in horror at your fashion sense. You are ugly, you dress ugly, you are stupid, you dress stupid, go away, we don't want to play with you. And don't come back. Until you know the password. Or I will hit more of you with my mace!"
An ogre under the wall, being harder of hearing as the older ogres tend to get happened to choose that moment to contribute, "They're like little sheep, you roar at them and they run." And so, Princess Pap leapt over the wall, and roared behind the older ogre. "If a dragon had sex with a hippo and then that got caught in some crazy sorceror's blender with a slug? That would be your face. You should put a bag on your head so you don't make baby birds die from looking at you." And giving him a good smart crack across the shins for good measure, sent him running down the trail, in tears, which preceded the general rout.
For a short time "Princess PottyMouth" was a hero of the kingdom. Until, some royal secretary in the treasury department noticed that money that had previously been allocated toward 'keeping marauding monsters from destroying the city' was now allocated to 'keeping morose poet-monsters from destroying the city'. Which, still you kinda gotta admit is an improvement.
K.