Princess Penny ✦

When she was a young Penny was always told the story of a little girl who used her magic to make her own toys and bring them to life. But she was scolded by her parents every time she was caught doing so, because they lived under the rule of a tyrant king who disallowed any form of joy, including toys. When the girl was a grown up toy maker, she secretly made and gave toys to the children to play with in secret. But one day the evil king discovered a child with a toy, and sent his guards to search every home, and slaughter any family that broke the law by having a toy in their home. When the Toymaker discovered nearly every family had been murdered for her toys, she became angry; at herself being at fault for making the toys in the first place, and at the evil king for his unforgivable acts. The toymaker used her magic to create toys for the souls of the victims to host, and made an army to oppose the tyrant. With her powerful magic and army, she defeated and overthrew the evil king. Many of the souls passed on after that, some remained in the toys. The Toymaker gave life to those empty toys, and to new ones she'd make. Together they'd rebuilt their old kingdom into the bright new Toy Kingdom, with the Toymaker as their queen. 

Later in life the kingdom was flourishing with toy people both old and new along with toy makers who'd build toys, but only the Toymaker herself could give them life. Eventually she had started a family of her own, and taught them her craft to pass down for generations. But it seems they weren't the only one with the magical gift, a young female toy maker, who specifically enjoyed making plushes, approached the queen one day with a plush she had made and brought to life herself. Out of fear of the woman's capabilities possibly surpassing her own, the Toymaker had the woman and her husband exiled from the Toy Kingdom. The Plushmaker wandered the land, until she made it to the nearest valley, where many plant and wild life lived. It was there she decided to use the materials around her to create her own plush people, eventually an entire plush village, which grew and grew until eventually it had it's own castle and became the Plush Kingdom with the Plushmaker as it's queen. 

The Toymaker hated the Plushmaker for being able to build her own toy themed kingdom, and right next to her own, as if to mock the Toymaker herself. The Plushmaker hated the Toymaker for exiling her in the first place, and vowed to have her kingdom be more soft and welcoming to all than the neighboring kingdom. The quarrel between the Toymakers and the Plushmakers continued, passing on from generation to generation, and still continued to this day.

When Penny turned 16 and it came time for her to take over as the kingdom's ruling princess, Penny's first act was to finally declare war against the plush people and take over their kingdom. When news of this reached the Plush Kingdom's ruling princess, Plusheera, she quickly rushed to the Toy Kingdom in hopes of offering peace between the two and ending the ridiculous quarrel before both kingdoms were at lost. Once Plusheera reached the toy castle, she was apprehended by guards and taken to Penny, who was ready to show no mercy to the enemy she had never met but was raised to hate on behalf of their ancestors. But when Princess Plusheera came through Princess Penny's doors, time froze as they met each other's gaze. Penny immediately called off the guards and listened to what the pretty princess had to say. They discussed, wrote, and signed a peace treaty between the two kingdoms that day, and started dating. Eventually it soon blossomed into a romance, and within a year the Toy and Plush Kingdom's became unified into the giant kingdom now known as Toybox, with Penny and Plusheera as it's ruling princess couple.

Another year later all was well in Toybox, and Penny proposed to Plusheera, asking her to become the only queen by her side for the rest of her life. The princess duo were to be married and become the queens of Toybox! Preparations went accordingly, and when it came time for the rehearsal dinner everyone was eager for the real event. They pretended to have a toast, and the couple linked arms as they were about to drink from their glasses, but Penny accidentally tugged a bit too much as she drank hers and made Plusheera spill her whole drink before she get a single sip. A few minutes later, Penny dropped her glass and fell to the floor, killed by poison put into the couple's drinks.

Plusheera had the entire castle on lockdown and had guards search for anyone who stood out as the possible murderer. She then immediately had the best mages in the land searched for and called in, including necromancers, to find out what kind of poison killed her fiance, expel it from her body, and bring her back to life. The mages soon came and were able to take the poison out of her body, and began testing it along with the poison from the drinks. But none of the mages were powerful enough to fully resurrect Penny back to life, otherwise she'd be a walking corpse, but the best they could do is summon her soul to try and find a host. So Plusheera quickly had the mages cast a spell to preserve Penny's body so it'd stay fresh and never decay, but it would still age, and was carefully placed in a glass case. Then she had the toy and plush makers work together to build a life-like puppet replica of Penny to host her soul until they could find someone or something powerful enough to bring her back.

Penny's soul was able to successfully take refuge in the puppet replica, Plusheera was tearful over the fact that her loved one was still with her, but also in the condition she was.  She informed the confused Penny of the situation, much to her fiance's shock. The guards returned, saying they turned the whole castle upside down trying to find a suspect with no luck. The couple decide to postpone the wedding until they found out who the culprit was, and a way to get Penny back into her body. The mages approach the princess' saying they've identified the poison found in both of their drinks, which they've concluded was an instant heart stopper that could've rotted Penny's heart away if not removed as soon as it was, and the poison could have only came from somewhere in the kingdom across the sea known as Feverish. The couple decided that they would continue to rule as usual and keep a calm image as they work on their next plan to figure out who would want to jeopardize Toybox's prosperity and why.