“It was hard not to notice the air of suspense and uneasiness in Agelon for the past few days. After all, the royal castle was put under a lockdown and right before the Awakening Festival, no less! With the only people leaving the castle being the guards on rather silent patrols, and the sudden arrival of several mages, researchers, alchemists and potion masters into the castle, the situation gave birth to quite a few rumors, none of which we have, or will ever disclose due to their sheer speculative nature.

As the Awakening Festival grew closer, the city was preparing for it with a sense of wariness, since per tradition, due to the lack of a queen, it befell on our young king Veliger to open the festival with a speech. Luckily, on the morning of the first day of the festival, the lockdown was lifted, and the king was right there on the capital’s main square to uphold said tradition - and it was the moment the good people of Agelon learned the truth of the situation in the days prior.

For the king was now a bee.

That is correct - due to some undisclosed circumstances, the king was polymorphed into a bee, and neither the passage of time, nor magic, nor medicine relieved him of this unfortunate condition. Luckily, as he enthusiastically buzzed his surprisingly intelligible speech, his loyal subjects came to realize that our fair king’s current circumstances do little in order to impede him in his royal duties. Of course, this does raise the question of the royal succession, but there’s quite enough time for this condition to run its course, or for the king and his royal adviser Marah to find a cure.

As such, the Awakening Festival had started without a hitch, and the royal kitchen even participated in it with a huge batch of bee-shaped honey lemon caramels and beehive cookies. They were bee-licious!