The Rise of Princess Potato

The auditorium’s spotlights clicked and shined upon a stage, illuminating a scene of colored cardboards depicting a village straight out of a fairytale.

Cherry leaned behind a cutout of a mushroom house, glowering down at her ridiculous costume.

Every year for the Spectacle Series, the Drama, Literature, Sculpturing, and Fashion Clubs would collaborate to stage a grand play. The Literature Club would write a script based on the number of actors and on a voted prompt, the Sculpturing Club would be responsible for the stage props, and the Fashion Club would sew costumes.

Ultimately, the Drama Club would bring all that together with their performance.

During her second year at Astrale Academy, Cherry joined the Drama club out of inspiration by Monty and signed up for the collaboration for a chance to win tickets to The Spectacular Theory. Out of all things, out of all characters available…

She was chosen to play the role of a talking potato.

Yep. A potato.

Supposedly, the potato was meant to be a minor obstacle in the main protagonist’s adventure. The potato had but a few lines, and it only showed up in this one particular scene.

As someone with the least experience on stage, she couldn’t argue against it, and yet, somewhere deep down, a gut feeling whispered the thought that they didn’t want the Honey Badger’s sister to stand out. Clearly, they wanted to discourage her from even participating.

Jokes on them, she accepted it willingly. Everyone who participated was guaranteed to be rewarded, so even if her role was brief, as long as they’d win, she'd be rewarded too! On the bright side, she didn’t have to work that hard either!

If anything, the only complaint was the character itself. Who the hell wrote this character and why did it have to be a potato? Why not a farmer?

As she pondered, Cherry gazed at the shadowy sea beyond the stage, their heads slightly swaying like ripples of water.

Maybe it was just her, but why did most of the audience appear to be… burly, middle-aged men? This play was meant for children! Sure, there were a few families here and there, but why did most of them all look like they were part of the royal knights?

A gut-wrenching mass of anxiety gradually stirred up her stomach. Her heart drummed in her ears, and her knees shivered.

So this was how Penelope felt before a huge audience. God, being on stage was scarier than it looked! Maybe they were right to have her play as a background character for her first time. Playing as a major character would’ve been like dropping her into the deepest depths of the ocean without any swimming practice!

In one of the boxes stood Headmaster Fantario himself, his glasses glinting as he tilted his head. Standing next to him was a peculiar, black-haired man wearing a red theater mask, both gazing back at her.

Wait, why were they staring at her?

No, wait a moment.

She glanced back at the audience again, chills crawling up her spine.

Why were most of the scary-looking people staring at her?! And somehow while she was completely hidden in the shadows?! Talk about creepy! Look at the narrator, not her!

Cherry stepped further back into the shadows, forced herself to break eye contact, and turned to the speaker on stage.

“The Prince’s journey through the forest, although riddled with monsters, thus finally came to an end,” said the Narrator. “When he broke through the trees, he found himself in a village!”

The young man playing the Prince walked on stage, and a spotlight followed him, his royal blue cape flowing behind his back. He raised a scrolled map and unrolled it. “So, this is Greenville Village,” he said loudly. “I hope the people here can let me stay overnight! I’m so exhausted from a whole day of traveling!”

“The Prince looked around and approached a house, knocking on it,” said the Narrator.

The actor followed the Narrator’s lines, knocking at the cardboard mushroom house Cherry was behind.

“Little did he know,” the Narrator said dramatically, “that the Prince would encounter someone completely unexpected!”

The Prince knocked on the cardboard door again. After a brief silence, he frowned and knocked once more.

What’s going on? Where’s the Princess? Cherry asked to herself, glancing at the empty spot behind her. She’s supposed to open the door and greet the Prince! Where is she?

She turned to the Narrator and the Prince, and the three exchanged the same, confused expressions. The three glimpsed to the backstage, where frantic shuffling of feet grew louder.

A student slid in and frantically whispered, “She’s still in the lavatory!”

The three hopelessly gawked at him, their faces drained of color.

What were they supposed to do then?!

The Prince glanced at the audience, who began to spread murmurs, and sweat trailed down his cheeks. He looked back at the door and knocked again. “Hello?” he called out. “Anyone home?”

The Narrator quivered his lips, utterly at a loss of words.

Cherry caught the anxiety next, frantically looking back and forth at the chaos brewing backstage with trembling eyes.

Headmaster Fantario and the masked man traded glances. At another elongated box across theirs were the Vamiers and her own family, where a certain young lady with analytical eyes instantly understood the situation.

“The actress for the Princess went missing,” whispered Penelope.

“Oh no, what happened to her?” whispered Dorothy.

Penelope squinted, read each of the performers' faces, and shook her head dejectedly. “They don’t know either.”

“No freaking way they screwed up!” Theodore hissed, clutching his head. “My club worked so hard on the script!”

“Should we do something?” asked Charlie.

“Don’t bother,” said Fiona, crossing her legs and leaning back on her chair. “They’re on their own.”

“Yep, they’re on their own!” Maribel leaned on the railing and curved a mischievous grin. “I wonder how they’ll improvise now that their supposed MVP is stuck in the lavatory!”

“Mother, how do you know that?” asked Clover, raising a brow.

She whistled and looked away, only to accidentally lock gazes with her husband with a suspicious stare.

“Now that you mention it, I do happen to remember that the bottle of laxatives went missing from my shelf this morning,” said Solomon. “Mari, what did you do?”

“Oh, it’s nothing.” She pulled out a fan and innocently waved herself. “I simply think… that arrogant child doesn’t deserve the spotlight.”

Solomon turned to the butler standing by and crossed his arms. “Horace, don’t bake her any sweets for a month.”

“Nooo! I had a reason!” Maribel tugged on her husband’s sleeve. “That girl was bullying our Cherry! She deserved it!”

The others tossed glances.

“Make that one week,” said Solomon.

“Understood,” said Horace.

Everyone’s gazes returned to the stage, where the Narrator and Prince stalled some time by repeating their lines while Cherry chewed on her thumb nail. 

Something inside her sparked with fire. Something burned and itched her muscles.

They couldn’t mess this up. They worked so hard on it for weeks! She couldn’t lose this chance to win those tickets!

The show must go on!

Cherry sharply inhaled, kicked the cardboard door open, and stepped into the spotlight, arms raised high into the air. “What ho!” she said loudly. “And who are you to wake up from my slumber?”

The Narrator and the Prince gaped their eyes as if she had committed a taboo—which didn’t exist, mind them. Improvising was the last acceptable resort, and they knew it!

“I… I-I am Prince Charming!” said the hero, posing dramatically. “I am on a quest to find the missing princess of my kingdom! Pray tell, who are you?”

In the original script, the Prince should’ve briefly met the Princess, only for her to be captured and taken away by talking vegetables controlled by a witch.

…What the hell was Cherry thinking, replacing the Princess in this ridiculous potato costume?

“Uhm, I…” She continued to stammer, her knees quivered, and her breaths grew more unstable by the second.

It didn’t help that hundreds of people were now boring their eyes into her, and for a moment, the room spun around her as she battled against nausea. She swallowed her pride and struck a pose.

“I… I-I am Princess Potato!” Cherry blurted out.

The Prince, the Narrator, Headmaster Fantario, Horace, the Vamiers, and her family all dropped their jaws. Meanwhile, some of the spectators—including Solomon and Fiona—whipped toward the masked man, who also darted confused glances at the headmaster and at Cherry. Murmurs spread across the audience, and a few smirked with amusement.

“Pfffft—hahaha!” Theodore leaned on the railing and repeatedly smacked it. “Princess Potato! Ahahahaha! That’s brilliant!” He continued to wheeze after he collapsed onto the floor, kicking his legs up. “I can’t breathe!”

Maribel slapped her knee and cackled as tears sprayed away. “Oh my stars, Fiona, your daughter is incredible!”

Cherry’s mother and brother covered their faces with embarrassment along with the other youths, including the butler himself.

“Horace? What’s wrong?” asked Solomon, stepping closer to him.

“Solomon, please kill me.”

“Huh?! Why?!”

“Just hurry up and kill me!” Horace snatched his lapels and shook him, his face flushing with the most second-hand embarrassment out of everyone there. “I can’t bear to watch this!”

More murmurs and laughter weaved through the audience. Meanwhile, the Narrator and Prince stared down at the so-called "Princess Potato." If Cherry’s costume were to be a tomato instead, her face would’ve perfectly matched its color.

“I-I beg your pardon?” the Prince asked. “Princess… Potato? You’re a princess, you say?”

“P-Precisely!”

“Then where is your crown?”

Cherry twitched an eye. “You’re not helping!” she hissed.

The 'Prince' glared back at her. “You can’t convince anyone with that getup!” he whispered back.

She gritted her teeth. “Th-That’s… erm…”

The masked man discreetly snapped his fingers. Out of nowhere, a golden tiara dropped on top of the potato lady’s head. Solomon and Fiona widened their eyes at the masked man, who playfully shushed them with a finger at his lips.

“Eh?” Cherry gawked up at the crown. “Er—ahem! S-See? Here is your proof! Anyway! Rise, my people! Seize the prince!”

On cue, a group of people dressed in vegetables like her scurried to the stage, wielding prop swords and swinging them at the Prince. With haughty laughter, Cherry waved farewell and strode off the stage.

God, so much for her first experience on stage.

✦☆✦

Cherry squinted at the bed’s tester as her mind continued to replay her most embarrassing memory yet. Of course, such a memory had to haunt her in the middle of the night.

Well, either that or the terrible itch to meet Horace forced her to stay awake.

A few days flew by since they started their official training, and during all that time, she and her friends performed aerobic exercises nonstop—aside from Eloi receiving combat training with Charlie and Solomon. Even though her body could shatter at any moment, she still found herself at the mercy of her own heart.

Cherry groaned and covered her eyes with an arm.

The grandfather clock ticked, and the wind outside her windows howled, but neither of them matched the storm of thoughts raging in her head.

Solomon did mention that during or after intense exercise, a vampire’s heart would often deliver emotional memories to stimulate a sense of drive. Out of all her memories, why did she end up recollecting the embarrassing ones?

Then again, the humiliation was as painful as torture. She won praises and tickets, and she couldn’t care less about her new nickname, so why did it still bother her? Was it because she found out about her horrendous stage fright? Was it the strange loneliness she felt on stage?

Or was it the fact that Monty ruined her normal life before she could even get a second chance?

…If she couldn’t even stand properly on stage, then how could she keep pursuing this dream? Was it the wrong choice after all?

Utterly exhausted, all she could do was mumble to herself, and while doing so, she subconsciously called out a name.

“Mister Horace…”

“...Cherry?”

Cherry twitched and moved her arm, gaping at a pair of beautiful, dark blue eyes gleaming under the moonlight behind him.