#they’re all bony and wrinkly but also shriveled

[firaknight]

Okokokokok so I have Queen Ripple braincells and headcannons as to why she is big

So, Ripple didn’t used to be the size she is now. Originally, she was the same size as all the other fairies! The leading royalty has to undergo a special transformation before they’re crowned to help show who’s in charge (and also because it makes them stronger).

It starts roughly a year before coronation. The princess is given a special diet of magic imbued food to prepare the body. The magic gives a sort of cushion for the upcoming transformation, which happens at such a fast rate that it can cause serious damage without this magic cushioning. The food also starts to slow the natural bodily processes of the princess down. This is to prepare the body for the transformation stasis. The princess puts on quite a bit of weight (necessary for what’s going to happen), and after around 3 months, they begin the transformation.

Much larger and with a heavy magic cushion, she goes into the Great Crystal (the one that breaks in Kirby 64) and uses her natural magic to get the crystal to react to her. It opens up, the princess steps inside, and it becomes a cocoon (it’s one of the reasons the fae are so damn protective of the crystal. Without it, they can’t crown their queens). Thus begins the 6-9 month process of transforming. The princess’s body essentially enters a stasis dictated by magic. If she becomes too weak, the stasis is temporarily halted and the crystal will alert the fae tending to everything, asking them to add magic to the crystal to support the princess. Once she gains enough to become stable again, stasis resumes. This can add a month or two onto the process, depending on how the princess was prepared (if she wasn’t given enough, it can add almost 4 extra months onto the process, but this is in extreme cases). This process can also speed itself up if the princess was given extra preparations (the fastest a princess transformed into her queen form was 3 months and 23 days!).

While the princess is in the crystalline cocoon, her body rapidly changes. The extra weight was added for a good reason: her body uses the excess to grow without having to build new muscles and tissues. It merely takes what it already has and stretches it, applying magic to help polish everything up and make it functionable. The head is one of the things that merely enlarged slightly rather than stretch and grow, and it’s one of the only body parts that barely changes in the process. The wings lengthen (this takes an unbelievably large amount of magic to do) and become thicker to accommodate for the larger body (fae use mostly fairy dust to fly, as their wings are too paper thin to allow them to safely fly. However, they’re still needed to lift off the ground and need to be thick enough to do so safely). The torso is the first thing to grow, followed by the arms and legs, and then the wings (the head doesn’t change at all besides growing a tiny bit, but that takes almost nothing), since those require the most magic to grow. The crystal then begins rapidly imbuing the princess with magic, hence the magic cushion added beforehand. It helps slow this process down and make it more manageable for the body. After the body has grown out, the crystal makes any last minute fixes it needs to make in order to create a functional body for the queen, and then ends the stasis manually. The crystal takes another day or so to break itself open, and the princess gains consciousness during this time. Once ready, the crystal melts the underside and out drops the princess! She lands on a ton of cushions and soft stuff so shes unharmed! Fae come and get her and bring her to a much more comfortable space. The kingdom is the most vulnerable at this point because the princess has just transformed and the crystal is weakened considerably. It takes a month or two for the crystal to fully repair itself. The princess however has a lot of work to do.

Once she’s been cleaned up and moved, the extent of the changes are clear. Think of how human babies come out: they’re not fuckin done yet. Same with the transformation. The soon-to-be queen should reeeeeaaallyyy be in there for another month or two, but the crystal can’t handle any more than what it’s doing, forcing the princess out early. Her body looks shriveled and malformed, and highly unnatural. Usually anything from the shoulders down looks like this, as the head barely changes. Her old clothes have been torn to shreds and the crystal fits her with magic imbued rags. These MUST be left on for at least a day to prevent leakage of magic (it’s a mix of things that helps her grow and control her new magic). These first 24 hours are basically just the princess being stuck on bed rest until she’s absorbed all she can get from the rags (they change color when everything has been absorbed out of them), and then begins coronation. She’s typically able to walk at this point (some can’t and need assistance), and is able to at least stand. She gets crowned queen and begins her recovery and training process.

Recovery is a change in diet and a fuck ton of rest. She sleeps for almost 12 hours and eats a specific nutrient-rich diet to help her finish adapting to her new body. She also has to take at least 1 day a week to bathe in a magic spring, which is a hot spring chock full of magic. It gets absorbed through the body and helps promote magic stability and provides some assistance in growth.

The training process is the practice of controlling her overflowing magic. One of 3 types are trained, sometimes combined: Offensive, Defensive, and Support. Queen Ripple leans towards Defensive and Support, but she does have Offensive magic! Offensive is utilizing the Great Crystal as a weapon, turning it into forms similar to the Crystal Shards Gun. Defensive involves using it in shield based attacks that create impenetrable barriers. Support covers the healing aspect of the crystal and amplifies it to create a more powerful healing ability. Masters in these magic types work with the queen and help her determine which she specializes in.

The queen also gets a weapon (what happens if she can’t use the crystal? Gotta have something else to work with!). This weapon is dictated by their magic abilities. It can range anywhere from crossbows to spears. Queen Ripple uses dual Rapiers with additional hand guards! She’s got funky hands that haven’t fully recovered from transformation and the sword gives her some reach! Shes quite the skilled fighter!

As for their bodies, they look really deformed for years after transformation and it can be unnerving to look at for people not native to Ripple Star. To remedy this, they wear long, thick, heavy robes that cover 90% of their body (the head, neck, and wings remain unaffected). Queen Ripple has grown into her body (as of Star Allie) but her hands are still funky. She prefers the long robes despite not needing them because they’re nice and help ease her anxiety (it’s like having a constant weighted blanket!).

Bonus:

The only reason Queen Ripple failed to protect against the Dark Matter invasion during Kirby 64 was because she was such a new queen. She’d only been in power for a few weeks, and the crystal was too weak to protect anything. She sent Ribbon off with it in hopes that she’d be able to escape to a safer location with it so the crystal could recover and return to protect the planet. However, due to how fragile the crystal was at the time, it couldn’t hold up to the attacks dealt while Ribbon was escaping with it.