Love, Politics, and Other Acts of War

Book 2: A Gentle Apocalypse

by M. H. Foster

Genres: Fantasy; Humorous Fantasy

Synopsis

An annoying long-lost “cousin,” war, and the prospect of love all threaten the Demon Overlord's tranquil retirement in the edgy, funny follow-up to The Demon Overlord's Retirement Plan. Includes an exclusive bonus adventure coming 10/20/26! 

There’s no rest for the wicked, especially when they have family next door.

After centuries of conquering kingdoms and terrifying the cosmos, the Demon Overlord just wants to retire in peace. Unfortunately, peace is hard to find in Lower Middleton, a quiet village full of gossip, feuds, and one dangerously charming succubus—who also happens to be his "cousin."

Now Willem Porter (definitely not Galornus Prime, Destroyer of Worlds) must navigate enchanted pickles, noble politics, and the delicate art of staying out of trouble, all while pretending he’s just a humble turnip farmer.

A cozy, laugh-out-loud fantasy of infernal bureaucracy, reluctant heroism, and small-town chaos.

Perfect for fans of Legends & Lattes, Good Omens, and anyone who likes their comfort reads served with sarcasm, tea, and a touch of demonic meddling.

Start your next infernal vacation in Lower Middleton today.

Release date: October 20, 2026

Publisher: Grand Central Publishing

Print pages: 192

Sample

The thing about retiring from being the Demon Overlord is that demons don’t understand the concept of retirement. They understand death, banishment, temporary imprisonment in soul gems, and the occasional millennia-long nap. But retirement? Voluntary cessation of evil activities to grow vegetables?

Incomprehensible.

Which is why, when Tom Fletcher said, “Your cousin is here,” I should have immediately set fire to everything I owned and relocated to a different continent. I should have known that there was no way my followers would have given up hope so easily.

The absence of my perfection would have been excruciating and intolerable to my minions, and they were undoubtedly all trying to find me and bathe once again in the glory of my presence.

Instead of realizing all this, I’d blurted the first question that came to mind. “Cousin? What cousin?” Being around humans had dulled my mind.

Tom had given me that particular look humans perfected when they thought you were being deliberately obtuse. “That cousin? Rajani? Came all the way from”—he paused, clearly trying to remember—”the Eastern Protectorates? Yes. I think that’s what she said. Probably explains her fancy words and accent.”

The Eastern Protectorates didn’t exist. Hadn’t for three hundred years, not since I’d accidentally summoned a plague of locusts there during incarnation number two hundred and twelve. Or was it two hundred and thirteen? The point was, anyone claiming to be from there was lying. And anybody that remembered that place even existed was either a scholar or an immortal demon.

Which meant… No… Yes… Uh-oh…

“Where is she?” I asked, already knowing this would end badly.

“At your door. I was just… I wanted to make sure you were prepared. She’s…” Tom’s face did something complicated, like his features were trying to have three different emotions simultaneously.

I pushed past him and immediately understood his expression.

Rajani, Queen of the Succubi, Mistress of the Scarlet Throne, Collector of Ten Thousand Hearts, and Juicer of Youthful Romance stood at my cottage door wearing what appeared to be a repurposed potato sack.

Not metaphorically. An actual burlap sack that had recently contained potatoes, based on the faint smell and suspicious brown stains. She’d cut holes for her arms and added a rope belt. Her hair, usually an architecturally impossible cascade of midnight silk, had been chopped into an aggressive bob that made her look like she’d lost a fight with gardening shears.

She was trying to look unattractive. The Queen of All Desires was actively attempting to be homely.

She was failing spectacularly.

It was like watching the sun try to disguise itself as a candle by squinting. The potato sack somehow emphasized rather than hid her figure by being demure. The terrible haircut just made her bone structure more obvious. Even the dirt smudges she’d added to her cheeks looked artfully placed.

Tom stood frozen beside me. Not leering—nothing so crass. As if. His lizard brain had simply stopped processing information and left his body on standby mode. A light breeze could have knocked him over.

“Cousin!” Rajani exclaimed, her voice pitched to sound travel-weary and common. It came out as musically husky instead. “It’s been so long! Don’t you recognize your dear cousin Rajani from”—she paused for exactly the right amount of time to suggest she was remembering, not inventing—“your mother’s side of the family? Our Grand Uncle Silas’s younger brother’s third sister?”

I didn’t have a mother. I’d spontaneously generated from the primordial chaos when the universe needed something sufficiently evil and interesting to balance out all the good and dull the Divine kept creating.

I simply… was. But Tom didn’t know that.

“Rajani,” I said carefully. “What an… unexpected and pleasant surprise.”

My tone left no question that it was not pleasant at all.

Her smile grew even wider, and she pretended to rearrange a loose strand of hair that had artfully fallen across her face. She was loving every moment.

“Aren’t you going to invite me in? I’ve traveled such a very long way to see how my favorite cousin is doing in his new life as a”—her eyes glittered with barely suppressed mirth—“turnip farmer.”

I felt my shadow want to grow horns. Sharp horns. I consciously kept it normal-shaped.

“Tom,” I said without looking at him, “could you give me time with my… cousin? She’s clearly exhausted from her travels.”

Tom made a sound that might have been agreement. He hadn’t blinked once since seeing Rajani.

“Tom,” I said more firmly, “you may go now.”

He ignored me. Or didn’t hear me.

Rajani smiled sweetly at Tom as she moved past me and into my cottage.

“Tom. Leave. Now,” I said. I enunciated every syllable perfectly clearly, and his head snapped back to look at me as if breaking out of a trance.

“Right. Yes. Leaving.” He took three steps backward, still staring at Rajani, then seemed to remember how walking worked. “I’ll come by later! To… to welcome your cousin to the community! We should have a party!”

“She won’t be staying long,” I said, closing the door in his face before he could start planning the celebration. What was it with humans and their obsession with celebrating everything? Someone sneezed? Party. Tuesday again? Party.

Demon Overlord’s retirement discovered by the Queen of the Succubi? Definitely no party for that.

I summoned Buttercup mentally. He materialized from the shadows and positioned himself in front of the door, all two hundred pounds of hellhound ready to prevent interruptions. He’d grown a lot lately with good food and belly rubs.

Not fatter, just better proportioned. The subcutaneous fat that coated his ribs was just an additional form of protection. Anybody versed in the arts of war knew that.

No one would be getting through him without my permission. My security was impervious.

I turned back to find Rajani already making herself at home on my sofa, my silk throw wrapped around her legs, which were curled beneath her with calculated casualness.

The sofa was new, a recent addition I was particularly proud of. Kettaran silk lining, stuffed with cotton from Lower Middleton grown with exactly the right balance of Sin Blessings. Positioned perfectly—three steps from my ale brewing closet, within arm’s reach of the Henderson cheese storage, and optimal distance from the fireplace.

It was MY seat. I’d EARNED that plushy comfort for tolerating these mortals.

“Nice throne,” she said, stretching out with proprietary ease. “Very… austere. Going for the ‘humble despot’ style minimalist aesthetic? Or do you prefer ‘agricultural emperor’? Sir Willem the Turnip King has a certain ring to it.”

“It’s not a throne. It’s a sofa. A completely normal human sofa.”

She snorted and adjusted her position. She sat straight, arms resting on the sides with regal precision and her face taking on the stern expression of an empress. The potato sack somehow became imperial robes. The simple wooden frame of my sofa suddenly looked suspiciously throne-like.

Fine. Maybe I’d accidentally recreated certain structural elements common to thrones. The high back. The imposing armrests. The way it was positioned to survey the entire room. It wasn’t my fault that the constants of architectural beauty were universal.

It was still just a sofa. Turnip farmers didn’t have thrones. Obviously.

“What are you doing here, Rajani?” I asked. “And how in the seven hells and six heavens did you find me?”

She didn’t answer immediately. Instead, she uncurled herself and her eyes began exploring my cottage with the thorough attentiveness of someone cataloging assets.

“Such a quaint little hovel,” she said, getting up and running her fingers along my pickle shelf. “Though I see you’ve made some improvements to the region. Opening the pass to Pelan? Brilliant. Releasing the river to create new trade routes? Inspired. You’re playing a long game, aren’t you, my liege? Build economic power first, then leverage it for control?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. Those were clearly absolutely natural occurrences,” I said, looking at her squarely without blinking.

“Of course they were.”

She stopped at Thomas’s suit. It hung carefully in its place of honor. Her fingers traced the worn fabric with unexpected gentleness. I twitched but held myself back.

“My, my,” she said softly. “So much love woven into such coarse material. And loss. And”—she tilted her head—“recent contentment? How deliciously fascinating.”

I gently removed her hand from the suit without saying a word. Succubi were empathically sensitive; she could feel every emotion that had been near that fabric. Mrs. Crankshaw’s grief. Her unexpected approval. My own complicated feelings about wearing a dead soldier’s clothes to not court someone who was definitely also not courting me back.

This was not something for her to trifle with. The older memories and feelings belonged to Mrs. Crankshaw, and the newer ones were for mine and Clara’s alone. Our emotions were ours to disentangle. They were insignificant to the world at large, but they were… precious to me.

“It’s complicated,” I said, my voice thicker and deeper than I intended, and Rajani looked at me, one perfectly manicured eyebrow raised. She was surprised for the first time.

Before I could elaborate, a thunderous crash interrupted. My door—my newly reinforced door with three separate locks and a dead bolt—exploded inward. The primary lock came flying at my head. The most expensive one I’d meticulously designed and paid for, of course.

I caught it reflexively.

The silhouette in the doorway barely reached the handle. Sally stood there, wooden sword already half-drawn, eyes blazing with righteous fury.

“Uncle Willem! I came to rescue you!”

Her red cloak flapped behind her. Mrs. Crankshaw had made it for her. I don’t know why. Cloaks got in the way of good old-fashioned mayhem. They were impressive to look at, but they had a tendency of catching on things at the least opportune moments. I’d given them up long ago, and heroes going through training were taught to never, ever wear them or risk getting defeated by Galornus Prime in the most humiliating ways possible.

I smiled at the memory of a few of my better ones. Like the one where I’d hung the hero from the spire of the… I shook my ahead and gave Sally my full attention. It wasn’t every day I got to experience my minion rushing to my rescue, and I looked forward to it.

Buttercup padded in after her, looking simultaneously proud and sheepish. He positioned himself carefully between Sally and Rajani, though I noticed he wasn’t quite meeting my eyes. Behind them, Prometheus stood with his back to us. The goat had kicked my door open. Backwards. With unnecessary force and perfect accuracy.

The goat turned to look at me. The rectangular pupils radiated smug satisfaction, and his mouth was open in a smirk that showed all his lower teeth. The blasted animal did it so he could get entertainment.

Sally planted herself between me and Rajani, sword hand ready, feet in the defensive stance I’d taught her carefully.

The Bastion of Eternal Midnight. Sword angled down to deflect blows into the ground, body compressed to absorb impact. The body becomes the fortress that cannot be breached.

Sally called it: Scared Turnip Hides in the Dirt.

I’d given up long ago on correcting the name, so one of the most feared stances of the Demon sword arts became synonymous with malformed turnips.

“Who are you?” she demanded, glaring at Rajani with the suspicion of someone who’d been raised on stories of evil enchantresses.

“Me?” Rajani fluttered her eyelashes, a gesture that had conquered kingdoms. I had no doubt she recognized the stance and knew this child was under my protection.

Sally remained unimpressed. “What’s wrong with her eyes, Uncle Willem? Is she having a seizure?”

Rajani’s jaw dropped slightly. She was the Queen of Succubi. Emperors had started wars for her attention. Poets had died of longing after a single glance. And this child thought she was having medical issues.

“Nothing’s wrong with her,” I said, keeping my hand on Sally’s shoulder.

I gloated. My shadow danced a little jig, its hips swaying independent from my physical form.

It was wonderful to have minions.

Sally’s sword was only wood to casual observation. Since the Brennan incident, I’d added certain enhancements. The edge would cut through anything Sally genuinely believed was an enemy. And from her expression, Rajani was definitely classified as a threat.

I swelled with pride and almost purred. Finally, minions who rushed to my aid at the first sign of danger. All those months of tolerating their chaos, their noise, their relentless affection—it was paying off.

“This is my cousin,” I said. “Rajani. From… the Eastern Protectorates.”

Sally’s eyes narrowed further. “The Eastern Protectorates don’t exist. They got eaten by locusts hundreds of years ago. Arthur told us about it in school.”

Of course he did. That meddling scholar and his accurate historical education. He constantly repeated that “the children are our future,” which is all fine, except the fool actually meant it!

“She means her family is from the Eastern Protectorates,” I clarified reflexively. “Originally. Before the locusts.” I’d taught a few classes. Reluctantly. Just to make sure that they heard about one Galornus Prime correctly and didn’t attribute my atrocities with someone else.

“The locusts that appeared mysteriously and ate exactly one kingdom’s worth of crops before vanishing?” Sally’s hand hadn’t moved from her sword. “Those locusts?”

When had human children become so well-educated? In my day, they barely knew their own kingdom’s name, let alone historical disasters from three centuries ago.

“Yes. Those locusts. Tragic, really. Shall we all have tea?”

Sally didn’t budge, but she sheathed her sword. “She feels wrong.”

“Wrong?” Rajani asked, genuinely curious now. She’d inched closer and was only a few feet away from Sally now.

“Like the air before lightning, but backward. Like honey that remembers being poison.” Sally’s description was disturbingly accurate. Descriptive beyond her age but capturing the essence perfectly.

“She’s not your cousin,” Sally said firmly, still glaring at Rajani. “Cousins don’t make Buttercup nervous. And Prometheus doesn’t attack doors for cousins.”

Sally was correct on the first point, woefully incorrect on the second. Prometheus regularly broke my door down when he heard me trying to snack without him. That’s why I had three locks in the first place.

The goat bleated agreement, though it sounded more like laughter.

“Yes, little girl,” Rajani said, suddenly kneeling so she was eye level with Sally. “His cou. . .