A peasant girl gets the Evil Overlord's crown

I'm having trouble completing this premise.

So an Evil Overlord decides to kidnap a peasant girl for some sacrificial ritual, but some mistake in ritual procedures caused him and most of his underlings in the ritual chamber to be killed by dark forces.

Meanwhile the peasant girl was left unscathed. When she woke up to an empty room, she found the Overlord's crown lying on the floor and decided to wear it for shits and giggles.

But the moment she put on the crown, she became the new overlord, and inherited a portion of the old overlord's powers as well as becoming the new owner of a rather broken down castle.

Now I'm stumped as to what challenges she would face next. BTW this story is suppose to be rather lighthearted and silly.

edited 18th Jun '14 10:02:44 AM by Worlder

What kind of powers did she inherit, and is she fully in control of them?

Is it one of those corrupting artifacts; was the old overlord really such a bad guy in the beginning? I'd suggest that you stay away from the more powerful influences, since you say this should be silly. Having the thing whispering that she should perform blood sacrifice is a far different thing from it telling her to turn the local river green, but both could be played for comedy, depending mostly on how you play it.

Of course, you'll probably have a bunch of old servants hanging around to either serve her or challenge her, not to mention the local (misguided) hero who thinks she should be killed before she becomes too powerful.

I'd like to be a part of this, it seems like a very interesting project.

Ok perhaps I should have specified "silly and lighthearted but still qualifying as dark comedy".

Ah, that's a bit more challenging.

So, what's the general thing you'd compare this to, so I can have some more understanding of the specific feel you're trying to achieve.

Are you thinking more of the Ice king arcs from adventure time or the beginnings of Cerberus syndrome where the comedy is only starting to sour?

The Overlord games.

Casually crushing anyone who wants to get in your way.

She could crush this guy, but dang he's soo hot.

Hmm, let's see...

It is a fantasy version of "what if the Beverly Hillbillies suddenly became in charge of a Banana Republic, because the former dictator died in an embarrassing accident?"

EDIT: You know I could turn it into...

"Good news you got a huge inheritance from a recently deceased distance relative. Bad news your distant relative was the most wanted person in the world, now you are taking his/her place."

edited 18th Jun '14 2:13:32 PM by Worlder

I could see the crown having the effect of bringing out the darkest urges of the wearer. In the case of the old overlord, those were desires for dominion and dark, arcane power. In the case of the peasant girl those desires might be something very different.

She might also decide to set herself up as a benevolent overlord—which of course no-one believes at all (especially if the crown does start bringing out her darkest desires, perhaps causing some inconveniently-timed villainy or evil laughter).

I'm suddenly beginning to think the Beverly Hillbillies route might be a good idea.

Another route you could take the corrupting artifact thing would be to make the peasant girl the dominant one in the relationship and have the crown meekly obey her commands.

Or, have her be Too Dumb to Fool into evil.

If your looking for arcs and plot movements you could do worse than Overlord having a MC that isn't overwhelmingly powerful but a Item Caddy or Super Weapon, Average Joe type might work well