The title derives from the way the king, his knights and even the mythical figures Sophia interacts with views the lower classes of the world- as beasts. If you thought that was too subtle, don't worry- you'll be hit over the head with it enough times for it to sink in.

Princess Sophia is the MarySue- the kind, gentle, entitled, clueless waif who eschews needlepoint and harp lessons for swordplay and strategy (how else can she be the heroine if she can't kill the bad guys?) Yet she wrangles a promise on her birthday from her warrior king father to stop expanding the realm, which makes everyone else see him as weak and losing his edge. Even a mythical figure named Ares now thinks the king's a punk and it's time to march on his lands. On her weekly errand of mercy to the local village, Sophia's confronted by a tall, handsome, dark haired youth named Raphael. She also learns there's an outbreak of plague (which in all her other trips she'd somehow never heard of it)- and the scene where she contracts it is both unintentionally funny and sets up the ridiculousness of the rest of the story. I don't want to ruin it; you really gotta read this for yourselves.