I have such a weird relationship with this story because I do enjoy it, but I don’t think the moral framing is as clean as the fandom makes it sound.
Like, I’m not “Team Rashta” or “Team Navier.” Rashta did awful things. She lied, hurt people, and kept making choices that made everything worse. I’m not pretending she was just some poor innocent girl the whole time.
But at the same time, I can’t ignore that she started as a runaway slave with no education, no noble background, no real protection, and no idea how to survive palace politics except clinging to the emperor. Sovieshu was the emperor. He was the married one. He was the one with all the power. He brought her into the palace, made her his concubine, used her position for his own plans, and then everyone acts like Rashta alone caused the entire disaster.
That’s what bothers me most. Rashta gets punished by the story and by the fandom for being desperate, selfish, clingy, manipulative, etc. But when powerful people do similar things, it’s suddenly politics, strategy, love, or “they had their reasons.”
Navier is a good character, but I don’t think she’s above criticism either. She’s graceful and competent, yes, but she is still part of the same class system that crushed Rashta. The story wants us to see her as the perfect empress, but perfect for who? Nobles? The empire? Her inner circle? Because slavery exists in that world and it never feels like something the story really wants to sit with unless it’s being used to explain why Rashta is beneath everyone.
Even the Lebetti situation rubbed me the wrong way. Rashta’s former owner and that whole household were part of the reason Rashta was traumatized in the first place, so seeing people connected to that side get treated more lightly felt strange. It made the story feel less like “justice” and more like “whoever is on Navier’s side gets cleaner framing.”
And Heinrey too. I like him with Navier, but let’s be real, he is not just a cute bird husband. He inserted himself into the life of a married woman, acted all sweet and harmless, and later we find out he is way more calculating than he looks. If Rashta acts clingy and cute, she’s manipulative. If Heinrey does it, it’s romantic comedy. That double standard is hard to unsee.
Again, I don’t think Rashta deserved a happy ending after everything she did. But I also don’t think the story handled her with as much nuance as it could have. Her downfall is written like it’s only because she was greedy, when really she was also shaped by slavery, classism, Sovieshu, Ergi, Lotteshu, and a palace that was never going to respect her anyway.
And Rashta’s first child situation is one of the clearest examples of how uneven the story’s sympathy is. Alan may be framed as her former lover, but Rashta was still enslaved under his family. That was never a normal equal romance. Her child was taken from her, she was lied to about him dying, and yet the story still treats people around that situation with more softness than it gives Rashta.
SPOILERS
I have such a weird relationship with this story because I do enjoy it, but I don’t think the moral framing is as clean as the fandom makes it sound.
Like, I’m not “Team Rashta” or “Team Navier.” Rashta did awful things. She lied, hurt people, and kept making choices that made everything worse. I’m not pretending she was just some poor innocent girl the whole time.
But at the same time, I can’t ignore that she started as a runaway slave with no education, no noble background, no real protection, and no idea how to survive palace politics except clinging to the emperor. Sovieshu was the emperor. He was the married one. He was the one with all the power. He brought her into the palace, made her his concubine, used her position for his own plans, and then everyone acts like Rashta alone caused the entire disaster.
That’s what bothers me most. Rashta gets punished by the story and by the fandom for being desperate, selfish, clingy, manipulative, etc. But when powerful people do similar things, it’s suddenly politics, strategy, love, or “they had their reasons.”
Navier is a good character, but I don’t think she’s above criticism either. She’s graceful and competent, yes, but she is still part of the same class system that crushed Rashta. The story wants us to see her as the perfect empress, but perfect for who? Nobles? The empire? Her inner circle? Because slavery exists in that world and it never feels like something the story really wants to sit with unless it’s being used to explain why Rashta is beneath everyone.
Even the Lebetti situation rubbed me the wrong way. Rashta’s former owner and that whole household were part of the reason Rashta was traumatized in the first place, so seeing people connected to that side get treated more lightly felt strange. It made the story feel less like “justice” and more like “whoever is on Navier’s side gets cleaner framing.”
And Heinrey too. I like him with Navier, but let’s be real, he is not just a cute bird husband. He inserted himself into the life of a married woman, acted all sweet and harmless, and later we find out he is way more calculating than he looks. If Rashta acts clingy and cute, she’s manipulative. If Heinrey does it, it’s romantic comedy. That double standard is hard to unsee.
Again, I don’t think Rashta deserved a happy ending after everything she did. But I also don’t think the story handled her with as much nuance as it could have. Her downfall is written like it’s only because she was greedy, when really she was also shaped by slavery, classism, Sovieshu, Ergi, Lotteshu, and a palace that was never going to respect her anyway.
And Rashta’s first child situation is one of the clearest examples of how uneven the story’s sympathy is. Alan may be framed as her former lover, but Rashta was still enslaved under his family. That was never a normal equal romance. Her child was taken from her, she was lied to about him dying, and yet the story still treats people around that situation with more softness than it gives Rashta.