Crying tears of joy, never in my life had I thought I'd ever read such a glorious story
The expressions, the short compelling backstories, even the piss! Beautiful!!
At least they're in the middle of buttfuck nowhere, they can atleast cover up and spare some dignity if they crawl into the tall grass nearby when they're booted out
FINALLY!!
IS THIS WHAT SUCCESS FEELS LIKE??
It was perfect, overstimulated top who cries, and a bottom who rides like it's the goddamn Kentucky derby, we've done it folks.
We've reached PEAK!
I cannot wait for our third couple, I hope the story continues outside of the cube. I want to see how these three couples find their freak in different scenarios!!
To play devil's advocate, the duke believes the empire's slavery wouldn't end with it being legally forbidden, and that's technically true.
Historically, it's not as simple as just making it illegal. There are many examples of that where people just find more creative ways to enact slavery. Even today most prison systems operate on a level of slavery and exploitation.
His proposed solution is for the imperial family to systematically manage the slave market, probably to "control" it better. Which is similar to the above mentioned modern day slave work. Whereas the Emperor seemed to just want to make it illegal, and that's that, he doesn't mention an actual plan on how to deal with the aftermath, which is in truth, a very naive way to think overall.
The duke is cynical because things have never been easy for him. While the Emperor doesn't seem to be thinking of the aftermath that could occur because he's had it all very easy. I mean, he's an Emperor, let's not forget how empires come to be, usually through violence and conquest. The Emperor benefits from this past, which largely contributes to his simple thinking.
I do still obviously think the duke is in the wrong. I mean, he sees the future problems that could arise, and instead of finding a way around it with the Emperor, he'd rather just avoid it altogether, which also isn't a good thing or a solution whatsoever.
the duke is also a high noble, not even towards commoners, this was towards slaves. the fact he didn't straightly reject the idea of absolving slavery was already very different because usually in story it's the nobles who opposed to this because they profitted. if the royal managed it then the nobles will not have a profit and he didn't seem to mind. the problem was that he commented it as 'wasting of time'. i see this come from similar place as apathy. apathy isn't good either but it is kinda better than malice.
anyway since the start it's already established anyway that he's a villain I always anticipated when will this person make his move that will make him more like villain









this ending was somehow worse than solo leveling's:
"and then we reset the timeline, did some mining offline, and made it back to the end again because this time we'll win!" ending
except here we don't even get the courtesy of seeing a speck of the expected ending!!