korean social mobility slop ragebaits me like no other. genuinely whats even the point of becoming emperor or taking revenge on the people who killed you only to turn out exactly like them? what did you change bro? what wrongs have you righted? what good are you beside chasing power all your life because you were deprived of it?
he was raised in a barn scoping shit but became a ruler that didn’t give a fuck about his people, that was made out to be a heroic ally of a marginalised race only because he showed up when it was convenient to him and killed people he wanted to kill which happened to not be the elves in question, that allowed reinhart to be reduced to ashes. he was alienated for utilising the spear and instead of getting more people to learn the spear or changing the worth of the spear, he just goes out of his way to kill as many people in a flashy as possible manner. that didn’t display the greatness of the spear that’s just gloating the greatness of himself and alienating the spear even further, the spear’s greatness is not the spear’s but joshua sander’s. he spoke out against the dehumanisation of people at the academy but didn’t bat an eye at single handedly slaughtering a million people. if you are strong enough to have reduced them to ashes you could have simply stopped them from charging at you again. he was subjected to pure classist venom for his mother supposedly being a maid but became a sovereign whose nation is strictly hierarchical and will further perpetuate the venoms that had him and his mother getting beaten up scooping shit deprived of dignity or respect or freedom. he had all of this unimaginable power but instead of just clearing out the rot he so claimed needed clearing from day one, he stood there chapters after chapters watching them throw tantrums and argue with each other to build up a bunch of necessary loss of life and resources before he stepped in and stepped up. bro thinks hes fucking jesus christ (╯°Д °)╯everybody point and laugh, its a clown!
i also hated the whole hes not defined by his bloodline take when his mother was lucia the maid and the 180 turn of hes got claim to the throne from both bloodlines take when his mother was revealed to be a van briton. thats that classic harry potter pitfall. because the social mobility propaganda of you can work hard and you can prove yourself and you achieve if you keep going is ultimately just bullshit. you’re strong cause your dad is strong cause his whole bloodline was strong and also youre a reincarnated angel, and youre an emperor cause your mama royal and your dada royal and also you’re the chosen one. a hypocrite piece of nothing because hes got no substance (didn’t really stand for anything didn’t really want anything beside revenge), no integrity (injustices and personal betrayals are bad because it happened to me not because it exist at all) and no fucking guts because you and i both know that he could have ended it all 100 chapters ago before all these long winded plans came to fruition or all these new underdeveloped no clear motivation no clear goal no background characters came out of the woodwork. joshua sanders is the author’s rock hard fantasy, to disappear as it falls to shit and to return when its all fucked up seven ways to hell so that you’re needed most. im sorry that you’re so much of a fucking coward you have to resort to fantasies of being god just to be a person.
i dont think its comically evil that the emperor tortured and killed countless people under a proclaimed righteous disguise because that is irredeemably evil but that is also literally three genocides happening in the world right now ヽ(`Д´)ﾉ
i do think that its comical the way the ultimate confrontation in these regency era stories always end in battle though like if it was that easy just kill him 50 episodes ago. justification is necessary for logical story progression but politics is utterly nonsensical so all this faff is for nothing.
i did love how sophia still loved monica though because i do believe that all you love comes back to you in the end.
also the art change is criminal felt like i was reading a completely different story.
read this to me when im dead and watch me come back to life
i only read this because people kept referencing “trashta” in the comments of other mangas being like “this bitch is as bad as trashta omg” and not knowing who “trashta” was was straight killing me. but finding out people were cock sucking a piece of shit dead horse beating manga about top 1% elites being evil people to each other whilst blaming all the suffering of their beloved empress not on a misogynistic system that placed all women even empresses as second class (not to mention the classist nightmares of systemic behavioural surveillance and control disguised as ‘politeness’ and not psychological warfare being consistently employed as a plot device to trigger some sympathy parade like sorry that she called the empress by her name a few times she was trafficked like an animal you were educated by the bluest of bloods get off the fucking cross we need the wood) but on the supposed evil ambitions of a teenage slave girl was actually fucking crazy. i had to put my phone down and look around because i thought i was in hell.
hate it when systemic problems of imperial/monarchal societies are individualised into the fault of a single ‘evil’ regent or ‘bad’ ruling party so all dehumanisation problems can be resolved by placing the correct person in power as if systems of hierarchies are not inherently built on exploitation and oppression. its banging on a wall whether the wall is brick cause they dont want to see you or glass where they do
loyer trust the personal attorney is right up there with sara blizzard the weather forecast reporter, andrew drinkwater the water researcher, page turner the author, les mcburney the firefighter, joshua butt the gastroenterologist and usain bolt the sprinter.
the burn was slow but i think the lengthyness braised the story real tender and juicy. details like how her taste buds are incongruent to the people in this other world because she does not belong is so delicious to me like i can tell when an author puts their pussy (soul) into it. plus the conclusion and the added side stories tied it up pretty nicely for me. i like that after such a world shattering ordeal these people are united in way that does not have to be confined to strict labels like romantic or sexual ‘cause really they are tied in the mental way comrades be after everything theyve been through.
what ruined the reading experience was the few people saying odd unprovoked shit in the comments like “these evil gays made me homophobic”. was that supposed to be fucking funny? if youre joking then why is no one laughing? and that kind of talk in this political economy?? (╬￣皿￣)凸 miss me with that bullshit.
also the evil of yurigel and evans was the way entitlement via unchecked tyrannical power allowed them to manipulate entire systems of society to benefit themselves at the cost of the dignity and freedom of others. and their degradation of women specifically was rooted in them being rich and powerful men who would never be subjected to the dehumanising humiliation that renders an able individual into inaction through repeated learnt helplessness to exhaust them into suffering silently. because they were men.
they didnt do that shit because they were gay. they did that shit because they were rich. powerful. men. who saw the lives of other human beings to be that of ants.
yall have a fundamental misunderstanding of consent in the comments. do allow me to clarify. sexual consent is four pillared.
1) it must be Informed. he was not informed of her touching him (he thought what she did to him was a dream) and she was not informed of him touching her (she literally said she woke up feeling weird without reason ergo she didnt know it happened) (and no i dont think your personal assumption that just because you would know what happens to you when youre asleep somehow equates to her also knowing. are yall the same people? do yall think all people are the same? do yall think all sleep is equal? lets ponder with whimsy in our hearts. powered by all available brain cells in the room).
2) consent must be Explicitly Given. which is saying outloud i want this or writing it on a piece of paper. literally any mode of convey will ball. this happened only once at the very end (when she said i want this and grabbed his cock - correct). before that she was asleep when he jumped her and he was asleep when she jumped him. aurkay? you can say nada that you mean when youre asleep.
3) consent must be Enthusiastic. enthusiasm is most evident in the lack thereof. for example: girlfriends and wives often feel obligated to perform sexual activity because its “their (marital) duty”. so despite the propaganda of abundant pornography with an agenda, no you cannot show enthusiasm when youre asleep. your brain is not even on, there is no proper assessment of risk and reward. please be serious.
and most importantly, 4) consent must always, without fail, be Reversible. if you cannot say no then saying yes holds absolutely ZERO weight. for example: if you are ‘persuaded’ and ‘convinced’ into saying yes after saying no then thats coercion. he could not have even said no (half asleep) and neither could she (completely asleep). sure we know now that they would have said yes - ah but they didnt. how can you reverse a decision you have never made?
5) i do acknowledge that the waters muddy in kink. thats why safeguards must exist in order to temporarily bypass these pillars. for example: safewords, clear boundaries (in discussion of kinks before practice, parties outline plays that are most often categorised in the colour system: red for no go/yellow for only in certain ways or only for a set period of time/green for totally good) and practice. it takes trust to lay still like youre sleeping and allow another person to touch you as they please. and that type of trust takes time to solidify. without these safeguards, where power is properly redistributed to ensure autonomy, its just rape.
so in conclusion: yes they raped each other. it is possible for people to be both victims and perpetrators. and i dont think that saying that it is rape (because it violated all four tenets of consent they way they violated each other) is somehow unproductive. there is a 1:1 ratio between fiction and reality. if you cannot recognise rape in text, how will you recognise it in motion?
praising elon musk as a genius entrepreneur is actually pure fucking jokes the man is a stupid deranged white supremacist who inherited an emerald mine and has never worked a day in his life. bitches (author) love to googoogaga for the knife for fucking free
its the first time ive read a story where they dont try to salvage a selfish genocidal warmonger through the ritualistic sacrifice of literally just some poor girl. and for that i feel i must applaud! i think yall are mad because yall expected a more romance appropriate ending with some kind of relief or happy ever after but the story was filled with horror and blood and fear and its not incongruent then for it to end bloody and fearful. i wouldnt say it was satisfying but subverting the genre is rare and honestly i think the ending (even though absurdly abrupt) [is the cia chasing after the author with a knife?] is realistic as hell. its a fairytale when a woman who lives in fear of a man renown for his cruelty suddenly redeems him by repeatedly forcing herself into decisions that betray her comfort and character. so their story ending with him disappearing her from the world in order to cage her forever is consistent with his inhumanity and her willingness to delude herself into believing that imprisonment is peace if he just said this one right thing is too consistent with her character. truth is, almost everybody in her position would have suffered and failed. seraphina then angelica and if time was wound back a hundred more times, a hundred more girls would be dead.
i resent the portrayal of aspd here. the way narrative alludes to aspd as something one is born with - instead of something one develops after repeated exposure to violence (both as victim and witness) - plays into the dehumanising condemnations of mentally ill people in general but those with personality disorders specifically. the mentality of it is intrinsic to who they are thus they are irredeemable therefore there is no helping them (by providing behavioural therapy/coping strategies) because they are monsters (not people) is a dangerous pipeline. a specific kind of dehumanisation i see alot is when people excuse/justify the harm created by mentally ill people. especially because we both know that wooyeon did not try his best nor desired to do his best for anyone, he toyed with people as if they were worth nothing and garnered animosity in return, for which inseob repeatedly paid the price and is continously assaulted and violated by wooyeon for it. wooyeon is not incapable of understanding like some kind of puppy and he does not deserve the leniency shown to children who are not yet able to understand when they do harmful/irresponsible things. he knows what he did because he knows what “no” and “stop” and “i dont want to” means in two seperate languages. and maybe he doesnt feel that it was wrong in his soul but we dont judge people by their souls we hold them accountable in accordance with social standards of ethics and morality. wooyeon like many bl leads are exempt in the big year of our lord 2026 and thats not sympathy for the mentally ill thats holding them to a lower standard because they are considered as lesser than.
inseob’s character is very typical. his most interesting aspect is his guilt. not because i think his feelings were really ‘betraying jennie’. i think its more of a disguise for his internalised homophobia. it better explains his crash out and subsequent guilt in the flashback because she said it first even if she said without intention. i also think that his guilt coloured his delusions, in the sense that he thinks himself a trouble and burden to everyone so being hurt and disrespected like this is the kind of treatment he deserves (that tweet thats like “i pity the fool so deprived of love he finds it in violence”). also in the sense that his guilt isolated him even further. his one friend is dead and his supportive family he refuse to turn to because of undeservingness so he is left lonely beyond recompense. if he had a single true friend to hear half the shit he was innermonologuing about to express genuine worry over his wellbeing and be like gworl what are you on right now i dont think he would have gritted his teeth through half the things he did.
ultimately i despised the sprinkle of sinophobia, the lack of depth in all supporting characters because they were all plot trigger or a resource, the author’s lack of real world understanding visible in the worldbuilding’s lack of dimensions, and most importantly, the fact that 90% of mature scences between them were coercive and frankly fucking disgustingヽ(`Д´)ﾉ !
slow burn? i guess. but more accurately, trash heap on fire presented gift wrapped with pretty bowtie
this story the very definition of “never worry about being an evil gay freak. there is always a gayer eviler freak behind you.”
The fact that rape and abuse apologist cinderella rip-off bullshit written by mentally deficient racist author who publicly wishes death upon people for reading, like low tide in twilight gets over a hundred episodes when something this good, this beautifully drawn and well developed, ends in five chapters is real devastating stuff
i read this on webtoon and around the 10s mark i saw a spoiler comment about the archmage and the dragon becoming romantically involved which i didn’t take seriously because a) miltein was just rejected and it was implied that it is because their age gap as well as past history made it impossible for the mercenary guy to see her in a romantic manner. which i thought was common sense. it also set the standard that the story had common sense logic regarding age/dynamic inappropriate attraction. and b) if they wanted me to take the ‘foreshadowing’ (i consider it more of a threat tbh) seriously then they should not have drawn the dragon fem lead’s human form to look like an actual child. because i dont know if yall remember being prepubescent teens but thats what prepubescent teens look like. not to mention that she also acted with little impulse control and impunity, as if a child. by the 20s the constant hinting made me very uncomfortable especially because by that point the math was clear. the great dragon who protected the dwarves set the baseline for old age at around 5000. the known age of dragon fem lead is 799. thus her human age: give or take 16. maybe by feudal standards he wasn’t a pedo but im not living in feudal times and neither was he raised in one so what the fuck is twisted and cursed about him (character explicit) (writer implied) i dont know. what i do know is i ran here to check for confirmation immediately. i was not about to push forward and spoil my own mood for yet another stereotypical power fantasy (〜￣△￣)〜
this story reminds me of that tweet thats like “sometimes people exist to do the most horrendous inexplicable shit to each other then die #wutheringheights”
i see this in media a lot and unfortunately i also see it in real life. the overgeneralisation people are prone to do when they’re brainwashed into their elders’ bigotry gets me so bad. i hate the whole my bastard uncle killed my legitimate parents so i will also treat you a bastard daughter like shit storyline. because its an artistically lazy at best and flagitiously ignorant at worst attempt at characterisation. (you see this a lot in fantasy. eg: my parents were killed by vampires ergo i will kill every vampire to ever exist like yea bro commit genocide and drive a species to extinction this will in no way perpetuate generations of looping cycles of violence producing countless assholes like you who think the indiscriminate killing of any people justifiable so long as they hurt you via the constant reproduction of victims like yourself. youre so right.) (and this is not an anti-revenge message, dont get me wrong, i think you should get to kill the asshole who killed the mother you love. but thats almost never the case. instead theyre killing a bunch of vampires who got nothing to do with them just because theyre vampires. like ok you sound like a cop. die.) how, in the most genuine fuck possible, does one piece of shit illegitimate child make every illegitimate child equally complicit in his crime? do you fucking hear yourself?? a fully grown man and he doesn’t even have the mental capacity to ponder? to question?? to hold space for fucking whimsy???
whats more important to note about this is not the way in which this flimsy hot bag of air storyline attempts to excuse his feudalist prejudice via trauma, but the way it ultimately didnt even matter. because sure it might have excused, if youre dumb as a rock or naive as a doe i suppose, the beginning of their relationship, the schemes he orchestrated, but he married her bro. he lived in the same house as her bro. do you know how hard it is to actively ignore the existence of someone you are married to, share a house with, and fuck often? really. super. fucking difficult. it requires an extreme level misogynistic inhumanity through which he viewed his own wife for him to be able to continue living that way for several years. literally drawing the curtains close at the sight of her. the comments make it clear that we all hate this man and for that i am glad but i think its important still to label the ways in which he used like her like a sex object then exclusive womb, literally reducing a woman down her functions like an animal (vitriolic misogyny). and the way the story excuses him in order to, i assume, assure some semblance of a future romance in some capacity (also vitriolic misogyny).
its not just the character but also the people who created that character, who give that character the leeway to be excused of all his crimes. because the cleaning house and actually looking his son in the fucking eye is that. excusing his crime (because accountability is to be held responsible, to bear blame in essence, and he didn’t do that did he? no he just killed everybody else. how predictable). he neglected her, dismissed her, lied to her, forced her, abused her and held her captive. but its fine now because he killed the people who did exactly as their master had done and treated her like shit. what did he think was going to happen? the body moves with the head. you should not be allowed access to such power and be characterised as a brilliant schemer if you are so dead behind the eyes and rotten in the brain and low of intellect that you could not see the ways in which a head of house’s mistreatment of one person enabled their mistreatment by the hands of everybody else. none of it even means anything because shes dead now. but the story, i believe will attempt to make it matter by bringing her back into the hellhole she despised so greatly that she drank poison to escape from like fuck! god gives my girl nothing!!! and sure hes grieving but thats hardly suffering in my opinion, youre supposed to fucking do that anyway. if shes just going to come back and hes just going to get everything he wants in the end and the story is just going to make it out to be that shes happy and that’s all that matters then its just another cishetero patriarchy propaganda piece trying to normalise the women end up with their children’s father fantasy. and most of us here i believe have seen in our lives the numerous ways in which that is just pure fiction.
the main reason that i wanted to leave this comment was to say that us here raging in the comments, wishing this man pain and everyone wondering how the story is even going to progress, is ragebaiting in its purest form. this is how the author manipulates you into consuming a story that has no fucking weight or worth in any way. i know because ive seen the people’s reactions on webtoon and several other manga forums where this story is being updated. this is not to attempt to police what anyone is consuming, i cant stop you nor do i want to. this is just to say that the reason youre reading it and the reason i read it, is because we’re being actively manipulated into engaging and i think thats worth saying.
the official translation is literally so trash. i am always grateful to jujucat for feeding the class but why is bestie juju having to pay for genuinely one of the worst official translation i done ever seen? like sorry are we seriously sticking with boy when they are having raw sex in a few chapters?? knotting and everything??? (╯°Д°) ╯
moonflowergem would have never done this to us
everything by garamdal is so boring. the premise always promise so much and the actual story is always a let down