(hope it's ok that i'm replying here because i want to hold fe3hteen seminar across the great firewall)
hwa you are absolutely insane for this!!!!!!!!! HOW DID YOU DO THIS!!!!! i finally got to sit down and read this over dinner today because i didn't want to be overly influenced while i was still writing my last fill and it honest to god felt like i was playing the game again for the very first time, even though OF COURSE i knew what was coming and how it was going to end. like i was so locked in. you've designed such a powerful narrative as you always do, such smart and meaningful decisions about who to cast and how to make their character arcs intersect. the genius of the meanie foilery on so many levels and the potency of the background jeongcheol, "background" as if it's not the political context that shapes the entire world and story lol – which is so richly imagined and adapted!! reading thru the comments i really hope we get some new carats to cross over... your power.
like structurally i'm sooo floored by the elegance of this story esp after reading klav's comment and your reply: the reversals! the foilery!! the fact that jww would have been yjh's ideal knight and kmg csc's, but how the fact that they ended up on different sides of that conflict meant that they were doomed from the beginning?? and the way that wonwoo and mingyu's parting scene as children haunts wonwoo's character arc because it encapsulates the social contradiction at the heart of the story, that they live in a broken world that can only be transformed through incredible violence and upheaval, a choice that wonwoo is ultimately too passive to make – and the irony that violence is only necessary because of people like wonwoo and seungcheol who mean well but don't have the courage to break free from the familiar system. and wonwoo asking seungcheol to swear the oath because he needs to surrender agency to something larger than himself is such a powerful scene, because he's accepted already how he's going to die, but to the very end he's determined to fit it into the framework of his ideals – that his final act of resistance is a narrative/interpretive one instead of the material one he's unwilling to make. what an absolutely great universe to put our poor boy in and watch him wriggle in the name of character study and i'm not just saying this because i spent the last year sliding deliriously back down the fe3h rabbithole!
and on a more granular level i love how the first half of the fic has so many wonderful moments of levity even as the tension builds and you can tell things are getting serious:
from the very beginning i was so tickled by wonwoo's fantasies of bureaucracy/public works/research sponsorship, like baby noble wonu WOULD be exactly like this (in another universe he's an ipad baby cutting his teeth on New Urbanist Memes for Transit Oriented Teens).
mingyu doing a pirouette in pantaloons
seungcheol asking wonwoo to be his cyrano de bergerac!!!!! (putting on my delulu goggles) how i need the (won)jeongcheol romcom version of this where they just spend the whole time talking radical politics until jeonghan falls in love but by that time seungcheol is on board too and Yay Continental War Averted
when jeonghan appeared as the imperial prince i actually screamed.
the interhouse card game under the table was so cute now i want to think about garreg mach wwjnisms. feeding the stray cats.... i loved all the house assignments/backgrounds for the other sebongs too!!! i want to hear more about them!
“Let him stew,” Jeonghan smiled knowingly, “It’s a good for him.” jeonghan you are so jeonghan.
every jeongcheol appearance killed me i'm so down bad for them...... i can't believe i never even thought to make them dimigard because it really works for their characters (i think i was too busy considering how to shoehorn josh into the triangulation lol) but i'm so upset! CAN I BE HAPPY? CAN I LIVE???? PLEASE
CRIMSON FLOWER. THE MOON IS BEAUTIFUL TONIGHT. SEUNGCHEOL LION. SOONYOUNG'S TIGER CREST ACTIVATION. HELLO??????
one of my profs always loves to use the phrase "muscular prose" and even tho it makes me giggle it kept popping into my head during so many scenes – so powerful in moving the plot along/explaining lore while also being thoroughly enjoyable. jeonghan confronting wonwoo about his essay for one! so many delightful jeonghanisms there, but also the not-joke about mingyu becoming emperor which comes back around with SUCH force later. and the descriptions of combat, both interspersed with the deaths of their classmates but also leading up to the final scene... wow.
and so many scenes i'll be haunted by, especially jeonghan's face turned up as if in prayer. wonwoo's exchange with the jeonghan inside his head. wonwoo with his brother's lance (the implication being that if he's crestless he's also taking damage every time he's using it – wonu sentimental to a fault T___T)
just so much to study and learn from and chew on!!!! i'll be thinking about this for a long time.... thank u for this crazy 15k fill truly what a gift.
(and also i'm so glad i waited to read this bc if i hadn't i don't think i would have been able to finish my own without it turning into something completely derivative, which is all to say that the plot bunnies are already spawning in my brain..... if not a proper remix then at least fanart because the image of jeongcheol in their regalia at the white heron cup!!!!!!!!)
Re: [FILL] kingmaker
hwa you are absolutely insane for this!!!!!!!!! HOW DID YOU DO THIS!!!!! i finally got to sit down and read this over dinner today because i didn't want to be overly influenced while i was still writing my last fill and it honest to god felt like i was playing the game again for the very first time, even though OF COURSE i knew what was coming and how it was going to end. like i was so locked in. you've designed such a powerful narrative as you always do, such smart and meaningful decisions about who to cast and how to make their character arcs intersect. the genius of the meanie foilery on so many levels and the potency of the background jeongcheol, "background" as if it's not the political context that shapes the entire world and story lol – which is so richly imagined and adapted!! reading thru the comments i really hope we get some new carats to cross over... your power.
like structurally i'm sooo floored by the elegance of this story esp after reading klav's comment and your reply: the reversals! the foilery!! the fact that jww would have been yjh's ideal knight and kmg csc's, but how the fact that they ended up on different sides of that conflict meant that they were doomed from the beginning?? and the way that wonwoo and mingyu's parting scene as children haunts wonwoo's character arc because it encapsulates the social contradiction at the heart of the story, that they live in a broken world that can only be transformed through incredible violence and upheaval, a choice that wonwoo is ultimately too passive to make – and the irony that violence is only necessary because of people like wonwoo and seungcheol who mean well but don't have the courage to break free from the familiar system. and wonwoo asking seungcheol to swear the oath because he needs to surrender agency to something larger than himself is such a powerful scene, because he's accepted already how he's going to die, but to the very end he's determined to fit it into the framework of his ideals – that his final act of resistance is a narrative/interpretive one instead of the material one he's unwilling to make. what an absolutely great universe to put our poor boy in and watch him wriggle in the name of character study and i'm not just saying this because i spent the last year sliding deliriously back down the fe3h rabbithole!
and on a more granular level i love how the first half of the fic has so many wonderful moments of levity even as the tension builds and you can tell things are getting serious:
- from the very beginning i was so tickled by wonwoo's fantasies of bureaucracy/public works/research sponsorship, like baby noble wonu WOULD be exactly like this (in another universe he's an ipad baby cutting his teeth on New Urbanist Memes for Transit Oriented Teens).
- mingyu doing a pirouette in pantaloons
- seungcheol asking wonwoo to be his cyrano de bergerac!!!!! (putting on my delulu goggles) how i need the (won)jeongcheol romcom version of this where they just spend the whole time talking radical politics until jeonghan falls in love but by that time seungcheol is on board too and Yay Continental War Averted
- when jeonghan appeared as the imperial prince i actually screamed.
- the interhouse card game under the table was so cute now i want to think about garreg mach wwjnisms. feeding the stray cats.... i loved all the house assignments/backgrounds for the other sebongs too!!! i want to hear more about them!
- “Let him stew,” Jeonghan smiled knowingly, “It’s a good for him.” jeonghan you are so jeonghan.
every jeongcheol appearance killed me i'm so down bad for them...... i can't believe i never even thought to make them dimigard because it really works for their characters (i think i was too busy considering how to shoehorn josh into the triangulation lol) but i'm so upset! CAN I BE HAPPY? CAN I LIVE???? PLEASECRIMSON FLOWER. THE MOON IS BEAUTIFUL TONIGHT. SEUNGCHEOL LION. SOONYOUNG'S TIGER CREST ACTIVATION. HELLO??????
one of my profs always loves to use the phrase "muscular prose" and even tho it makes me giggle it kept popping into my head during so many scenes – so powerful in moving the plot along/explaining lore while also being thoroughly enjoyable. jeonghan confronting wonwoo about his essay for one! so many delightful jeonghanisms there, but also the not-joke about mingyu becoming emperor which comes back around with SUCH force later. and the descriptions of combat, both interspersed with the deaths of their classmates but also leading up to the final scene... wow.
and so many scenes i'll be haunted by, especially jeonghan's face turned up as if in prayer. wonwoo's exchange with the jeonghan inside his head. wonwoo with his brother's lance (the implication being that if he's crestless he's also taking damage every time he's using it – wonu sentimental to a fault T___T)
just so much to study and learn from and chew on!!!! i'll be thinking about this for a long time.... thank u for this crazy 15k fill truly what a gift.
(and also i'm so glad i waited to read this bc if i hadn't i don't think i would have been able to finish my own without it turning into something completely derivative, which is all to say that the plot bunnies are already spawning in my brain..... if not a proper remix then at least fanart because the image of jeongcheol in their regalia at the white heron cup!!!!!!!!)