Discussion What makes THE TWELVE KINGDOMS (Juuni Kokki) so special?

Discussion in 'Novel Discussion' started by CreativeCriticalThinker, Mar 4, 2023.

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Is Twelve Kingdoms better/superior than Fushigi Yûgi?

  1. Yes, so much better!

    5 vote(s)
    62.5%
  2. No, it is isn't. Just different.

    2 vote(s)
    25.0%
  3. No comment...

    1 vote(s)
    12.5%
  1. CreativeCriticalThinker

    CreativeCriticalThinker Well-Known Member

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    I only knew the 45 episodes anime and I keep rewatching many scenes by Retrocrush in Youtube.

    Only recently did I discovered that 9 volumes of this novel has been fan-translated in novel update.
    https://www.novelupdates.com/series/twelve-kingdoms/
    I am going to read it!

    Before that I like to collect many arguments why this work is so underrated and why this storytelling is so special/unique. People still keep mentioning and recommending it on the internet.
    I argue based on the anime and the wikia articles that Twelve Kingdoms is much darker, more mature, thought-provocative and progressive than the influential melodramatic mainstream popular Fushigi Yûgi.
    I personally compare these two works because they both use a similar setting by combining ancient Chinese and Japanese Culture/Elements together.
    There was also this Youtube Comment:
    "THIS is the Akatsuki no Yona. Before Akatsuki no Yona, Great character development. Minus the KDrama bishie pandering."
     
    Last edited: Jan 21, 2024
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  2. puukkiss

    puukkiss I'm Keeping My Eye On You!

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    Yes, I still love this novel/anime, my favourite. Just like you, I first watched the anime and fell in love, afterwards, when I started to read more, I found out about novels and again fell in love...
    I curse every day they haven't remade the anime and for the author not writing more stories in that world.

    This is the type of novel I want when I'm trying to find something to read. A MC that starts ordinary, becomes even weaker because of sudden power, and only grows strong when confronting her inner demons and the reasons why she wasn't strong in the first place. No magic and another world would solve issue that you have inside. MC had to deal with it all and she won. And most importantly, NO FUCKING love interest that suddenly solved all her problems.
     
  3. CreativeCriticalThinker

    CreativeCriticalThinker Well-Known Member

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    The most powerful dialogue that really touched me:
    "If he betrays me, it will be his shame, not mine!
    I won't die and I won't be a coward, either!
    I can't trust people, if they're not sincere?
    I can't be kind to people, if they are not kind to me?
    That's not true. Whether I trust others or not, has nothing to do how they treat me!
    You're right. I am alone. That's why I'l make my own decision!
    No matter how bad people treat me, or how many times I'm betrayed...
    I'll still choose to trust people!
    I don't care what others think!
    I'll be kind to people because that's what I want!"


    The scene where Youko conquered her inner critic with this music playing was incredibly powerful.
     
  4. ToastedRossi

    ToastedRossi Well-Known Member

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    Twelve Kingdoms is good for one very simple reason: effort. Other books will put all their attention on the protagonist and how she experiences the new world. The older isekai novels do have a lot of world building, but this world building is about how it affects the protagonist. When Ono Fuyumi built the world of Twelve Kingdoms, it's all about making a cohesive world which her protagonists participate in, but it's not all about them. This world exists whether the protagonists are around or not, but they all can make contributions in making things better.
     
  5. CreativeCriticalThinker

    CreativeCriticalThinker Well-Known Member

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    You make a very good point.(y)

    If I get it right:
    While we have our primary Isekai Heroine, it is more about an ensenble cast that introduce us + explore the mythology and rules of 12 Kingdoms.
    The worldbuilding itself is its own character.

    Do you think this Isekai Story/Writing is very unique?
    Do you happen to know other Stories that fits the standards of The Twelve Kingdoms?
    I would argue that Terry Pratchett's Discworld has also a very cohesive worldbuilding with an ensemble cast of different interesting (odd) characters that change, grow and mature + show us the realm they are living.
     
  6. ToastedRossi

    ToastedRossi Well-Known Member

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    In terms of Isekai, Twelve Kingdoms is absolutely unique. The reality is that while there were a fair number of such stories that used to explore similar ideas to it like Saiunkoku Monogatari or Escaflowne, they still approach the idea of story and how it's worked into the setting in a much more conventional manner than Twelve Kingdoms does. And obviously the modern isekai stories are nothing like this.

    When it comes to Japanese novels with super intricate worldbuilding, the two that stand out the most are the Crest of the Stars and the Legend of Galactic Heroes. Of these, the former has a very fanciful fictional society and how it affects all of its people. I like this particular story quite a lot, and I think that there's a lot going for it. The one criticism I have is that it does a bit more cheerleading for this society than I like. The book is probably more well-loved, and the world building is more of a straightforward space opera affair. It talks a lot about philosophy and military strategy. I read a lot of this kind of book in general so I don't find its depiction particularly noteworthy, and I think that way the story talks about its themes (especially democracy vs. dictatorship) are disingenuous so I don't like it all that much.
     
  7. CreativeCriticalThinker

    CreativeCriticalThinker Well-Known Member

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    I watched 'Vision of Escaflowne TV & Movie and Banner of the Stars Anime when I was in my teens. Did not like the 2nd season of BotS.
    I had no idea that Banner/Crest of the Stars is in NovelUpdate until now!? Just added to my reading list.

    I remember that in the anime the Abh species often tend to praise their own superiority compared to other races in the universe.
    Do Banner of the Stars + Legend of Galactic Heroes have this Imperialism Propaganda?

    With 'conventional manner' do you mean how authors often choose the narrative that dramatizes, romanticizes and glorifies political & philosophical human conflicts in a soapy epic fashion?
    Like starting a bloody war or commiting genocide out of jealousy or love for a special woman. And during the war there is always an angsty love triangle between larger than life characters.

    Would you say 12 Kingdoms is the least melodramatic, grandious, glamorous and showy of all the titles you've mentioned?
    There is this rare thought-provoking maturity that I just don't see in many other storytellings.
    Maybe perhaps in Netflix Castlevania S1-4...
     
  8. ToastedRossi

    ToastedRossi Well-Known Member

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    These books have slightly different kinds of problems. "The Legend of Galactic Heroes" is a bit more obvious. It sets up two main factions with wildly different political philosophies with one protagonist from each one, and poses the big question of which one is better. Supposedly these factions were set on an even level so that each has an equal opportunity to state its case, but it's obvious that the author vastly preferred one over the other. One of the main draws of the story are the battles and the in-depth strategies involved, but I never found them particularly convincing so I didn't like it much.

    Withe "Crest of the Stars", the story is almost entirely about the fictional society of the Humankind Empire of Abh. And I think that it works pretty well for the most part. The issue with this story is that the author is a little too in love with his creation so reading it feels a bit unbalanced. I don't think that this is much of a problem so I'll happily read it again.

    This way these kinds of stories works is that the author comes up with some great idea for their fictional universe and can't wait to tell the audience about how cool it is. A common way to do this is to go in detail on how society functions and to pass judgements on it. Where Twelve Kingdoms differs is that it treats its world like a history book would. It's very matter-of-fact, and serves as a backdrop for how the characters can make their way in it. It's about how people make choices they do, and what opportunities and possibilities exist within this framework even when the people think that they have no options.

    I don't really think that "Twelve Kingdoms" is quite like that. The story itself is fairly low-key, but the actual world building is more wild than almost anything else out there. Think about it: the world has a wildly unique systems for childbirth, for rulership, for how the kingdoms relate to one another, and so on. It's just that most of this is built up so organically that the weirdness doesn't stand out so much.

    Oh, and on the note of quality worldbuilding and storytelling, check out Arcane on Netflix. I find it a lot more impressive than Castlevania and it's ridiculous how much work the creators put into their show.
     
  9. CreativeCriticalThinker

    CreativeCriticalThinker Well-Known Member

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    Your analyis about 12 Kingdoms makes me love this kind of worldbuilding more and more :)
    If I ever want to create/write my own fictional fantasy otherworld, I think I might use Fuyumi Ono's writing style as a blue print.:aww:

    What do you think about the worldbuilding of Ascendance of a Bookworm, if you read/watched it? Many fans and the Youtuber Mother's Basement praise the author how she builds/writes the Fantasy World around the MC Myne. One Youtuber named Noralities points out that in Dr. Stone the Hero teaches the audience science by showing off in very spectacular way, while in AotB we learn with Myne how things or specific inventions work in a mundane slow pacing way.

    Love how LGTB friendly the world of Arcane is and how a small French Studio managed to bring out such high quality work! :)
    Still very speechless about the shocking ending of Arcane S1. Can't believe Jinx did it......
    Hoping that Netflix isn't gonna cancel season 2 since this streaming service platform has now the tendency of axing good shows especially the animated series. :cry:
    Still pissed about the cancellation of The Baby Sitter Club, The Midnight Club + Dead End Paranormal Park:mad:
    At least Hilda gets a final season.

    I am very thankful that you share your vast knowledge about animes, animated series, mangas, light novels and other stories.(y)
    I really appreciate that.
     
    Last edited: Mar 30, 2023
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  10. ToastedRossi

    ToastedRossi Well-Known Member

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    I think that trying to emulate her is going to be hard in general, but if that's what you want to do, you should approach the subject the same way she did. She was originally inspired by a Japanese-Chinese coproduction documentary called "the Silk Road" and it's precisely this copying from real life that lends her work authenticity that most authors struggle with. If you were to read proper Chinese historical novels, it'd be even more striking how much detail the writer can put into the setting.

    I've read it a bit, and while the setting is superior to other isekai novels that doesn't say all that much because most isekai writers don't put any effort into their settings. In "Ascendance of a Bookworm" I feel that the setting is designed to serve a specific purpose rather than something that's built up organically. It's the difference between setting up a stage to tell a certain story as opposed to creating a setting that feels natural and the characters are players who are given the freedom to explore it as true to their personality. All in all, I don't think it's that bad. Other isekai novels with decent settings are "Overlord" and "Kumo Desu Ga, Nani Ka?" Oh, and check out "Kenkyo, Kenjitsu o Motto ni Ikite Orimasu". It's not this kind of book at all, but the world building is surprisingly solid and engaging. The rest of the story is a really good lesson on how to tell Villainess stories. It constantly surprises me that writers don't try to copy it more.

    Arcane is ridiculously good, and the making of documentary is a real revelation into the creative process. You don't have to worry about Netflix axing the show. Unlike most of the shows on Netflix, this show is funded and produced by someone else (Riot Games in this case) so Netflix doesn't have any say in how much of the show gets made.

    No problem. I'm always into in depth descriptions.
     
  11. CreativeCriticalThinker

    CreativeCriticalThinker Well-Known Member

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    Good for ARCANE not being financially depended on Netflix's money.

    I didn't paid any attention to Kenkyo, Kenjitsu o Motto ni Ikite Orimasu because it was either overshadowed by or I was already good with BAKARINA + Accomplishments of the Duke's Daughter. Can you please tell me what makes this Reincarnation Otome Story so special?

    I did some internet research and did she mean the 1980 Japanese Documentary TV Seies The Silk Road?
    Fuyumi Ono mentioned in a 2007 interview that she was inspired books like C.S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia and Roger Zelazny's Nine Princes in Amber.

    Maybe the interest of reading Historical Uncensored Chinese Novels may motivate me more to refresh/relearn my mother tongue.
    Chinese is a difficult language to learn.

    https://www.animenewsnetwork.com/interview/2007-03-18/fuyumi-ono-author-of-the-twelve-kingdoms
    https://www.storyunlocker.com/blog/2017/05/05/ghost-hunt-manga-inada-shiho-x-ono-fuyumi-dialogue/
    https://katemanga.blogspot.com/2022/05/interview-with-translator-twelve.html

    I was surprised and didn't expect that she wrote the horror vampire story SHIKI.
    I watched the anime and read the manga adaptation and I found it personally as very over the top edgy shounen horror.
    Didn't recognize her writing style/tone at all.

    Should I read her prequel novel The Demonic Child first since it is set in the same universe as 12 Kingdoms?
     
  12. ToastedRossi

    ToastedRossi Well-Known Member

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    I haven't read "Duke's Daughter", but "Kenkyo" is vastly superior to other Japanese Villainess novels. For starters, it's based on a shoujo manga instead of an otome game, and that automatically confers a large number of advantages. Next, it's one of the few novels of this type that understands that being a villainess is ultimately a matter of social power, and the story plays into this instead of running away from social aspects as many other books do. And at the end of the day, this book manages to be varied and constantly amusing. It's been over 5 years since the latest update, and people are still clamoring for new chapters. Back in the day, "Kenkyo" was permanently in the top 10 on Syosetu popularity list, and it was usually in the top 3. No other female-oriented novel has really come close.

    That's right. It's really interesting to me how old school light novels were influenced by all sorts of sources, from books to music to films to foreign material. Sadly most Japanese webnovels limit all their influences to anime, manga, and video games, and this serves to make them so much less interesting than they could have been.

    Chinese historical novels are awesome, but they're probably the most difficult genre to learn to read. These books usually try to be authentic so they'll have a lot of Classical Chinese writing and there will be a lot of historical terms to learn. This makes this genre just about impossible to MTL as well.

    Ono Fuyumi is probably mostly known as a horror writer. Other than "Shiki" she also wrote "Ghost Hunt", which made for one of the only scary anime out there, and "the Demonic Child" is also a horror novel. I haven't read the latter myself, but it's probably worth reading as the protagonist is Taiki (the black kirin). While it was written before "Twelve Kingdoms", it's not really a prequel as it's a continuation of Taiki's story after "Sea of the Wind, Shore of the Labyrinth".
     
  13. CreativeCriticalThinker

    CreativeCriticalThinker Well-Known Member

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    Convinced by your arguments, I think I give Kenkyo, Kenjitsu o Motto ni Ikite Orimasu a try ;)
    I suspect that the visual appearance of Villainess MC Reika Kisshouin (Kenkyo) may have been inspired by the character design of Reika Ryuuzaki (Aim for the Ace! / Ace o Nerae!).
    How would you describe Reika Kisshouin?
    When you mention shoujo manga, villainess and social power together, I have to think of the classic white lotus bitch antagonist Fukiko Ichinomiya/Miya-sama in Dear Brother / Oniisama e... which deals with the messed up class-politics in an exclusive private girls' school academy. Maybe this work/manga/anime also influenced the novel Kenkyo/I Will Live with Humility and Dependability as My Motto.

    If Kenkyo is/was so beloved and popular, how come it didn't get a manga or anime adaptation already like Bakarina / Destruction Flag Otome?

    So I guess you have to be open-minded and be interested in any kind of creative intelligent works to improve your own writing + expand your creativity.

    Which good Chinese Historical Novels do you have in mind?
    Perhaps novels that were banned by the CCP ;)

    Would you say 12 Kingdoms has actually horror elements?
    Do you have an opinion about the writing in Shiki?
     
    Last edited: Mar 29, 2023
  14. ToastedRossi

    ToastedRossi Well-Known Member

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    It's influenced by all sorts of classic shoujo manga but "Oniisama e" is probably the most direct inspiration.

    Nobody knows for sure, but the speculation is that the writer rejected any and all offers from publishers. There are lots of rumors about what happened but there is no confirmed communication from the writer so we know next to nothing about her. One thing that we do know though is that every Syosetu top 50 book (and probably every top 100 book for that matter) has been picked up for at least a light novel adaptation so "Kenkyo" most definitely got publication offers.

    For me, the issue is that a writer can only write what she knows so if she limits herself to new material then her work is going to suffer. This doesn't happen much in Chinese novels and in the few Korean novels I've checked out and they're a lot better than Japanese web novels as a direct consequence.

    Chinese censorship doesn't tend to affect books set in Imperial China all that much. They tend to be most strict about politically problematic matter, and those books are so removed from modern politics that they're largely immune. In any case, the historical novels that interest me the most are the ones that delve the deepest into the setting. So here are a few of my favorites:

    回到明朝当王爷
    In many ways this is the progenitor of the kind of historical novel I'm talking about. There were famous historical novels before this, but most of the newer ones use this book as a model. And it's a stunning book in regards to how detail about the Ming Dynasty and how the people lived gets crammed in. It's like taking a history course on the time period, and I was blown when I read it.

    There are caveats attached to this book though. The main one is that it's a harem novel. This isn't as bad as it seems because it's a high quality harem novel with some really great characterization, but that can still be a deal breaker for some people.

    燃烧的莫斯科
    For a bit of a different take on historical novels, this book is about combat in World War II. Even though I've read a ton of military historical novels, this does things that almost none of the others do. One of the most important of these things is how it manages to capture the feel of very extreme circumstances: what it's like to be thrust in the middle of combat, what it's like to take command in harrowing situations, and what it's like to face brutal and arbritrary military justice. And to top it off, this book has a female protagonist. Normally this wouldn't be believable but she's in the Soviet Red Army, and this is a military that actually had a lot of female soldiers.

    For a Prosperous World
    This book is lighter on historical detail than the ones that I like the most, but it's probably still as rich in them as you'll find in non-Chinese historical novels. And what it lacks in detail it makes up for in some beautiful characterization. It actually plays around with the idea of immortality that "Twelve Kingdoms" does except that the protagonist is the only immortal in the story so she ends up being a lot more isolated. Sadly, the book has some excellent prose that no translation is going to be able to replicate so it's a book that going to read much better in Chinese.

    Bu Bu Jing Xin
    This is the Romance and I hate the fact that it's extremely popular, few other Romance novels decided to follow in its footsteps. Again it's not the most in-depth historical novel out there, but what I love about it is that it's extremely authentic. Not so much authentic historically (although it's not too bad), but more that it's authentic to its characters. Unlike all those dumb Romance novels out there which care about the main relationship, this book is about the vicious infighting between the Kangxi Emperor's son as they vie to succeed him. The protagonist is stuck in the position of knowing exactly what the outcome is and not understanding she can fit into everything.

    "Twelve Kingdoms" doesn't have all that many horror elements, but there are a few moments that smack of it. The part where Youko is torn into the Twelve Kingdoms and how isolated and broken she was at that point in the story, and how bizarre things kept happening to her feel very isolating and scary.

    As "Shiki", I only watched a bit of the anime and I don't know how closely it hews to the book. However, I can feel that it's more of an atmospheric horror than it is the blatant kind that "Ghost Hunt" is. I prefer the latter more, but it's also designed to be more easily digested.
     
  15. CreativeCriticalThinker

    CreativeCriticalThinker Well-Known Member

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    I don't get yet how your own writing will suffer, if you 'limit' yourself to new materials?
    Do you mean they loose focus, when they get their inspirations from too many other sources?
    Or are you trying to say they should stick with what they are really good at depicting?

    I guess it is difficult to develop a good appealing writing style and a skill will never be perfect enough...

    How do Chinese, Korean and Japanese Novels differentiate from each other?

    And is there a quality difference between the two formats webnovel and lightnovel?
     
  16. ToastedRossi

    ToastedRossi Well-Known Member

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    Being limited means that it's very hard to write better than those limits, it means that there's less material to draw on for ideas, and it means that the stories end up getting more and more self referential and less and less believable. This is probably best illustrated with examples:

    The difference in quality between these two passages is enormous, and I'd say that the first one is straight up unreadable trash. Sure, this is a comparison between an amateur webnovelist, but that's still no excuse for screwing up just about every aspect of creative writing. Most Japanese web novels (that are worth reading) are going to be better than this, but they still tend to not understand the basics of creative writing. It's basically an industry that's eating itself and when the material isn't great to begin with, it's very going to take a very talented writer to produce anything good.

    I've read very little Korean web novels and the writers seem to be decent. They understand what creative writing is supposed to be so they are much better writers than Japanese webnovelists. I read a lot more Chinese web novels and this familiarity makes it hard for me to generalize. On the whole, I'd still say that most of these writers are still a lot better than their Japanese counterparts. The really good Chinese web novels are basically on a completely different level of existence.

    As to the Japanese web novel compared to light novel comparison, I'd say that it's a bit dangerous to generalize. The reason is that there are two kinds of light novels, or more accurately, there are two kinds of light novel writers. The first kind are the amateur writers whose novels got popular enough to get picked up by a publisher. The problem with these writers is that they are often pure amateurs who don't have any creative writing skills. When they get published, they'll be given editors who can polish up their stories so these will usually be a fair bit than the original web novel. But an editor can only do so much, and there's no way they can fix a complete lack of writing skills. And so I would still expect the resultant books to be poor on characterization, descriptive writing, dialogue, prose in general, and so on.

    The other kind of light novel writer are the ones who planned on becoming professional writers so they put the hard work into learning the craft of creative writing. Often they'll come to prominence through winning writing contests or getting short fiction successfully published. These authors are proper novelists and at their very best, Japanese novelists are some of the best in the world.
     
  17. CreativeCriticalThinker

    CreativeCriticalThinker Well-Known Member

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    I think you've answered all my questions in this thread now. :)
    As always thank you very much for all the detailed comprehensible explainations you've been given me. ;) I've learned a lot about the topic writing characters and worldbuildings :blobokhand:
     
    Last edited: Mar 30, 2023
  18. CreativeCriticalThinker

    CreativeCriticalThinker Well-Known Member

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  19. naman0

    naman0 New Member

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    Comparing Twelve Kingdoms and Fushigi Yûgi is subjective, as both series offer unique narratives and styles. Twelve Kingdoms focuses on political intrigue and character development in a fantastical world, exploring themes of responsibility and self-discovery. On the other hand, Fushigi Yûgi is a blend of romance and adventure set in a mystical realm, centering around a girl's journey to collect magical artifacts. Preference depends on individual taste, with Twelve Kingdoms appealing to those seeking intricate world-building and complex character arcs, while Fushigi Yûgi may be favored by those who enjoy a mix of romance and fantasy elements in a captivating storyline.