She was forced to be a concubine, but since the king ignore her, she was completely alone in a foreign country. She became jealous of the queen and try to poison her.
payne's mother came from a rich country (now destroyed) and the emperor's adviser pressured him to marry her. The emperor didn't love the concubine and abandoned her. The concubine went crazy and tried to kill the empress. I think that the emperor was a smarter person than his son but i can understand who the asshole prince take the character from (hell, she was forced to become your concubine, you could at least tried to make her comfortable)
Do we ever get to see the wedding between Sasha and Arth. I'm also curious about Arth's position cause I know that is Farther was an Aristocrat so does Arth have some noble title as well???
Arth is a bastard, his mother was a commoner. Since he has half-brothers, not sure that he hold a title. He's talent was recognized by the king and become attendant for the trash prince. I don't thing there is more information that about his past. His father was a violent drunkard too.
Spoiler: Princess Perilla: first mention ch 22 Princess Perilla, Payne's mother, is first mentioned in chapter 22. She was the princess of Ianne, a country with lots of mineral and mining resources. The nobles in Atlanta wanted access to these resources, so they pushed the Emperor to take Princess Perilla as a concubine (which would have involved trade agreements and treaties and things). He didn't want to, (or, more likely, the Empress didn't want him to) but eventually caved to pressure and brought Princess Perilla in. The Emperor slept with her a few times, resulting in Prince Payne, then he basically dumped her in a corner and forgot about her and his child for the next decade or so. The chapter says Princess Perilla was "blinded by loneliness and jealousy" after years of this, and tried to assassinate the Empress with poison. Princess Perilla was caught and executed. Note: unlike some other posters say, Iannes is was not conquered by Atlanta, nor is it a fallen country. Spoiler: Perilla second mention, ch 44 Princess Perilla is next mentioned in chapter 44. The Emperor blames the impending threat of other countries invading Atlanta and his own ill health on Princess Perilla's ghost, saying she's coming to take him from this world. He describes Princess Perilla as a jealous woman who tried to kill the Empress because he had no desire for her, and who was always glaring at him, with her red eyes that frightened him (reminding me of how Johannes reacts when people glare disapprovingly at him). He goes on to say he genuinely believed she was a demon and still does. He tells Payne that Payne is guilty by association and must pay for her sins, which the Emperor does not believe were paid for with her execution. Spoiler: Princess Perilla, Final mention, ch 92 In chapter 92, it is revealed that the Emperor had actively lied to Payne's mom, saying he was in love with her in order to seduce the princess into agreeing to being his concubine. When confronted by a upset, angry-crying Perilla, and an Empress demanding to know if it's true he'd told Perilla that he loved her, the Emperor says it was all fake affection: he seduced her to get his way, and so the ministers would shut up about access to Ianne's resources. He then says they have enough of Ianne's resources from his taking Princess Perilla as a concubine, so he doesn't need to bother keeping up the farce with Perilla, a fact he is glad of. Because of this, Perilla then snapped, and tried to poison the Empress. (Payne does say "it's suspicious" but the context is hazy on whether he is thinking his mother is framed, or if he was beginning to doubt if the Emperor actually viewed his mother as a 'sinner', or if he was using that as a convenient excuse to treat Payne badly.) The Emperor then basically enslaved Prince Payne, requiring him to wage wars in Johannes place to make up for Perilla's 'sins', while holding Perilla's remains and grave hostage as leverage. You can't make someone Empress out of pity, no matter how good and hard working. Rebecca was a very bad choice for Empress in the OG Timeline. While she's a perfect administrator and very intelligent, she lacks the soft skills and mental fortitude necessary for the role. Her spirit and ability eroded away from the stress, and she became increasingly erratic, strained, bitter, and quarrelsome as Johannes continued to cheat on her. In general, Rebecca always goes a little crazy from pressure and disappointment. We can probably use Rebecca's behavior in the later chapters (the hopelessness, stress, and shaken mental stability) to give us an idea of what she would have acted like in the OG timeline, but she would have had heartbreak and desperation on top. Spoiler: Rebecca sucks at socializing and forming alliances Chapter 2: Evie, the betrothed of the 3rd prince, explains that she and many of the other noblewomen are afraid of Rebecca. They find her extremely intimidating and even scary. Rebecca is considered "perfect", making everyone afraid to make the slightest mistake around her. Social events where Rebecca is present are described as comfortable as "sitting on a bed of thorns". The noble women enjoy viciously gossiping about Rebecca, and rumors of Rebecca and Johannes fighting and being in a terrible relationship happen even before the OG female lead was introduced, and even before Sasha stepped in to tell Rebecca Johannes is a POS. They were fighting in the garden in chapter 4, enough for Rebecca to be crying. Spoiler: Arth thought she'd be a bad empress who didn't have the mental skill to handle it Arth likely didn't think arranging Rebecca's downfall was a big deal, considering he viewed Rebecca as a poor choice of Empress. In chapter 6, before he knew her, and before Rebecca became close with Sasha, Arth says he views Rebecca as similar to the symbolic, noble tree in the palace gardens that's nearly dead, and being artificially kept alive with injected vitality. As in: she's barely keeping it together and could crack at any time. Spoiler: Rebecca broke the law Rebecca also did the wildly illegal thing of hiring assassins to kidnap and murder Lillith (ch 12) which is why she was executed. Spoiler: Arth had been Johanne's puppet, but grew into a puppet master Prior to Sasha's influence, Arth did not give a crap outside of executing his duties perfectly, which involved fulfilling Johanne's wishes. If Johanne's wants Rebecca gone, Arth would get rid of her without qualm. Original timeline Arth has no emotional connection to anything, outside of a slight one to Lillith. It is solely due to Sasha's influence that Arth became close friends with Rebecca, Arth began to appreciate he had his own skills, and didn't need to be grateful to the imperial family for using him, Arth began using those skills independently from his job, to influence the nation Arth begins to understand how powerful emotional intelligence is and deal with his feelings regarding his inferiority complex and form healthy attachments to people and find fulfillment outside of his job role Arth allowed himself to openly express how much he hated Johannes and thought the man was stupid. In chapter 8, Arth is genuinely shocked at himself when he mentally calls Johannes idiotic and tiresome, even looking around the empty hall to see if anyone noticed him thinking it, and realizes that, until now, he had never though negatively or positively about Johannes, he just focused on his job duties. But now, he despises Johannes and thinks the man is a waste. So, obeying Johannes became distasteful in the extreme.
Given the bits of the OG story that we've been told, OG Lillith & OG Johannes probably DID have a true love. OG Lillith, being so pure & the epitome of a Shoujo Mary Sue protag, with loving doting parents who were adored by their peasants/staff, would have probably grown up to be INCREDIBLY naive & think that everything could be solved with kindness or just working hard enough. Current Lillith had that lifestyle forced onto her & was never allowed to explore other choices as a kid (like OG Lillith probably had), which made her resent that pure image, as compared to OG Lillith, who probably got to do whatever she wanted (with gentle parenting if she messed up) & settled for the pure white dresses & light food because she genuinely enjoyed that. According to Sasha - Johannes, in the OG story, stopped messing around with other women (lol Rebecca doesn't count, who dat) to purely chase Lillith who was "interesting" & "not like other girls" (because she never suffered in any way or was restricted in anyway by noble society). Rebecca would have been the Queen Bee in that story, the epitome of "everything wrong with the popular girls", the Alpha Bitch & thus the negative role model for not being nice. If she was REALLY a nice & good person like Lillith, she would have been able to stop Johannes from cheating on her after all~. So it's likely the original story was a "I'm a sweet gentle girl who reformed the scum man" - a typical "you can fix a bad boy with kindness" kind of tale. (Please note that most of these stories still have the scum man be a total RAGING sexist douchebag, they're literally only nice to the Heroine + any future daughters they will have with the heroine. They probably still scream at min wage employees & sneer at every other woman for being a SLUT/BITCH even after the main plot is over. That is basically probably how OG Johannes' "character development" turned out.) And with Lillith charming the dragon to be the defender of the kingdom, it's likely that Payne's use as a tool ran out & they either had him killed off or he defected to Kanakta, who would have recognized his usefulness even though there's zero way Payne can help them beat a dragon.
Arth was NOT a bastard. His mom was a commoner, though, and his father was an alcoholic, abusive nobleman (mentioned in chapter 8) He goes into more detail in chapter 11, saying his mother was constantly terrified she'd lose her position, his father neglected his duties as a nobleman, and his classmates in school often stole his things and viewed him as a monster due to his frightening intelligence. He mentions never being loved by either parent. Neither chapter mentions him being a bastard, or him having any brothers. It's possible brothers are mentioned in other chapters, but I don't remember any brothers being mentioned. His chapter 4 introduction says he graduated from Atlanta's most prestigious institution, Mulansa Academy, in only 2 years. Upon graduation, he could not find employment, due to prejudice against his mother's commoner background, until he was recognized by the Emperor and assigned to be the Crown Prince's aid. Arth's father's title is never mentioned that I recall, and I also don't remember people calling Arth by a title (members of the palace staff tend to call Arth "Mr. Arth", like in ch 79, but most nobles simply call him Arth) So, Arth is not a peer in his own right, either because his father is still alive, or because his Morganatic origins excluded him from inheriting.
Yes that is true. I said Arth is a bastard because of all of that. I quote you "due to prejudice against his mother's commoner background", mother background. If he was prejudice because of his origin, that phrase will be "due to prejudice against his commoner background" that why I deduce his father was a noble. Also, it's improbable that a commoner go to a prestigious academy without having noble origin or backer. If he isn't noble, he is backed by someone, that possible since he is a genius, but that someone let his investment being bully without moving ? That doesn't fit. Even if the backer doesn't move, Arth should talk about him since he is the man who give him a chance, someone who recognize him. But he never mentions him, so these theories is improbable. If he is a noble son, he can go to the academy and being bullied. His father doesn't favor him even so he is a genius, but we knew his mother is a commoner, so lineage is the problem. That can explain his situation. No one was there for him at that time, that fit more what he explains about his past. The brothers aren't mentioned that true too, I just guess it since he is a son of a noble, but didn't have a title. Even after being the attendant of the prince. So he probably has half-brother who keep the father title. But I admit there is no proof of this point.
What's with people constantly calling this series queerbait??? If there was a manga where a girl & a guy were competing over another guy's love & the girl lost, would that be considered hetbait? NO. Queerbait is when the author chickens out & never EXPLICITLY confirms the romantic feelings a character has for another character of the same sex. Rebecca's feelings ARE in fact mentioned & she even has conversations about it with Arth. Could she have won Sasha's heart romantically? Perhaps, but given the setting (& please don't use the "oh but it's a fictional historical setting, the author can do whatever they want, girl power~!", there are literally MULTIPLE character backstories, including Sasha's!!!!, about the status of women in the story - the author should NOT go around breaking the rules of their own story just to hamfistedly shove in a relationship) - Rebecca's decision to choose over being her family's successor (which IS something that not only makes her independent & validated, but would also be a big step in improving the status of women in the kingdom) MAKES SENSE. She threw away everything in the past for Johannes' love & nearly destroyed herself in the process. Would she REALLY be happy throwing away all the work she put into herself just for Sasha's love? And Johannes had the pre-installed advantage of being adored by everyone & all the prestige & status he could ever need. Sasha doesn't have that & Rebecca would not want Sasha to suffer more from society. Also what's with the Payne bashing & people calling Payne stupid in the comments of the webtoon??? "Why doesn't he just take over when Johannes sucks?" well why didn't ARTH just take over - answer: he didn't have Sasha & he didn't HAVE an opinion on Johannes until after he met Sasha because he didn't FEEL the need to & he had more pressing problems than Johannes being an incompetent jackass. Also Payne is literally like almost never around cuz they keep sending him out to war to die. His literal only allies are his soldiers (who are with him & thus NOT IN THE FREAKING KINGDOM) & Lillith - the only kingdom girl who chased after him cuz she didn't care about his rep/status & wanted to spite her mom. There's also talk about how "Payne is too naive to run the kingdom" & like - okay, it's ONE thing for servants to disrespect you & treat you like shit during normal times, but it's NOT naive of Payne for him to expect "well they'd at least DO the bare minimum of their jobs when we're in a crisis situation, delegates of other countries are watching us like a hawk because the prince accused them of poisoning the king & also the king is dying from poison & we STILL don't know who did it". Like, going out of their way to enable, gawk at Lillith, fiancee of the leader of the investigation of the king's ATTEMPTED MURDER, being violently beaten by her own mother & then even attempting to BLOCK Payne from helping her, all while foreign delegates are PRESENT - that is a whole other level of INSANE & you could argue that they're even deliberately sabotaging the kingdom. Payne hasn't been in the castle long enough to realize that it's not that they JUST don't respect him, but like Lillith's own maids back home - the shitty abusive parents' behavior have completely corrupted them. Like that doctor treating Lillith's mom said: "This whole place is crazy. If I stay here any longer, I'll go crazy too."
Wanted to double down on how psychotic that short aside to Lillith’s mom was. Going, “oh the madam’s beating that maid cause she looks vaguely similar to her daughter” like it’s perfectly normal and not crazy talk. And the dad in general burying his head in the sand so hard to ignore his wife’s unmistakable insanity so he can continue play acting like they’re a nice happy family. On the complaints with Payne not pulling a que, I see that a lot in regards to these stories. Especially in reincarnation plots when the MC isn’t able to immediately start running rings around their previous tormentors. I think it’s a combo of A) way to many OP MC’s who are able to pull that sort of thing, and B) people want that big emotional gratification without concerning themselves too deep in the practical details. In regards to the reincarnation stories, foreknowledge can only do so much. If their 1st life’s downfall can be mostly blamed on their own foolishness, then yes coming back wiser and with greater insight will make all the difference. But if the problem was because of the other person being in a position of power, or having leverage, or really anything, then those issues don’t go away or become easily surmountable just because this is round 2. It’s made pretty clear that Payne had 0% approval rating in the capital and no backing. Even if he convinced the army to march on the place and take over (little bit of a tall ask), he probably wouldn’t have been able to keep it as absolutely everyone else in the existing power structure would react with ‘see, we always knew he was a crazy murderer’. And fully replacing the current power structure and organization is way more problematic than people want to acknowledge. As is, supplanting the idiot prince required Machiavellian plotting from Arth, Sasha leveraging her connections and understanding of emotional manipulation, and Rebecca throwing the power and prestige of the highest ranking noble title onto the stage to grant their claims legitimacy. If they hadn’t masterfully set Johannes up take the fall for something as horrifying as patricide/regicide it is unlikely that public opinion would have turned against Johannes and towards Payne. Also gotta give props to the author for bringing details back in at the end. Turns out that Sasha’s friend from way at the beginning, who was able to get Sasha an invite to the royal ball through her fiancé, is actually the fiancé of the 3rd prince. Thought she’d just quietly dropped from the story.
I love this story a lot but i have a problem with how they treat dragon boi; like he deserves so much more. Most people probably have never felt the pain of seeing someone you like/love with someone else but its really painful and he had to go though that in both of his lifetimes; like is sad and pathetic of the author to hurt this beautiful character for a little bit more plot; you could have had him and Rebecca fall in love or have him live life interested in the friendships he built with the help of Sasha; but no he is doomed to forever be the 2nd male lead and not have a single person fall in love with him. For me to see this carefully crafted character be in an unrequited love and not be able to break out from that peace of him in the original story is heartbreaking to see/read. To me he deserves to live a life and not be so sad like the other characters, and its sad that that’s not the case. p.s. ik it’s hard to come up with plots and drawing this because i write stories and i draw manhuas but please treat your characters better. Ik not everyone will be happy in the end but come on this man deserves to be able to get away from 2nd male lead syndrome
I think he did end up better off compared to his canon counterpart in the end, but it definitely could have been executed better or shown better. No doubt that in the og story, he would have received a very naive rose-colored black & white education from pure sweet heroine Lillith. Here, he gets a more nuanced view of humans & how they struggle in their lives through Sasha's difficulties & relationships. Sure it sucks that he lost in the competition for Sasha's love, but I don't think he'll pine for her forever. He's got a comrade (Rebecca) who understands his pain. If anything, Sasha would probably kick his ass for it & push him to experience life instead of resigning himself to permanent guard duty like in canon.
I must say, I really like this story. As many have mentionned in other posts, the characters have mostly realistic and human behaviours. Even the Idiot CP is realistic, if pushed a bit far, since you can see, throughout the manwha, that all he wants is an easy life where Rebecca and Arth will take care of everything and he can just have fun and do as he pleases. He is the product of his parents "education", where their indulgence towards him actually has turned him into the spoilt brat that he remained without ever really growing up. Rebecca, in that sense, is his mirror image of a too stern "education" with no room to relax or indulge even the tiniest bit. Both are extremes in what damage parents can do without ressorting to physical abuse in education. Therefore, CP and Rebecca bounce off each other nicely in the narrative. Even if the CP is an ass, (no qualms here), he is, in many ways, also a victim. Never allowed to really grow up, always being indulged, with his parents setting everything up to have others take charge, (through any means possible, look at Paynes' situation), in his stead so he can stay "their lovely boy". It isn't healthy either. Making him believe that his behaviour and having everyone else do his work is "normal" and his "due" is what brought his downfall in the end. His childish and bewildered reactions when he is "punished" from the moment of his arrest to his death (killed by Nasca), are really good narratively speaking. The "final confrontation" between Rebecca and him, as he attempts to "escape" is great and sad for both that are involved. Rebecca can finaly let out all her spent anger (in a very cold fashion, a reflection of her past self) and make him finally get a taste of what the "real world" is like, with him still unable to understand where this is coming from and getting angry, teary and bewildered like a child really shows off how much or little both have evolved as characters. Rebecca shows sadness when she acknowledges that the CP doesn't understand what she is talking about, I think she was hoping for him to have at least a bit of a "breakthrough" in his character and maybe, at least, an apology. And, as a reader, I find it sad for both characters, Rebecca and CP that he dies without ever realising anything. I find it very bittersweet.
I also agree with you, I felt kinda sad for the prince and Rebecca. One grew up with a rigid education, learning how to deal with high society and politics while the other one is an asshole who know nothing about the world. In the end I feel very angry towards the emperor and his wife. First they made Paine’s mother suffer (even if you marry for politics, at least you should treat her well, from what I can see, Paine’s mother wasn’t a crazy jealous bitch who would scheme, she only needed some attention and a good relationship with the imperial couple), then they used Paine as a war weapon. They spoiled their son but I can’t believe the emperor was so foolish to raise his child like this; the power of the imperial family is absolute but if the ruler is weak minded, is a big trouble. No one want to follow a weak person, even if he is a emperor.
The Imperial couple are, in my opinion, the real antagonists of this story, just as you said. I do wonder what would have happened to the story if Sasha had taken upon herself to "educate" the CP, the story could have been very different with all protagonists involved and the imperial couple could have been outed as the main villains. If short it could have been like this: Sasha opens the CP eyes regarding his lack of knowledge of the real world on one hand and his parents infantalizing him on the other with the consequences of his womanizing on top. He could, with Sashas' help, who would have befriended Arth and Rebecca, ask Arth to help him get educated into becoming a good ruler, made amends and rekindled his relationship with Rebecca, asking for her help as well in politics, acknowledged Payne and asked him to help him learn swordmanship and how to plan battles, gaining his respect, and, by searching for the truth about Paynes' mother, getting a real brother to help him depose his own terrible parents and exiling them where they could do no harm whilst telling them how their "education" almost costs him his throne. The other love stories could have stayed identical, Sasha + Arth, Payne + Lillith, their respective arcs being kind of side stories with this set up. Our poor Nasca would still finish as is in though..... What do you guys think about this possibility?
Is a beautiful fantasy but not realistic. We are in the high society where people fight to survive, Sasha isn't an angel, she befriended Arth and Rebecca with a purpose, only confiding in each others grievances they become friends. From the start CP was an asshole, the author could have made Sasha do something like what Melissa Podebrat (from "beware of the villainess) did to the prince (she "educated him") but Melissa comes from a powerful family (even if she beat a prince, she won't be punished so much) while Sasha is a low noble without a family protection and she hardly manage to survive. Maybe the author could he could have lengthened the novel and put some arc where Sasha and company could have gone together outside the capital and meet the CP. By this way the CP would be far away from his parents and could do some experience and mature. But would his parents allow him to go outside ? Not sure. In the end they were all victim of the system: the emperor is a typical ruler who never saw the war and think power is something he own. He isn't a bad emperor, he cares about the empire but his mind isn't open enough to see that the enemy of the empire are always near his house, ready to attack him. Same for the empress, most probably she was a loved daughter without too much education nor political education. From this i can see that the emperor was a only child so he was never been schemed by stepbrothers o stepmothers, therefore he never understood how cruel is the high society and failed to see his mistake. it's a pity that the emperor and his child grew up in a golden cage. In few words they were narrow-minded.