#twelve kingdoms

I AM NO MOTHER I AM NO BRIDE I AM KING

Have I ever discussed Twelve Kingdoms on here? I don't think so, not in any depth (or nothing comes up in the archives at least).

I saw the anime first like almost everyone outside of Japan as a teen - and I loved it, a top five anime for me at the time. I was clued into it by (oh god this is gonna hurt to say) a poster on the Megatokyo forums in the 2000's by the name of Cymbaline? Who ran a review blog on the side called WhySoHostile - defunct now, but it is archived and you can find its review of Twelve Kingdoms right here. Cymbaline himself as a writer is pretty deep in my DNA, honestly. He had that 2000's "caustic edge" style was of course the zeitgeist of the time, expletive overdoses included, and looking back today I can see the "artifice" of the style for what it is. But he also had a casual approach to his writing and a willingness to pivot to authenticity and back that others at the time often lacked and I was on the hunt for; that sense of being immersed in the raw stream-of-consciousness of someone of wit and insight. Other writers would do it much better, of course - he was doing a pretty basic personal review blog in the end - but he is certainly one of the seeds of a style of prose for me.

The forums pretty-much fell apart as the 2010's arrived, Cymbaline stopped posting there, and he abandoned the blog soon after - looks like the last posts are around 2011. He vanished, and I will never know what happened to this virtual stranger who I still remember well over a decade later. And who I think of, every time Twelve Kingdoms pops back into my line of sight; something I am sure would shock him to learn is true.

Then again, he hated Haruhi and thought the broadcast order was stupid, so fuck him.

*cough* Anyway, Twelve Kingdoms is a light-novel-series-turned-anime proto-isekai that takes as its premise "what if the Confucian Mandate of Heaven was literally true?" Kings rule their nations with a divine mandate that grants them immortality, and in return they must perpetually uphold virtue and rule well or risk losing their blessing, resulting in their death and a sweep of natural disasters until a new ruler can be crowned. Our protagonist Youko is pulled from Japan into this land as the divinely-appointed heir of one such kingdom, and a quite unsparing story of survival and dealing with the trauma of war & loss ensues as Youko spends most of the book lost, unaware of her purpose, and beset by violence from hostile actors and a world that Lost the Mandate.

As a teen that story of violence and trauma, set in a universe of deep world building and serious plot lines around governance and taking responsibility, was incredible to me. It was "everything other anime wasn't" - absolutely the kind of show someone on MAL in 2008 would recommend if you are "mature" and "hate fanservice". Cymbaline referred to it as the "anime Lord of the Rings" (and the superior one to boot).

As an adult? I still like it! But this is very clearly a capital-L Light Novel. You spend much of the story in Youko's head, and she is very often alone with her thoughts - the level of introspection is very refreshing. But because of its target demo it constantly steps back from going deeper than it could, and wraps things up in a bow to make it digestible for an audience that isn't gonna gel with greater ambiguity or complexity. The world-building is truly quite deep - so many details about this world just emerge from the narrative that you wouldn't expect, like the fact that everyone in this world is born via the fruit of a tree and with detailed rituals to pray for the fruit, etc. But it is quantity-over-quality, a shallow version of depth; the political motivations of the actors for example are very basic. Why does the Queen of Kei and the King of Kou lose the Mandate of Heaven? They go crazy, or are "weak". They are essentially morality tales, which substitute in for actual political complexity.

But I will say that these morality tells do really sell the biggest strength of the series - the commitment to the bit of Chinese political mythology. In traditional historical accounts of Chinese dynastic emperors, they also often die or fall for morality tale reasons! Their literary world absolutely does operate on these principles, and Twelve Kingdoms feels right at home in the world of the Record of the Grand Historian. Are we externalizing Youko's inner turmoil as a monkey demon spawning from her magic sword so it is more concrete and digestible to the audience? Sure, absolutely, but that also makes it match the tone of its source material as a dynastic legend. The world is literally a grid of kingdoms, defying all the rules of organic mapmaking, because that is what the Heavenly Order would do:

So yes, the comparison to Tolkien from a more mature vantage point is cringe - but within it is a kernel of truth. Just like Tolkien lived his life obsessed with the corpus of Germanic+ medieval literary traditions, and the Lord of the Rings is a reinvention of that genre for a modern age, so too is Twelve Kingdoms that same process but for Chinese celestial-political mythology for a modern animanga/fantasy audience. I definitely respect the attempt, even if of course the outcome isn't nearly so revolutionary or complex.

I do think that this story actually lends itself better to being an anime? As a visual medium, a television show inherently isn't going to say dive deeply into political intricacies, or have long sequences of internal character introspection. It compensates for that via the use of visual art to express ideas and feelings that text never could. That approach matches the complexity of concepts the book has anyway, and as a series extremely rich in newly-invented fantasy worldbuilding splendor, drawings just get that across better than prose. I haven't rewatched the anime yet to say for sure though? I am confident that it would no longer be a top 5 show for me, for one - it just isn't a show trying to "push" the medium of animation or the genre of anime in new ways, it is a workhorse adaptation. But I did watch a few episodes recently, and it seemed to hold up as a very well-executed workhorse adaptation of a great story, so I think it might still hit.

Finally, another thing I am noticing this time around is that this is a book for fucking girls lmao. It is so obvious! Female author, female protagonist who is attractive-but-not-in-that-directly-sexy way, going on a journey of self-actualization and shedding oppressive societal norms? Her companions are a hot, tall, bishi kuudere guy who turns into a unicorn and a shapeshifting rat beast whose clothes don't transform with him. Youko literally gets to touch unicorn guy's horn, something no one else is allowed to do. She is a fucking horse girl! How did I miss this in my ignorant youth?!

I know how; it is all super understated. There is no romance, and the scenes that have any of this subtext are pretty short. Twelve Kingdoms could have leaned into this but made a deliberate choice not to, which I think is a core part of its appeal. It is in fact "not like other anime" to have a main character so focused on personal growth and morality questions - from that lens it isn't for girls, it is for everyone, and this is a big part of its success as a series.

But it also totally is for girls on the sly - get hugged by a naked wererat Youko, you deserve it.

So yeah, overall I have had a great time reading these books, and will continue to buy them! Solid 8/10 novels. If you want something right on the line of serious but still breezy, and the concept appeals, give 'em a shot. I certainly hope to rewatch the anime at some point as well, could make for a fun comparison post.

I will leave you with art of our ratboy Rakushun in his rat form because he is an adorable little Redwall mouse scholar and he deserves it:

SO. svsss people! if you're in an exploratory mood, this series is japanese but based on chinese historical aesthetics, girl/boy gets pulled to another world and it turns out they're the emperor/emperor's really important magical unicorn, respectively. (not to each other.)

i read these originally in the tokyopop translation back in the early 2000s (also when the anime was made) but seven seas is licensing a new translation, so clearly they think it'll appeal to you guys! a bunch of them are already available.

there's no romance whatsoever, a lot of it is political drama or fighting, but the characters are amazing, the ties between emperor and kirin (the unicorns) are sooo interesting, etc. (i am someone who does not enjoy reading about politics and fighting, and i still cannot put these books down. i love them.) immortal kings (gender-neutral) and their sexy, sexy assistants who can transform into flying horses. it's great.

ALSO. if you don't want to purchase. a particularly dedicated fan (RIP eugene) completed translations of all the books over a decade or more, and you can read them all here/on the site he links.

reading order: i think they're all great and would just start from #1. if you have trouble with the politics, names, etc. you can watch the anime first so that you have their faces in your mind! The OG book 1 (SS 1+2, youko + keiki) and its section of the series focus on female mcs, and the anime starts there.

but if you're coming from danmei, i can imagine that you might want to start with the male/male sets, so SS book four (enki + shoryuu, originally book 3) or the whole taiki + gyousou saga (SS book 3, OG 2). enki + shoryuu first appear in youko's story, and everything is connected but i think the different stories are designed to be able to be read standalone, so.

pithy summaries: taiki (black hair, above) is a twink who falls for (/chooses as his emperor) a hot white-haired army general. there is no way they don't have a weird codependent relationship in the later books. enki (blonde hair) similarly falls for a jaded young samurai lord and now they're both 500 years old and stuck ruling together. (one of the books is about a courtier rebelling against the emperor and i really want them to fuck.) (the emperor spends his time at brothels drinking and listening to music. he's like if shen jiu wasn't totally insane). youko (red hair) gets chosen as empress by a tall blond himbo who might be thought of as a lan wangji w/o his wwx. her best friend is a twink who turns into a rat and then she falls in with an ex-princess and a peasant. the closest this series gets to romance is youko x the rat. it's amazing.

this concludes me plugging 12k....please watch/read!!!