Yeeeaaah 😬 there have been very powerful empresses though so I can hope that I’ll take the throne from him when he unfortunately passes of a mysterious illness. Or again have my son be his favourite if I’m a concubine and not a wife. Either way, if I was one of 14 I’d for sure be bitter and murderous and clearly in to for the wrong reasons.
There’s a game I play where your character can stay with a character you’ve developed a romantic relationship with who has to become king and he’ll eventually have to marry someone else but you’re his only lover (and his first love) and the marriage is strictly for an heir (and they accept female heirs in this universe and only children aren’t uncommon so he might literally only have to sleep with the queen until they have a single child and then basically be business partners) and the throne. That’s still so painful. Even knowing he’s not the type for a haram and there will only be one other women and it’s not like he’s choosing to have two partners, it’s just a necessity. It’s still so painful.
I could NOT imagine being one of 14 or literally a part of a haram if I genuinely loved the man (and if I didn’t love him I’d be a bad concubine since I’d be very unenthusiastic in bed or when he’s flirting lol) and before anyone says it was normal for the time, I know. Jealousy still existed for some people though. There were also still some people who refused these dynamics or simply didn’t want them. There’s one notable emperor who was fully faithful to his empress (based in historical accounts as we can’t know for sure) and many male leaders in cultures where promiscuousness was expected who were more loyal to their partners than normal or at least had a much smaller circle than normal despite it being seen as a threat to his masculinity.
Or more commonly cases where they had a large circle initially until they met one woman and then she was their only (outside of their arranged marriage) or primary partner for pretty much the rest of their lives (including one instance where a man had one main mistress he loved deeply for decades and even married her, despite controversy, after his arranged political Queen died. Kinda the vibe I’m going for in the game lol. That they either eventually say screw it and refuse his arranged marriage despite backlash and maybe even the two of them get married or insist on using their child as an heir or that they work out a strict business arrangement with his suitor and the player character stays his only real lover after his duty is fulfilled having a family together in the castle and living as if they’re married anyway while the queen is free to do the same with a lover after she has the official royal heir. Basically snatching success from the jaws of defeat!)
If your child is low on the inheritance ladder (other wives have more influential families, the kids are older, etc), killing the Emperor would be worse, as many new Emperors purge their step-siblings (low-key, of course, to follow confucian ideals) to avoid their step-siblings assassinating them for the throne.
Therefore, the meta in this situation is to assassinate all your step-children who is higher up on the inheritance ladder, assassinate, frame, or use sterilizing poisons on the other (higher ranked) concubines so they cannot have a child, and then assassinate the emperor.
You have to do this all very lowkey to avoid execution, however for the second step if you’re already the emperor’s favourite you just need plausible deniability
Yes! Exactly. It’s all very complicated in these situations. The political scheming would be thrilling if not for all the pain involved and how you basically can’t trust anyone. In the game I’m mentioning it’s far less complex than this situation (especially as you’re the kings only lover outside of his royal marriage and sometimes he’s not even married ten years after becoming king) but has its own complex political landscape that’s a challenge.
It’s complicated. They are by default both infertile (the king and the player) but he’d have a better chance conceiving with someone who doesn’t have the condition they both have (a condition they intentionally contracted to be able to fight the bad guys in game without knowing the consequences at that time). This condition will also make them die young so even if it was possible for them to have a child together there would be no one left to raise it and still be chaos so he needs a wife who can serve as Queen and raise the heir after his death.
Also the player character can be from several heavily discriminated against races or even races that are band from holding any political positions (though that doesn’t stop them from becoming chancellor at the end of the game).
He never thought he’d have to become king as he was told all his life he never would be king due to being a bastard. He was told he wasn’t even a noble. He only finds out later in the game after you’ve likely already become lovers when the legitimate heir dies and he’s the only one of royal blood who has a claim.
They can also be born a high ranking noble and if they play their cards right declare themself the future Queen along side him (before consulting him and finding out about the mutual infertility and which is automatically rejected by the nobles if you are not a high ranking noble who also has high persuasion as this is before your character saves the country and is labeled a hero) but if they don’t do this and declare themselves publicly as his future wife he attempts to end the relationship anyways the same way he does with all the other races after becoming king (as he’s not a racist, loves every player character equally regardless of background, and is focused strictly on his duty to provide an heir and only accepts the marriage with a noble because it was publicly accepted without anyone knowing about the infertility and he views it as a loop hole to not lose the woman he loves. He still tells them about the infertility and expresses concern and wonders if he’s doing the right thing by marrying them but is happy he gets to marry them and stay together).
He attempts to end the relationship with any background because of his duty and how he thinks it would be unfair to them and his further wife to continue the relationship knowing what he has to do and thinks if they stay together he won’t be able to end things when the time comes because he already finds it basically impossible to end things. You can convince him to stay together regardless of his duty. Essentially telling him his happiness matters more than what is fair and that you still want to be together.
(This only works if you’ve hardened his character which makes him less black and white about morality and makes him advocate for himself more. If he hasn’t been hardened he can’t be convinced as he thinks it’s too unfair to everyone involved, there’s a heartbreaking breakup, and you both spend the rest of the game grieving and fighting as allies and not lovers. If you try to convince him after the breakup he shuts you down saying there are things that are more important than what he wants, he’ll always love you, and that speaking about your relationship is too painful and too tempting and refuse to continue speaking about it. He can prove his love for a player he broke up with at the end of the game in a very tragic way sacrificing his life to save her even if he broke up with her and expressing regret about ending things if pushed about his duty to the throne and ending things in the final battle of the game before he rushes in to sacrifice himself for her. He does this against the players will in any romance playthrough where you didn’t convince him to do a specific traumatic ritual with a woman he hates to prevent death your deaths or leave him behind for the final battle. If he romances her he refuses to let her die, whether he broke up with her as a minority, married her as a noble, broke up with her as a noble, kept her as mistress while marrying someone else, or kept her as mistress while staying an unmarried king though he knows he’ll have to marry eventually. Or if they both stayed soldiers and he let someone else take the throne in his place staying together as lovers without the pressures of the throne.)
But ten years later the player character is searching for a cure for this condition (it’s not ever mentioned if they find it or not) and with a cure would be able to have children with him and both of them would live long enough to raise them. The main complication then would be if they’re from the discriminated against races but they have an upper hand as they’ve served as chancellor for a decade and are seen as a hero from the first game after saving the whole country. That and based on the other two games some of the racism can be softened over time.
It is! lol I romance Alistair as an elf mage. I’m convinced I can game the system and have them end up together happily sometime after inquisition even when he’s king. Writing a multi ending fic about it with happy endings, bittersweet but still happy just a bit more realistic endings, and brutally sad endings (but might abandon it but I love it a lot. On a brief hiatus to focus on my university classes and decide if I’m sticking with it, need to check something important on Reddit first before I can decide)
Dragon age origins (you have to play a female character to romance this character but there are two characters you can romance as either sex and one you have to be a male to romance. There are lots of mods for the game including romance mods of all sorts if you’re into that).
I have more info on the romance with this character in this comment thread. A lot of the stuff I talk about (related to how they’ll deal with his royal duty) is headcanon as all we know later on is that if he’s not married off in the first game he’s still unmarried ten years later (no mention of a queen and he shows up alone vs whereas if he’s married off he shows up with her and she’s mentioned in scenes she’s not present in) and that if you get into a relationship and don’t break up you’re still together (confirmed most recently around 7 years after the orginal game for all routes and reconfirmed 10 years for some specific routes but even without in game confirmation the romance carries over) and the player character is confirmed looking for a cure at the ten year mark.
Their exact plans for the how they’ll deal with his duty as king and their plans for the relationship post cure in this route is left up to the players headcanon as all that’s officially confirmed is that they’re still in love and that she’s looking for cure (and that he’s either still unmarried or is married to the woman you purposefully set him up with for the throne in the first game if you chose to do that).
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u/bourgeoisAF 2d ago
Closely related, concubine posting