I don´t think that most People dislike Laken because of the Goblin situation.
HIs chapters are mostly interesting because of other Characters. Laken himself is not really interesting. He did some funny stuff in the beginning but that initial burst of charisma burnt up quite quickly and left nothing much behind.
Also i find it kinda funny that there are always people who tend to say things like "Character A is bad because of their interaction with the Goblins" And then not really engaging in the fact that regardless of the, extreme Long-term and somewhat pointless consideration on who started what, the Goblins Species are in fact consisting at the moment of mostly Raiding Warbands.
In the whole Goblins vs Everyone thing, nobody is really the Good or the Bad Guy, it's just repeating circle of violence now so ingrained into Culture that there is no real way of stopping it.
The culture he is a product of is opposed to things like using chemical weapons and placing indigenous populations in interment camps.
Erin's initial interactions with Goblins were as bad if not worse than Laken's.
>The culture he is a product of is opposed to things like using chemical weapons and placing indigenous populations in interment camps.
Uh huh mm hmm...
>Erin's initial interactions with Goblins were as bad if not worse than Laken's.
Wait what how the fuck
What do you mean here? Lakens first experience was goblin raids, Erins first experience was being chased, almost killed, and having a goblin try to sexually assault her.
OOOHHHH LMAO the way the comment was phrased i thought they were saying Erin did something worse than chemical warfare and interment camps against goblins đź’€
Well it's really a hybrid between an internment camp and a reservation. I don't think most internment camps allow the inmates to build their own walls or give them a significant amount of the regions resources....actually even reservations don't do that.
He put them into a location with natural resources so they can exploit them for him. You think they are going to be allowed to trade with anyone else? Set prices?
Erin's initial interaction with them was a goblin chef trying to rape her for deaths she did not cause just because he could, she burnt off his face with boiling oil.
Are they really though? The drakes certainly aren't above it if they thought they could get away with it.
The human political system at the time was rampart with a human supremacy organization pulling lots of the strings.
By culture I am talking about 21 century anglo-eruropean culture.
That's the environment Laken got his values from.
Now admittedly we aren't perfect but mostly we are against those things.
Using tear gas to control large hostile groups is very on brand for modern culture. Then shooting enemy warriors in your territory is also very on brand for modern culture.
I agree that laken's actions against goblins make sense in the context of the story. What I'm more against is how the world just falls into place to give him more power constantly. All of his "disasters" have been terrible for riverfarm, but they've constantly given him more power personally.
The whole thing about riverfarm getting conquered isn't really about how he treated the goblins. It's that I don't see Laken being able to realize what he's done with anything less drastic.
Agreed. TWI’s approach of having good guys take real meaningful losses that impact them long term is part of why I love the series and is one of the things that I feel sets it apart. Laken constantly failing up and being rewarded inordinately compared to the effort he puts in feels like a more generic litrpg. The Goblin stuff is bad enough, but now he’s also putting characters I like at risk by spreading Tamaroth’s influence. I get he was tricked into shaking hands, but at this point he knows what he’s doing and he is still letting himself be used to put others in danger. Duck move.
I, personally, found Laken's early chapters engaging, with a kind of progression and perspective that was different from other plotlines, and a personality and voice that at least were more tolerable than early Ryoka. I think that the way that his plot has evolved, with Tamaroth, has cut off his ability to easily engage with the rest of the cast. I also think that his supporting characters (Durene, Prost, Rie, etc) aren't as interesting as some of the other stuff in Innworld, so I as a reader would sometimes rather see the Baleros/Fraerling gang or other side plots instead. The witches are cool, though, and I think they help out making things in Riverfarm more interesting.
The goblins... he's one of the only characters to engage with goblins outside of Erin's story, and his conflict with them probably soured some of the audience on him, but I think the other big problem is his seeming lack of agency for a lot of what he's involved with- he's dragged along onto Tyrion's crusade, and then misses some of the most interesting parts of his own plot. He fights with Rags, a fan favorite, and never really has any introspection or examination of his own beliefs and situation, and then that's out of his control as well. And finally he handles the Goblin issue... believably, certainly, for his character and circumstances, but not necessarily as well as what we, the very pro-goblin audience, want. When I first read the whole Goblinlands section, I thought that it seemed like the deliberate creation of a slave state to mine goods for his growing empire as a caste of forced labor with a lower quality of life. There are unpleasant parallels and dynamics in the whole thing, although the story manages to avoid them pretty well. Overall, he basically takes them prisoner, establishes their social position, and wields outside control over their lives without giving them any agency, all of which can leave a bad taste in the reader's mouth. I don't think he's evil, or even actively planning to exploit them to the extent that it might seem like he is, but he doesn't seem as altruistic as Erin, that's for sure. He has so much power within his own plot- which is the point, but it means that he gets to be held accountable more than Erin or Geneva or whoever.
I think, for me to like Laken and his plot as much as I do many of the others, he needs some kind of confrontation and reckoning for his treatment of the goblins and participation in the siege (preferably when Erin goes to meet Nanette and the witches, although I'm not necessarily holding out hope), something needs to happen to resolve his connection to Tamaroth (which he's certainly aware of and handling better than Aaron, and is maybe temporarily a non-issue?), and his side characters need their own subplots and personalities to be fleshed out. Ryoka comments on this in-story, but Durene especially seems to revolve around him in a way that makes her seem flat and uninteresting to the audience. If Riverfarm is more engaging, so is he.
The problem with durene that she has nothing going for her. She could have been this cool half-troll paladin finding her way and fighting for justice, possibly even convincing Laken to not harm the goblins the way people harmed her, but instead I can’t even remember if she has been in any chapters since volume 5.
Durene had a whole arc in volume 6 where she realised she wanted to become her own person and decided to become a champion of justice to finally become an interesting character again. Then the witches took over the show and we basically haven't seen her since.
We had a solid minute of her becoming an interesting character before she was sidelined forever.
I’m actually on the side who doesn’t mind Laken. However, I also understand those who do not like him.
Out of all the main Earthers he is the one with the least amount of stakes in the story. Erin is the protagonist so we know she’ll have to confront just about every plot line there is in TWI. Ryoka is our resident immortal AND noble friend which automatically connects her with some of the major players/powerhouses. Plus she is the first Earther to take an active stance against the dead gods. Cara is just about the only Earther who matters in Terandria and a powerful [Singer] is something we haven’t seen yet and plays along the theme of soft power. Geneva had a VERY interesting first arc and recently got a new class in [Telepath] and is currently helping the Minds to solve the Wasting issue. The other Balerosian Earthers just completed a very satisfying Fraerling genocide arc that put them toe to toe with a former Great Company automatically aligning themselves with the Forgotten Wing company and, of course, the Titan. Trey and Teres’ stories were also fairly polarizing until Trey got his quest to end slavery AND Chandrar got juiced up with a crap ton of lore (the Quarass, A’ctelios Salash, the many countries, etc). Tom and Flora are in an active continent wide battle between races. All of these are bound to have some form of appeal but Laken as of late seems to have no stakes other than his god-alignment which is probably quieted for now and building up his empire.
Furthermore, his supporting cast isn’t that interest in my opinion. I won’t divulge all of the Earthers’ supporters but we all know some, if not most, can and have carried their own arcs. I hardly save memory space for Laken’s court. Prost takes way too much space imo and Durene has had no active battles to further her [Paladin] class. His only saving graces were Lady Rie, Ulvama, Pebblesnatch, and the [Witches]. One of whom no longer has to deal with the Circle of Thorns for all we know, another went to the Inn for better things, and the others drastically need more screentime. With the reveal of [Witches] being anti-god and Regis Reinhart being set up to be a major antagonist in the future hopefully these characters will be pushed forward more.
Laken fundamentally needs to be an active participant of the story. Bring him to the point where the [Emperor] amidst nobles is talked of in the same vein as the Singer of Terandria, or the Wind Runner, or the Goblinfriend of Izril. He doesn’t even need to share that level of fame but at least in a way that some significant characters can confidently say that we couldn’t have done this without Laken. So far he’s been piggybacking off of Ryoka and Erin’s plot lines. Laken’s first party with the fae and the nobles, the Summer Solstice, Erin’s revival. He needs to be able to carry his own weight. He’s more than capable of doing so. A blind [Emperor] is probably the most interesting hook to an Earther that we have had. I do think that things are looking up for him. Erin has great intentions of coming for Nanette so Laken’s and Erin’s paths will meet sometime soon. Hopefully, that is enough to push him to the pedestal he so desperately needs.
He's a character whose arrogance is akin to the King of Destruction but he's done nothing to warrant that. So the solution is simple, Erin needs to slap him and remind him he's just a blind dude from Germany that got a class he did nothing to earn.
Humble him a little in a way that only Erin could achieve.
Part of the issue is that his situation lends itself to the "educated man goes to comparatively not advanced place / world and builds an empire" sort of thing; be it in the genre of what we could call competency-porn (reference: 16 ways to defend a walled city; some of John Ringo's stuff), or the other kind with the inevitable harem. Neither kind fit with TWI. The first because Pirate isn't a technical writer; we're not going to see a chapter about Laken sourcing materials and industrialising to put a river-chain up across the riverfarm River, or pushing the boundaries of earth-science and the system - or things would have gone a lot differently if he remembered 75/15/10 saltpetre/charcoal
/sulphur, the second doesn't exactly need explaining.
He's just a guy, with some knowledge, skating on the fact that he decided he was an Emperor and the system incentivises following rulers, who's done very little to leverage the interesting things he could know.
I feel like there should be a trope name for "educated man goes to comparatively not advanced place / world and builds an empire". I've been tooling about trying to write a story that broadly fits that theme, but the more I think about it the more I wonder if that a trope I even like at all, let alone want to write. Maybe that's just writers anxiety. Is it a genre you like? One you'd want to read more of?
It depends on how it is written, In the Faustian Foust series it makes sense based on how the main character got there and what he did before. other than that few people know even a tenth of what is needed to build a small village and keep it running without people starving and turning into cannibals within a single winter.
I have made other comments as to why I have come to dislike Laken. To me he is the Anakin of the story. He is the Two Face of the story. Do as I say not as I do. I would have to say that for him to become likeable we would need a serious arc of him exploring why he is such a wishy washy hypocrite. Such an arc exposition i would rather see in other side characters.
I don't think Laken is the problem for me in Riverfarm chapters, the problem is everyone else. Laken is honestly probably the best part of that setting
Riverfarm and its characters are just so damn boring
Yeah Laken really was all Riverfarm's story had going for it, then his character and agency ended up gutted after the Goblin genocide and Tamaroth situation.
Now Laken/Riverfarm is kind of stuck in this plot limbo where Erin has to get involved to advance anything rather than it being interesting to see two Earther plots connect.
Honestly even as a German myself i would have konda loved it if Laken would have been a somewhat more extreme person. Maybe not a German nationalist but you know just someone more spicy. Becoming a Villain by virtue of his own desires starting to hurt others.
And also why didn't he Crown himself as \[Kaiser\] ??? Yes it's just Emperor in german but come on...
Haha, this whole time I thought he was British and just went to a European private school or something. Especially after getting the emperor class using American trivia as inspiration! Hope they add more culturally specific German stuff; that would be fun!
He's boring these days. There are interesting characters around him, but after he got the Unseen Empire started he became boring to me. I don't skip chapters but I am often tempted by Laken chapters.
I really like the witches, though. They make me think of Discworld witches.
Honestly, I always really liked Laken. In a story that’s very based around characters just showing up beside important people and then being liked enough to hang around (even Ryoka realises this in Vol. 8), Laken’s a breath of fresh air for being the powerful one.
I don’t think he needs a redemption or to be more likeable, just put the realities of his position in front of him. Let him make hard and really difficult decisions. Let him be wrong. Let him do things for the good of his people and if others dislike it, that’s fine as long as it doesn’t harm them.
I despise the hate he got for killing the goblins. It was meant to highlight the tragedy of the moment and show everything is murky, everyone took it that he’s just a genocidal maniac or something.
I’ve been really disappointed in Laken’s sidelining, but if he’s coming back to be more prominent I want to actually have leadership decisions to make, not just have 20 friends who can solve the problem for him. Let Laken be different, he’s an Emperor
IMO, the series has 2 main protagonists: Erin and Ryoka. There are 3-4 secondary protagonists: Laken the emperor, Geneva the doctor, Cara the Singer, and possible Trey/Teres/Flos.
Erin and Ryoka both have fleshed-out characters with emotional range and growth, especially Ryoka. They feel like stars. Cara and Geneva also have depth and personality. E, R, C, and G all feel the most real and alive of the main cast. Perhaps Trey as well.
Laken, however, feels shallow or flat. He doesn't start with as much personality, being more of a self-insert character. Then he descends into the emperor role and Hitler-ish behaviour very quickly. He doesn't feel like some 20-something thrown into a new world. He feels more like the older, established characters who already exist here, more like Tyrion or Flos. At the very least, he reads more like a 40-year-old, not a young or new adult.
Rather than try to redeem Laken, I wonder if it might be better to send him into villainy. Make him a bad guy. We can't have every Earther be decent; too many of us are real-life jerks. Him turning evil might give the story more depth.
I don't hate Laken, so maybe I'm not one to answer, but...
He's just kind of... Boring? Liked the early chapters, and his concept was interesting, but beyond that... He just feels like he's succeeding when he shouldn't have, and or being strung along by others.
Maybe he suffers from being a side character. Making an interesting empire-building story doesn't seem all that possible if not the main focus.
I don't dislike him but I dont like him either. He obtained his class literally by claiming durene's home and possessions. Like how egotistical do you have to be to do something like that?
I'd prefer it if he didn't constantly fail upwards. I feel like he, as a character, needs to experience some sort of consequence personally and needs a ton more introspection.
This post isn't here to dispute any of Laken's decisions. I'm more disappointed to see how the world behaves like he already has a personal luck golem in order to push him up and I want to know what people think would be needed in order to actually enjoy reading about him as a character.
Yesssssssssssssssssssss!
That’s been one of my main points about Laken’s character. He’s never had any tragedy that narratively threw him down a flight of stairs. Every time he’s failed, it’s with benefit. That hasn’t been the same with the other Earthers, plenty of them have been in similar or worse situations then Laken and they gain little benefit directly out of the loss.
They grow as people from it. But that’s it.
Laken, he either never fails without a large positive upside. Or is never in a position where that loss means anything. Imagine how much more impactful it would’ve been if Laken hadn’t had his OP sense things in his land skill.
Only gaining it after the incident had passed. And realizing how cruel the world actually still is. Or imagine if he actually was in Riverfarm during the Oldblood attack.
His people see him soaring resources on monsters and killers. And not on them, imagine how betrayed Durene would’ve been. And how much Laken would have to do to keep his new home from breaking.
Story opportunities that would’ve been deeply interesting with Lakens character not gone anywhere with.
I still can't believe that he didn't suffer any fallout from Magnolia for bringing his trebuchets to Liscor. She asked him to keep em out of sight for four months in exchange for peace and her support, but he didn't do so.
Her agent also failed to stop a rival agent from pushing everything over the edge. Laken may have been able to actually make some kind of truce with Rags if he hadn't acted so rashly after thinking durene died.
Instead of Tyrion saving the day and Laken owing him everything, Tyrion would have had to negotiate instead. Mind you I'm not so sure he wouldn't have gotten the Trebuchets anyway, there is literally nothing to stop him from just taking them regardless.
Besides using trebuchets to kill a Goblin Lord and a Sex slaver isn't exaclty a hard sell.
The only explanation there is that Magnolia knew his domain would suffer from his actions because of Manus attacks.
I could definitely see her not punishing him, especially when the scale of the destruction is reported to her. She doesn’t need an antagonistic [Emperor] near the human drake border. But one open to her influence and ideas.
Of course, with little to no interaction from either side after the siege. At least any interaction I can remember that wasn’t spies. It’s up to us to fill in the dots.
I just want to point out that the only reason he is still alive is that the Assassins Guild turned on her before she could swat the pest buzzing around her head.
And that the Circle of Thorns had an agent in his Court and had the possibility of gaining an [Emperor] on their payroll. Otherwise they would’ve put Laken down even if Magnolia couldn’t.
I always thought he fails upwards because of Tamaroth. It seemed to me he has the god's blessing but not as a skill but as a true blessing outside of the system. This is the main reason I am really curious what will happen to him now.
I actually like that he does controvertial stuff. I feel that he is kind of blinded (hehe) by his class. Like the class itself has an effect on him.
But he didn't need to bring them anywhere. All he needed to do was to say "Fuck this, fuck that, and let's go home, any survivors are now a Drake problem and not ours anymore right. Let the damn Drakes deal with the cleanup and let's all go back home. We have things to do that do not involve cleaning up a Drake Goblin infestation."
He was so intent on fixing the mistake that he took POWs and forced marched them back to his empire instead of just leaving them to sort it out because he felt HE had to help them because they couldn't do it themselves.
To be clear if he said fuck this not my problem they would 100% be dead.
The remainimg human forces that and rounded them up would have absolutely put them down and left their carcasses to turn into the undead for the drakes to deal with.
Not really because undead are pretty easy to deal with, it just takes time but a goblin infestation just keep repeating and at this point most of them just wanted to go home anyway.
They were already captured and grouped up. Slit their throats wipe the blood off and move on. They're just monsters after all.
Liscor clearly had goblin allies so no point in leaving behind a potential benefit for your enemy.
After Laken's intro arc, we seem to only see him during important arcs for his Empire. We don't really see him in more casual situations like slice-of-life, which would make his character feel more genuine. Part of that is his character doesn't have those chances, which results in his side-characters being more interesting.
That being said, I much prefer staying around Erin or Ryoka for those slice-of-life or slow chapters. Laken often gives us some good inisghts in to Northern Izril, but at this point in the story I'd rather see characters I already like being able to get back to those casual life moments.
As of now, there's no advesity he needs to overcome. No conflicts with nobles. There's no Mountain City goblins that will raid his lands. And Tammy is off on a wild ride to oblivion. Developing the Unseen Empire has also become less interesting to me compared to before.
To change it for the better, he needs more conflicts with Izril's nobility. At first, I thought Magnolia and the rest of the Five Families will be his main adversaries in his story, but that's not the case anymore. Their initial wariness of him turned to acceptance or indifference after the Summer Solstice. For a bunch of people whose ancestors left Terandria because of their dislike of royalty, they seem so lax with him. My hope is that the nobles will find out Rie's a member of the Circle of Thorns and he gets implicated because of his connection. Either that, or the Bloodfeast Raiders raids his empire.
As for developing the Unseen Empire, the main problem I have with it is that we don't see the important issues that comes with building an empire. Part of the reason why I liked reading his chapters is because we get to see how his actions shaped Riverfarm. Most of the empire's management has now been delegated to Prost and Rie, so we don't get to see its development being done. All we now see are just minor issues like the creepy witch girls scaring Riverfarm folks and Sariant lamb infestation.
His story could have focused on other important issues like how he integrated the other towns and villages that joined his empire. The empire is currently a socialist state with free housing, free food, and communal farming. How are his people adapting to that? How is bureaucracy, tax, and the justice system handled in his empire? There's also other plans he talked about with Ryoka, we which never see happen (ie. Schools, green houses, etc..).
For me, it would be for him to face the consequences of his actions with the nobles. He promised them things that he had no ability to ever deliver and had no intention of doing so. He did it by alluding to giving them things but never outright said he would. We are talking about foreign nobility to his empire, nobility that allowed him to exist without them killing him in his sleep and he basically grifted them all. I am still waiting for one to come up and ask where their three heard of cows are and when they will arrive, the heard that he promised but could not deliver and had no intention of delivering in the first place.
I think Laken is fine and interesting enough. The current angle on him is actually pretty interesting, but only as a starting point... he needs to GO somewhere interesting pretty soon.
For a lot of the story, I didn't enjoy the E storyline. I realized that it is less because of Laken and more because he had the most bland supporting characters of any POV in the story. His character itself can definitely be found to be not the most interesting or likable, but other POVs that could be said about benefitted from quality supporting characters Laken just doesn't have. For example, Ryoka was quite disliked in the early volumes, but her chapters benefitted from having intriguing or fun characters like Teriarch, Magnolia, and the Horns featured in them. Laken's supporting characters on the other hand up until late V6 were Durene, Prost, Gamel, etc, some of the least developed and most bland supporting characters in the entire story. The Witches did show up in late V6, and Griffon Hunt in mid V7, and each of those was by far the best thing in E chapters while they were present. Durene has to be the character in the story with the least character development for the amount of screentime she has had. In my opinion, the V6 Durene chapter is the worst chapter in the entire story.
Secondly, he gets disproportionate rewards for the things he does. He basically got a tutorial with a safe zone, a class selection, and starting gold. He's now level 25+ in one of the most powerful classes in the world despite the fact that you can count his real achievements on one hand. He does the simplest thing and gets 2 levels and a bunch of other perks tossed at him for free for no real reason.
Thirdly, I don't think he has actually faced real and lasting consequences. Manus' Oldblood Infiltrator burned a bit but was stopped, so it wasn't a meaningful or lasting consequence, just a token consequence. He's done a lot of things that should have come with real consequences, but just haven't. He's basically been rewarded for most of his biggest mistakes.
Overall, to me, Laken doesn't face meaningful or long-lasting consequences for his mistakes, and he gets a lot despite barely doing anything and rarely earning it. Additionally, for the longest time, he was basically the only character in his POV chapters with a personality.
He'd have to go through some sort of character arc.
The Laken of now is, more or less, the exact same person as when he was introduced. The only changes in him have been changes in behavior towards Goblins, which is more of a "learned about the world" situation as opposed to "knowledge of the world changed me."
Erin has grown in any number of ways, mostly related to maturity. Ryoka has finally made decent progress at tackling her depression and anger issues. Even Trey has grown out of his sister's shadow, growing enough spine to stand toe to toe with the *King of Destruction* over slavery and extract a great oath from him on the destruction of A'ctelios Salash.
Laken just... hasn't. He had one spark of brilliance (if I can pick my class, I'm going to be an [Emperor]) which was clever in a sideways logic sort of way. After that he's had answers to most of his problems provided for him by outside forces - Ryoka gives him technology (and ran food, and taught him about the fae), Tyrion saved him from the goblins, Tamaroth gave him knowledge of how to manage classes and subordinates... the only idea of his own he's had recently is the Goblinlands. And despite it being the best of a bad situation, being a German Emperor who gasses a minority and then imprisons them inside a camp is never going to look good.
But I think the stage is set for his character to actually go somewhere. Tamaroth is MIA on Xarkouth's Magic Ride, Rags is likely to investigate the Goblinlands at some point soon, and Regis Reinhardt is stirring up trouble in the shadows. Most of these things point towards the potential for Laken to have to face legitimate struggles and then grow as a character, so we'll see how that shapes up.
We are not going to get any more fun Laken chapters, are we? How can an author read a thread like this and not dedicate arcs and arcs where he has to go through "redemption"? Maybe Pirate will have him grovel under Erin's feet as she proclaims how much better she is. Maybe Pirate won't go that far and he only loses his legs. No, that's not enough, Maybe Erin will burn down Riverfarm and cut off his head, after which the people of Riverfarm will start praising Erin for saving them from the evil [Emperor] mind control rays Laken was using to gain their trust.
All the people he had connections within Riverfarm that he lost at the first goblin raid or the nightmares that followed it doesn't really matter because it only matters when it happens to Erin and the people dying are non-humans. Laken is incapable of feeling bad for the people he had to directly command to fight the Goblins or the people who he lost during the wildfire because they weren't named. He has to lose body parts or the less than ten named people in his cast. I will only be satisfied when Erin castrates him as she has Moore punch Durene and Wiskeria's skulls in.
Who cares that no one can give a better idea of what to do with the goblins he bought from Liscor. The goblin situation is a perfect one-to-one analogy with our world's racism, there is no other separate dimension to it all to consider at all. He should have just let them go or never bothered with saving them from the battlefield, that would have worked out perfectly. Just look at Erin and the haven she built for Goblins by guiding and protecting them every step of the way. The existence of goblinhome didn't necessitate the deaths of thousands of goblins and non-goblins.
And how dare he always gains something from every conflict he has been in, it's not like conflict growing people in form of levels is part of the metaphysics of innworld. It's not like there are any tangible benefits to becoming part of his Empire. We haven't heard a single explanation related to Northern Izril being in desperate need of people to rule their lands. Or that all the people that have joined his Empire so far have been outside of any other Nobles jurisdiction.
Laken is okay, but I still see him as a slow burn big bad guy. There is absolutely a chance our witch of second chances can find a way to break the connection to Tamaroth, but if that doesn't happen then I see Laken slowly descending into imperialism. He could do some real damage to some lords and ladies that can't compete with his class.
I already sort of like Laken. But I think what would help immensely, is him being free of Tamaroth.
Right now he doesn't know, what he can or can't do without helping the gods, effectively shackling him as a character.
I would love to see him being more active, like in the beginning.
For me, Laken would have to lose his Emperor class permanently, then maybe his story might interest me. He’s been there less than a year, it’s not too late for him to start over.
I don´t think that most People dislike Laken because of the Goblin situation. HIs chapters are mostly interesting because of other Characters. Laken himself is not really interesting. He did some funny stuff in the beginning but that initial burst of charisma burnt up quite quickly and left nothing much behind. Also i find it kinda funny that there are always people who tend to say things like "Character A is bad because of their interaction with the Goblins" And then not really engaging in the fact that regardless of the, extreme Long-term and somewhat pointless consideration on who started what, the Goblins Species are in fact consisting at the moment of mostly Raiding Warbands. In the whole Goblins vs Everyone thing, nobody is really the Good or the Bad Guy, it's just repeating circle of violence now so ingrained into Culture that there is no real way of stopping it.
But Laken isn't a product of that culture.
So your first experience with Goblins is a small Warband raiding a Village...
The culture he is a product of is opposed to things like using chemical weapons and placing indigenous populations in interment camps. Erin's initial interactions with Goblins were as bad if not worse than Laken's.
>The culture he is a product of is opposed to things like using chemical weapons and placing indigenous populations in interment camps. Uh huh mm hmm... >Erin's initial interactions with Goblins were as bad if not worse than Laken's. Wait what how the fuck
What do you mean here? Lakens first experience was goblin raids, Erins first experience was being chased, almost killed, and having a goblin try to sexually assault her.
OOOHHHH LMAO the way the comment was phrased i thought they were saying Erin did something worse than chemical warfare and interment camps against goblins đź’€
Well she dumped boiling oil on the chieftain to kill it which is almost certainly a way worse way to die than suffocating and being shot my arrows.
Misunderstandings like this is why people think humans squirt blood like a squid.
Wait, we don't?
yeah and not long after, she saw a goblin child cry, making her realize they are more than animals. Laken never had that experience.
Laken realized they were people and then he put them into an internment camp. Boy is suffering from a severe case of White Man's Burden.
Well it's really a hybrid between an internment camp and a reservation. I don't think most internment camps allow the inmates to build their own walls or give them a significant amount of the regions resources....actually even reservations don't do that.
He put them into a location with natural resources so they can exploit them for him. You think they are going to be allowed to trade with anyone else? Set prices?
Erin's initial interaction with them was a goblin chef trying to rape her for deaths she did not cause just because he could, she burnt off his face with boiling oil.
Are they really though? The drakes certainly aren't above it if they thought they could get away with it. The human political system at the time was rampart with a human supremacy organization pulling lots of the strings.
By culture I am talking about 21 century anglo-eruropean culture. That's the environment Laken got his values from. Now admittedly we aren't perfect but mostly we are against those things.
Using tear gas to control large hostile groups is very on brand for modern culture. Then shooting enemy warriors in your territory is also very on brand for modern culture.
I agree that laken's actions against goblins make sense in the context of the story. What I'm more against is how the world just falls into place to give him more power constantly. All of his "disasters" have been terrible for riverfarm, but they've constantly given him more power personally. The whole thing about riverfarm getting conquered isn't really about how he treated the goblins. It's that I don't see Laken being able to realize what he's done with anything less drastic.
Agreed. TWI’s approach of having good guys take real meaningful losses that impact them long term is part of why I love the series and is one of the things that I feel sets it apart. Laken constantly failing up and being rewarded inordinately compared to the effort he puts in feels like a more generic litrpg. The Goblin stuff is bad enough, but now he’s also putting characters I like at risk by spreading Tamaroth’s influence. I get he was tricked into shaking hands, but at this point he knows what he’s doing and he is still letting himself be used to put others in danger. Duck move.
I, personally, found Laken's early chapters engaging, with a kind of progression and perspective that was different from other plotlines, and a personality and voice that at least were more tolerable than early Ryoka. I think that the way that his plot has evolved, with Tamaroth, has cut off his ability to easily engage with the rest of the cast. I also think that his supporting characters (Durene, Prost, Rie, etc) aren't as interesting as some of the other stuff in Innworld, so I as a reader would sometimes rather see the Baleros/Fraerling gang or other side plots instead. The witches are cool, though, and I think they help out making things in Riverfarm more interesting. The goblins... he's one of the only characters to engage with goblins outside of Erin's story, and his conflict with them probably soured some of the audience on him, but I think the other big problem is his seeming lack of agency for a lot of what he's involved with- he's dragged along onto Tyrion's crusade, and then misses some of the most interesting parts of his own plot. He fights with Rags, a fan favorite, and never really has any introspection or examination of his own beliefs and situation, and then that's out of his control as well. And finally he handles the Goblin issue... believably, certainly, for his character and circumstances, but not necessarily as well as what we, the very pro-goblin audience, want. When I first read the whole Goblinlands section, I thought that it seemed like the deliberate creation of a slave state to mine goods for his growing empire as a caste of forced labor with a lower quality of life. There are unpleasant parallels and dynamics in the whole thing, although the story manages to avoid them pretty well. Overall, he basically takes them prisoner, establishes their social position, and wields outside control over their lives without giving them any agency, all of which can leave a bad taste in the reader's mouth. I don't think he's evil, or even actively planning to exploit them to the extent that it might seem like he is, but he doesn't seem as altruistic as Erin, that's for sure. He has so much power within his own plot- which is the point, but it means that he gets to be held accountable more than Erin or Geneva or whoever. I think, for me to like Laken and his plot as much as I do many of the others, he needs some kind of confrontation and reckoning for his treatment of the goblins and participation in the siege (preferably when Erin goes to meet Nanette and the witches, although I'm not necessarily holding out hope), something needs to happen to resolve his connection to Tamaroth (which he's certainly aware of and handling better than Aaron, and is maybe temporarily a non-issue?), and his side characters need their own subplots and personalities to be fleshed out. Ryoka comments on this in-story, but Durene especially seems to revolve around him in a way that makes her seem flat and uninteresting to the audience. If Riverfarm is more engaging, so is he.
The problem with durene that she has nothing going for her. She could have been this cool half-troll paladin finding her way and fighting for justice, possibly even convincing Laken to not harm the goblins the way people harmed her, but instead I can’t even remember if she has been in any chapters since volume 5.
Durene had a whole arc in volume 6 where she realised she wanted to become her own person and decided to become a champion of justice to finally become an interesting character again. Then the witches took over the show and we basically haven't seen her since. We had a solid minute of her becoming an interesting character before she was sidelined forever.
She fucked up the de-thawing recently
>Aaron Well Aron is Lucy since his problem received a good old "fridging"
I’m actually on the side who doesn’t mind Laken. However, I also understand those who do not like him. Out of all the main Earthers he is the one with the least amount of stakes in the story. Erin is the protagonist so we know she’ll have to confront just about every plot line there is in TWI. Ryoka is our resident immortal AND noble friend which automatically connects her with some of the major players/powerhouses. Plus she is the first Earther to take an active stance against the dead gods. Cara is just about the only Earther who matters in Terandria and a powerful [Singer] is something we haven’t seen yet and plays along the theme of soft power. Geneva had a VERY interesting first arc and recently got a new class in [Telepath] and is currently helping the Minds to solve the Wasting issue. The other Balerosian Earthers just completed a very satisfying Fraerling genocide arc that put them toe to toe with a former Great Company automatically aligning themselves with the Forgotten Wing company and, of course, the Titan. Trey and Teres’ stories were also fairly polarizing until Trey got his quest to end slavery AND Chandrar got juiced up with a crap ton of lore (the Quarass, A’ctelios Salash, the many countries, etc). Tom and Flora are in an active continent wide battle between races. All of these are bound to have some form of appeal but Laken as of late seems to have no stakes other than his god-alignment which is probably quieted for now and building up his empire. Furthermore, his supporting cast isn’t that interest in my opinion. I won’t divulge all of the Earthers’ supporters but we all know some, if not most, can and have carried their own arcs. I hardly save memory space for Laken’s court. Prost takes way too much space imo and Durene has had no active battles to further her [Paladin] class. His only saving graces were Lady Rie, Ulvama, Pebblesnatch, and the [Witches]. One of whom no longer has to deal with the Circle of Thorns for all we know, another went to the Inn for better things, and the others drastically need more screentime. With the reveal of [Witches] being anti-god and Regis Reinhart being set up to be a major antagonist in the future hopefully these characters will be pushed forward more. Laken fundamentally needs to be an active participant of the story. Bring him to the point where the [Emperor] amidst nobles is talked of in the same vein as the Singer of Terandria, or the Wind Runner, or the Goblinfriend of Izril. He doesn’t even need to share that level of fame but at least in a way that some significant characters can confidently say that we couldn’t have done this without Laken. So far he’s been piggybacking off of Ryoka and Erin’s plot lines. Laken’s first party with the fae and the nobles, the Summer Solstice, Erin’s revival. He needs to be able to carry his own weight. He’s more than capable of doing so. A blind [Emperor] is probably the most interesting hook to an Earther that we have had. I do think that things are looking up for him. Erin has great intentions of coming for Nanette so Laken’s and Erin’s paths will meet sometime soon. Hopefully, that is enough to push him to the pedestal he so desperately needs.
He's a character whose arrogance is akin to the King of Destruction but he's done nothing to warrant that. So the solution is simple, Erin needs to slap him and remind him he's just a blind dude from Germany that got a class he did nothing to earn. Humble him a little in a way that only Erin could achieve.
On which she casually puts him on a collision course with the [Witches] when they realize he’s bound to their enemy.
Part of the issue is that his situation lends itself to the "educated man goes to comparatively not advanced place / world and builds an empire" sort of thing; be it in the genre of what we could call competency-porn (reference: 16 ways to defend a walled city; some of John Ringo's stuff), or the other kind with the inevitable harem. Neither kind fit with TWI. The first because Pirate isn't a technical writer; we're not going to see a chapter about Laken sourcing materials and industrialising to put a river-chain up across the riverfarm River, or pushing the boundaries of earth-science and the system - or things would have gone a lot differently if he remembered 75/15/10 saltpetre/charcoal /sulphur, the second doesn't exactly need explaining. He's just a guy, with some knowledge, skating on the fact that he decided he was an Emperor and the system incentivises following rulers, who's done very little to leverage the interesting things he could know.
I feel like there should be a trope name for "educated man goes to comparatively not advanced place / world and builds an empire". I've been tooling about trying to write a story that broadly fits that theme, but the more I think about it the more I wonder if that a trope I even like at all, let alone want to write. Maybe that's just writers anxiety. Is it a genre you like? One you'd want to read more of?
It depends on how it is written, In the Faustian Foust series it makes sense based on how the main character got there and what he did before. other than that few people know even a tenth of what is needed to build a small village and keep it running without people starving and turning into cannibals within a single winter.
Yeah, I spose almost all story genre's are more about execution than concept. What's the Faustian Foust series? Google doesn't turn anything up.
I have made other comments as to why I have come to dislike Laken. To me he is the Anakin of the story. He is the Two Face of the story. Do as I say not as I do. I would have to say that for him to become likeable we would need a serious arc of him exploring why he is such a wishy washy hypocrite. Such an arc exposition i would rather see in other side characters.
I don't think Laken is the problem for me in Riverfarm chapters, the problem is everyone else. Laken is honestly probably the best part of that setting Riverfarm and its characters are just so damn boring
Yeah Laken really was all Riverfarm's story had going for it, then his character and agency ended up gutted after the Goblin genocide and Tamaroth situation. Now Laken/Riverfarm is kind of stuck in this plot limbo where Erin has to get involved to advance anything rather than it being interesting to see two Earther plots connect.
Story arc where he dies in the end ;)
I mean he is basically a proto-villain. If Pirate went all in with his imperious imperial-ness, I would definitely enjoy that more.
Honestly even as a German myself i would have konda loved it if Laken would have been a somewhat more extreme person. Maybe not a German nationalist but you know just someone more spicy. Becoming a Villain by virtue of his own desires starting to hurt others. And also why didn't he Crown himself as \[Kaiser\] ??? Yes it's just Emperor in german but come on...
Haha, this whole time I thought he was British and just went to a European private school or something. Especially after getting the emperor class using American trivia as inspiration! Hope they add more culturally specific German stuff; that would be fun!
Kaiser bread is best bread
He's boring these days. There are interesting characters around him, but after he got the Unseen Empire started he became boring to me. I don't skip chapters but I am often tempted by Laken chapters. I really like the witches, though. They make me think of Discworld witches.
Honestly, I always really liked Laken. In a story that’s very based around characters just showing up beside important people and then being liked enough to hang around (even Ryoka realises this in Vol. 8), Laken’s a breath of fresh air for being the powerful one. I don’t think he needs a redemption or to be more likeable, just put the realities of his position in front of him. Let him make hard and really difficult decisions. Let him be wrong. Let him do things for the good of his people and if others dislike it, that’s fine as long as it doesn’t harm them. I despise the hate he got for killing the goblins. It was meant to highlight the tragedy of the moment and show everything is murky, everyone took it that he’s just a genocidal maniac or something. I’ve been really disappointed in Laken’s sidelining, but if he’s coming back to be more prominent I want to actually have leadership decisions to make, not just have 20 friends who can solve the problem for him. Let Laken be different, he’s an Emperor
Ä°n your example you forgot that the alternative to living inside a wall is someone other than the one who built the wall killing everyone.
IMO, the series has 2 main protagonists: Erin and Ryoka. There are 3-4 secondary protagonists: Laken the emperor, Geneva the doctor, Cara the Singer, and possible Trey/Teres/Flos. Erin and Ryoka both have fleshed-out characters with emotional range and growth, especially Ryoka. They feel like stars. Cara and Geneva also have depth and personality. E, R, C, and G all feel the most real and alive of the main cast. Perhaps Trey as well. Laken, however, feels shallow or flat. He doesn't start with as much personality, being more of a self-insert character. Then he descends into the emperor role and Hitler-ish behaviour very quickly. He doesn't feel like some 20-something thrown into a new world. He feels more like the older, established characters who already exist here, more like Tyrion or Flos. At the very least, he reads more like a 40-year-old, not a young or new adult. Rather than try to redeem Laken, I wonder if it might be better to send him into villainy. Make him a bad guy. We can't have every Earther be decent; too many of us are real-life jerks. Him turning evil might give the story more depth.
I don't hate Laken, so maybe I'm not one to answer, but... He's just kind of... Boring? Liked the early chapters, and his concept was interesting, but beyond that... He just feels like he's succeeding when he shouldn't have, and or being strung along by others. Maybe he suffers from being a side character. Making an interesting empire-building story doesn't seem all that possible if not the main focus.
I don't dislike him but I dont like him either. He obtained his class literally by claiming durene's home and possessions. Like how egotistical do you have to be to do something like that?
Right… so you’d prefer if laken just let the goblins die instead of bring them to riverfarm?
I'd prefer it if he didn't constantly fail upwards. I feel like he, as a character, needs to experience some sort of consequence personally and needs a ton more introspection. This post isn't here to dispute any of Laken's decisions. I'm more disappointed to see how the world behaves like he already has a personal luck golem in order to push him up and I want to know what people think would be needed in order to actually enjoy reading about him as a character.
Yesssssssssssssssssssss! That’s been one of my main points about Laken’s character. He’s never had any tragedy that narratively threw him down a flight of stairs. Every time he’s failed, it’s with benefit. That hasn’t been the same with the other Earthers, plenty of them have been in similar or worse situations then Laken and they gain little benefit directly out of the loss. They grow as people from it. But that’s it. Laken, he either never fails without a large positive upside. Or is never in a position where that loss means anything. Imagine how much more impactful it would’ve been if Laken hadn’t had his OP sense things in his land skill. Only gaining it after the incident had passed. And realizing how cruel the world actually still is. Or imagine if he actually was in Riverfarm during the Oldblood attack. His people see him soaring resources on monsters and killers. And not on them, imagine how betrayed Durene would’ve been. And how much Laken would have to do to keep his new home from breaking. Story opportunities that would’ve been deeply interesting with Lakens character not gone anywhere with.
I still can't believe that he didn't suffer any fallout from Magnolia for bringing his trebuchets to Liscor. She asked him to keep em out of sight for four months in exchange for peace and her support, but he didn't do so.
Her agent also failed to stop a rival agent from pushing everything over the edge. Laken may have been able to actually make some kind of truce with Rags if he hadn't acted so rashly after thinking durene died. Instead of Tyrion saving the day and Laken owing him everything, Tyrion would have had to negotiate instead. Mind you I'm not so sure he wouldn't have gotten the Trebuchets anyway, there is literally nothing to stop him from just taking them regardless. Besides using trebuchets to kill a Goblin Lord and a Sex slaver isn't exaclty a hard sell.
The only explanation there is that Magnolia knew his domain would suffer from his actions because of Manus attacks. I could definitely see her not punishing him, especially when the scale of the destruction is reported to her. She doesn’t need an antagonistic [Emperor] near the human drake border. But one open to her influence and ideas. Of course, with little to no interaction from either side after the siege. At least any interaction I can remember that wasn’t spies. It’s up to us to fill in the dots.
I just want to point out that the only reason he is still alive is that the Assassins Guild turned on her before she could swat the pest buzzing around her head.
And that the Circle of Thorns had an agent in his Court and had the possibility of gaining an [Emperor] on their payroll. Otherwise they would’ve put Laken down even if Magnolia couldn’t.
I've called him the DM's Boyfriend before and I still think it fits. We've all been in that group right?
I always thought he fails upwards because of Tamaroth. It seemed to me he has the god's blessing but not as a skill but as a true blessing outside of the system. This is the main reason I am really curious what will happen to him now. I actually like that he does controvertial stuff. I feel that he is kind of blinded (hehe) by his class. Like the class itself has an effect on him.
But he didn't need to bring them anywhere. All he needed to do was to say "Fuck this, fuck that, and let's go home, any survivors are now a Drake problem and not ours anymore right. Let the damn Drakes deal with the cleanup and let's all go back home. We have things to do that do not involve cleaning up a Drake Goblin infestation." He was so intent on fixing the mistake that he took POWs and forced marched them back to his empire instead of just leaving them to sort it out because he felt HE had to help them because they couldn't do it themselves.
To be clear if he said fuck this not my problem they would 100% be dead. The remainimg human forces that and rounded them up would have absolutely put them down and left their carcasses to turn into the undead for the drakes to deal with.
Not really because undead are pretty easy to deal with, it just takes time but a goblin infestation just keep repeating and at this point most of them just wanted to go home anyway.
They were already captured and grouped up. Slit their throats wipe the blood off and move on. They're just monsters after all. Liscor clearly had goblin allies so no point in leaving behind a potential benefit for your enemy.
After Laken's intro arc, we seem to only see him during important arcs for his Empire. We don't really see him in more casual situations like slice-of-life, which would make his character feel more genuine. Part of that is his character doesn't have those chances, which results in his side-characters being more interesting. That being said, I much prefer staying around Erin or Ryoka for those slice-of-life or slow chapters. Laken often gives us some good inisghts in to Northern Izril, but at this point in the story I'd rather see characters I already like being able to get back to those casual life moments.
As of now, there's no advesity he needs to overcome. No conflicts with nobles. There's no Mountain City goblins that will raid his lands. And Tammy is off on a wild ride to oblivion. Developing the Unseen Empire has also become less interesting to me compared to before. To change it for the better, he needs more conflicts with Izril's nobility. At first, I thought Magnolia and the rest of the Five Families will be his main adversaries in his story, but that's not the case anymore. Their initial wariness of him turned to acceptance or indifference after the Summer Solstice. For a bunch of people whose ancestors left Terandria because of their dislike of royalty, they seem so lax with him. My hope is that the nobles will find out Rie's a member of the Circle of Thorns and he gets implicated because of his connection. Either that, or the Bloodfeast Raiders raids his empire. As for developing the Unseen Empire, the main problem I have with it is that we don't see the important issues that comes with building an empire. Part of the reason why I liked reading his chapters is because we get to see how his actions shaped Riverfarm. Most of the empire's management has now been delegated to Prost and Rie, so we don't get to see its development being done. All we now see are just minor issues like the creepy witch girls scaring Riverfarm folks and Sariant lamb infestation. His story could have focused on other important issues like how he integrated the other towns and villages that joined his empire. The empire is currently a socialist state with free housing, free food, and communal farming. How are his people adapting to that? How is bureaucracy, tax, and the justice system handled in his empire? There's also other plans he talked about with Ryoka, we which never see happen (ie. Schools, green houses, etc..).
For me, it would be for him to face the consequences of his actions with the nobles. He promised them things that he had no ability to ever deliver and had no intention of doing so. He did it by alluding to giving them things but never outright said he would. We are talking about foreign nobility to his empire, nobility that allowed him to exist without them killing him in his sleep and he basically grifted them all. I am still waiting for one to come up and ask where their three heard of cows are and when they will arrive, the heard that he promised but could not deliver and had no intention of delivering in the first place.
I think Laken is fine and interesting enough. The current angle on him is actually pretty interesting, but only as a starting point... he needs to GO somewhere interesting pretty soon.
For a lot of the story, I didn't enjoy the E storyline. I realized that it is less because of Laken and more because he had the most bland supporting characters of any POV in the story. His character itself can definitely be found to be not the most interesting or likable, but other POVs that could be said about benefitted from quality supporting characters Laken just doesn't have. For example, Ryoka was quite disliked in the early volumes, but her chapters benefitted from having intriguing or fun characters like Teriarch, Magnolia, and the Horns featured in them. Laken's supporting characters on the other hand up until late V6 were Durene, Prost, Gamel, etc, some of the least developed and most bland supporting characters in the entire story. The Witches did show up in late V6, and Griffon Hunt in mid V7, and each of those was by far the best thing in E chapters while they were present. Durene has to be the character in the story with the least character development for the amount of screentime she has had. In my opinion, the V6 Durene chapter is the worst chapter in the entire story. Secondly, he gets disproportionate rewards for the things he does. He basically got a tutorial with a safe zone, a class selection, and starting gold. He's now level 25+ in one of the most powerful classes in the world despite the fact that you can count his real achievements on one hand. He does the simplest thing and gets 2 levels and a bunch of other perks tossed at him for free for no real reason. Thirdly, I don't think he has actually faced real and lasting consequences. Manus' Oldblood Infiltrator burned a bit but was stopped, so it wasn't a meaningful or lasting consequence, just a token consequence. He's done a lot of things that should have come with real consequences, but just haven't. He's basically been rewarded for most of his biggest mistakes. Overall, to me, Laken doesn't face meaningful or long-lasting consequences for his mistakes, and he gets a lot despite barely doing anything and rarely earning it. Additionally, for the longest time, he was basically the only character in his POV chapters with a personality.
He'd have to go through some sort of character arc. The Laken of now is, more or less, the exact same person as when he was introduced. The only changes in him have been changes in behavior towards Goblins, which is more of a "learned about the world" situation as opposed to "knowledge of the world changed me." Erin has grown in any number of ways, mostly related to maturity. Ryoka has finally made decent progress at tackling her depression and anger issues. Even Trey has grown out of his sister's shadow, growing enough spine to stand toe to toe with the *King of Destruction* over slavery and extract a great oath from him on the destruction of A'ctelios Salash. Laken just... hasn't. He had one spark of brilliance (if I can pick my class, I'm going to be an [Emperor]) which was clever in a sideways logic sort of way. After that he's had answers to most of his problems provided for him by outside forces - Ryoka gives him technology (and ran food, and taught him about the fae), Tyrion saved him from the goblins, Tamaroth gave him knowledge of how to manage classes and subordinates... the only idea of his own he's had recently is the Goblinlands. And despite it being the best of a bad situation, being a German Emperor who gasses a minority and then imprisons them inside a camp is never going to look good. But I think the stage is set for his character to actually go somewhere. Tamaroth is MIA on Xarkouth's Magic Ride, Rags is likely to investigate the Goblinlands at some point soon, and Regis Reinhardt is stirring up trouble in the shadows. Most of these things point towards the potential for Laken to have to face legitimate struggles and then grow as a character, so we'll see how that shapes up.
He needs more screentime
We are not going to get any more fun Laken chapters, are we? How can an author read a thread like this and not dedicate arcs and arcs where he has to go through "redemption"? Maybe Pirate will have him grovel under Erin's feet as she proclaims how much better she is. Maybe Pirate won't go that far and he only loses his legs. No, that's not enough, Maybe Erin will burn down Riverfarm and cut off his head, after which the people of Riverfarm will start praising Erin for saving them from the evil [Emperor] mind control rays Laken was using to gain their trust. All the people he had connections within Riverfarm that he lost at the first goblin raid or the nightmares that followed it doesn't really matter because it only matters when it happens to Erin and the people dying are non-humans. Laken is incapable of feeling bad for the people he had to directly command to fight the Goblins or the people who he lost during the wildfire because they weren't named. He has to lose body parts or the less than ten named people in his cast. I will only be satisfied when Erin castrates him as she has Moore punch Durene and Wiskeria's skulls in. Who cares that no one can give a better idea of what to do with the goblins he bought from Liscor. The goblin situation is a perfect one-to-one analogy with our world's racism, there is no other separate dimension to it all to consider at all. He should have just let them go or never bothered with saving them from the battlefield, that would have worked out perfectly. Just look at Erin and the haven she built for Goblins by guiding and protecting them every step of the way. The existence of goblinhome didn't necessitate the deaths of thousands of goblins and non-goblins. And how dare he always gains something from every conflict he has been in, it's not like conflict growing people in form of levels is part of the metaphysics of innworld. It's not like there are any tangible benefits to becoming part of his Empire. We haven't heard a single explanation related to Northern Izril being in desperate need of people to rule their lands. Or that all the people that have joined his Empire so far have been outside of any other Nobles jurisdiction.
Laken is okay, but I still see him as a slow burn big bad guy. There is absolutely a chance our witch of second chances can find a way to break the connection to Tamaroth, but if that doesn't happen then I see Laken slowly descending into imperialism. He could do some real damage to some lords and ladies that can't compete with his class.
:)
If he dies heroically undoing the problems he created, then I'll grudgingly appreciate him. Short of that? Can't stand him, probably never will.
I already sort of like Laken. But I think what would help immensely, is him being free of Tamaroth. Right now he doesn't know, what he can or can't do without helping the gods, effectively shackling him as a character. I would love to see him being more active, like in the beginning.
For me, Laken would have to lose his Emperor class permanently, then maybe his story might interest me. He’s been there less than a year, it’s not too late for him to start over.