I suppose they were designed to serve as palate cleansers. It’s an interesting idea and Nakyum now being the noble lord who calls Seungho a “lowborn” and “rascal” might be an attempt to show that if the social standing was reversed that Nakyum would look also down on people who are not of his social class. Like an attempt to soften the blow from the main story where Seungho looks down his nose at Nakyum and treats him like a toy because his own high status gives him the freedom to do so. To make it clear that outlook and behavior can be influenced by how you are raised. But honestly it’s not too well thought out as they still behave the same way here. Nothing in their characters changed. If Nakyum was a noble, he wouldn’t just let a low born drag him about. If Seungho was a low born, he would be more careful while dealing with a noble and not taunt him out in the open, drag him off and more or less sexually assault him. He might do so with men of his own standing but him doing so with someone of high class, who he doesn’t know, where he can’t predict his reaction to such audacity, is just dumb. And that makes me now wonder more than ever how much the author actually understands the psychology of people of different social classes in a historic setting. I know it’s just a fun side story of “what if” but I don’t see a purpose in it if nothing changed but their social class.
I suppose they were designed to serve as palate cleansers. It’s an interesting idea and Nakyum now being the noble lord who calls Seungho a “lowborn” and “rascal” might be an attempt to show that if the social standing was reversed that Nakyum would look also down on people who are not of his social class. Like an attempt to soften the blow from the main story where Seungho looks down his nose at Nakyum and treats him like a toy because his own high status gives him the freedom to do so. To make it clear that outlook and behavior can be influenced by how you are raised. But honestly it’s not too well thought out as they still behave the same way here. Nothing in their characters changed. If Nakyum was a noble, he wouldn’t just let a low born drag him about. If Seungho was a low born, he would be more careful while dealing with a noble and not taunt him out in the open, drag him off and more or less sexually assault him. He might do so with men of his own standing but him doing so with someone of high class, who he doesn’t know, where he can’t predict his reaction to such audacity, is just dumb. And that makes me now wonder more than ever how much the author actually understands the psychology of people of different social classes in a historic setting. I know it’s just a fun side story of “what if” but I don’t see a purpose in it if nothing changed but their social class.