The Kingdoms of Ruin: A Dance of Revenge and Redemption
Machine-translated from Traditional Chinese
Just finished watching The Kingdoms of Ruin and want to share my thoughts.
This anime aired in October 2023 and tells the story of the demon prince Adonis and the human kingdom's second princess, Ai. The opening scene shows the human kingdom celebrating the 'extermination of demons', only for a black mushroom cloud to swallow the capital the next second. Adonis watches his kin being used as 'power batteries' and pulls out the broken horn his sister left behind, vowing to destroy the kingdom.
What draws me in most is the tension between the male and female leads. Adonis wants to take all of humanity down with him, but Ai's simple question 'Humans cry too?' makes this revenge machine stop for the first time. They're separated by a sea of blood and hatred, yet share a skinny horse during their escape—the reins are held by hate on both ends, but in the middle, it's heartbeats.
The most unique thing about this show is that there's no absolute good or evil. The king uses his own daughter as a test subject, but after she leaves, he can't sleep all night; the knight captain slays demons without blinking, yet secretly leaves bread for demon children. Hatred is like a virus, and even the audience gets infected.
The ED 'VILLAIN' is performed by the popular band WHO, with lyrics like 'I'm the villain, but I still want to embrace the light'. I looped the song until dawn and suddenly understood: what's destroyed isn't the nation, it's prejudice; what's rebuilt isn't the capital, it's heartbeats.
Has anyone else seen this? What do you think? Feel free to discuss~
This anime aired in October 2023 and tells the story of the demon prince Adonis and the human kingdom's second princess, Ai. The opening scene shows the human kingdom celebrating the 'extermination of demons', only for a black mushroom cloud to swallow the capital the next second. Adonis watches his kin being used as 'power batteries' and pulls out the broken horn his sister left behind, vowing to destroy the kingdom.
What draws me in most is the tension between the male and female leads. Adonis wants to take all of humanity down with him, but Ai's simple question 'Humans cry too?' makes this revenge machine stop for the first time. They're separated by a sea of blood and hatred, yet share a skinny horse during their escape—the reins are held by hate on both ends, but in the middle, it's heartbeats.
The most unique thing about this show is that there's no absolute good or evil. The king uses his own daughter as a test subject, but after she leaves, he can't sleep all night; the knight captain slays demons without blinking, yet secretly leaves bread for demon children. Hatred is like a virus, and even the audience gets infected.
The ED 'VILLAIN' is performed by the popular band WHO, with lyrics like 'I'm the villain, but I still want to embrace the light'. I looped the song until dawn and suddenly understood: what's destroyed isn't the nation, it's prejudice; what's rebuilt isn't the capital, it's heartbeats.
Has anyone else seen this? What do you think? Feel free to discuss~
