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rynlingBalthazar’s three main character traits are that he is (1) lazy, (2) unpleasant, and (3) kind of sad. His secondary character traits are that he is (1) bad at everything he does, (2) likes porn, and (3) also weed. Which is relatable, honestly.
Meanwhile, Ceres works very hard and is very good at what she does. The problem I have with writing Ceres is that, while she is supposed to be smart, I am not.
So where to start with her?
I guess the key to her character is that she straight-up killed people with her own hands when she was younger, starting with her mother. I’m not sure when “younger” is, though. Let’s say around twenty years old? In any case, this was traumatizing to her, and she’d prefer not to have to do it again.
Ceres’s ultimate goal is to dismantle the monarchy, which she sees as dangerous and irreparably corrupt, and she wants to put people in power whom she can trust to engineer a transition between regimes. She understands that this transition will not be entirely peaceful, but she still wants to minimize the damage. She therefore started cultivating a relationship with Balthazar (in both this timeline and in an “earlier” timeline) to set him up as a scapegoat. She’d hoped he would be properly villainous and establish himself as a threat, but this hasn’t been working out for her.
Attempting to provoke Balthazar into making bad decisions has therefore become little more than a hobby for Ceres, who has redirected her energy into setting up a conspiracy. I still need to plot this out, but what I think Ceres intends to do is solidify multiple small factions into two opposing camps, create a conflict, and then side with the camp that she has decided will lose the conflict. Abdicating (or pulling a stunt like faking her own death) would create a power vacuum that would only result in another absolute monarch who would probably be just as bad as her mother, so she has to be slow, careful, and meticulous. In order for her plan to work, she needs to maintain power until she chooses to relinquish it, so most of her smaller character arcs involve her asserting dominance by underhanded means. She is not a “caged princess,” because she totally gets off on this.
Also she’s vain and bossy and loves being the center of attention, so there’s that too.
Meanwhile, Ceres works very hard and is very good at what she does. The problem I have with writing Ceres is that, while she is supposed to be smart, I am not.
So where to start with her?
I guess the key to her character is that she straight-up killed people with her own hands when she was younger, starting with her mother. I’m not sure when “younger” is, though. Let’s say around twenty years old? In any case, this was traumatizing to her, and she’d prefer not to have to do it again.
Ceres’s ultimate goal is to dismantle the monarchy, which she sees as dangerous and irreparably corrupt, and she wants to put people in power whom she can trust to engineer a transition between regimes. She understands that this transition will not be entirely peaceful, but she still wants to minimize the damage. She therefore started cultivating a relationship with Balthazar (in both this timeline and in an “earlier” timeline) to set him up as a scapegoat. She’d hoped he would be properly villainous and establish himself as a threat, but this hasn’t been working out for her.
Attempting to provoke Balthazar into making bad decisions has therefore become little more than a hobby for Ceres, who has redirected her energy into setting up a conspiracy. I still need to plot this out, but what I think Ceres intends to do is solidify multiple small factions into two opposing camps, create a conflict, and then side with the camp that she has decided will lose the conflict. Abdicating (or pulling a stunt like faking her own death) would create a power vacuum that would only result in another absolute monarch who would probably be just as bad as her mother, so she has to be slow, careful, and meticulous. In order for her plan to work, she needs to maintain power until she chooses to relinquish it, so most of her smaller character arcs involve her asserting dominance by underhanded means. She is not a “caged princess,” because she totally gets off on this.
Also she’s vain and bossy and loves being the center of attention, so there’s that too.
