 Today on the channel we're going to talk about Gold Kingdom and Water Kingdom, one of my recent reads that I thought I would share my thoughts on. So welcome back to the channel everybody. Today, like I mentioned at the intro, we're doing Gold Kingdom and Water Kingdom. I thought this was a pretty cool book and I wanted to do a solo video for it. One of my most recent reads. This is a Jose drama slash romance book written by Nao Iwamoto and of course it is published by the folks at Seven Seas Entertainment. The whole basic premise of this, if I can summarize it for you guys without spoiling anything, is you have these two kingdoms. One is a gold kingdom as the title suggests and the other is the water kingdom. The two nations have always been in disagreement with each other and have had multiple conflicts throughout its existence, throughout history, with no end in sight for this rivalry. So on one particular moment in time the two nations agree that something must happen for peace, quote unquote. So the two of them decide that the most beautiful girl from Kingdom A, which is the gold kingdom and the smartest man from Kingdom B or water kingdom will get married, binding the two nations together. However both of these kingdoms of course not liking each other have ulterior motives and decide to go back on this deal and instead they each send an animal in the place of the person. For the water kingdom they send a dog and the gold kingdom sends a cat. Supposedly the gold kingdom is going to send one of their low level princesses, Sarah. She is selected to marry the band chosen from the water kingdom but instead is sent a puppy in place of the groom. Meanwhile the candidate for the water kingdom, he is called Naranbayar, is saddled with a cat. As chance would have it these two characters actually do end up meeting Sarah and Naranbayar and they decide that in order to stop the war and conflict between the two countries they will pretend to be in love with each other. Will their planned work and what if real romantic feelings blossom between them? So that in a nutshell is the basic premise for this series. I knew about the political aspect to it but I was very interested to see how the story would develop and of course the relationship between the two main characters and for the most part I thought this was a pretty enjoyable, bite-sized romantic drama. I really enjoyed seeing Sarah and Naranbayar interact. I think they are a wonderful couple, very wholesome and the backdrop of this world is really interesting. One of the first things I noted is that the two kingdoms seem to be based on the Middle East with a very heavy emphasis on that architecture and culture from many centuries ago with the different kingdoms. I enjoy how everything looks and how everything feels. I like that the gold kingdom, although in the book they do only refer it to as Kingdom A and B, but later you do get those nicknames of the gold and water. So for the gold kingdom where Sarah hails from is very rich, grand and abundant in its resources. Unfortunately they don't have water and it is suggested that in 80 years time this kingdom will actually just self-implode due to their ongoing conflicts with the water kingdom and of course the lack of water. Meanwhile the water kingdom has suffered tremendous losses thanks to their conflicts with the gold kingdom and they aren't as strong but are still mad and resent the gold kingdom preventing them from coming to some sort of truce and the idea of settling for peace seems so far-fetched at the start of this book. Now this all begins to change when we meet the character of Sarah. She is one of the lower tier princesses and is placed in the border town between the two kingdoms. She is at first somewhat hesitant because she sees that her father just treats her as rubbish and doesn't really care for her feelings, but there is some interest with the idea, the prospect of being married to this mysterious man that will come from Kingdom B. However when the carriage arrives it turns out to be a dog and they realize this is Kingdom B's answer to this treaty this peace will not take place obviously so they guard this secret and don't inform the sultan of what is happening and they protect the dog which is great. Meanwhile in Kingdom B something similar is happening as you have the character of Narambayar and he is the librarian's son. He's kind of goofy and carefree at first but shows a great humbleness and intellect towards engineering and politics and all that. He's awkward and hasn't had the opportunity to shine and flourish under the strict guidelines of this kingdom. He's interested in building aqueducts and investigating ruins and all that stuff and he has been chosen by the kingdom to be the groom for Sarah obviously he doesn't know about it and something similar happens when the carriage arrives it turns out to be a cat so both kingdoms even though they're at odds with each other have similar tactics they are so intertwined that they don't know how similar they behave and act. Now on a particular day Kingdom A's dog called Lukman escapes and Sarah goes after him and she ventures into Kingdom B's territory or the water kingdom and she is marveled by the lush forests and all the creatures and all that. This is a very nature-heavy area whereas her hometown is dry and more akin to a desert oasis where they rely on wine instead of water. In this lush forest the dog falls into a hole and by chance she ends up meeting Narambayar not knowing that the two are destined to be husband and wife. Her palace is outraged once Narambayar saves the dog and the two share a meal she decides to take him back to Kingdom A and they come up with the idea of Narambayar pretending to be the husband because Sarah's sisters the other princesses are coming into town to inspect and see this quote-unquote famous husband that has been assigned to Sarah and the gold kingdom. Narambayar takes it to himself to learn about the culture and the ways of the gold kingdom so that he can make a good first impression and in typical rom-com hijinks the two start to hit it off right away. Sarah is a very thoughtful caring person same with Narambayar so they are really an ideal wonderful couple and you immediately want to root for these two even in the grand scheme of things of potential war breaking out between the two kingdoms again. So once the two of them start to know each other and Narambayar ventures into town with her he starts learning about their customs and culture and admiring all that stuff it's such a metropolitan-esque environment compared to the more barren water kingdom that is more nature inspired and he immediately notices the lack of water and proposes the idea of helping them build an aqueduct so that the two kingdoms can come together form this much needed peace alliance treaty if you will and saving the gold kingdom from impending disaster but in order to do this in comes the political struggle as he starts to get to know the different ministers the politicians and all the people lobbying for war instead of peace and that's sort of your basic premise I don't really want to ruin the fun if you're interested in picking this up obviously I could go more into what happens with the story because at the end of the day this is a one and done book and it only has seven lengthy chapters that really cover all the political struggles while also the drama between the couple now one of my favorite aspects of this story is the fact that while yes we are talking about prejudice between two nations we are also talking about the prejudice towards our lovely Sarah and how she is labeled as sort of inferior compared to the sultan his wife and the first princesses which compared to her are higher ranking and they somehow see it as a joke a disposable gag if you will of having this switch up of pets being delivered to the other kingdom and not really taking into consideration this person's feelings while the character of Naran Bayar shows the promise of a better tomorrow with this new generation that has good intentions and ideas that come from a place of nurturing wholesomeness and goodness and is not given the opportunity to shine and possibly save these two kingdoms from war I did enjoy their story and how they come closer there are some setbacks midway through the story that pulls them apart but we all know story beats like this where you know they are going to meet up towards the end into a possible satisfying conclusion and I think that is one of the strongest points for this manga gold kingdom and water kingdom where even though you might know where the story beats are headed you have a lot of fun going there because of the well written characters and the attention to detail when it comes to the relationship and the lore of these two kingdoms and having these outcasts if you will coming together and potentially saving people in the end I don't want to be negative and point out any bad stuff but if I had to talk about some weaknesses of this book the lore of these two kingdoms well it is talked about I wish this was just a little bit of a longer running story so we could learn just a bit more to fill in some gaps and fully flesh out that drama of having neighboring kingdoms be at war and the heavy impact that is weighing on their leader's minds as they do the things that they do in this book similarly the main couple I wish we could have gotten just a little extra time a couple chapters more of them interacting and getting to know each other but what we do have is good or just a little bit more would have been icing on the cake I do think the art on this manga is exquisite I love the quirky character designs and the sharp contrasts that you see with the different kingdoms the author does a fantastic job of emulating past artistic and architectural art styles from the Middle East and are beautifully represented here there are some really nice splash pages where you see the town square and the buildings and the towers and of course when you see the water kingdom this lush vegetation with the animals and a much more beautiful looking scenery there's great attention to detail also with the costumes which is one of the best parts of this series if you love costume design you're in for a treat the tapestry at display here is breathtaking at times I love the outfits for all the characters and seeing how their ornate designs just shine through every page this is a really gorgeous looking series and I highly recommended not just from a storytelling perspective but from a visual one as well I really enjoyed gold kingdom and water kingdom I wish it could have been just a little bit longer but also at the end of the day this is a story about romance and I think it is well executed it is very charming honest and wholesome also props to seven seas entertainment for releasing this in large trim size this is a beautiful release I highly recommend picking it up if you want something a little bit more laid back but also much more emotionally gratifying I think you'll be right at home with gold kingdom and water kingdom I highly recommend checking it out all righty that's gonna be it for now thank you so much for tuning in I really do appreciate it I hope you enjoyed this video and potentially are interested in picking up gold kingdom and water kingdom let me know in the comment section if you've read this what are your thoughts on the book and if you haven't what are some of your favorite epic romantic stories that I think I should check out for the channel very interested in finding out thank you everybody for tuning in I truly do appreciate it thank you so very much that's gonna be it for now god bless stay safe out there I will catch all of you on our next video