Kingdoms of Death - the most significant book in the series
I wanted to share my thoughts on KoD in the comment section but I decided to make a post. When I talk about this series, I urge new readers to push through to KoD. A tall order but so worth it. Everyone has their favourite book. Yet I find all the effort becomes worthwhile after finishing KoD. It's what makes the series special and challenges many modern heroes for what makes them compelling. It's brutal but underscores the brilliance of CR's writing. Ruocchio puts on display Hadrian's most powerful quality as a character: His human endurance. It really challenges and changes Hadrian's relationship to destiny & fate. Finishing this book gives you every justification to why the story begins and ends the way it does.
Kingdoms of Death is what separates Hadrian Marlowe against many protagonists utlizing the chosen one trope. Outside of Berserk, I've never seen a hero fall so hard in their character arc. KoD is also filled with cosmic and existential horror, a huge tonal shift from the rest of the series. We get aspects of cosmic horror in the series but never at this scale or intensity.
While Demon in White is Hadrian's high moment in his precieved lifetime, KoD is his lowest. With DiW, we really dive into the galactic human order of the Sollan Empire. While we deal with tensions, hubris and clashing ideologies of humanity - we often feel safe with the stacking camaraderie & enemies of those surrounding Hadrian. Hadrian is powerful in the third book. He quite literally is indestructible at the end of DiW.
KoD is the opposite. It is absolutely hostile, alien and anti-human. It is filled with strange creatures, societies and cultures. Everything surrounding Hadrian is like a sharp rusty knife in the dark. For a period of time, every smile upon Hadrian is like looking at the smiling teeth of a great white shark, smelling blood in the water. Ravenous and hungry. I really find from the first chapter, there is this charged dial of pressure and you feel it slowly building acceleration. It's more dense & pronounced in tension than in any of the other books. Both KoD & AoM operate on the feeling of watching a ticking time bomb. When we get to the Black Feast, the pressure is so dizzying that we really feel delirious seeing the Red Company again - just like Hadrian does. KoD is the most intimate and vulnerable we will ever be with Hadrian, which is something to say in conjunction to how the entire series operates.
What I love most about KoD is the ending. We are given death upon death upon death throughout this book. The title is so silly and ancient, like OG Golden Age sci-fi but there is nothing more fitting. We are understanding death cults and death-centric cultures championing anti-existence in this book. We are also given the anti-humanism aspects from the Lothrians to the cosmic horror of giant alien creatures commiting mass suicides. The miniscule nature and insignificance of our place in the universe is almost unfathomable. Torture and death for humans are presented like cannon fodder. And yet, the most profound and healing death in the book is with Gibson. After such a harrowing tale, the most humane way for Hadrian to heal is still with one more death. It is done in a place of safety, reverence and with human traditions that respect communities, history and stories of life. The ending helps illustrate what separates the destructive nature of the Cielcin (controlled by the vengeful, anti-life Watchers) from the growth and cultivating nature of humans. I appreciate seeing the text making that whole moment come full circle from Hadrian's preaching. KoD is this unequivocal anchor for what has to be done.
"This must be."
It's what underlines Hadrian's monologues on being a defender for humanity. Becoming a shepherd and tool for the Absolute (it helps supports CR's views relating to Abrahamic religion in the text - I couldn't appericate and seperate myself from this till way after finishing the series). It is why I really think DiW, KoD & AoM are just extraordinary books for the chosen one narrative.
"Why must your burden be light?"
Chosen One types cannot just be powerful or given a simple destiny. We need to believe why they can't stray from the path or why they are compelled to finish what they started. KoD answers that question egregiously. What Hadrian has turmoil with in Howling Dark, he completely commits to after KoD. Ashes of Man, Disquiet Gods and Shadows Upon Time carry weight when we are reintroduced to Cielcins or Watchers. What had been fathomable, barbaric brutes from the human perspective, we now obtain this nuanced construction of who they are from this point forward. Seeing the cosmic horror of the influence god like beings can have on creature on a galactic scale. Something like Nahutes become an ugly, horrific and charged weapon with meaning. They are seekers aiming to kill its prey as fast as possible, engineered not just as a tool but from a dark belief system. Hadrian knows that yes, Cielcin on mass are brutal and awful to other species. But we are later are horrified by the influence a powerful being can have on creatures, converting their entire civilization in service to utter annihilation. Tolkien references in the book hit harder now upon re-read. KoD after finishing the book becomes a tradegy of gargantuan proportions rather than just a torture porn. "This must be" is not just to vanquish an enemy or entire species. To Hadrian's justifications & bizzare ego, "Fire at Will" becomes a strange act of mercy.