Blood for The Undying Throne is the second book in Sung-Il Kim’s epic fantasy Bleeding Empire trilogy, once again translated by Anton Hur. It follows up Blood of Old Kings, a book that took a while to find an English translation, but then was successful enough to warrant continuation. This second book spends most of its time world building – filling in backstory and deepening and shifting alliances before what is likely to be a more epic confrontation in the final book of this trilogy.
As with the first book in the series, Kim follows three characters, although only two of these are in the story’s present time. Prince Emere lives in Imperial Capital. When the book opens he is told in a dream by Loran that he is destined to be a King. Emere is quickly drawn into imperial intrigue and uncovers a plot to take over the Empire and make it even more despotic. Meanwhile, Arienne, one of the main characters from the first book, is on her own mission to Mersia. This was an area of the country that was completely decimated by a mysterious weapon a hundred years before and Arienne is trying to find out more about that event. Arienne’s journey is counterposed by the story of Yuma. Yuma lived in a time when the area was called Merseh and under the rule of a tyrant called the Grim King, whose soul Arienne contended with in the first book. Yuma’s story is about the coming of the Empire and the events that led up to the destruction of Mersia.
As noted, there is only really one thread of this story that keeps the main narrative moving. While the stories of Arienne and Yuma do eventually dovetail with that story, they are more about deepening reader’s understanding of the history of the country but also some of the aspects of its unique magic system. Arienne can see and interact with ghosts, for example, which is one way she gains information that she needs for her quest. These narratives are never dull, however, and give some much-needed context to some of the character motivations from the first book while also revealing where some of the conflict will come from in the next.
Blood For the Undying Throne is an unusual middle book for a trilogy. While most middle books will spend some time deepening the broadening the world that the characters inhabit, not many will spend so long on backstory and context. In fact, we have seen authors recently, putting out novellas which contain some of this type of information that they didn’t have space for in their bulky main narratives (Samantha Shannon’s Among the Burning Flowers and Adrian Tchiakovsky’s Lives of Bitter Rain are two recent examples). That said, Kim does a good job of integrating the information from these flashbacks into the main story and it sets up Arienne to be an even more important character in the finale.
While the Bleeding Empire series sometimes feels like epic fantasy that comes from a very Western tradition, Kim continues to bring a new slant on common tropes. With a fairly twisted magic system, and some interesting politics, Kim is well positioned to deliver a fascinating conclusion to this trilogy.
Blood for the Undying Throne by Sung-Il Kim
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