You Don’t Understand the Joys of Story of Minglan

As a prince, you can marry any woman you want, the emperor gives you whatever money you ask for, and you can make anything you need. If he won’t give it to you, you can just take it. Keep taking things, and before long you’ve taken the throne itself. Then you get to live like an emperor: up earlier than a dog, to bed later than one, endless arguments and countless meddlesome affairs to deal with. Sure, you still have more women than you can sleep with, but when your back aches from handling dozens at a time, you realize being a prince was better. Can I give up the throne? Watching my dog sleep with the empress’s dog, damn it. Tonight we’re eating dog meat. Somehow they’re living better than I am. Then I look at my drooling three-year-old son. Good heavens, I’ve got seventeen more years of this miserable life ahead of me.