ok i need to cry about desha (my beloved) for just a moment
We’ve been told Desha absolutely hates his face, early on after meeting him. Particularly, Despa said that when they were younger, Desha had a tendency to look into a mirror and cry in the dark
Desha is a wonderful king who cares greatly about his people and his people love him for it. When walking through the underground, Kage notes that there are all kinds of people there - various monsters and humans, living together in harmony.
When Ouken escapes, Desha doesn’t blame the guard for it, not even for a second. He is clearly a lenient and fair king, as long as people are not malicious. That’s what makes him the #2 king, not just his strength. He’s running a happy, prosperous kingdom.
So happy and prosperous, that people put up a massive statue in his honour… which he destroyed because he hates his face so much, according to Despa.
But I don’t think his hatred and agony over his appearance stem as much from just the fact that he sees himself as ugly. I think Desha is way too reasonable for that alone to mess with him that much.
I think that when Desha looks at the mirror, this is the person he sees:
Desha looks almost identical to his father, the cruel Saturn who, in search of immortality, murdered the people he was supposed to protect. His reign was so horrifying that his three sons stood up against him to kill him.
In the war against his father, Desha had to make horrifying and immoral choices that he saw as necessary for the greater good; that being taking the life of an innocent child to keep his army of mercenaries happy and driven. We later see a flashback showing exactly how much that action gutted him.
Desha looks into the mirror, and he sees his father.
He sees the person who did unforgivable things, and who he had to do unforgivable things for in order to defeat.
He sees the face of evil, and he destroyed the sculpture his people lovingly built for him, because he doesn’t want that face of evil overlooking his kingdom.
I think the reason Desha would lurk in the shadows and cry when he was younger, was because he was afraid of becoming like Saturn - becoming immortal and losing his humanity to the madness of immortality. He was the most likely candidate for it after all, right?
