I personally discovered The Dark Lord's Confession (henceforth TDLC) while browsing webtoons, looking for a comic that was simultaneously well illustrated, fantastical, and not painfully heteronormative(A high bar I know). I recall spotting TDLC while looking through comics tagged as LGBTQ+, but I can't find any such tag on the work. Regardless of this intent, I went into the story looking for queerness, and I undoubtedly found it.
This post will be split into two parts, the first of which is a spoiler free or spoiler lite version, covering only information and plot points contained within the work's summary and first few chapters, and a spoiler heavy section, and a clearly labeled section that contains spoilers up to the end of season 1 (chapter 65).
Spoiler Lite: Gender, Summoning the Dark Lord, and Magic AIDS?
The first sign I had that TDLC going to be good (or at least interesting) was a clear subversion of gender roles in the first chapter. The story opens telling of how magic was brought to the world by the dark lord, and how she was slain by a holy saint. Notably, both figures are depicted as explicitly feminine.
Through out the story, both combat prowess and magical ability (heavily linked within the conceit of the story) are treated as inherently genderless. This avoids a lot of pitfalls or overused tropes of girls being naturally weak or surprisingly powerful (or the reverse of men being naturally powerful or surprisingly weak). The story also features a female main character and mixed supporting cast, which allows the story to discuss gender more intentionally and interestingly. The story is also interesting when it comes to romance.
The inciting incident of the story is that Lapis, and aspiring holy knight, accidentally summons the dark lord. There is a lot going on around this event, but what is notable is that after her many failed attempts to produce any sort of magic, Lapis's first ever successful spell employs the "lovey-dovey summoning sigil" who's target must love the caster. Lapis and the Dark Lord Calla, are of course, both women.
These are both early and fairly explicit queer elements of TDLC, however much more interesting is the ways in which Lapis and her relationship with magic can be read as an allegory for transfeminism, although the character is not explicitly trans.
(Disclaimer, the author of this essay is nonbinary but not transfeminine, and while my analysis is heavily influenced by my own trans experience and what I have heard about the experiences of trans women, I am by no means a subject matter expert.)
As alluded to, within the universe of TDLC, there are two types of magic, holy magic and dark magic. Holy magic a limited resource that is gifted to holy knights or transferred to weapons, and Dark magic is a transmissible curse that eventually results in a horrific and destructive death. People with this curse are called magicians, and must hide their status or be hunted and killed.
Given this, it is easy to see Dark magic as a metaphor for the AIDS crisis, given its stigma and danger. However, I think this metaphor is not particularly relevant to the overarching queer subtext of TDLC beyond how it connects magicians to the queer community and stigmatization, given that AIDS was seen as a "gay disease" and disproportionately effected gay people during the crisis. I also find this a less compelling primary reading than other alternatives, because the author is Korean.
A much more interesting reading to me is how it functions as a metaphor for queerness in general, or in the specific context of Lapis: transfeminity.
Lapis has no knowledge of when she acquired the curse, so she might as well have been born with it. Additionally, this is a part of herself that she must hide from the people around her, and a piece of her that people see as inherently dangerous. A common false idea around trans women is that they are secretly men, waiting for a chance to take advantage of the people around them and hurt them under the guise of womanhood. People (even Lapis, at times) view magicians as unstable ticking time bombs.
Lapis herself also searches to remove this reality, this curse, because she believes it will be her downfall- wanting to completely remove an inherent part of herself, mirroring the internalized transphobia or misandry trans people experience. (Yes, the curse is actually dangerous, which may seem to subvert this idea of it as an authentic representation of queerness, but I will get into the spoiler section.)
A final note is that Lapis for the most part, cannot do magic, which at least on the short term dissuades the idea of her in particular being dangerous. This mirrors how trans women are often thought of as dangerous, but in reality do not have access to any of the male privilege or other supposed dangers placed upon them by transphobes.
Spoiler Central: I'm Not A Monster If You Started It (also, Steven Universe is so trans guys)
As I previously mentioned, one of the biggest knots in this reading is the actual danger that magicans can pose to the world around them. The reality is there is no difference between holy magic and dark magic aside from dark magic being tainted by the dark lord's anger at her betrayal by one of her disciples.
It is also worth noting the Dark Lord Deitasterra's queer nature, queer in the more general sense that she was incredibly strange and new compared to the world in which she was, a literal alien who brought a new concept, magic, to the world. Magic is only so dangerous because it was rejected, and then people are demonized because of the danger caused by their rejection. This mirrors the real world trend where queer people (and other minorities) resist the status quo, sometimes violently, and are then treated as dangerous, violent, or threatening, despite the only reason they behaved violently being that they were resisting oppression.
The discussion of Deitasterra leads into the most interesting element in Lapis' transfeminine allegory, her relationship to Deitasterra.
After Lapis works will Calla to start to return the Dark Lord's power in order to remove the curse on magicians, it is revealed that Lapis is in fact, the original Dark Lord (Deitasterra), the one responsible for the curse. We learn that Calla loves Lapis, and is devoted to Lapis, because Lapis is the current form of her master, Deitasterra.
As the story progresses and Lapis tries to regain her own power, she is made to reckon with her nature as Deitasterra, part of this is her own self of identity being possibly overcome be Deitasterra's, but moreso she reckons with how Calla and Deitasterra's other remaining disciples want to help her not because of her identity as Lapis, a girl who wants to save the world, but Deitasterra, a woman who might want to destroy it. Disciples who want Deitasterra's return.
Much like Steven Universe, from hit kids show Steven Universe, Lapis is surrounded by people wishing for a person who she once was, but who her existence is incompatible with. In Steven's case, the whole transness of this situation is made more obvious by the fact his space rock mom was a woman and he is a boy, but Lapis still finds herself in a very similar relationship with her own space rock mom.
It is a common reaction among people to, when a person they know come out as trans, miss the old person that they used to know. Sometimes, trans people too, to some degree, mourn a loss of their former self. However, their current existence, happiness, and fulfillment is incompatible with the existence of their former self. This isn't a true experience for all trans people, but it is a very common one, and Lapis is caught in a place much like this. I do also think it is very meaningful that Lapis is brought back to herself by a person who knows her as Lapis first, but as Lapis the magician. In a way, a person who knows that she is trans, but still affirms Lapis as the person she presents as, regardless of any past.
(I also appreciate that this point is not a romantic moment, especially not a hetero-romantic moment, since it would fall into a lot of tropey moments to allow this to between Lapis and a male love interest, but she is saved by platonic love and understanding.)
Uh in conclusion Calla is basically Pearl from Steven Universe before she got over herself and accepted that Rose Quartz was never coming back. UH BYE
I wanted to add the eye highlights even though the og doesn't have any... I just thought my drawing looked bad without it compared to the actual one 😭 so it ended up looking like a cute scene instead (・へ・)
