I wrote one of these for the Flute Chapters but it got HECKING DELETED and I am too demotivated to write it so here have some rapid analysis of how I plotted these.
High Queen Sheryl
Basically the worst parts of me in one character, and then stripped away of any willpower. I mean, seriously. "Boohoo my advisors are plotting against me" Then PLOT BACK you idiot. I swear, if ANY of the other country leaders were in her place the whole rebellion would be over by now.
Blake: You're such a coward.
Calvin: I totes don't agree with Blake.
Shaw: ....*Challenges to a duel and calls them heretics to Andersen when they lose* Suck on that Elijah!
Blake: Why don't you go to war with the Trumpets? DO YOU HAVE NO PRIDE? *waves knife in face*
Calvin: *sits back* Oh no how terrible.
Simran: ..............................*Disarms Blake and has them both arrested for treason* You both are wasting my time.
Blake: YOU SUCK
Calvin: YOU SORT OF SUCK
Ellie: Oh how sad! Both Blake AND Calvin were revealed to be involved in massive conspiracy with the Trumpet Imperium and embezzling funds. Oh and tax evasion. How tragic. They must be replaced. Along with the rest of the High Conclave. How very sad.
But anyways. She exists to die. I sort of made her more of a..."hero" earlier on but she gets to be more in the morally gray area, since she sort of throws away the few checks on her power in favor of dissing Blake.
“Then I’m using my Conclave veto,” Blake hissed. “By the law of the Constitution of 171, you must submit to the will of your advisors.”
“Constitutions have been overturned before. And the document you speak of hasn’t been followed in decades. My uncle did not accept vetoes.” She glared at the two. “I am your ruler. You would do well to listen to me.”
“I refuse to accept this as well.” Calvin folded his arms. “I also use my veto.”
“You’re outnumbered by a two-thirds majority,” Blake added.
“No. I have tolerated this—” She waved a hand at the two of them. “—far too long. This is not the Clarinet Republic. Your vetoes and votes don’t count for anything if I decide otherwise. And today, I do. I am withdrawing the funds from the treasury and military. Immediately.”
Fire And Blood And Communism
Yes Noah's motivations originate from 8th grade me just beginning to learn what communism was. His ideal vision is a lot more simplified I'd imagine, but it is quite similar. What is his backstory? I have no idea. I imagine he doesn't have the greatest past though seeing as he enjoys murder and all that.
He's sort of an idiot rebel leader, mostly for comic relief but also so I can further plunge the Kingdom into chaos once he takes over. He does have skill for speeches however. He loves metaphors to an almost painful degree. Like yes we get it, you're going to burn the world down and also make it bleed a whole lot, quit talking like a wannabe Targaryen prince.
Fire imagery is great. Even though it's definitely overused, I like it lol.
Calvin (To Be Poisoned)
Calvin's character has deviated a lot from its original, quite flat characterization of "obvious lying bureaucrat who hates the queen". He's actually the closest I'd say to a hero here. He's nice to Blake and the two have a fun dynamic which is basically "chill nice guy who likes jokes + edgy schemer who makes mysterious statements out of nowhere" lol. He cares about his soldiers and army.
The only thing that makes him more of an anti-hero is the fact he is in favor of war, and also overthrows the Queen (but that is sort of here and there seeing as she was a crap ruler). His core motivations are mostly helping his soldiers and making friends.
It sucks that he has bad judgement in terms of his friends. He tries to befriend the High Queen and later Blake. Maybe he has a tragic backstory. But also maybe not. He at least probably didn't have a lot of friends growing up lol.
Blake (The Conniving Snake)
Despite being a jerk Blake's character is my favorite to write. His internal monologues (and external) are essentially just constant scheming mixed with egotism. He's like Stannis, but more conniving and ruthless. Or like Ellie but less nice and with less morals.
I think one of the more fun parts of his character is he has pretty crap intentions, but a decent overall impact on the Kingdom. While Sheryl has good intentions and wants to make things better, she overall makes the Kingdom worse. Blake's motivation is essentially "make everyone love me enough that whatever I say goes", but since he wants people to love him not fear him and he doesn't want to get couped, he overall does good for the Kingdom. That is until things start going downhill.
It's pretty ambiguous how much he actually likes Calvin as a friend. He does poison him which turns out to be a huge mistake, but later on he seems to be haunted by him and regrets it. But does he or is it just his unbalanced mindset? Also his backstory. We know his dad died of lung cancer and his mother died shortly after, but not how much it affected him. One could say his mindset is a result of his tumultuous upbringing, maybe he wants control over his fate since his parents died so quickly. Or maybe his father just spoiled him too much and he's power hungry now.
He also gets a pretty depressing death of slowly dying of lung cancer before either being shot to death by his former allies, or just dying. Which sucks for him, especially since he has literally nobody he trusts with the Kingdom after he dies (No heir or anything). His High Conclave is mostly made up of sycophants and shifty people. And Calvin is dead after Blake poisoned him (This is why you think before killing off your allies).
In some other universe Blake doesn't kill off Calvin and the Kingdom actually turns out okay (Blake still dies, but you know...better). But nope, you had to let your desires for power overpower common sense. Sucks for you bro.
Democratic Republic of Saxophone
Love me some Soviet-ripoffs.
I promise I don't hate the saxophones. If I could, I'd give them a happy ending, but since we go through like, four different rulers it would just feel repetitive and forced and contrived to suddenly have a "good" leader who fixes everything. The DRS is cool and pretty powerful militarily with all their weapons technology, despite their...troubles with inflation and the like. They are capable at least of winning wars, disregarding how they treat their own citizens.
Orchestra Invasion
There's probably a few spies from the Orchestra within the Kingdom. I'll have to decide that later on. Unfortunately for them, Noah murders most of them before they can do anything useful lol. The DRS joins the Band Coalition, but threatens repeatedly to pull out, probably with some sort of quote like, "You all want me dead! I know it! Everyone wants me dead! I can't trust ANYONE!!"