I was going through the drafts on my blog today and there is no text in any of my drafts. I don’t understand what happened. Anyway, I see that a lot of people are getting interested in webtoons lately and hence, I decided to rewrite this piece (because the earlier text I wrote is now missing).

Plot: Divine Bells is a historical fantasy by Lee Hye which tells the story of prince of an unknown country in the land of six kingdoms. In this world, if a girl has divine powers, she is considered a priestess but if a guy has divine powers, he’s considered unlucky (ok, some messed up world this is). The story starts with the ceremony of divine bells choosing their owner.

There are eight divine bells which appeared 150 years ago (they were actually made by a powerful witch/ priestess). They choose their masters, mostly kings of the six kingdoms and the number of divine bells possessed by a kingdom determines their influence. Till now, kingdom of Dae Hyun has possessed three divine bells and kingdom of Myung Joo, none. Others have either one or two divine bells with them. The king of Dae Hyun has recently passed away, and hence, our protagonist, king Hong Ryung has come to take part in the ‘divine bells choosing their owner’ ceremony for the same reason. However, everyone is of the opinion that the three divine bells will choose king of Dae Hyun again. Hong Ryung has no interest in the ceremony either.

But, call it fate (or the author), one of the divine bells ends up choosing Hong Ryung. Hong Ryung, himself is a kid and faces opposition from his late dad’s concubine Chui Bi who wants her own son to be the king. The story develops from here to reveal what divine bells actually are, who Hong Ryung’s real enemies and friends are, why he is chosen so suddenly by one of the bells and ultimately, his role in saving/ destroying the world (No spoilers! Phew!).

Art: I love the art. It’s minimal yet portrays everything. There are some scenes which become vertical from horizontal to show the full extent of the cut, which is a bit annoying. But the author changes the drawing style, I would rather say the drawing style evolves throughout the webtoon. The colors become brighter later and it keeps getting better and better (when will I be able to do something like that?).

Characters: There are lots and lots of twists. I read it while it was still publishing, so it seemed slow to me, but since I was writing a review now, I read it once again. 140 chapters aren’t that much. Pace feels okay now. Character development is not bad. Villains become friends and friends become the enemies, there are many many and huuuuuge plot twists. Every character has got time of their own. However, I would have loved it if each divine bell had much more screen time of their own than they were given. You see Hong Ryung transform from a ‘no fucks given’ to the sympathetic guy who prepares to sacrifice himself for the world (well, he is protagonist after all).  Rest you can find out on your own.

On account of not spoiling the story too much, I have to withhold the names, so I cannot say much. But I would highly recommend this one to anyone who has slightest interest in fantasy and history or just general interest in webtoons. There are quite a few elements of comedy as well. Read it here: Divine Bells on EG Scans

Now for today’s song (I don’t even know why I am listening to this one on repeat, it’s neither Korean nor Japanese, it’s an ENGLISH SONG!!!!):

(The credits for images goes to their respective owners. None of the images are mine.)