The second episode of Kingdom’s 4th season takes a sharp left turn at Albuquerque, shifting the focus to an entirely different set of characters than the premiere.  Last week was all about the main names Xin, Diao, Qian Lei, even Meng Tian.  I get the sense that was a sort of touch-base with them as they’re going to be pretty far removed from the main plot for a while.  Of course I could be totally wrong – it wouldn’t be the first time.  I completely missed in my assumptions about what Cheng Jiao’s role was going to be, for example.

Though Zheng put his half-brother on the throne while he went to save the country as a hedge against Lu Buwei, I’d still thought he was going to be a tool in Lu’s hands – intentionally or not.  That may still prove to be the case, but for the moment at least Cheng Jiao very much sees Lu Buwei as the enemy.  I’m not certain of his loyalty (no one is) – his eventual goal will almost surely be to usurp power for himself.  But at the moment the two brothers have a common enemy.  And Cheng Jiao was genuinely impressed with Zheng’s courage in facing the invasion on the front lines.

Judging by the ED Cheng Jiao is going to play a truly significant role this season, to the point where he may even be the main character.  So is his wife, Liu Yi (Orikasa Fumiko), who we meet for the first time – she’s all over the ED.  She and Zheng seem to have a playfully tense relationship, and she’s clearly quite invested in her husband’s climb to the top.  She’s about to visit her home city of Tunliu in the Northeast of Qin for the first time in a decade – a city that is about to become central to events in Kingdom.

So the capital we have three factions now – Zheng’s, Lu Buwei’s, and Cheng Jiao’s.  Lu Buwei is ever-restive, trying to manoeuver events in his own direction.  He’s in league with Guo Kai, who engineered Li Mu’s internal exile in Zhao and now wields authority in its capital.  They’ve concocted a scheme to have an army of 20,000 from Zhao strike out at Tunliu (which was once Zhao territory).  It seems superficially that the plan is to have Lu Buwei try and goad Zheng into defending Tunliu himself in the absence of any available great generals, perhaps hoping he’ll die in battle or perhaps for even more sinister reasons.  But that seems too obvious and like Zheng, I suspect something else is going on here.

In theory Cheng Jiao volunteering to defend Tunliu in the King’s place is a setback for Lu Buwei, but the latter doesn’t seem nearly disappointed enough.  For Cheng Jiao the appeal her is obvious – his wife is in danger, for starters, and as her husband he’s well-known in the area.  And having seen what Zheng’s heroism in battle did for his reputation – and power base – it’s only natural Cheng Jiao would want to bolster his own bona fides with some heroics of his own.  But why does Lu look so pleased with himself?  Of course if he manages to rid himself of either brother this was it’s a win for him, but it feels like there’s something more there…