This is! A great question, but I’m worried about unintentionally spoiling parts of the story, so forgive me if it’s not quite what you’re looking for~ I think it would be interesting to talk about how the developed from the original draft of the story to the one they are now, and their character backgrounds and concepts (so much as it doesn’t spoil the story)!

In the original concepts, Baekhyun was more of an adventuring type—he stowed away on the ship leaving Vahyína before the port closed of his own volition—and then met Minseok in Matté and settled for the time being. In that initial concept, there was going to be a lot more anxiety that Baekhyun’s wanderlust would take him opposite Minseok’s (which was more southward facing, whereas Baekhyun wished to go to the lands beyond Rothí). In that original concept, Minseok—though enchanted by Jongdae—would have been most at odds with Jongdae (while Baekhyun actually retained a sense of familiarity with him). Elia and Vahyína are both cities of the same empire (the Zíhada Empire), and were sister cities before history rended them apart. In the current work, Minseok and Jongdae have the most friendly chemistry (though even that has its Moments, as we’ve already seen) and Jongdae and Baekhyun have the most outright aggressive.

Each character was meant to have a strong loyalty to their birthplace, and that loyalty has extended to the concepts you’d be familiar with, just the way it shows is a lot more different (and time will reveal those LOL)! Jongdae is meant to represent Elia: untouchable, cutthroat, artistic, charismatic. Baekhyun is meant to represent Vahyína: timeless, curious, stubborn, familial. Minseok is meant to represent Matté (as we currently know it): stubborn, egotistical, judgmental, incautious, but as each of the cities develop with the reader, so to do the characters! In the same way the journey will unveil forgotten histories, it’ll unveil unrecognized truths about each individual and ways for them to grow~