Slowly comparing Chinese and English texts

[cashew]

OK, so a thing that was interesting to me as I'm looking through wiki and trying to find more official info on JY...

Here's an excerpt of the English description from story part II of Imbibitor Lunae:

On the other hand, the Cloud Knight Lieutenant who used to chat and laugh with the dragon contained his languid indolence, holding his devastator glaive in hand as he stood with his men to repel the borisin pawns attacking from the battlefield's wings...

Now here's the same paragraph in Chinese:

平日与他谈笑的那位云骑骁卫则收起一身闲散，手持阵刀，与所部军士们抵抗着侧翼袭来的步离战卒;

My interest is in the title. Obviously, the Cloud Knight Lieutenant is refering to JY, but the Chinese title is "骁卫". According to Baidu wiki, the title comes from:

汉 有骁卫将军， 东汉 改为骁骑。 晋 领营兵，兼统宿卫。 南朝 梁 置左右骁骑。 隋 改置左右骁卫府，为禁卫军之一。 唐 宋 因之，而去“府”字，设上将军、大将军、将军等官。 金 元 皆无。参阅《通典·职官十》、《续通典·职官十》。

Translating points of interest, in Han, "骁卫" is followed by the "general" title. The name got changed for a for a few dynasties until Sui, where the name returns to 骁卫 with 府 added, and now refers to the imperial body guards rather than straight up military. In Tang & Song dynasty, the 府 got removed, and added multiple "general" ranks (brigadier general, major general, lieutenant general, etc.).

So my point here is that it's possible the "lieutenant" English translation is actually meant to be "lieutenant general" (aka 3-star general), which makes JY very high ranked. At this point, he would be the equivalent of second-in-command to the general. Because the memory description is of JY attending battle, it's unlikely his rank is that of a bodyguard at this time.

Of course, Luofu's ranks might not follow RL military ranks, but given the literary/military reference, I'm inclined to to intrepret the memory from Imbibitor Lunae's story as refering to JY becoming second-in-command.

It also means that despite the joking around about promoting Fu Xuan to general, her actual position as Head of Divination Comission means she's actually pretty far away from getting promoted to general. On the other hand, Yan Qing is referred to both as 侍卫 and 骁卫, he's also the youngest 骁卫... So, if the titles are consistent, then the actual person that's second-in-command to JY is Yan Qing, but he's also mostly serving as a bodyguard... So is he actually here based on merit or is this just JY favoring his disciple and giving him a position he totally is not ready for?

Meanwhile, Jing Liu's only known title was Sword Champion, one she shares with current Yan Qing, so like... uh... Was JY higher ranked than his master?! Because it sounds like she was officially part of the military (if the animated short is anything to go by), but we don't know of her actual position, or if she was some kind of special unit that's not part of the regular chain of command.

Anyway, so many questions on how the system works!

Comments

[tanithryudo]

To clarify, Fu Xuan is looking to be promoted to the position of Arbiter General of the Luofu. Not to be the head of the Cloud Knights.

As for localization, I think they use "lieutenant" instead of "Lt General" because not many people know what the latter is and the translators probably thought it would cause more confusion than just using "Lieutenant" as to mean "deputy/right hand man".

[cashew]

My personal feeling is "lieutenant" makes it sound like JY was much lower ranked during the memory description, which probably feeds the fanon that JY met Dan Feng at a much younger age than canon intended. I honestly don't think Lt General is that much harder to understand for an English audience.

Or maybe intended 骁卫 as a far lower position so they used "lieutenant" in the English translation. Unless we get a Q&A session with the actual developers, it's all speculation.