Rage Review: Resist and Bite (Chapter 11, Part C) · 11:09am Apr 9th, 2020
Chapter 11: Rough negotiations in the Changeling Kingdom (Part C)
Charlie was the first to regain his visions. He slowly looked up and saw a very unique creature. It was a green bug with orange deer horns, it had a purple coloured chest, wings of a fly or mosquito and a very weird mane which looks nothing like a horse or pony, and it appeared to be sitting on a throne in an open area which is a little bewildering because many Castle throne rooms have roofs, but this one doesn't.
(1) A point to Author for having an actual description of Thorax here, instead of just assuming everyone knows what he looks like. We may know, but Charlie doesn't, so from his POV there should be a description.
(2) Having said this, the description makes a very common mistake regarding Changeling apperarance. From a Human POV, Changelings do look something "like a horse or pony." They specifically look like insectoid horses or ponies. They are quadrupeds with natural body armor and wings coming from the armor, something between mammals and insects.
(3) Is it bad that I half-expected this to include "But to Luster Dawn, the King looked pretty hot in a weird kinda way, and she blushed at her own improper thoughts" ... ?
(4) I honestly don't remember if Thorax's throne room were open to the sky. It's quite true that Chrysalis' throne room, which Thorax was still using in Season 7-9, had been blasted open to the sky, and the fact that it hadn't been repaired (when he has numerous Workers to potentially labor on it) implied that he was okay with this. He might have outright liked this as a symbol of the Changelings no longer Hiding in fear, and opening their culture to the world.
Mind you, none of this necessarily applies to the time of and after "The Last Problem." It especially would not necessarily apply if Thorax built a new Hive as his capital.
Pharynx would definitely disapprove -- but, as always, remain loyal to his brother.
(5) Oh, and historically medieval kings and other potentates might very well choose to hold outdoor courts in good weather. Also, rather a lot of palace architectural traditions include atria (open areas enclosed on the sides by other parts of the palace) or semi-enclosed courtyards (note the term!).
So Charlie is making an unwarranted assumption here, though to be fair he's not claiming to be an expert on royal architecture and customs. He's just going by the most common Modern Western European customs.
Pharynx reports to Thorax that he has captured two intruders.
Charlie then turned around and saw another buggy looking creature almost interchangeable as the one sitting on the wooden throne. But this one was dark green coloured, and it's voice was very deep like Batman or talking into a gas mask.
An interesting couple of comparisons, given that Batman isn't real and few modern Westerners have ever talked into gas maks!
When the dark green bug noticed that the white alicorn wasn't looking at his brother, he immediately pushed his head forward which gave Charlie an indignant experssion. Then, Pharynx left the throne room.
"Wow, what an impertinent jerk." Charlie thought angry in his mind.
Charlie. Charlie, Charlie, Charlie.
Has it ever occurred to you that Thorax is a king, Pharynx is obviously (from his behavior) a trusted servant of the king, and you ARE (in point of fact) an INTRUDER? Pharynx captured Luster and yourself just before you were about to try to batter down the Hive's front gate, which is not exactly a friendly gesture?
Protagonist-Centered Morality, ladies and gentlemen.
(I know AC97 has a different take on this. All I can say is that Pharynx is canonically rather rough and even obnoxious, and it's trying times for this particular Hive).
Thorax politely introduces himself.
Charlie is confused:
Charlie was extremely baffled for the moment when he heard that this bug thing is a King. If he is a King, then why is Twilight Sparkle a Princess? Because a King does have more power than a Princess, and maybe a little surpassing than a President.
Charlie, you're on another world. There are examples enough in the history of our own world of self-styled "Kings" of very small countries, who were in fact subject to or minor allies of nobles with more modest or politician with more democratic titles. Right now, in our world, President Trump has more effective power than do the kings of Saudi Arabia or Jordan (the country, not me personally).
So really, you should just accept the titles the Equestrians and their allies choose to claim and acknowledge.
AC97 points out:
(you could've, y'know, asked Luster Dawn about that, like "who's the Queen or King of Equestria" or something, right? Found out why? (AC97)
Indeed, and Luster's here to be his guide, which makes the fact that Charlie seems totally-clueless regarding Changelings especially egregious. What, was Charlie too busy regaling the doe-eyed Sweet Young Mare regarding the wonders of far-off fabled Australia, the Land Down Under, and realm of Sydney of the Opera House and Really Awesome Gyms, to have any time to ask her even basic questions about the land he's entered or the people he's attempting to meet?
"Hello there King Thorax, my name is Charlie Lam." He introduced himself as he stood up "And this is my friend Luster Dawn." (Story)
No mention to him that Luster is an apprentice to Princess Twilight Sparkle. I mean, King Thorax probably knows this already, as he's her friend and ally, and would logically have eyes and ears at her court. Heck, Ocellus would probably keep him apprised of whatever Equestrian developments she learned.
That's not even espionage. That's "white intelligence," meaning intelligence gained from open sources. Only the most paranoid country objects to such information-gathering, and it is quite consistent with the generally very good relationship between Princess Twilight and King Thorax.
Charlie is favorably-impressed by Thorax's friendliness, and hopes to recruit him against the Invaders
Thorax tells him he knows of the invasion:
"I can tell, because many of my changeling subjects have been enslaved and captured by those deadly invaders." Thorax said with a depressed expression
How?
Again, Changelings are shapeshifters. It's in their collective name. Changelings are very good at hiding. It is improbable that the Red Chinese, unfamiliar with Equestria as they were, would even have looked for the Changelings, let alone found them.
Thorax continues:
"And there is no way that me, my brother and my guards can go there and save the ponies, yaks, griffons, my subjects, Ocellus and many more creatures from those invaders because, they could instantly kill us with those weird dark metal things of theirs."
From which we may conclude that Ocellus (!!!) has been captured -- Ocellus, who as a mere adolescent was an extremely gifted shapeshifter -- and that Thorax for some reason puts Ocellus in a different (and singular) category than "his subjects."
Well, Ocellus isn't perfect: we've seen her screw up on the Show, though in her defense she's the equivalent of a 14-16 year old on the Show. She's brave and idealistic, and might very well get captured in the course of trying to save others. She may also not be Thorax's "subject" -- she may, now, be an Equestrian citizen and hence Twilight's "subject," at this point in time.
I'm also not sure why Thorax doesn't know about "guns." Quite aside from there being a clear Equestrian technological analogue of them, so it's more likely he'd be calling them "hand-cannon" or something like that (did you know that the kind of "gun" you carry comes from "hand-gonne?").
More to the point, since the Invaders are a clear threat to the Changelings, it's weird that Thorax doesn't, right now, have Infiltrators watching them and sending back intelligence. Thorax should already know of the capabilities -- and limitations of pistols, SMG's and rifles -- and have some sort of designations for the weapons types.
As AC97 points out:
Changelings are shapeshifters. They make wonderful spies due to that, and they can also easily infiltrate the ranks of the enemy due to that fact, assassinate them, steal their equipment, etc. Subterfuge is what a Changeling is good at ... (AC97)
Precisely. The small Chinese force would be especially-vulnerable to such tactics, as each lost soldier, technician, officer, and important piece of equipment would constitute significant attrition.
Charlie and Luster then tell King Thorax they would like to make a "simple request" ...
But meanwhile ...
Outside of the Changeling Kingdom. The Chinese military captain Zhou Chang Min has made it to the front gates of the Changeling Kingdom. He then got off his motorcycle and looked at the red and blue indicator on the tracking device ...(Story)
Okay.
He's pulled up on his motorcycle. This means that his approach enjoyed zero stealth. The roar of his engine should have been audible to everyone in the outside, or in a room with any access to the outside, of the Hive.
Charlie, Luster and Thorax should be able to directly hear this in the throne room.
... "(Looks like I have arrived in the correct location.)" Zhou Chang Min said as he threw the tracking device on the ground.
Why did he toss down the tracker? This is a dramatic gesture, but an extraordinarily stupid one, as he's throwing away a very useful device, while abandoning it to the enemy.
What's his plan if Charlie and Luster escape?
He then rolled up his sleeves and cracked his knuckles .... "(Luster Dawn, Charlie Lam. Prepare to be enslaved.)" He finished with a wicked smile.
Ooh. Scary.
I agree with AC97 that this is ridiculous.
I agree even more so that this is ridiculous:
After that, he walked up to the front gates and kicked it open. And the force of his kick made the gates open and hitting the walls with a loud 'ting!' noise. Then, he entered the kingdom.
Are the gates unlocked? Or simply so flimsy that one good kick can break them?
I'll grant that Captain Zhou is big and strong and probably a suffciently well-trained martial artist that he can deliver a very powerful kick. But town gates are a strong point in a fortification.
[quoteKicking the gates open? What the hell were they made out of? Papier-mâché (AC97?
Given that the gates are Changeling gates, they might be literally made of something akin to papier-mâché -- but it would be silk reinforced papier-mâché, and might well be stronger than steel.
Captain Zhou should not be able to kick in the gates -- and should rationally be very suspicious of the situation if he could.
But no.
Zhou encounters half a dozen spear-wielding Changeings in armor.
The Changelings frontally-charge him; no attempt is made at an ambush by anyone.
Zhou simply draws his pistol and starts shooting the Changelings.
Back in the throne room, everyone hears the gunshots, a POV switch which confirms that nobody in there heard the motorcycle. Charlie readies for a fight, which involves standing between Luster Dawn and the door.
While waiting, Charlie, Luster Dawn and Thorax heard some grunting noises as well following up with some loud bang noises, blood splattering and bodies falling on the floor with a thud. Seconds later, a changeling guard was seen thrown at the entrance the throne room. He was bleeding from his head and chest. He tried to get up and flee but suddenly, another banging noise was heard and the changeling was killed.
Captain Zhou has apparently fought his way through the Hive and found his way to the throne room in a matter of minutes.
Do you remember how confusing was the layout of the Hive under Queen Chrysalis? Heck, even if this were merely a normal mundane Changeling structure, without the shifting-passage defense mechanism installed and activated, even granted Zhou's Omniscanner tracker (which, remember, he pointlessly threw away before he kicked in the gates), you would think he would have some trouble navigating the twisting and turning alien architecture.
But no. Apparently Captain Zhou is playing a videogame where there's an arrow at the end of each scene showing him where to get to the next one.
Then, a soldier with wearing a military suit, a drak [sic] protective vest and armed with a pistol walked past the dead changeling and into the throne room.
Guess who.
And Luster Dawn began to tremble.
What, was she vibrating so fast that her teeth were chattering like in a slapstick horror-comedy and the whole room shook? Seriously, just how squirrely IS this chick that she can upstage an armed invader breaking into the throne room and menacing everyone?
This also confirms that Captain Zhou apparently did all that with a pistol. How absurdly few Warriors does (or did) Thorax have? Even if he now has mostly Workers, shouldn't they have tried to create obstacles or get their King to safety? Was the whole freaking Hive defended by half a dozen to a dozen Changelings?
"Who are you invader? And how could you kill my subjects?" Thorax asked with an enraged expression. But the invader didn't reply to him, he kept his focus on the fugitive Luster Dawn and Charlie Lam.
Captain Zhou thus ignores a high-value Changeling target, and focuses on his assigned targets, which is not unreasonable.
Dialogue ensues, in which Zhou confirms that he is hunting those two by name, and knows exactly who Charlie is. Also, Zhou says:
"I don't even know why you would side up with these vile animals Charlie after what they have done to my country. I have read your file that the Lieutenant General gave me, and you are a very clever and astonishing M.I.T student who invents all of these very amazing gadgets and many more impressive and sagacious technologies."
This shows that the Red Chinese intelligence is astonishingly well-informed (though to be fair, given Charlie Lam's name and specialties, they could look him up on open Internet sources -- Charlie is far more likely to have a public Internet presence than, say, the Sooper Secret Chinese Teleporter, which Charlie was able to locate on YouTube.
Furthermore:
"I can't believe this, how would you think your parents will see you as?" Zhou Chang Min asked which made Charlie's eyes widen "You are a human, you are one of us. You are suppost to fight back all bullies and enemies just like how you are adroit with your martial art. But, you just sided with these cretinous creatures who has committed a heinous crime. Your parents would be so disappointed at a dumb son like you-"
This is both insulting, and possibly a veiled threat regarding his parents. As I pointed out in an earlier post, the Sooper Secret Chinese Teleporter would basically give them world dominion, or at least a very good shot at it: it would be a trivial use of its powers to murder two middle-aged Chinese immigrants in Australia, and get away with it. (That's assuming that they couldn't just dispatch an assassin; it's not as if Charlie's parents are likely to have bodyguards).
The following absurdly run-on paragraph, made of run-on sentences with multiple changes of subject even in each sentence, is inflicted on the Readers:
Zhou wasn't able to finish his sentence when Charlie charged up towards him and delivered an excruciating punch to his chest. And the force of his punch made him fall on the floor resulting with a constitution on his chest. Zhou tried to get up but Charlie pinned him down with magic, and Zhou got petrified. Charlie was about to beat the soldier with no mercy but he just realized that this exertion was wrong because violence doesn't solves a problem. He then immediately deactivated his horn and backed away from Zhou. Zhou then slowly stood up and began to stagger to the exit of the Changeling Kingdom not wanting to pick up a fight with the infiltrator since he is an adroit martial arts master, and a very wise university student who is capable of inventing such technologies almost similar to theirs and various of other countries.
(1) Charlie just sucker-punched a ridiculously-competent martial artist, who is also armed with a pistol and could have shot him. (Granted, it's harder to accurately shoot someone already at melee distance than fiction makes it look, but the whole advantage of a pistol is that it's handy enough to use even at point-blank range).
(2) A "constitution" on Zhou's chest would either be very idealistic (inflicting the notion of guaranteed civil liberties on an officer of a tyrannical regime) or ridiculously heavy (the large sail frigate USS Constitution displaces around 2200 tons). I suggest Story actually meant "contusion," which is a very severe bruise.
(3) Charlie just remembered he has telekinesis. At least someone remembered telekinesis. I'm looking at you, Princess Twilight Sparkle who even in Season One lifted an Ursa Minor while simultaneously milking cows, but who in Story can't even stop one man from beating her up. And at you, Luster Dawn, who can do nothing but helplessly cower behind Charlie.
(4) In a fight, violence is often the best and only good solution. You are in a fight.
(5) Maybe you don't want to beat Zhou "with no mercy," but can't you at least knock him out? Or hold him with your telekinesis?
(6) Why does Charlie's "wisdom" make him more dangerous in a fight? He doesn't seem to have invented any weapons or armor, and his Omniscanner is irrelevant here. Is it that Zhou considers him too valuable to just shoot?
Charlie then turned around with a disconsolated expression when he heard the soldier mentioning about his parents.
"How the heck does this soldier know about my parents?" Charlie thought depressed.
So Charlie goes into a funk and simply lets Zhou escape.
Oh, and to reply to your question, Charlie:
Possibly in Story there's some special reason why. But even in the Land O'Reality it's not that difficult to believe that the General or his aides, once they knew your name and school, did some simple Internet research and bothered to ferret out information on your immediate family, the better to profile, cajole and threaten you.
Heck, you looked up their Sooper Secret Teleporter on YouTube! Can't the Red Chinese have a smart intelligence analyst working for them?
AC97 points out:
Also, parents... did he say anything specific? At all? What did he actually say that was so hurtful? How do you know he wasn't talking out of his hindquarters just to see what stuck? (AC97)
Yes. That's an actual skill, called "cold reading." And here the reading wouldn't even have to be completely cold, as the starting point would be publicly-available information.
"Charlie? Are you okay?" She asked.
Charlie looked at her and said "Yes, I'm fine." Which made Luster Dawn sigh in relief, ...
Since, after all, tending to Charlie's emotional health and morale is the sum and purpose of your life, Luster ...
Thorax, however, is pissed off:
"Wait a minute, Charlie Lam, your not an alicorn?" Thorax asked with a traumatised and anger mixed expression.
"No I'm not King Thorax." Charlie replied with a shake of his head "I am a human being homo sapiens. And that soldier was actually one of my kind. I was turned into an alicorn because I wanted to succour all of you creatures and assist you all in taking your land back. So King Thorax, we really need your help." He pleaded.
(1) The concept of "shapeshifting" is apparently new and shocking to King Thorax, talented shapeshifter and ruler of a whole Hive of shapeshifters.
Now, I might be able to justify this if Thorax had turned against shapeshifting as some relic of a barbarous past, but Story does not say or even hint at any such development in the Changeling culture.
(2) Once again, Charlie claims kinship with the Invaders without first emphasizing that he comes from a different nation than the Invaders. Which works about as well as this always does.
(3) Charlie was actually turned into an Alicorn as a side effect of the mysterious Talisman of Plot Convenience, though I can see why he wouldn't tell Thorax this under the circumstances.
Thorax responded by spreading his wings and activating his horn and glaring at them which gave Luster Dawn an 'Uh oh' expression.
Given that this is the third time this exact thing has happened, why does Charlie keep trying this tactic?
You would think that Luster Dawn would break off for one moment during a calmer scene, such as the travel montages, and stop contemplating the wicked, wonderful things that virile, stallionly Charlie the Alicorn could do to Luster's lush, pink and tantalizingly-virgin young body just long enough to advise him on this? Or does she not get it either?
Oh, and Thorax just remembered that he
"You think that I would help you when your kind killed, enslaved and slaughtered many of my changeling subjects?" Thorax asked in anger.
"Killed" and "slaughtered" are redundant, Thorax, though under the stressful circumstances, I can forgive you the grammatical inelegance.
"King Thorax, please calm down-"
"Calm" is not the issue here. The issue is that you are claiming to be one of the Invaders, and the Invaders really have done these terrible things to Thorax's people.
What you need to do is first let Thorax know that you are not one of the Invaders, but of a different nation than them, before you let him know that you are of the same species.
"No! Leave the throne room immediately you two! Or I will blast you all out of here!" Thorax yelled as he charged his horn even more.
When Charlie noticed Thorax's s horn glowing as bright as the sun. He immediately grabbed Luster Dawn's hoof and ran to the exit of the Changeling Kingdom.No teleporting this time, eh?
Oh, and Charlie and Luster Dawn are quadrupeds, so grabbing her hoof would mostly just slow them both down. Though I guess this would work better if they were both some sort of bipeds, with hands.
Finally, how does Charlie know the way to the exit? Remember, he and Luster were brought in here in a big bag; they didn't get to see the route Pharynx took.
...Yeah, like Thorax would do that, when even aside from it not fitting his personality, he had to deal with "being feared just because of his species" himself. (AC97)
That's a good point. Thorax is about as mild-mannered and reasonable as any monarch could possibly get without being entirely useless. And he would have noticed that Charlie and Zhou were enemies
For that matter, if he thought Charlie were some sort of renegade defecting from the Invaders' forces, wouldn't he want to recruit him? The Changeling Royals are supposed to be masters of intrigue, not hot-headed fools!
Our Designated Heroes escape the Hive unharmed.
Luster Dawn's reaction:
"Okay seriously, what is wrong with everyone?!" Luster Dawn exclaimed in anger.
Showing either that she is equally-clueless about they are doing wrong, or a shameless suck-up to an extent that she could be used as a Black Hole Bomb.
"Can't blame them. After all, I am a human. And I am not one of your kind. Not loving or peaceful." Charlie said.
Charlie doesn't get it either.
"Okay so should we go to the dragon lands? Because that is our last destination and our only hope." She said.
"Yes we should. And hopefully the dragons from there are more nicer." Charlie said, then he looked down on the talisman on his chest and pressed the blue gem. Then a long blue stream was shot out of it and it shot to an area with volcanos not far from the changeling kingdom which kind of startled Charlie a little but he managed to stuff it down.
Canonically, the Dragon Lands are very far from Ponyville, the Everfree, and the Changeling Hive. Remember "Dragon Quest"?
In the world of Story, apparently all of the Equestrian continent is roughly the size of Oakland CA or the Bronx NY, and if one stands on a height one can see anything of geographical interest.
Sure makes travel more convenient!
Off to the Dragons.
Based on "To Change a Changeling," he has an open-air court that... Oh. Looking at it, I only just realized that it does appear to be Chrysalis's old throne room. I'd thought it was a detached courtyard.
But yeah, there's no reason to do it in a newly established Everfree Hive a generation after deposing and petrifying Chrysalis.
Furthermore, he's in the Everfree, which means the engine noise might have been interpreted as a challenge by local predators. By all rights a manticore should've pounced him off of the thing.
Thorax says after the invaders have already killed his subjects multiple times in the past.
Which is actually kind of odd this time, given that one of said invaders stormed into the throne room only for Charlie to fight him off. You'd think the practical demonstration that they're on different sides would count for something.
Memory limitations. The map can only be so big. And this is before Charlie unlocks all of the fast travel points!
To rationalize a bit on my part, if you don't mind, I think that take was kind of the result of everything going rather samey for the protagonists (considering they had those kinda things happen before, like twice [if for admittedly different reasons]), but... yes, the way you put it, I know you're right in this context, Pharynx is 100% well within his rights to do what he did, because they were in the wrong, 10000% (they should've at least shouted "is anyone there" [accompanied with an intent-stating, with said call for attention] before jumping to "let's break the gate down," not even a "is there any other way in, if you fly/teleport?").
(it also doesn't help that the author did do a lazy retread of To Change a Changeling without anything to change it up, like Pharynx not striking alone)
Even aside from navigation, if there's only, like 10 of them, most of them not warriors, or something, there's a point that you gotta realize "there's only one of them, we can dogpile this guy faster than he can take us out with that pistol, for it isn't instant death," just take care of each limb, have two Lings deal with each limb, have the remainder start stomping his head, and he's done. There's not much martial arts can do to stop that sort of thing, when you just don't have enough time to react to everything happening, and there's too many of them.
(although then again, the author does not understand that bullets don't incapacitate as easily as in the movies, especially not pistol cartridges, and this guy is so badass, he's immune to logical consequences when he doesn't have anything to offset them, like magic)
There's some interesting thoughts, there... but... well, I'll let Story do the explaining, on that one. (and I can't wait to see you talk about it)
And it's not like he's unusually wise for his years either, right?
"Constitution" can be used in regards to someone's health... but it is definitely in no way synonymous with any type of "injury," only what effects said injury might have on a person's constitution.
This is a war, they've come in (for reasons explained in Chapter 19: Revelations, without being specific with that nonsense) and killed others. This just isn't the time for you to be stuck up with your morals, right?
Interesting indeed, that (what's an interesting aspect to me is when you see that it can involve non-verbal reading too, that they can figure things out without your words; body language can say a thousand words, just like a picture)
Luster Dawn, for how she doesn't have much characterization in the series, is basically an OC, for the writer to fill in as they wish. She does have traits in common with Twilight (magic interest, her initial attitude with friendship), but there's some leeway on that one anyhow... but anyway, well, the author is essentially failing at writing two OCs well here (and making them unjustly unequal), is my point, not to mention the entire world around them (which we all know).
Lusty nooooooooo, your priorities aren't sorted here!
Can use magic? I'm basically certain you were saying that.
Also a great point. He could've gone for a (one-sided) Enemy Mine, if he was being even slightly logical, which stops being that when it becomes clear that no, he was never with the damn Chinese Army.
That line cracks me up. All I can imagine is Zhou literally turning to stone.
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I know that the motorcycle is there simply due to Rule of Cool, for the benefit of the scenes where he pulls away from the headquarters and pulls up to the Hive. It is just there for the same reason that he cavalierly disposes of his tracker. To show how unbearably cool he is, so that Charlie's curbstomp victory over him seems all the more impressive.
It might even work in the movie.
But in text, where the reader has time to analyze what he just read before proceeding to the next action, it is just plain silly. Especially when the invasion is such a shoestring sort of venture. Captain Zhao needs the element of surprise to make his raid at all plausible. Entirely abandoning it just to look cool makes the captain look stupid.
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The oft-employed "traumatized" is funny too, especially when it is applied to really minor surprises. I keep expecting the characters to be taken out on stretchers, gibbering "The horror ... the HORROR!" every time something mildly unpleasant happens to them.
Also, the incredibly heavy-handed way Author is presenting the developing love story between Charlie and Luster Dawn, complete with running hand in hand while the author forgets just how difficult that would be for equinoids like the ponies. You realize they have absolutely no basis for attraction other than the fact that he's brave and she's incompetent?
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I totally agree with you regarding the tactical problem that one man with a pistol would face attacking an enemy structure with zero knowledge of its layout and an unknown number of foe inside. This is one reason why one man assaults are not normally a good option.
This gets even worse if the enemy can shape-shift and has a standard tactical doctrine employing this as part of ambushes. How do you prevent being blindsided when the enemy might have looked like a potted plant when you walked right by him?
In addition to getting there unwounded, it's unbelievable how fast Captain Zhao reached the throne room. Even if he'd memorized the route and had no opposition, I don't see how he would have done it, unless this Hive has a very simple plan.
This will be an odd question, but is Captain Zhao supposed to be some Chinese super-soldier (or maybe I should say Chaoji zhanshi) like Captain America? What with him kicking down front gates and winning fights at 10-1 odds without getting scratched it seems obvious he's not a normal mundane human, even a highly trained and motivated one.
And does this story just wash-rinse-repeat every meeting between Lam and non-equine heads of state in Equestria? It's starting to feel that way.
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I think you could do some satire where Reality Ensues when the human tries to one man assault their way into dominance... and gets curb-stomped.
Yeah, that's not quite pertinent to the matter, but that sort of thing is how the first chapter would've gone without the plot bending to their will, assuming they even got past the...
...stage.
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Sadly, no, the implication doesn't seem to exist that any of them, from Captain Zhao, to Lieutenant General "Metal Pads" Jin, is anything beyond normal human limits, in this story. The author seems to genuinely have believed while writing this that humans can be that dangerous just because they have martial arts training, and/or guns, equipment. A notable case being the future chapter that revolves around Jin and Twilight Sparkle fighting (it's in the chapter title too), where apparently, the mundane "vest" designed to stop probably rifle bullets that he's wearing can save him from magical blasts, magic apparently being "weak," his words, not mine, which I think I might cover; maybe I should take initiative and review some more chapters of this.
It would be at least something to go off of if they were like Spartans off of Halo, or Captain America, as you said, but it doesn't seem to be the case by any account, and even then, I'm not inclined to think super soldiers would go in alone, ideally.
I've got good news and bad news. The good news is that the direction of the story changes after the next chapter... the bad news is, the next chapter isn't much of a change of pace, and that the story doesn't exactly get much more competent.
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Your response to Jordan seems to have been completely spur of the moment writing, and it still comes off as better than what's been described in the journals.
Heck I'd read a story where various self-styled human badasses try to conquer Equestria, starting with the villains, and get curbstomped. It couldn't be very long but it'd be entertaining.
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I think it was... what, five-ten-ish minutes, maybe (I should've timed myself)? And I'm not going to claim myself to be a great writer (certainly not an experienced one); maybe I'd have more potential if I practiced, but thanks... it's not a high bar though, to clear that, to be fair.
(In particular, I think copying Nightmare Moon's dialogue basically verbatim from S1 Ep 2 is the laziest thing I did on that one, which was a blatant sign of "spur of the moment, don't edit much as you go," and another example would be it coming to me in hindsight that "dang it, maybe Chrysalis should've appeared in person, with the other part of the stakes being 'suspend him above a fatal drop'"; also should note regarding the spear one, I did look at the prologue of this story to refresh my memory a bit)
I definitely wouldn't mind it being a short and sweet comedy, with some spices of "dark comedy," if the outcome is outright cruel, beyond a simple defeat.
(Chrysalis being sadistic is what makes her an interesting villain to me, on another note, along with the ego; I think it's having the novelty of having a character like that in a kid's show, as a contrast to the general setting. It's not like Cupcakes!Pinkie where she'd be wildly out of character, since it'd been kinda obvious since her debut)