Characters don't automatically know you're the new king. I intentionally let people treat you like a normal stranger, until they're told in dialog or realize somehow, that you're the new king.
When I was talking about people sending you around as a gopher, I meant in the throne-room.
The first part I noticed was the maid who tells you to meet her, where she should probably be asking to meet you.
Second, the people telling you to go check out this abandoned fort with the ghost or going to this place to talk to this character who wanted to speak to you but can't leave their post.
Even for an unusually active king, who goes out and solves problems by stabbing them, Ryu does a lot of minion-work that should probably be foisted off on messengers or couriers.
Also, while I've got you. Ryu feels super underwhelming in combat.
Your first party-member gets two multi-hit attacks (objectively the best type of attack in a game like this) whereas Ryu only has self-buffs.
Given that most fights don't last three full turns, any buff that doesn't make your buffed attack (on your second turn) do more than double the damage that it would have done otherwise, is totally wasted, because you'd be better off just using your default attack twice in a row instead.
Whatever, sometimes adding fire damage to your melee attack lets you bypass resistances. It's niche but potentially useful.
... except the first two skills he can learn via skillpoints are Corrupted Body (a self-buff that hurts him) and Corrupted Magic (a self-buff that hurts him)
Combined these skills mean that he has three abilities that waste a turn to make him stronger without letting him actually attack.
Well, at least Combo attack is a direct attack, right?
Except... it seems to do less damage than his default auto-attack, for some reason.
All-in-all, Ryu has about as little direct kill-power as the angel girl, which makes him feel a bit underwhelming as the 'ace swordsman' of the group.
Maybe he gets some better moves later, but he's
desperate for a two-hit attack or something as of level 14.
His slow-building buff-focused playstyle just doesn't work when your other party-member can end fights in one or two turns. He'll buff up and then not even get to attack before it's over.