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Sounds like a Non-Protagonist Resolver
This signature says something else when you aren't looking at it.
There are...a lot of tropes that show up here. "Side characters do everything" sounds like Non-Protagonist Resolver, or Pinball Protagonist (if the protagonist is particularly passive).
Other tropes that appear in your query might be Guest-Star Party Member (temporary companion until arc is resolved) and some sort of "becomes royalty" trope like Rightful King Returns.
I'm not so much thinking of the side character bit - my apologies for the title being incorrect. It is really that you meet and befriend exactly one representative of a foreign culture, who does not become a protagonist, and then they must inevitably become that culture's ruler in some later time, which may very well be an entirely different plot. They may have been a prince all along, or may inevitably win the election, anything, just the "one character we know of foreign culture" <becomes> "ruler of that culture" is what I'm talking about.
Edited by Harmonia
So more a Really Royalty Reveal + Token Minority / Token Nonhuman?
Edited by Daefaroth This signature says something else when you aren't looking at it.
Yes, a combo of those two. Though they may also win the election instead. I wonder if it should be its own trope...
Bob travels to a foreign land with very strange people. With one person in particular, Alicia, he manages to set aside their cultural differences, have adventures, and become good friends.
Now they may part ways again, for Alicia is definitely not made into a main character. Alicia will however, inevitably, become the ruler of that land at some moment after that.
Two examples in Eragon: Orik the dwarf and Arya the elf.
One example in Rangers Apprentice: (that viking guy I forgot the name of).
One example in Sword Of Truth: Gratch the Gar.
I'm sure there's more out there.
Edited by Harmonia