Epic historical romance. SPOILERS: "The heroine An Yi was raised as a valiant General's son and companion to the child Crown Prince. When the heroine chases young nobleman Yan Ping, he rejects her ruthlessly because he thinks they're both male. When the neighbouring Crown Prince Feng Zhao Wen visits their country when the heroine is 14, Crown Prince FZW/H discovers that she is a girl and sneakily falls in love with her.
3 years later, the 2 kingdoms are at war. Our heroine is now a war General and falls in battle from a head wound. She is captured and recuperates for 6 months in the enemy camp of Crown Prince FZW/H, except that she's lost her memory and thinks he's her boss! He has a lot of fun ordering her around and making her stick as close as possible to his side. However, eventually she regains her memory. Nobleman Yan Ping's father helped betray the country and enemy Crown Prince FZW has won the war. Our heroine flees and escapes into obscurity with the deposed child Emperor.
After 3 years of extreme poverty, nobleman Yan Ping captures our heroine An Yi and the deposed child Emperor in the very first chapter and sends them to the new Emperor FZW/Hero. When nobleman Yan Ping later discovers that An Yi is a girl, he bitterly, bitterly regrets his actions. The deposed child Emperor escapes and our heroine is sent to the dragon bed. THIS IS CHAPTER ONE in a nutshell. Total hijinks ensue for the rest of the book.
What really resonated was An Yi's character. She is totally zany. She has lost so much - her father, her kingdom, her crush, everything - she has struggled and worked for 3 years to feed the deposed child Emperor through crushing poverty - by the time she is captured in the first chapter, she just wants to survive and eat well. She has no shame anymore, and is quick to embarrass/scheme her way to freedom/food. Other reviewers have described her as muddleheaded, but I thought she reminded me of someone who has been through trauma - depressed, can't feel pain, forgotten things that make her hurt, just wants to survive day by day - her EQ was never the best (like chasing Yan Ping for so many years) - and that made her zany actions so realistic because she just wanted to live and eat. She doesn't care for riches, status, handsome men, she just wants to survive and eat meat. When she meets Emperor FZW again in the first chapter, all the way to the last chapter, you can see her heal and recover from her trauma and learn to love and live again."
"It's first person POV, the story starts halfway through their relationship, she has forgotten many things, there's amnesia, he continues to love her and she is quite clueless to it, and heck, he's a Crown Prince too."
Tags: Amnesia, Ancient China, Beautiful Female Lead, Cross-dressing, Death of Loved Ones, Dense Protagonist, Depression, PTSD, Devoted Love Interests, Empires, Female Protagonist First-time Interc**rse, Handsome Male Lead, Imperial Harem, Love Interest Falls in Love First, Military, Naive Protagonist ,Nobles, Past Plays a Big Role, Past Trauma, Persistent Love Interests, Politics, Pregnancy, Rebellion, Royalty, Rape, Schemes And Conspiracies, Soldiers, Tragic Past, Unreliable Narrator
4/24/24 this was such a sweet silly book - with a stupid FL but I didn't blame her. First, she literally has a TBI. Second, the way she was brought up was super fucked - first, as a boy, second, by an incredibly abusive father - who loved her but man did NOT know how to be a proper parent... I'm glad she only associated her former crush with her father's death - he treated her like trash forever and it was satisfying she was like "man fuck this guy." Not only did he try to use her and play her with a beauty trap to get information, he was out flirting with another girl, and even if he didn't like that bitch and actually had feelings for FL - which he had complicated issues about thinking she was a dude... like man he really took it out on her every time. So.
And then there was ML who was in love with her but never SAID it - but with our derpy lovable FL even if he had said it I don't think she would've grokked it. She was both stupid and not. I think the author overly made her "stupid" at the beginning ... but a lot of it is also her repressing shit cuz trauma. I mean first of all, the literal physical trauma and brain injury, then the fact that her country was destroyed and overtaken ... Then her having to care for the shitty former child emperor ... 😜 I liked that he liked her and he never had a chance. Fuckhead never deserved her and was lazy the entire time they were in hiding.
I can definitely see myself re-reading this as a lighthearted silly fun thing.
C+ or B--
~*~*~*~*~*~ C27 lol I love how absolutely clueless FL is (in part not her fault cuz her wtf upbringing + those hits to the head…) plus how ML treats her ~on the surface. I’m SUPER curious as to how she ACTUALLY looks though…
C28 oof 😹😅 *fans self* ML telling FL that tonight it’s him that will be serving her in bed and he’s her person 🥵😅❤️ 😬😅 him being upset she’s regaining her memories…
C31 honestly her saving Chen’s (former) crown prince … why? Cuz patriotism? Loyalty? And oof the 2 guys reaction to the fire. That ML was going to kill her 😱 (though I think it was to force her to go down…)
C34 Aww he brought her to her home. And is trying to heal her psychological trauma. (And heal her physically…)
C37 😹😹😹☠️☠️☠️ her sending her servant to go discuss with the emperor
(Whatever chapter, I am so glad she unknowingly buried the military seal with her father)
C53 😹 I was literally 🙊🙊 when he used the dildo on her 😹💯
C58 😱 wtf assassination attempt
C63 omg so sweet FL acknowledging how ML treats her & how he’s her biggest and strongest support ❤️
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
The story is written in the female lead's POV. It tells the story of her struggles, heartbreak, and depression. She was a girl who was forced to be a boy by her father. She loved her childhood friend to the point of doing anything for him. She literally chased him despite the warnings of her father. She was naive. She thought she had a chance with him, but apparently her friend was just using her to get what he wanted. In the end, she lost her father because of him. Losing her only family and experiencing the most painful rejection from her love forced her to be unfeeling. She was already self-deprecating from the start, experiencing these things only made her think of herself as just someone who needed to just live so as not to make her father worry. It was like she loved and hated herself at the same time. She was so dense when it came to the love of the male lead because she was betrayed to the point that she believed that no one could actually love her unconditionally.
The story was also written in a humorous tone, but I think it was also kinda dark. We only knew the thoughts of the female lead and she was muddle-headed due to her depression. We didn't know what actually happened because it was her point of view. But, even in the female's POV, it could be seen that he only loved and cared for her. He helped her through her depression, although of course this was in ancient China. There were questionable acts by him, but as I said, we didn't know from a 3rd person perspective. Nonetheless, he loved her unconditionally. He waited for her to be his empress. Maybe because he too had his own struggles, he understood and was patient with her.
In general, you would laugh, cry, and experience pain for the female lead. She was a strong one for putting up with everything she had been through. This was a story of heartbreak and unconditional love.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
It was a good read. But the way it was told is a lil bit messy because of those flashback and to be honest, the extra feels like main story and main story feels like extra lol but it was a good read! Do read it yalll 😋