MC's position in the family is quite awkward. Her adoptive mother (eldest madam) and her birth mother (second madam) are always at odds at each other because they're both competitive. Eldest madam is proud and guarded against MC, because she thinks that MC is partial to her birth mother. Second madam also has complicated feelings for MC, since she had to give her to someone else to raise and didn't grow by her side. As a result, MC's relationship with both families ends up quite lukewarm, so she doesn't feel like she belongs anywhere.

CYM, on the other hand, grew up with her birth mother and is the recepient of all her motherly love.

In their past life, during their stay in a mountain estate one snowy night, CYM suddenly disappeared. Realizing that it had been a few hours since she left, CYJ grew concerned and personally went with her servants to search for CYM. She ended up rescuing Marquis Jingyong in passing after discovering him in a cave and taking him to the estate.

The marquis was grateful for her life-saving grace and proposed marriage in return. CYJ's family was thrilled and immediately accepted. Unbeknownst to everyone, CYM had already helped and treated the Marquis prior to CYJ's rescue. CYM felt like CYJ stole her credit, but wasn't able to voice it out until after the marriage and CYJ's pregnancy with the marquis' child. CYM used this as an opportunity to "visit" her sister, but her purpose was actually to voice out her "grievances" to the marquis.

This put a wedge between CYJ and her husband, which eventually led to her death. CYM married in, etc. Etc.

CYJ dreamed about this in the current timeline when she and the marquis were still engaged. Around the same time, CYM also experienced a rebirth, so she immediately revealed the whole story to the marquis and he found it convincing, prompting him to cancel the engagement with CYJ the very next day. The marquis thought that this was CYJ's scheme to steal CYM's credit for saving his life, labeling her as a malicious sister in his head.

Already aware of the reason after dreaming about it, CYJ accepted by calmly tearing the engagement book to pieces in front of everyone, angering the marquis and his mother.

Afterwards, the marquis followed CYJ outside the main hall, leading him and CYJ to argue, where she ended up slapping him out of frustration. This was the first scene ML encountered with the MC upon his return, after years of traveling outside the capital.

MC previous life doesn't truly impact her as much since she describes it as though she watched a move. MC sister Chen Yumo has the standard rebirth and rememberseverything almost vividly. The Ex fiance actually gets snippets of the previous life at his wedding with Cheng Yumo. This eventually progresses more and it is hinted that he starts to remember everything. Which unravels his and Cheng Yumos relationship. ML Chen Junjing/ Li Chenjing..... I believe I spelled that right.... in the the 2 extra chapters we go back to the original timeline and he is alone and possible wife candidate dies unexpectedly or disappears. ML is a lonely monarch and one day he falls asleep and slips into the current timeline. Their he sees what his life could've been like. This leads him to investigate what happened to Cheng Yujing and he ends up demoting the EX because of his conduct. ML spots a Taoist who tells him that he missed his fated person and she passed. This angers ML and he locked the Taoist in the dungeon. The next day the taoist disappears and ML wakes up back to the the starting point and decides to speed up the process with MC. Which seems like a separate timeline now.

first, as u know, the FL can be seen as selfish and arrogant thinking of choosing husband with a great background and family. I don't blame her, at that time marriage is a big deal for them. I don't think she is selfish as she just want to have a good marriage which will last for her entire life. Nothing wrong from wanting to have a good life.

One thing I want to complain is the grandfather, the Cheng's old master. Now, let's talk about the cheng's old master. He's not a villain but why I disliked him so much ?

Selfish. Hypocrite. That what I think his character is. Yes he did a great job protecting the ML's identity and everything he did is for the Cheng's family. But I saw him as a failure for a father and a grandfather. He never ever cared much for his family. He was always reminded of the past, so in love with his old lover. That when he is dying, one of his thought was his old lover must have been waiting for him.

Sure I understand hardly any love will exist between him and his wife, the grandmother, Mrs. Cheng. But from what I seen as I'm mtl, although mrs Cheng is not a great person, I pity her for marrying the old master. Even if there is no love between them, at least he could care for his sons when they were young. I could just imagined when he decided to bring his old lover back with ML, how sad and hurt is mrs Cheng. She live knowing that her own husband probably will never love her or their sons.

I just felt pity. If he take his role as a father seriously, perhaps his sons would actually grew up as a great person. But no he never look or cared for them. He never even cared for his own grandchildren. He was so selfish. He blamed his sons for being s*upid, blamed his wife for not taking care of his sons. But never ever thought that they grew up this way also part of his fault. He so invested in taking care of his old lover and the prince.

As a father and grandfather, he never did a good job at raising them if he even think of them in the first place.

I think I'm maybe too emotional but at that time, I agreed very much with FL, men in that era only know how to blame their wife if their child do something troublesome. I just feel tired. He never deserved any respect at all. My rant is done.

She was given away as soon as she was born. Her birth mother Ruan-shi loved the children who grew up by her side more. Qingfu Junzhu obviously loved her biological son more. Only Cheng Yujin, who was caught in the middle, had nothing. Ruan-shi accused her of preferring a rich adoptive mother. Qingfu Junzhu also guarded against her, thinking that she was a white-eyed wolf who wasn't close to herself despite the adoption grace.

She was the adopted daughter of the first sons wife (bc wife was unable to have kids at the time), but was birthed by the second sons wife. Both women who were her "mothers" treated her like shit. The former because she was suspicious of her loyalty, the latter because she wasnt raised by her and valued the other daughter more. Her father's on both sides did not care for her, neither did her grandparents who valued her for her use, neither did her cousins who liked the more cheerful sister of MC and found MC dull, neither did the fiancee who abandoned her swiftly for said sister. Never, not once, was she put first and cared for.

So in that environment, she forced herself to become perfect. Perfect manners, always gaining the higher moral ground, trying to benefit herself as much as possible in everything. Bc if she didn't take care and consider herself, literally no one would. So even when shes scheming to the extreme and using people, I never faulted her. She was doing her best with a bad lot. She was called dull and boringly perfect, and maybe she is, but you can see how circumstances made her that way and as the story progresses we see alot of her emotions of inferiority as she tries to find a husband for herself (to get out of her situation, she still has to rely on a man, sadly). The story tells alot about how it isn't women's fault they had to manipulate and plot for a man's love, as often times that was there only way to live. I admired her alot, especially near the end when she become increasingly courageous and vicious, while gaining even more pride as she finally had the status to back it up. In general tho shes brilliant.

Interrupted MC and her suitors alot but tbh I didn't care bc as readers we know their going to be together anyway and all these people are obviously plot devices. If he didn't prevent it and one her 4 suitors managed to succeed, where would the story be? In fact watching the antics it was obviously the author implementing humor because the story would go MC sets her sights on a possible prime rib husband, ML notices shes weighing the meat considering someone, he gets jealous, he hilariously puts a stop to her plans, she shows a little temper (which, for someone known for being calm all the time I honestly thought a little anger and playfulness was good for her. She never got to be a child and this is shown later when the two joke around and are comfortable with each other).

In any case ML was a pretty great guy. He had thoughts like thinking it was s*upid to leave the harem completely up to your wife and how a husband should manage the house affairs too. He never took concubines and only married the MC (even though her family didn't benefit him at all). He liked and appreciated MCs scheming nature. He tried to understand the dependency women were forced ti have on men in those times and how that could lead to actions MC would take. He helped in alot of ways he could by returning power to her hands (stoping the family from taking her dowry, sending his men to help her manage her shops, often seating back and letting his wife talk once they get married. In any case I liked him.

Update: Saw someone say that author also gave him a plausible reason for having those thoughts as an ancient man. His mom was empress and she was the emperors only woman before she died. His adopted mom that picked him up, while with a married man, also had him to herself once they reunited. He grew up with monogamy and with evidence that a messy harem showed incompetence. So he simply eliminated that possibility by making MC his only. In fact, when he explains to her why he doesn't even talk about love he says that he wants to guarantee the eldest son (or just in general his kids) is born from her and the best way to do that is to simply not have anyone else in the harem since we all know these btches be scheming. This was a surefire to get rid of many issues. Also he never planned to rely on either his empresses or his harems families to occupy the court. He did it on his own so he didnt need to use other women for power. So it all made sense in the grounds of that time. It wasnt just an "I love you so imma ignore these courtiers telling me to marry concubines". Though ofc it was a bit of that too lol

Like I mentioned, MC was never the favored one in anyone heart. She was never put first and for ML it was similar. His dad (the king) was so incompetent and obviously had other things he valued more despite feeling bad for this son of his. His adopted dad was only with him to save his family's ass. In general, both of their treatments depended on how useful they were, like embroidered pillows. But in reality they were both crazy scheming and masters of outwardly calm inwardly vicious. While putting on a facade to the world, together they could loosen up a little and trust. This was especially hard for MC as she knew ML could take concubines and that the marriage was not advantageous for him. It was hard to let her guard down and face possible disappointment from having expectations. But by the end I felt like she was able to finally out down all her burdens and open herself fully to ML. He waited for her to do so while understanding her fears. They just felt very harmonious, like it was only natural for them to be together

ML sheds his fake identity and goes back to being the prince and they marry, we get palace scheming. This was fun too, so was the face slapping and MC getting used to her position and wielding her power. Alot of the things I found irritating about palace intrigue weren't in this since both leads are smooth as cucumbers. Theres a tangible buildup to them eventually taking over the throne.

died. No literally the queen, the dowager, the king, the scheming princes, they just kept dying like dominoes wtf! I dont think I've ever read a historical novel where the whole palace got emptied usually the leads are forced to keep someone around because "appearences' but nah they all went. By the end MC had no filial piety at all to do I wanted to laugh. ML had a death grip on the court without the queens family all up in his business. Everything was neatly wrapped with a bow tie. It was very satisfying.

1. Anytime MC was ruminating over where said guy would be a good husband. There was so many candidates yall she was hard at work. It was hilarious.

2. Any scene where the main couple got contrasted with MC ex fiancee and sister. Like deserved btch.

3. When the MC is cornered by an imperial doctor and the dowager (or was it the queen idk) so they can induce her into miscarriage but she was so strong about it! Like omg her inner strength at that moment she literally threatened them with a weapon and ran off to the king for asylum. All the while ML could not help her since he was doing business outside the palace. I felt both terrible for her but also crazy proud of her.

4. The Phoenix dragon twins. So cute.

5. When the palace ladies come to inspect the MCs etiquette (aka bully her) before she gets married but they literally cant see any flaws in her behaviour whatsoever shes simply too perfect lmao. She even corrects them! Lol

Timeline 1 - original life - ML and MC never meet and get married. MC marries the Marquis, has a son and dies early. The Marquis also marries her sister.

Timeline 2 - story timeline - both MC and her sister have memories of their first life. Sister marries the Marquis in hopes they will be happy again. MC meets ML when the Marquis comes to break off the engagement.

Timeline 3 (in the extra/side story) - the ML from Timeline 1 dreams of his happy family life with MC in Timeline 2. He wakes up to his younger self in Timeline 1 and decides to take break off the Marquis' marriage with MC and asked to meet the MC.

ML likes to tease MC by calling her niece lmao. He teasingly asks her to call him Ninth Uncle in bed when she's utterly exhausted and she wants to kill him LMAO

An unusual point is that 2 individuals are rebirthed/have memories of a past life - the MC and her twin younger sister - but this doesn't really make a difference in the plot yet except as motivation.