He starts off trying to r*pe her, he sees women as expendable & disposable. But she's 'different' because she defies him & for that he wants to crush her. He continually invades her space and privacy, is sexually aggressive; at one point strips her clothes off but then claims he doesn't 'force women'. Like what he did when he was drunk & tried to attack her in the very beginning wasn't forcing. Worse to me, is that being curious as to why she loathes men, he discovers her history (history of the body she's in) involved an attempted sexual assault when she was a child. He admits to himself that must be very traumatizing. But then proceeds to man handle her, leer at her body, and punish her for resisting him. Even as he notes she's trembling in fear & upset.

He's whipped her, till she bled, caught a fever & then later on for his own ego punishes her when she's not recovered yet. But what? Because he puts some medicine on it, he's a romance partner????

To be honest... it might be a bit early to review this, but I have to agree with dona. The story starts out with an interesting spin on the typical betrayal of the ex-lover and half-sister and I was eager to see how she would make her way to her country to take revenge now that she was reborn as a lowly slave. And in a different country at that.

However....

As dona said before, there's not much information to go on - whether it's about the MC, her surroundings, her past, etc. It leaves the story sort of empty, and I'm unable to feel much for the MC since I barely know her. So far, the MC is okay but she seems to be a little bit too much like the typical cold and capable fMC that comes off more as a robot than anything.

As for plot, so far, until chapter 18, there hasn't been any progression towards her goal. Which okay, considering her low position is understandable, but since the MC doesn't seem to have a plan in mind, the story just feels like it's dragging.

It's more like everyone is out to get her right now because she got involved with the wrong person - which, granted, doesn't leave her with much time to plan, but even then she doesn't seem frustrated or annoyed...

Or it's more like she hasn't outright decided in what direction to go in, so the story just feels aimless right now. Especially considering that at this moment in the story we're uncovering the story of some palace maid who supposedly got killed after getting involved with a prince.... it feels weird and out of place since it doesn't seem like it has anything to do with her.

All in all, however, it's still has been an okay read so far. The translation is amazing, so it has that going for it. I just feel the author is taking too long to unravel the plot or not giving us simple information that's very important (such as the questions dona posed in their review) which can leave the reader (at least me) confused and / or unable to connect with the MC and her journey.

I figure since I reviewed the story this early, I might as well do the amazing translator a favor and review the story as it goes along every so often. Tho, disclaimer: this is still only a preliminary review, basically just my thoughts on the current translated chapters - that's why I still haven't rated the story.

Anyway, the story is still moving pretty slowly. The MC still hasn't progressed much other than getting a few subordinates tbh, and learning a little bit more about the power plays in the palace.

Thus, if anyone is planning to read this story, I would recommend to probably let the story stockpile to at least 100 chapters before jumping in. It'll probably make the story's slow pace seem not as bad.

I still feel the MC is still too cold, I'm really unable to connect with her. Altho we get her inner thoughts and observations, I feel like there's barely any emotion to her. I get she's focused on revenge but.... you would think she would be a turmoil of emotions, no matter how calm and proud she is usually / was previously. Even when she thinks of Lü Liu (her closest maidservant in her past life), it feels like there's barely any emotion - this might be due to the translation or just the author's writing, but either way, I just don't get much living signs from the MC.

Also... we meet ML pretty early (I won't say who it is, but if you've read enough of these novels, it's easy to sense who it is), and the interactions w/ MC are..... weird to say the least? I don't like him much yet, he's very much a product of the era, so it's kind of hard for me to feel anything but disdain for him tbh.

He's pretty misogynistic and so far seems like the typical alpha male, oppressive ML who looks down on everyone, especially women. He keeps invading MC's personal space - it's not too bad compared to other novels, he just gets extremely close and pinches her chin, but still, not something I like. There's obviously more to him that meets the eye, but I'm expecting that he probably have some annoying tragic backstory to "justify" his awful personality - news flash, it doesn't [especially considering he 'collects' women (yuck) and just watches them fight for his favor like some sick bastard].

(I also find it laughably ridiculous that he's so focused on finding out the woman who knocked him out when he was drunk (aka MC).... like apparently, he's the Prince Regent and he keeps coming over to the Palace Side Quarters where the palace maids are to talk to MC.... does he not have a country to run???? Like... why is he so focused on finding MC just because she, idk, hit him? Hopefully, there's a better reason to this obsessive search rather than just his manly pride being hurt that a woman got the better of him -.-

One thing I liked so far was this scene: a fat palace maid was initially made fun of, but the MC stood up for her basically and told her there's nothing wrong with her body shape. It was refreshing, since a lot of CNovels fat-shame or have fatphobic jokes or make the villains fat and use it as something to insult them with. (Altho I didn't quite agree with the MC's reasoning that it was the palace maid who viewed herself as fat that was the problem, rather than other people making fun of her - like yes, she should learn to love herself and not care about other people, but clearly people on the skinny side have the tendency to make fun of fat people / fat-shame them and that's the main problem to focus on: fat people who grow to hate their body do so because of society's prejudices and fixation on beauty = skinniness. And I speak from experience.)

In conclusion, I feel the same way I did in chapter 18: the story is moving really slow, not a big fan of the ML, and still finding it hard to connect to the MC. But it's still a decent read so far, so I would recommend to give it a chance and judge it for yourself.

the story kinda reminds me of stunning abandoned consort, where the MC reincarnated into other character in the same timeline. But when the MC in sac is someone who is able due to her skills and social standing, it’s totally unbelievable here to think a lowly palace maid could be an almighty character without a cheat. I’m literally begging for a cheat, so that it could make sense how the MC could win everytime against everyone

the original MC, the eldest imperial princess, reincarnated into a lowly palace maid, but isnt smart enough to change how she behave? How can she still be arrogant, have the nerve to argue with her superiors? I was expecting one of them to just plank her ever since the early chapters. And why is everyone there just be in awe everytime she debate? It doesnt make sense for that era

I’m also confused at how a chamber pot cleaning maid can suddenly attract two princes, if even me as a reader cringe everytime I read she was cleaning the chamber pots, how on earth can the ML and 2nd ML just freely get close and hug or hold her hand??? I MEANNN??!!!!

they keep praising her beauty as peerless, well then why is she the lowest level of palace maid?? Suddenly everyone just see how beautiful she is?

up until now, I dont feel any chemistry, the way they interact reminds me of chu wang fei, but with no chemistry. I feel the MC had more chemistry with the general who killed her, LOL and that was at the beginning of the story where they were actually arguing with eachother

somehow I dont feel like the dialogue flows well, I dont think it’s the translators fault, I’m reading the dialogue with robotic tone. That’s how stiff the flow to me