he doesn't side with his relatives when they commit treason, an act which results in the death of suffering of tens of thousands of commoners, as well as innocent officials in the court, and a side character who ML sees as a younger sister.

her husband participating in the slaughtering / mass exodus of an entire city.

He blames ML for leading him on even though ML is perfectly clear that he doesn't approve of MC rebelling. He acts as if ML is the unreasonable one for having different political beliefs, a fact which he knew from the start!

And yes, MC leads a military coup and almost kills the Emperor, who ML treats like a younger brother. He also uses the exact same excuse as their "enemy", prince of Xiling, that Li Yanzhen is incompetent, a de jure Emperor who doesn't have real authority, and the court is held up by MC and ML.

Worth noting is the fact that MC would attempt to kill ML and there would be a civil war if they weren't "in love". Also worth noting is that MC almost allowed the Xiongnu to overrun the capital because ML refused to acknowledge him. This is despite his tirades about how much he hates cowardly / irresponsible civil officials who don't defend Daxia against the Xiongnu.

He basically threatened mass mu*der - su*cide (which is emotional abuse!) to get with ML, and he's clearly even less responsible than Li Yanzhen. This makes ML's so-called principled behaviour extremely dubious.

The princess of Loulan dies because she trusts a Han merchant she fell in love with. Though this is not her fault, it seriously damages the political relationship between Loulan and Daxia.

The woman who asks Su Shiyu (ML) to spare her husband who committed treason ends up dying with her son. This is because, even though she doesn't agree with his actions (participating in the slaughter and mass exodus of an entire city and rebelling against the Emperor), he loves her and wants to sacrifice herself with him. By the way, she claims that he loves her and has always treated her well, but he has no respect for her opinion to the end. Then she refuses to escape the city without him, which is fine, except this also results in her son dying as well. She doesn't even make a cursory attempt to protect him, because apparently he (along with all the previous residents of the city) are just that unimportant compared to her husband. And this is the "warm-hearted" model of love MC wants ML to be.

After Jingshu hears that Li Che is dead, she immediately commits su*cide. Li Che isn't actually dead and is heartbroken when he finds out. How dogblood.

MC kills innocent courtiers, breaks laws as an official, and deposes and almost kills the Emperor, who ML grew up beside and swore to protect. Despite this, all ML does is kneel in the ancestral hall, feel bad for a bit, and then get together with the MC.

As for the side pairing, Du Yue has an IQ that is low enough that he's probably unfit for military service. Qin Zhao doesn't do anything particularly bad, and he's one of the few reasonable characters in the story, but the side pair barely shows up anyway.

Li Yanzhen and Li Qinghe (Emperor and Lu Shi's daughter) are fairly likeable, but Li Qinghe also attempts to "sacrifice her life for love" during the coup. Li Yanzhen also was plotted by one of his concubines, and then later almost poisoned to death by her, and despite this, chose to forgive her when she died.

There is a threat to sell Su Shiyu to enemy army to "play with" from the traitor who is later killed tho.

Underground casino part, for example.

We are explicitly shown that, for example, older brother of the envoy prince was a great brother. But at the same time he killed Chu Mingyun's sister when he attacked the border town she was protecting.

to get hands on the book that was on Su Shiyu, and could potentially reveal proof of Chu Mingyun planning a rebellion.

Su Shiyu after falling in love never tells the emperor about the planned rebellion even when he has concrete proof.

He is silent even after emperor was almost assassinated, only trying to convince Chu Mingyun.

Chu Mingyun does drug Su Shiyu once with sleeping medicine, but not to r*pe or torture - to stop him from getting in way of a rebellion.

But the thing with their encounter is - Chu Mingyun was sincere, but Su Shiyu thought he isn't, and basically seduced Chu Mingyun to get access to his secret correspondence.

Yes, Su Shiyu was already in love with him at the time. Yes, he did it both cause of feelings and politics. Yes, human beings are messy and complicated like that.

Su Shiyu has survivor guilt due to being the only one alive from the army he was leading that was ambushed and slaughered cause of Su Shiyu's closest confidant betrayal.

Chu Mingyun too, cause he was saved from the attacked city on the border by his sister who was cruelly killed at the time of attack with her corpse desecrated (her body was hanged).

Su Shiyu's and Chu Mingyun's survivor guilt is crucial to the story, as it defines their actions and plans.

Both of them have survivor's guilt.
And both of them had experience with being used for gains.

So both of them have a view of how people should be governed and what is the best for the country.
Cause Su Shiyu and Chu Mingyun genuinely care about the country, and are ruthless to themselves.
So both of them want to see the other's actions and understand the opponent better.

Also due the fact that Su Shiyu's survival guilt is tightly connected with him trusting a traitor which caused him army wiped out and him almost sold off as a toy.

He needs to be sure that his sister's sacrifice was not in vain.

Chu Mingyun let go of some of his control by not killing the emperor, potetially leaving a threat to his throne, and Su Shiyu accepted the changes by helping Chu Mingyun clean all political mess that was left after dynasty has changed, and was his loyal official his whole life.

They never married, as it would not be accepted, but lived in love and harmony for many years, with Chu Mingyun adopting a son from side branch of Su Shiyu's family to have a successor for the throne.

mingyun: oh dumbass boy, had to fight his way into his position and would do anything to move up and not lose it, as to why he approached his “enemy” shiyu to kill him, by being dumb and pretending to be gay, letting the whole world know that he was gay for shiyu onlycontinues to annoy and disturb shiyu and got used to being by his side and is shown one or two acts of kindness and completely forgets his motives to kill him, he puts off killing him bc he genuinely enjoys his company and would miss him as quoted🙄 like c’mon dude mingyun: ends up wanting to kiss shiyu and has mixed and complicated feelings about him, isolated himself to figure out his feelings, gets drunk, realizes his feelings and confesses to shiyu who just happened to be in front of him like his obvious feelings, becomes obsessed loves him so much and flirts with him every chance he gets, even sacrifices himself for him and fought by his side, honestly was a chad, was a huge baby and was betrayed, yet still loved him and wanted him and missed him sm it was unbearable for him, he then decides to rise up to power by any means, he is cold, ruthless and evil after all but he knew he changed, bc he knew he had a sweetheart that would be sad by the decisions he had made so he didn’t end up doing them, he knew he had to protect him he thought he was protecting him, and that it was the best decision and knew he was wrong when he woke up and was mad @ him so he stabbed himself with his knife, which scared shiyu away... from then he decides to let him be, give him space and worries abt him from afar during their break, he realized he loved him too much and would chase after him no matter what after he was motivated by qinghe and he made only one mf wish and was so antsy abt what shiyu wished... he was desperate and clinging to the last string of hope anyway my went by his side during the last battle in the last few ch after being away from each other for so long and held him by the waist and was scared to lose him n confessed that he kept the jade sy gave him the whole time and it was fixed :) n they back 2gether

mingyun characterization conclusion:
- had a hard and traumatizing childhood
- is cold, ruthless and evil (bc ppl see him that way duh but he just gets what he whats u go king)
- is actually rlly lonely bc he doesn’t know what love is and is haunted by his past
- soft as hell

- cares abt like 3 ppl in total
- would not hesitate to fight and sacrifice himself for his love ones
- had like a character redemption in the middle then became evil again then redemption arc again🙄 he was like shiyu here i’m happy shiyu not hete i’m unhappy🙄WAIT LETS NOT FORGET HE’S A BAD DRUNK AND HE GETS VERY JEALOUS SO EASILY 😭 he so much more annoying when drunk but can’t remember anything the next day n they never never talked abt the 2nd time he was drunk.... only sy knows n the shadow guards TT anyway great guy 10/10🙏🏻