FYI, there are 6 couples, not 2. "Harem intrigue" also doesn't remotely come close to being the plot. Seriously sounds like the reviewer posted about the wrong book.

The second half, the MC is in a male body, which is why this is tagged BL/yaoi. The romance only really begins when he is in a male body. The ML really does fall for the MC regardless of his gender, which is a very interesting plot point!

The ML is portrayed very similar to how you'd expect strong emperors to act: fairly ruthless yet pretending to be noble, speaking half-truths-half-lies, difficult to guess, never showing his true thoughts, good at manipulating the masses etc., which was something I enjoyed a great deal, but may not be for everyone.

update: the MC jumping to a new body (male) after the queen body died! And there is papapa between him and the ML! Hehehehehehehe....

He has a huge harem of concubines. Despite falling for the Empress he is still planning another Triennial Selection for new concubines to add to his harem and he wants the Empress to help with the Selection. Like what the heck? The whole point of the harem is to ensure the Emperor makes lots of heirs, the fact that this Emperor is regularly giving his concubines all "abortion teas" to drink to avoid having another prince being born renders the whole harem useless. Like, why condemn more women to join your harem if none of them are going to bear your children and you are currently busy trying to get into the Empress's pants?

Also, a lot of reviews say the ML was respectful by not forcing MC (Empress) into having s*x with him... but he does touch her inappropriately every time, pull open her clothes to feel her up, force her to give him a handjob and kiss her without asking. Just because he didn't put it in doesn't mean he wasn't sexually harassing her.

• Who is the Crown Prince's actual biological mother? Since ML was considering the Empress being 'worthy' to carry his next son then that would mean Crown Prince's bio mom must have been super special. Where did she go?
• The fact that the ML is feeding abortion teas to all his concubines is dumb. His excuse was that he did not want to have princes fighting for the throne like he did but... what makes him so sure all his babies will be boys? Shouldn't an Emperor also want to have a lot of princesses to marry off to foreign countries to form peace treaties?
• Everything about Feng Ming and Zhao Lu pairing. The fact that King Feng is bottoming and wearing dresses to please another man and skipping out on court duties for a year just to stay in bed for a guy that does not like him and all of that being an open secret to the whole court... I just don't understand how none of his officials didn't try to dethrone him. This was such an abusive relationship too. I think the author wanted to write King Feng as a femme and delicate man who is pretty, but got confused because in other chapters she wrote about how his body is full of scars from fighting in wars and how he knows martial arts and has a strong body, etc. like make up your mind!
• Also none of the wars make sense. It feels like each country is less than an hour away from each other because in the novel there were quite a few instances where the king ordered for someone from the other country to be brought over and they are brought over and it's all in the same day. Emperor Xue ends up winning against all the other countries with little schemes and the wars are all pretty much over in a few days. If it was that easy then what was the point of having wars in the first place?
  
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MC (Empress) dies off screen at the end of one chapter and is reborn in a new male body, the man who had set fire to mu*der the Empress. Like really? REALLY? ML was falling in love with the Empress, the crown prince already recognized and called her mother and now, MC is reborn in the killer's body. It's BL so I know MC and ML will end up together but I just can't... WHY IS HE REBORN AGAIN!? And again, where did the original's soul go? The jailers were specifically told just to torture but not kill him so the original couldn't have died for MC's soul to jump in.

As of now, MC still has little feelings for ML. For example, he gets sleep deprivation when forced to lie in the same bed as ML. I'm kind of rooting for TY to hold out much longer until ML really proves himself. It might even be in the second half of the novel where he becomes a man again.

The thing I like that most is that, normally in this setting, the ML would force himself upon the MC sooner rather than later, but it actually hasn't happened yet! I am sort of on the edge of my seat here and there though, as I don't prefer the r*pey type ML.

For example, when he found out that teng yun is the late empress and the current teng ying. In his thoughts, teng yun as one of the biggest threats for him comes first and after that he added that teng yun was also the person that he once loves when he's still in the empress body:)))

He didn't die, and he didn't leave the ml.

When teng yun woke up in teng ying's body, he made a deal with the ML that if he can succed in his task, he will be free to leave the imperial city. THAT IS HIS ONLY WISH.

But after he finished the task, he didn't leave which I tried to understand with him bailing out the ex emperor of teng (his father) from prison. And in return the ML wants him to replace his father as marquis of tengnan.