Aramintai

Says a person who mostly watches rom-com dramas. There are stats on this site, you know.
And my view on romance here would have been better if the main couple wasn't so boring, they have failed to deliver what you described above. I think it's because they don't have much chemistry together, unlike the second couple, and the script leaves much to be desired.
And dramas are not books, everything should be shown on screen visually or verbally. The audience can't see what's in characters heads, what their thoughts are if they are not shown.

I'm talking about showing clear signs of affection. Here ML can't even muster to give a bracelet as a gift to FL or go on a secret date with her. There's no liftoff to their relationship at all. You can say his position as CP doesn't allow for any of this, but then you can go watch a very similar The Forbidden Marriage that aired just before this drama and you'll see that ML, as a king even, does all these things and even gets help from his servants.
Romance here clearly is just an afterthought and that misleading poster isn't making it any clearer for new viewers. And that could have been fine if the overall plot had any grip, but it doesn't either. Just lots of cliches, seen in other saeguks dozens of times already, dragged out into whooping 20 episodes...

Try kisskh.me if you can't find where to watch it legally.

I've seen lots of anime with romance in it as well and this ain't it. In romantic anime, more often than not, one or both characters secretly fall for one another from the start and their struggle for reciprocation and to become a couple often is the main point of conflict. Also in anime, even if one of the characters is a cliche oblivious character, romantic scenes are still happening on a very regular basis. Here we don't see much progress in neither of them working on becoming a couple, nor arranging any romantic situations. This drama has too much focus on boring cliche politics. My bet is that they'll focus on the politics until the last 20 minutes of the last episode and then rush the heck out of that pale shadow of a romance. Tbh, I don't really care either way, main couple is boring me to sleep. I somehow care more about the second couple, at least they're funny and playful together.

Also, I'm baffled why some people have the need to fervently defend mediocre dramas as if it's the best thing on TV. Some dramas are simply flawed, writing walls of text in their defense is not gonna change anybody's opinion about them.

Hwang Chan Sung wasn't the stalker in Touch Your Heart. He played a minor role as a delivery man and was one of the crushes of an emophiliac female attorney side character.
The stalker was played by Jay Kim.

I do like fantasy shows, it's just that cdramas in general are not my cup of tea.
I guess Alchemy of Souls was one a kind kdrama, will have to wait a long time for something like that to come out again. Can't find it in the typical low budget saeguks.

No, I'm not a fan of cdramas.

Yea, was there any saeguk out there where the king was powerful right off the bat and the villain wasn't a cliche plotting minister? 🤔

Considering that most of the target audience are women why are you so surprised?

And also on MDL:
Commenter #1: I don't like this character/plot/etc. for such and such reasons.
Commenter #2-5: You're so wrong! This character is character/plot/etc. is superawesome and I'm enjoying it so much, it's the best drama on earth since sliced bread and the actor just ate the role and left no crumbs!

Nothing new here in the comment section, people are entitled to their opinions 🥱🙄

I wasn't saying anything about the acting, only about the character.

And yet what he says and what he does, and why he does it, as she found out several times already, are not the same thing. By this time she should have some trust in him at least. Looks like this FL just likes to jump to conclusions.

I've watched quite a few and far from many have such ML and FL. They look more like characters taken from contemporary legal drama, tbh.
But the king, on the contrary, is a very common sight in saeguks. They're very frequently politically impotent and there's always some evil minister that is the villain.

FL here is rather annoying. Though unconventionally, ML has proven several times already he's not a bad guy. And FL admitted it to herself several times as well. But with every new case she seems to forget all about it and starts treating him like he's a greedy human trash again.
Also, what is her end goal by doing all this? I don't get it. To help bring justice to common people through ML's help? Kinda vague. Seems like she has too much time on her hands and too much freedom. If it was a proper historical drama she would have been married off to some nobleman already and locked up at some manor, instead of running a guest house of all things. She doesn't hide her face or her servants that work with her, many people have seen her, but somehow nobody seems to care that a princess is absent from the palace for prolonged periods of time and is mingling with the commoners by working as a waitress.

Nothing to write home about, your typical saeguk with politically impotent king and evil minister as a villain. There's also third party that plots a bit of conspiracy for revenge.

Don't waste your time on this. Romance is barely existant, 18 episodes in and none of the ships have sailed yet. Mostly it's politics, sprinkled with some mystery revenge. And it's veeeeeery slow paced.

What quality of the storytelling? This plot is too dragged out, has lots of boring cliches and some serious dumbassery issues. At least romance could have spiced things up a bit. And I strongly disagree about romances being detrimental to the plot. In a well written drama romance can add a lot to entertainment value, it can be its driving point. And some plots are even focused on romance as the main dish. The quality of the plot solely depends on the writer, some just can't write good romantic stories for s*it.

Ugh, this is such a drag 😪😴 . I regret that I started watching this. 20 episodes is just too much for it, there's not enough plot to spread it out so thinly across the episodes.
And I especially hate that they presented FL as this very smart detective and excellent fighter in the beginning, but then forgot all about it later. She's as dumb and as weak and crybaby as any other saeguk's FL out there, if not worse. She didn't manage to solve anything and as usual her troubles will be resolved only with ML's help.
The only highlight of this drama are the secondary couple - the actually smart and quirky detective and FL's servant.
And SML here is very forgettable and his scenes are boring af. Even the guardian warrior side character is more interesting to watch.

And lastly, is there even gonna be a real romance here? Two episodes left and none of the ships have sailed yet!

Looks promising. Also, I recall seeing that actor who cheats on FL here in Touch Your Heart as well. He was playing a cameo role there though, one of the crushes of an emophiliac side character.

Those two are bffs forever, you can tell 🤗

I see that this drama is adapted from a webtoon? Anyone read it? What's the ending?