SD1D Enthusiast

My perfect ending tbh is JXN realizing she's better suited to rule this messed up country than all these psychos and having her own lil harem if she so wishes. the romance atp is secondary, but empress JXN had such a ferocity to her that's absent in her 2nd life and I miss it.

I know Xie Wei is the ML here and ppl are fans of the actor so they'll glorify everything he does, but some of the comments belittling his abusive behaviour and the effect it's had on FL are mind boggling.

What the hell sis....belittling violence against women is not a cute look. And YES, both physical, mental, and emotional abuse is VIOLENCE, all of which XW has done to her at one point or another.

honestly, it really annoys me the way some people here are so eager to put down JXN and shit on her and her emotions just because she isn't giving their favorite male character attention? I've seen people shit on her for not forgiving Yan Lin and giving him a chance despite her still having memories of him raping her. I've seen people whine that she's ungrateful, stupid, and doesn't deserve Xie Wei because she dares not to be in love with the person who imprisoned her and who she believes wanted her dead in the past life.

Like, at the end of the day, JXN went through a shit ton of trauma directly at the hands of 2 of the MLs and that includes the person who she ends up with. I have my own reservations and critiques about that choice and the message it sends, but focusing solely on JXN and the reactions to her just learning to live again for herself, scream misogyny. This is a female centric rebirth story above all else.

?? wrong on so many levels damn

Sorry, I will never have empathy towards rapists and in his first life he was one so I may like him in the second life, but first life, I could not care less.

Your logic here imo lacks empathy towards sexual assault victims. That is a nightmare that never leaves someone's psyche. There is no justification for it and she will never be beholden to give him a chance after it.

And hey, I don't think Xie Wei should have a chance with her either. He assisted her her torture just as much as Yan Lin, but this author loves giving her FL's abusers the limelight and ignore her trauma, so what can I do.

new ZLH x WXY ship 🤣

Oh I really want to see more of dark, sexy, somewhat evil empress JXN flirting with mr justice ZZ and making him hers haha

I mean, it's true that there was a lot more gravity given to them in the novel, but, you can see all the clues straight away and infer it from the drama if you pay attention too. In the moment before her death, she mentions how she has done many misdeeds and been reviled by others, but she doesn't owe them anything because they had all hurt her or hurt her back in some way or another. However, only ZZ had never harmed her and instead helped her at cost to herself.

At that point in time, we see that she had been imprisoned in the palace by XW. We see her frightened and pretending to be asleep as YL is in her chamber and taunting her by her bed. We have enough context clues to see how she was alone, vulnerable, and in pain because of those two, so instantly when she comes back to the present, we also know that she will hold reservations against them. We also can easily see how determined she is to be a better person in this life and change her fate; this motivation is brought back and tied to stemming from ZZ over and over.

In the drama, the encounter after ZZ helps her with the empress dowager, JXN tells ZZ that she is extremely afraid of pain and death, and if you look at ZZ, who has his back turned, his expression frozen at that moment. He stops in his tracks. Because he knows that despite that fear, she...the so called "selfish, evil empress," still overcame it for his sake, to save him. That's HUGE.

You can see it in their small gestures and involuntary actions when they see each other. They might not say much but their actions speak. Like how JXN is baring her teeth when she's facing the dowager, but as soon as ZZ comes, you can see her guard totally relax. She goes from attack mode to not being able to take her eyes off ZZ and even becomes clumsy. She's only able to be like that because of her trust in ZZ and how safe she feels with him around.

You can see it with how ZZ doesn't say much but his body seems to betray him. When ZZ stumbles in front of the dowager, he instantly reacts to hold her up even though his mind understands that's not the best move logically. When she stumbles in the rain, he reaches out a hand like he wants to help her even though they're separated by a whole street. He's basically unconsciously constantly reaching for her even when he tries to keep a respectable distance.

I mean, there's so much more and I could go on and on with just the drama alone, because there's SO much subtext in their interactions and body language around each other, but I don't want to write a novel over here. Just because it's subtle and may not be to everyone's taste, doesn't mean it's illogical or comes from nowhere.

Oh, I agree with you completely about XL. Even when XL was so called "evil," he was never really cruel in the twisted, misogynistic, obsessed way XW and YL were. When he treated FL harshly, it was when he thought of her as his soldier and treated her accordingly. Once he actually cared for her, his actions SHOWED that, and he never put his own desire for her over HER happiness. He instead helped her even if it meant injuring himself. That's what I call true love. I definitely think ZZ has resemblances to that. They were both wholehearted in their love.

yeah ancient chinese novels are my crack and I must have scrambled my brain reading so many of them with MTL but it's worth it for me at least, nothing else quite like it

In her past life, JXN didn't pursue love but power and status, so ofc she didn't care about YL's love and could throw it away even if she came to regret it later. In her second life, she had already experienced (TW ) being raped and tortured by YL, so although she still regrets what she did to him in her last life and wants him to be happy, just because her trauma now exists in another timeline, doesn't mean she doesn't have those memories with her. Imo, the story actually pretty much ignores the trauma of her SA and skims over it in an unrealistic way. Why would she beg him for mercy in this life when those memories are still there with her?

Like she says before she died, she did terrible things to people and they did even more terrible things to her back. YL had already gotten his revenge on JXN in the past life so there was no turning back after that. Of course she won't chase after the people who made her life hell, even if she regrets treating them badly, and instead chase after the person who gave her life warmth.

tbh you might want to try copy pasting the text into chat gpt and translating it that way. i've found those translations to be better than normal MTL

he is basically the entire reason she even gets a second chance and tries to change herself and her fate in this life. without him, there would be no rebirth or changed JXN, so it makes sense that he is crucial to her storyline.

well now that I'm seeing this i can't lie.... ZZ and XW have the kinda animosity that could go either way if you know what I mean.... 🤣

in this drama, there's an option that has both: both the one she loves and the one who loves her, so no need to choose! I wish that JXN could have followed her heart and been with the person she loved and who loved her for both lifetimes, but from a doylist perspective, the author doomed them to have no chance.

This is just a story after all, but in real life, girls, don't settle.

link pls sounds funny

This scene with Yan Lin imo is probably one of the best emotional scenes so far

https://www.tumblr.com/dangermousie/733979594974248960/seriously-i-love-how-this-is-a-break-up-can-you?source=share

I don't like YL in the last life at all but in this second life I have to admit he's grown on me. The actor is doing a good job.