The drama tells the love story of a General and Lady Lieutenant who, despite being part of different armies, fall in love. Both of them have hidden identities, him being the Emperor’s grandson and her being the daughter of the commander. Though walking on different paths, their goal of restoring peace in the court is the same.

The love story (which for me is the best part of the drama) is the main focus and the war is a subplot. The romance is Mr. & Mrs. Smith merged with Romeo & Juliette vibes.

WHAT WENT WRONG FOR ME:
I enjoyed the drama very much until the last 9 episodes. Episode 30 is the most intense and impressive episode in the whole drama (and generally in cdramas) so I feel it should have been the final conflict in order to make the drama more impactful for me. The writers could have put 1-2 episodes afterwards to wrap up the story like they did in episode 40. However instead of that the plot was dragged with unnecessary and pointless drama that added absolutely nothing to the story. Boring villains that nobody cared about were introduced and the actual final fight scene was extremely underwhelming (like watching a child’s play in comparison to episode 30 fight scene). I never felt like the stakes were high in the final conflict thus had no emotional reaction when the bad guys were defeated.

POSITIVE:
- Hot chemistry between the main leads!!! Their chemistry felt natural and organic, like the actors were indeed a couple in real life.
- Xu Kai (male lead) is brilliant. Seriously, even just for him it’s worth watching this.
- Feels like a high budget production. Cinematography is movie-like with beautiful visuals.
- Fantastic cast. I loved all the actors and their performances, especially the main leads.
- Realistic war/fight scenes that were done really well.
- Smart and cunning female lead.
- The whole final episode is seeing the main leads happy together which was super satisfying to watch especially as it’s rare in cdramas these days who love their open endings or 2 second reunions.

NEGATIVE:
- Annoying second male lead and second female lead with the cliche and extremely overused unrequited, obsessive love plotline that needs to be banned in cdramas for real. It added nothing to the story.
- A lot of back and forth and repetition in terms of plot. The female lead was always getting kidnapped, someone was always getting poisoned or there was always an ambush.
- Filler episodes. Throughout the drama, there would always be 1-2 episodes that literally felt like fillers in between great episodes.
- As mentioned above, the last 9 episodes (final conflict) were extremely pointless and underwhelming to watch.

OVERALL:
Watch this if you love a couple who tries to kill each other one moment but the next are passionately kissing.