A Minister Beneath Her Skirts [Historical Romance]

[Powerful Grand Princess who rules the court x Taciturn, obsessive shadow guard]

The year I took control of the court, my younger brother sent me a guard.

I shouldn't have accepted him, but he looked too much like someone I once knew.

So I made an exception and promoted him to my personal shadow guard, giving him the name A Jing.

Over the next two years, crises plagued the court and palace. A Jing took three blades and four swords for me, and a scar was left at the corner of his eye.

He knelt in my bedchamber, begging me to allow him to join the army on campaign.

I looked quietly at the scar by his eye and gave my permission.

Later, great upheaval came to the palace. I was so busy I could barely keep up, and somehow got married along the way.

My consort was named Rong Jing.

Before the candles could even be lit for our wedding night, urgent news arrived from the border: three hundred thousand rebels were closing in, led by a general with a scar at the corner of his eye.

As the rebel army attacked the city, I accidentally fell off a cliff and lost my memory.

A general found me and took me home.

He said he was my husband, named A Jing.

Later, the general became emperor.

At the empress's investiture ceremony, I suddenly remembered: I already had a husband. His features were flawless as jade, and he had no scar at the corner of his eye.

-

The ministers of the Yu Kingdom had never seen the new emperor's empress. They heard she lived in a golden tower deep within the palace, and only the emperor was allowed to come and go.

But one day, the woman in the golden tower disappeared, and the emperor went mad searching for her.

Just then, the neighboring country put an end to its civil unrest and held a feast, inviting the world.

The Grand Princess ascended the throne as emperor, and her consort was named A Jing.

"I cannot have both the throne and you. Besides, what I wanted from the very beginning was never you."

--The Grand Princess

Male substitute trope + the pursuit-after-a-breakup trope

The heroine is beautiful and ruthless. The hero suffers physically and emotionally, and becomes the other man for love.

The main story is told in third person.

Theme: A roundabout path can also be a strategy.