tl;dr
Beautiful artwork, and an intriguing setup for a series about palace drama.

Thoughts
First off - yes the art really is that good throughout. Delicate lines, nice tones, and gorgeous large panels are the order of the day, making this a very pleasing manga to look at. Which is good, because the story can get pretty dark in some places. It's got all the messy political stuff one would expect from a story where a child plucked from the streets suddenly has to pose as royalty. Nina is a great lead, refusing to be a doormat for someone else's politics, but also canny enough to play things smart. Azure is an interesting foil, someone else also trapped by the cards dealt to them, but he keeps his reasons close, and I'm curious to learn more about his motives and plans as the series continues. We have yet to meet the final piece of our lead trio in this volume, but the two leads so far are great to read, and I'm curious to know what happens next.

Thanks to NetGalley and Kodansha for the review copy. All thoughts in this review are my own!