Historically, why did Li Zhi have a crush on the mediocre-looking Wu Zetian? The answer is unspeakable!
The Tang Dynasty was the most open-minded dynasty in Chinese history, and because of the deep influence of the Xianbei culture, many things happened in the Tang Dynasty that were not accepted by our current moral concepts, including Li Zhi's marriage to Li Shimin's talent wu Zetian. The reason why Li Zhi likes Wu Zetian, I think there are two main reasons that play an important role, and then we will briefly look at these 2 key reasons.
Wu Zetian's appearance is not prominent, although it is because of a bit of posture to enter the palace, but it does not bring a sense of crisis to Empress Wang, and it is certainly not beautiful, at least it is not ranked in the harem, and it is even more incomparable with Li Zhi's favored Concubine Xiao Shufei - so the old king lures the wolf into the room and jointly deals with this little sheep. In fact, the biggest feature of Wu Zetian is not beautiful, but based on the "flattery" of personality, good at greeting, good at performance.
Approaching Li Zhi, she had been planning for a long time. Li Zhi is not an old man like Li Shimin. At the same time, Li Zhi, as a prince, did not have many women. Therefore, Wu Zetian had considerable self-confidence in front of Li Zhi. As soon as a woman is confident, her charm can be fully displayed. Coupled with her proactive display in front of Li Zhi, it was easy for Li Zhi, who was not deeply involved in the world, to fall into the hands of such a mature young woman as her.
After Wu Zetian returned to the palace, he immediately exerted his scheming expertise, not only was not used by Empress Wang, but quickly gained the favor of Emperor Gaozong, and Empress Wang and Concubine Xiao Shufei both stood on the sidelines and achieved a successful counterattack. Then there is the familiar story that Wu Zetian exterminated Empress Wang and Concubine Xiao Shu, and favored the harem until he came to the court with Emperor Gaozong and was called the Second Saint. After Emperor Gaozong's death, he first became the empress dowager to control the imperial court, and then simply deposed his son and became the only female emperor in Chinese history.