(CR) Kusuriya no Hitorigoto (The Apothecary Diaries)

[Frontier]

Originally Posted by ryllharu

It's a bit of an establishing episode under the pretext of showing the audience Lihaku's character. We know he's trustworthy and honorable now, without ambiguity.

We're seeing that after the previous incidents all coming together, Jinshi is testing to see if people orbiting Maomao are actually trustworthy, while also doing his actual job as a bonus for snooping around. If Lihaku took the loan, he probably would have been expelled from imperial service on the spot. Having someone buy your wife for you puts you in debt to them, and someone who would do so is a liability to the Courts.

What Maomao kept to herself is that Lihaku didn't even need the amount of money to begin with. Pairin can probably buy out herself at any time. Same with the other two princesses. They seem to make a lot more money than any other courtesan in the entire district by a wide margin, and the old hag treats them like family more than her other charges. Pairin is just waiting for someone who can satisfy her needs and also fulfill her fantasy of being carried out like a princess. She'll waive the rest of the fee or convince the old hag to take it by whining and crying.

And Maomao is also helping out the people she likes in the inner palace. There's been a lot of turnover lately, and new faces are a threat. Keeping the otherwise worthless quack's family providing most of the paper to the court means a family or group less trustworthy won't have an opportunity to slip in. Plus, he lets her do whatever she wants in the inner court's apothecary office.

Also Lihaku is connected to Lakan, so that's probably another reason for Jinshi to be interested in him.

[Anh_Minh]

I do wonder what Jinshi would have done if Lihaku had taken the deal. Maybe he'd have forked over the cash, but seen to it Lihaku never met Mao Mao again. Or maybe he'd have made Lihaku put in a good word for him, not that Lihaku would be able to subtly play wingman for him.

[Frontier]

Originally Posted by Anh_Minh

I do wonder what Jinshi would have done if Lihaku had taken the deal. Maybe he'd have forked over the cash, but seen to it Lihaku never met Mao Mao again. Or maybe he'd have made Lihaku put in a good word for him, not that Lihaku would be able to subtly play wingman for him.

I mean, either way he knows he doesn't have to worry about Lihaku around Maomao ever again .

[Frontier]

Gyokuyou is pregnant! Congratulations! Her daughter is now going to be a big sister! It's enough to even make Hongniang think about settle down! Though she's got enough on her plate making sure Auntie Maomao doesn't make Gyokuyou's daughter think of nothing but poison .

Lakan is up to his old tricks and trying to make blue roses happen at the next garden party, and Jinshi can't refuse him...and loses a lot of sleep over it. Though Maomao is happy to take the challenge and show up her biological father .

Nice to see Lihua again and her letting Maomao use the steam room, with the added perk of getting to read up on the emperor's favorite book to catch his attention .

Xiaolan returns! All is right with the world! And you can tell Maomao really is happy to see her because she blushes and uses her genuine smile .

Maomao puts in a lot of work to make flowers bloom early, fighting the weather and sleepless night after sleepless night, all the while giving Xiaolan a manicure in the process and popularizing it in court...and her efforts pay off !

Loulan makes her debut at the latest garden party, and her dad is voiced by Cho, but it's Jinshi who makes an impact by bringing in the colored roses...though while Jinshi is used to people looking at him with envy and wariness, he doesn't know what to make of Shishou and his daughter .

So Maomao just dyed the flower, which is probably what someone (likely Lakan) colored the roses for back in the day. And now the Emperor knows the secret !

But Maomao isn't done with her plan to challenge Lakan...Lakan sees the world only as go pieces, pawns he can move around as he sees fit, but one thing that stands out to him is none other than his daughter...with the same color nails as her mother .

[Thor's Hammer]

So it appears Lakan likely had a motive to have blue roses prepared for the Garden Party. It was to upstage Loulan and Shishou, Loulan's father, who was favoured by the previous Emperess Dowager, who likely wanted revenge on Jinshi for being swapped at birth, which led to the Empress Dowager's son dying. Lakan 99.9% knows that Loulan and Shishou were in league with Suirei and had Maomao prepare the roses to reduce Shishou's influence.

[Kanon]

We finally learned more about Lakan. I'm not sure if he suffers from severe face blindness or it was just portrayed that way to reflect how he thinks of other people as just paws/pieces. Maomao has decided she's had enough of avoiding him and to take the fight to him. It looks like the story of what happened between her parents will be revealed next week at last.

[Wandering Soul]

Looks like we're finally about to find out how things went down between her parents and get a a full explanation for the state of Lakan's and Maomao's relationship.

I'm surprised the concept of a manicure wasn't known around the court before Maomao introduced it.

[grecefar]

huh, I didn't expect maomao to face lakan in the end like that. She did say not wanting to run away anymore but I was thinking more on doing something against him to stick it to him.

man, there is nothing maomao can't do. She is a genius ahead of her time.

[Nachtwandler]

Originally Posted by Kanon

We finally learned more about Lakan. I'm not sure if he suffers from severe face blindness or it was just portrayed that way to reflect how he thinks of other people as just paws/pieces. Maomao has decided she's had enough of avoiding him and to take the fight to him. It looks like the story of what happened between her parents will be revealed next week at last.

Regarding Lakan, it is both. It should be explained more in details next week.

[Frontier]

Originally Posted by Kanon

We finally learned more about Lakan. I'm not sure if he suffers from severe face blindness or it was just portrayed that way to reflect how he thinks of other people as just paws/pieces. Maomao has decided she's had enough of avoiding him and to take the fight to him. It looks like the story of what happened between her parents will be revealed next week at last.

I think it's definitely noticeable that Maomao is the only person whose face he sees.

[Decel]

It felt like Lihua and Xiaolan's voices seemed to have changed. I had to go back to check. Maybe the VAs didn't use these voices in so long they were slightly off in tone

[ryllharu]

Originally Posted by Decel

It felt like Lihua and Xiaolan's voices seemed to have changed. I had to go back to check. Maybe the VAs didn't use these voices in so long they were slightly off in tone

The last times we saw Lihua, she was either dying or aroused. I think it was pretty consistent with the way Ishikawa Yui played her after she recovered. Lihua is a gentle and more mature concubine, so it tracks.

As for Xiaolan, I agree, but for a different reason. Kuno Misaki's voice has been narrowing in the last year or so. She doesn't seem to be able to do the kindergarten or elementary-school age voices anymore without her voice breaking or going shrill. It's audible in the majority of her active roles and many of her recurring roles don't sound quite right anymore. On the other hand, when she does more mature voices like Kurumi in Lycoris Recoil, she sounds fine. Thankfully, Xiaolan is growing up and in her early teens, so she's been playing her more that way from the start. There has been some scattered reports that she damaged her vocal cords in some strained recordings in the last year or so, which would track.

[Anh_Minh]

Originally Posted by Thor's Hammer

So it appears Lakan likely had a motive to have blue roses prepared for the Garden Party. It was to upstage Loulan and Shishou, Loulan's father, who was favoured by the previous Emperess Dowager, who likely wanted revenge on Jinshi for being swapped at birth, which led to the Empress Dowager's son dying. Lakan 99.9% knows that Loulan and Shishou were in league with Suirei and had Maomao prepare the roses to reduce Shishou's influence.

I think you're mixing up dowagers. Shishou was a favorite of the previous Empress Dowager - the current Emperor's late grandmother. Jinshi was swapped with the son of the current Empress Dowager, the current Emperor's mother, who's still alive and, as far as we know, doesn't have anywhere near the power her mother-in-law had.

Also, the roses were a fun conversation piece, but I doubt they did anything to Shishou's influence one way or the other.

[Thor's Hammer]

Originally Posted by Anh_Minh

I think you're mixing up dowagers. Shishou was a favorite of the previous Empress Dowager - the current Emperor's late grandmother. Jinshi was swapped with the son of the current Empress Dowager, the current Emperor's mother, who's still alive and, as far as we know, doesn't have anywhere near the power her mother-in-law had.

Also, the roses were a fun conversation piece, but I doubt they did anything to Shishou's influence one way or the other.

What I meant was that Lakan intended to provoke Shishou and Loulan into lashing out over the presence of the blue roses. That's why Lakan said that his provokation failed since neither Shishou nor Loulan reacted to it. Lakan very much wanted Shishou and Loulan to lose face over it, but he couldn't because they didn't take the bait.

[Tenzen12]

It's not out of question I guess, but Lakan seems to provoke Jinshi on regular basis for while. Asking him for impossible is quite in line with that. Also It doesn't seem blue roses hold any deep symbolic meaning for anyone but Lakan himself and even that's questionable.

[Twi]

Wasn't it because Blue Roses aren't natural and thus unless you pull the stunt Maomao did you wouldn't be able to do it?

[Kanon]

Originally Posted by Tenzen12

It's not out of question I guess, but Lakan seems to provoke Jinshi on regular basis for while. Asking him for impossible is quite in line with that. Also It doesn't seem blue roses hold any deep symbolic meaning for anyone but Lakan himself and even that's questionable.

I thought he was referring to Jinshi when he said his provocation didn't work too. He's been harassing him for a while because he's not happy he bought his daughter.

That said, it doesn't make much sense when I think about it because Jinshi fell for it hook, line, and sinker.

[Tenzen12]

I don't think that's true if Lakan expected Jinshi take bait and fail in obtaining blue roses as they don't actually exist naturaly (and wouldn't bloom even if they did), but Jinshi (well, Maomao) seen through his provocation and actually beat him in his own game.

[Thor's Hammer]

I don't know why you insist on believing that Lakan was provoking Jinshi when that garden party was meant to be Loulan's first public appearance, so if he was attempting to provoke anybody, it'd be Shishou and/or Loulan herself given how multiple people were surprised at the presence of blue roses at the garden party due to them being unnatural, which took away from Loulan's debut appearance. Lakan just forced Jinshi to add acquiring blue roses as part of his duties knowing that Maomao would be the one to do the heavy lifting, and thus, gain more favour with the Emperor. Just like with the Suirei murder case, Lakan had complete faith im his daughter.

[Tenzen12]

I have to ask same thing. Why are you insist he is trying provoke someone else when he keeps harassing since beginning of new cour? Especially as he was EXPLICITLY annoyed seeing blue roses on venue. That hardly spells "complete faith"

If his target was only someone of Loulan and Shishou level someone as cunning as Lakan wouldn't fail.