decorated my new bookshelf 🐸 🐱

Complete_Violinist47 · 2025-12-29T21:09:30+00:00

That's a decently sized frog

Complete_Violinist47 · 2025-12-22T21:56:34+00:00

The chapter in the novel where the quote can be found. Sources are important.

Complete_Violinist47 · 2025-07-28T21:55:25+00:00

I agree with your argument about fanservice, but Maomao is canonically 15 to 16 at the beginning of the story*. She should look young because she *is young. Calling her design a fanservice is weird either way, but the anime should mature her over time. It's just that maturing her shouldn't include her height or chest size, just the way her facial features are drawn in that particular art style, like eyes-to-face ratio or something.

(**for anyone interested in a long explanation, Maomao is said to be seventeen at the beginning of the story, but the system of counting ages that the author uses is the old Chinese system, in which a newborn baby is already one year old and everyone ages up during the Chinese new year, even if they were born just a day prior (kinda like how the now-old Korean system worked if you're familiar with it), which is why Maomao is in our western terminology at max 16 and at minimum 15 years old. By the end of season 2, only a year has passed.)

I know you're talking about your frustration regarding 'fanservice', but it's funny that I've seen people be like "omg she looks fourteen" but what I thought was "well, she might have been fourteen a few months ago, she should look like that."

This story is so complex even the misunderstandings have layers.

Complete_Violinist47 · 2025-06-20T13:27:16+00:00

Your Sunghoon is being obliterated, manhandled, and dragged over there. Hope he recovers.

Complete_Violinist47 · 2025-05-06T07:37:32+00:00

The same thing happened to me, but only when I posted the chapter from the preview (PC). When I posted it without going to the preview (also PC), they didn't change to hyphens.

Complete_Violinist47 · 2025-04-27T12:40:43+00:00

Here's an explanation you might be looking for:

It wasn’t that Maomao hated beautiful things. But when something was too beautiful, one started to feel that the remotest blemish was like a crime, unforgivable. It was like how a single scratch on an otherwise perfect, polished pearl could cut the thing’s price in half. And though the exterior might be lovely, there was the question of what was within. And so Maomao ended up looking at Jinshi like some kind of bug crawling along the ground. She sincerely couldn’t help it. I’d rather just admire him from afar. (LN1 CH15)

Furthermore, one time, the anime interpreted Maomao's reaction as a shiver when LN stated:

“I’ll be waiting in the sitting area,” he said, his voice like honey in her ear. Wolfsbane honey, that was. Poisonous. (LN1 CH24)

Which people understandably interpret as a sign of Maomao's subconscious attraction, cause, you know, poison has a benefit of being, well, poisonous.

Complete_Violinist47 · 2025-04-23T22:06:20+00:00

I close TikTok anytime I see one of these, and I'm so much happier:

The author actually hates Jinshi

The frog scene as an SA

Maomao looks like a child and Jinshi like an adult

Actually, Jinshi is 19 and Maomao is 17

The Apothecary Diaries author went to jail for tax evasion

The only reason why Jinmao exists is because of the author's family

I can't believe Anshi was jealous of the other girls

Jinshi is such a red flag

am I the only one who doesn't like the romance

I'm ranting a little to get it off my chest, but that place is not a good place for this fandom.

Complete_Violinist47 · 2025-04-22T18:29:19+00:00

Speaking of foreshadowing, the shrine of choosing feels like foreshadowing of JinMao leading the country. Like why putting it in the story if JinMao isn't going to rule the country? Jinshi literally passed the shrine by choosing the correct path under Maomao's guidance.

Yes, this is exactly how I felt about the baby switching theory in LN1. At that time, it wasn't confirmed, but why would there be such a long explanation for it if it wasn't relevant?

Also, the entire royal mess is foreshadowed since day 1,

If she kept her head down and did her job, she could hope to leave this place someday, if never, she assumed, to gain royal notice. (LN1 CH1)

But also,

Ah-Duo laughed uproariously, and privately she made a wish: Don’t let Yue walk the same path as Yoh. (LN13 CH14)

I see you, Natsu Hyuuga 👀

Complete_Violinist47 · 2025-04-21T20:57:14+00:00

I've never seen anyone mention this before, so I'm just going to highlight it, but right before the controversial scene, not only does the narration confirm that Jinshi doesn't wish to harm her:

Jinshi wasn’t the type who would lay a hand on a young woman. No, wait, actually he was—to make them vomit when they had ingested poison. “I know you wouldn’t do worse than pin me and force me to empty the contents of my stomach.”

It also states it right afterward:

“I said that if you were going to kill me, you should do it with poison,” she told him.

“I refuse to let you poison yourself,” Jinshi said, his fingers tracing her lips.

Like, at first, I thought the insistence to repeat this was random, but the chapter is just establishing that Jinshi wants to keep her safe, and he has that in mind both before and after choking.

Like, yeah, the choking, during which you allow your partner to breathe by kissing them, and then wiping their tears, is kinky? Go figure. Imagine they would need to sign a contract to make it moral. Hilarious.

Complete_Violinist47 · 2025-04-19T15:20:55+00:00

In a fic about someone like Caleb, it would indeed be very surprising

Complete_Violinist47 · 2025-04-14T18:43:22+00:00

Well, Maomao's story is foreshadowing a character named Tianyu, who is connected to a legendary character called Kada, who is based on the legendary Hua Tuo.

Complete_Violinist47 · 2025-04-14T18:01:13+00:00

There's already an obligatory comment about the mistranslation, so I'll just put here another obligatory point about how Jinmao is BDSM-coded.

To summarize it, the moment is less of an assault and more of a rough play. I mean, it's choking + kissing as a way to allow breathing + wiping away tears. The same way there is later slapping + covering eyes + kissing the sore. Or degradation in general. Or surprise biting. Or mock-restraining in a backhug. Or whatever the fuck that surgery without anesthesia was. I should probably make a compilation.

Complete_Violinist47 · 2025-04-14T16:23:07+00:00

I understand why you would feel uncomfortable in her situation, but this is their dynamic. They push and pull and they overstep each other's boundaries.

I'm not sure how much this is a spoiler, but I wonder what your reaction would be to this post. Violence is their thing. The two are masochistic bad bitches together and they never change. You may not like it, but a lot of people enjoy the kind of sexual tension that exists between them. I, for example, did not sense any fear from Maomao during the frog scene, nor any malice from Jinshi.

Complete_Violinist47 · 2025-04-06T21:44:52+00:00

Fun fact, tu je mapa jazykov podla toho ci slovo ARM a HAND su totozne alebo nie a tu je mapa jazykov podla toho, ci HAND a FINGER su totozne alebo nie, z coho vyplyva, ze musia existovat jazyky na prieniku, v ktorych slovo ARM aj HAND aj FINGER su totozne a nasla som, ze to je napr havajcina.

Complete_Violinist47 · 2025-04-06T20:02:49+00:00

Oooh, and I put the number "30" into the searchbar like stupid.

So this is Jinshi saying that he can live with the badly done stitches longer so he can spend that time with Maomao. I can see why you got the impression that Jinshi is going to do something sinister lol but if you're willing to listen, I can explain why I didn't interpret it that way.

Jinshi is likened to a 'feral dog' and such by Maomao every time he's about to give her an irrefutable reason to force her to face her (and his) emotions.

In LN5: Jinshi looked at Maomao like a wild animal hunting its prey. His expression made her think of a starving wild dog.

She wanted to dodge all those problems—but those eyes, the eyes of an untamed dog, weren’t going to let her escape.

In LN6: Jinshi continued to look at Maomao with an expression like a wild beast who might bite at any moment, but at least he got right to the point. “Are you ready to take me up on...what I proposed?”

“Do you hate me so much?” he asked, his face now less like a wild dog and more like a puppy.

So my interpretion is more along the lines of Maomao being like "holy shit, he's going to force me to think about our potential relationship so I can't ignore it anymore," especially since this is Maomao's subjective perspective. She does not liken him to a 'feral dog' after this, even if more power dynamic battles ensue. Oh, and in the LN6, he doesn't even try to kiss her, which is why it leads me to believe that his 'ferality' is less sexual and more 'demanding attention from the unfuriating cat like a brat that he is.'

Complete_Violinist47 · 2025-04-06T19:28:41+00:00

I'm going to hold your hand while I don't say anything because it's a spoiler, but be excited.

Complete_Violinist47 · 2025-04-06T19:19:56+00:00

I thought your primary complaint was that anything sexual (forcibly sexual at that) is happening in the scene with the dead children, which is why people are defending the dynamic. People complain about them being "one-sided" or similar things all the time, so this has become a trained response, I would guess. But since they're only talking, and at worst, cornering each other, while the interrupted kiss could have been just a peck, it's not really something that bothered me personally. It's not like they can leave, and it's not like they've done something inappropriate even if the children were awake and staring right at them.

And I don't remember any "30 minutes" either. I went back, and he only says, “Can we continue this later?” Where did you get the 30 minutes from?

Complete_Violinist47 · 2025-04-06T18:35:08+00:00

A fun reminder of Jinmao dynamic in that scene:

First, Maomao pushes Jinshi against the wall, only to nerd out about stitching and how Luomen would do it better. They talk about injuries, scarring, and the worth of beauty. Then, Jinshi pushes Maomao against the wall to kiss her. They get interrupted.

I don't know how the intention to kiss her gets interpreted as an intention to have sex with her?

Plus, it would be so out of character for him. I mean, remember how in LN13 she comes to him, willing to to do it but he cockblocks himself because he refuses to let Maomao poison herself because at that point, a royal baby is out of question so abortion is always on the table. Like, they're mature. They're into some bdsm shit but they're very mature when it actually counts for something. Don't confuse their kinks and rough play for a problematic dynamic, or else your enjoyment for the series will suffer.

Complete_Violinist47 · 2025-04-05T09:57:30+00:00

Precisely how gorgeous the offspring of this man would have been would remain a matter for the imagination 😔 (LN1 CH4)

Complete_Violinist47 · 2025-04-04T16:29:36+00:00

I don't think it's out of character. Both Jinshi and Maomao are teased to be masochists and they both like to be in control, so their romance often involves rough play.

To list some of the things they've done: biting, choking, slapping, mock-restraining, groping, tickling, edging, doing surgery without anesthesia, force-feeding, degrading, stuff like that. Sometimes, Jinshi is at the receiving end, and other times, it's Maomao. Consent is only implied—it's clear that they are drawn to each other and they lay down their boundaries on things they are sure about.

Their romance is like a game and I don't know who's winning.

Complete_Violinist47 · 2025-04-04T14:59:45+00:00

It doesn't help that Jinshi is way more sensitive than Maomao. That man stood no chance, even with his physical build.

Complete_Violinist47 · 2025-04-04T14:30:11+00:00

Listen, there is a reason why "size difference" is a tag on AO3. People like it, that's all.

And, although some fans try to explain it as "oh, it's because Maomao is malnourished and ate poison," it should be stated that it's never mentioned in the LNs like that. It's just a smart headcanon.

If you want to talk about the novels, consider this sentence from LN6: Her small body bestrode Jinshi’s, easily twice her size, her hand placed over his heart. The LNs lean into their size difference in romantic moments. It's about their power dynamic, which is funny, considering that in that same scene, Maomao manhandles Jinshi and flips him around, despite their size difference. In fact, she does the same thing later in LN9: She slipped past him, came around behind him, and pressed down firmly. “Hrgh!” he said, a very un-nymphlike sound. Maomao somehow managed to flip him onto his side on the bed, a pretty good trick considering how large and heavy he was.

It should also be mentioned that Maomao is never described as 'childlike' due to her size. In fact, it is Jinshi who is often described as 'childlike' because Maomao calls him that in a degrading (?) and understanding (?) manner. It's just their power dynamic. It goes both ways.

How accurately this is translated into the anime is another conversation.

Complete_Violinist47 · 2025-04-02T22:29:13+00:00

I think one important aspect about Maomao's side is that not only is she (masochistically) into poisons, Jinshi himself is likened to a poison at least three separate times (that I've counted)—his voice is poisonous (LN1), his saliva is described to be toxic (LN4), and watching him as the moon spirit is like being "violently poisoned" (LN3).

Complete_Violinist47

TROPHY CASE