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| “ | If I should die, I'd want to die of poison. | ” |
–Maomao, Light Novel | ||
Maomao (
Appearance[]
Maomao's Anime Design
Maomao's 2nd Anime Design
Maomao is a young girl who stands relatively short in height and possesses a petite frame. She has dark forest green hair (that's typically tied up and sectioned with a light blue ribbon that holds a portion of her hair back. Whereas two strands of hair can be seen framing her face and are adorned with 2 beads each; the top one being red and the bottom one being sky blue.) and blue eyes.
The bandage wrap seen on her left forearm hides the number of self-inflicted scars from where she had tested upon herself when experimenting with remedies and poisons.
Her main outfit consists of an aoqun hanfu with a light green top and a long, burgundy skirt. The inner robe in her top is white, while the collar of her light green robe is both pale and dark green. She also wears a pair of dark green flats to accompany this outfit. In essence of her usual wear, Maomao prefers to wear more simple and practical garments and will otherwise avoid wearing elaborate outfits and makeup unless the opportunity for her to do so arises, giving those the impression she dresses rather plainly. Despite avoiding makeup, she'd frequently paint freckles using clay around the bridge of her nose.[4]
On the occasions where Maomao would dress up, she is considered to be quite attractive, if less endowed, by many when effort is given. Something that usually leaves most people to fail in recognizing her as the same person entirely.[5]
Despite wearing an impassive expression on her face, she can radiate with heightened excitement whenever she is able to taste and or experiment with poison, rare ingredients, or medicines.
Personality[]
Maomao is a very pragmatic and knowledgeable individual who is well aware of her position in the world as someone with no status and that she could be considered expendable at a moment's notice. While she has an intense curiosity and a sense of justice, she prefers to not get involved with the more dramatic parts of the royal court recognizing that it could easily prove more trouble than it's worth, though she is often dragged in regardless either from her own curiosity or a demand from someone above her station.
She is also an extremely detached individual who avoids making any sort of close connection or deep attachment with the only exception being her adoptive father, Luomen. She refuses to accept that she is highly favored within the Inner Court, or utilize any special treatment those in power are happy to have extend to her for all her accomplishments. She maintains a firm wall between those around her, refusing to reciprocate any attempts of people trying to get close to her. She even appears to prefer having transactional relationships rather than those built on kindness. She has a habit of forcing herself to not notice or acknowledge, as well as withhold information of realizations significant events she has witnessed as a form of self preservation such as Lishu's harassment by her maids, or that Jinshi is not in fact the Emperor's brother, but is in fact his son by Ah-Duo, as she is well aware that her commoner status means that she is easily expendable if it means to protect a noble. She also is aware her words could get people killed, a burden she doesn't want to bear. She is particularly stubborn in her willful denial about people's obvious sincere concern and affection for her be it professional, platonic, or romantic. She most notably is Jinshi's clear romantic affection for her (though it more accurate to say she is aware but doesn't want to acknowledge due to inevitable trouble it will cause) and has even tried to run away at times when she is forced to confront it. She finds the idea of romantic dreams foolish and silly as they are likely to lead to someone's ruin rather than happiness. Her cynicism towards romance is likely due to her time growing up in the red-light district.
Maomao shares her father's side of the family's unique traits of having an astounding intellect in a specific, but odd personality.
A large part of her perspective and hesitancy towards accepting kindness and forming relationships is due to being raised in the red-light district where she never received true unconditional love, as well as the knowledge that someone sincerely loving you doesn't ensure they won't toss away if it's necessary in her world. While she was well-loved by what she considers to be "older sisters" who work in the brothel (known as the Three Princesses of the Verdigris House: Pairin, Meimei, and Joka) she nevertheless, she came second to their job. Even "Madam" or "granny," as Maomao refers to her as, had no qualms about trying to force her into becoming a courtesan, despite being incredibly fond of the girl. As a baby, her cries would not be answered until her sisters completed their work for the day, so she eventually stopped crying and asking for help.[6] She herself has stated she does not believe she has the capacity to love somebody or let them get close to her.
Her intense pragmatism is a likely response to the trauma of the being raised red light district which she was raised in. While she is fond of pleasure district and her odd family, the red light district gave her a skewed, though fairly accurate, view of relationships in the world as she spent her life watching courtesans be madly in love with their clients only to cast them aside when they ran out of funds. She would often see courtesans being promised the world by clients only for it to end in lies, people being sold as property, the perverse horror of cheaper brothels, numerous rapes and murder, and how even well liked courtesans that would bring in a fortune and put a brothel on the map would be tossed out back to be a common prostitute the second they lost their value.
Her negative opinion of love and relationships as well as hesitancy to hope for something more lest she be hurt if it fails is heavily influenced by her mother Fengxian; her mother had intentionally conceived Maomao with the patron she was in love with in order to bring her price down to one he could afford. However, he (seemingly) abandoned her and it forced Fengxian to work on the street for the lowest paying patrons, which led to her getting syphilis.[7] As a result she took her anger and frustration out on Maomao, which only got worse as the syphilis ravaged her brain. She even went so far as to cut her pinky off. Maomao came to view her mother as stupid and foolish for her actions. This presented her with the harsh reality of how expendable people can be and how even being loved doesn't guarantee your safety. Maomao was also charged by the Madam for taking care of her, while her mother wasted away in a back room, and this was considered downright saintly behavior of the old lady by pleasure district standards. This likely is what caused Maomao's aloofness-to-a-fault personality and resistance to forming relationships as a defense mechanism to protect herself from the (unfortunately high) possibility that despite being close confidants and friends, the Inner Court would throw her out if not kill her for something as small as being associated with the wrong person.
Having been raised by the esteemed apothecary Luomen, Maomao is fascinated by poison and herbs that she has a habit of experimenting with them to observe their effects, primarily on her own body. Due to her passionate love of poisons and her enjoyment when consuming them, she is considered strange, creepy, or obsessed by many characters in the series — a trait she shares with many other members of the eccentric and uniquely talented La Clan. This obsession is a major motivation for her actions throughout the series, as Jinshi learns to bait her to solve court mysteries with the promise of giving her rare medicines.
Maomao's approach to life is very practical, focused on learning to survive in whatever way her environment demands her to and avoiding trouble. Being raised in the red-light district led her to develop exceptional street smarts. Calm, mature, and sharp-witted, she is rarely tricked or charmed by others: she is one of the few to be unaffected by Jinshi's beauty and charm. Her mindset has helped her come to terms with matters that many would find concerning or even scarring: she considers her near-rape, and later her kidnapping, enraging situations, but also as inevitabilities of living in the red-light district.
As she has learned that her focus on survival and avoidance of trouble requires her to act with caution, she never acts rashly and follows commands without outward protest. In part because of her own self-preserving attitude, she finds people who will help others to their own detriment (e.g. Luomen and later Jinshi) painful to watch. Despite her awareness of the hardships of being low born, she believes that social hierarchy is the inevitable way of things, and that people of lower status should expect to be used and should be used, including herself.
All of this equips Maomao to expertly navigate the inner palace, which she herself notes is more or less the same as the red light district. She knows how to keep her head low, read people and situations, how to placate or intimidate aggressive workers or high ranking consorts without making them direct their ire at her. She knows her place, but also when she should speak up.
Despite her pragmatism, Maomao's insatiable curiosity often leads her to involve herself in the problems of others. It is also implied that she has a strong sense of justice, empathy, and compassion, which makes it hard for her to ignore misdeeds and injustice once she has witnessed them. This has made her wish she could avoid seeing or hearing about certain things.[8]
While Maomao has an incredibly high intellect and ability to master anything with ease, this only applies to things she is interested in. She failed her court lady exam as she found the material boring and couldn't retain it.
Abilities[]
Herbal medicine: Having been taught by Luomen, one of the best pharmacists in the country, Maomao is an excellent user and maker of herbs — so much so that she makes her own unique medicine, which she often tests on herself.
Perception: Having been raised in the red light district, Maomao is very good at dealing with and manipulating others. Along with her experience and knowledge of herbs, she is able to deduce and solve problems more effectively than most. In spite of this, she does not consider herself intelligent by academic standards as the only thing she can bring herself to study is medicine.
Poison resistance: Because she constantly experiments with poisons on her own body, Maomao has developed a mithridatic resistance against drugs and poisons. Whether afflicted by snake bite, aphrodisiac, and hallucinogenic mushrooms. She even once administered rescue breaths on a poisoned victim's drooling mouth. Despite her many resistance to poisons, this does not extend to her buckwheat allergy, which she has given up attempting to overcome.
Alcohol Tolerance: Maomao has an unusually high metabolism for alcohol compared to most people in the setting, including Basen and her own father Lakan.[9]
Trivia[]
- Maomao's date of birth is March 28th.
- At the beginning of the story, Maomao works for Shang-fu, also known as wardrobe services, in the Outer Court for the Imperial Palace.
- Maomao gets many of her leads via gossip from Xiaolan in the Outer Court.
- In episode 8 of the anime (as well as chapter 11 of the manga), Maomao is somewhat skilled in administering mouth-to-mouth resuscitation and using the Heimlich maneuver.
- Goof: Doctors reacting to the series have pointed out that Maomao is administering M2M & CPR incorrectly, pressing her knuckles against the victim's abs and giving him a dozen rescue breaths instead of only two. However, most fictional depictions of hands-on first aid are usually inaccurate and anyone knowing how to resuscitate in the 15th century of China's Qing dynasty is fanciful, since anything like chest compressions is not known until likely the mid 19th century.
- Goof: In the anime, the apprentice courtesan, who resuscitated the poisoned courtesan by repeating after Maomao administering artificial respiration on the male victim, should've also been affected by poison from sealing her lips on the drooling and coughing mouth of the female victim (Maomao is the only poison resistant one in the scene).
- Maomao's name is derived from "猫" (māo), the Chinese word for "cat". This is alluded to frequently with Maomao having a number of cat-like mannerisms such as curiosity and aloofness.
- In the manga and anime, Maomao is often given cat ears as a visual gag.
- Her nickname Xiao Mao translates to "kitten" (小猫).
- Her other nickname Niang Niang (in Chinese) translates to "lady/missus". Tianyu and some of the other physicians start calling her this to imply they think she's benefiting from nepotism on account of her relations to Luomen and Lakan.
- While Maomao is clearly very intelligent, she dislikes studying things uninteresting to her so much that she failed the civil service exam.[10]
- Maomao's family on her father's side are famous for being brilliant individuals that master a field in ways never thought possible but have odd, socially inept personalities. Maomao is known for brilliant apothecary skills, but is ridiculously aloof. Her adopted father Luomen (technically her great uncle) is a doctor 2nd to none but lives in squalor while her biological father Lakan is a genius tactician that can't even recognize distinct human faces.
- Maomao's high tolerance for alcohol in comparison to the rest of the characters in the story parallels the real world phenomena known as Asian Flush Syndrome. Most people of Asian descent have a mutant strain of aldehyde dehydrogenase (ALDH2), the gene which enables the liver to convert ethanol into acetate. People with the mutant ALDH2*2 variant cannot metabolize alcohol and so become inebriated much faster and recover much more slowly than people with the functioning gene. Maomao would have inherited the functioning gene from Fengxian, since Lakan doesn't have it.
References[]
- ↑ The Apothecary Diaries light novel: Volume 2
- ↑ The Apothecary Diaries manga: Chapter 29
- ↑ The Apothecary Diaries anime: Covert Operations (episode 5)
- ↑ The Apothecary Diaries light novel: Volume 1: Chapter 15
- ↑ The Apothecary Diaries light novel: Volume 1: Chapter 16
- ↑ The Apothecary Diaries light novel: Volume 3: Epilogue
- ↑ The Apothecary Diaries light novel: Volume 2: Chapter 20
- ↑ The Apothecary Diaries light novel: Vol 3: Ch 19, Vol 7: Ch 18, Vol 8: Ch 20
- ↑ The Apothecary Diaries light novel: Volume 5: Chapter 9
- ↑ The Apothecary Diaries light novel: Volume 2: Chapter 1
Fengming • Fengxian • Fuyou ☆ Gaoshun • Guen/Quack Doctor • Guiyuan • Gyokuen • Gyoku-ou • Gyokuyou
Haku-u • Hongniang ☆ Jazgul • Jin • Jinshi • Joka ☆ Kanan • King of Shaoh • Koku-u • Kokuyou • Kounen
Lahan • Lahan's Older Brother • Lakan • Lakou • Dr. Li • Lihaku • Lihua • Lingli • Lishu • Dr. Liu • Lo-en • Loulan • Luomen
Maamei • Madam • Maomao • Maomao, the Cat • Meimei ☆ Oracle ☆ Pairin ☆ Rikuson
Sazen • Seki-u • Shin • Shenlü • Shenmei • Shishou • Shrine Maiden of Shaoh • Suirei • Suirei's Mother • Suiren • Sotei
Taihou • Taomei • Tianyu ☆ Ukyou • Uryuu ☆ Xiaolan ☆ Yakou • Yao • Yinghua • Dr. You ☆ Zulin
Crown Prince • Emperor • Empress Regnant • Former Emperor • Imperial Brother