I used to work at a TV station in Ohio. On weekends, we only had an 11pm news broadcast. Not much happened on weekends, ya know? I worked Monday-Friday 9-5, but someone on the weekend shift quit, so I also had to come in at 9pm on Sat/Sun to work the 11pm news. It was brutal. I worked seven days a week, even if two of them were ~3hrs.

This was a particularly bad winter. One Saturday, we had a level 2 snow emergency: That means you should only travel if you absolutely must. Like, it's not uncommon for cops to pull you over in level 2 emergencies to ask where you're going and why. It is genuinely dangerous to drive in that much snow.

I told my boss as much, how I almost crashed on the way home at 12:30am after a news broadcast. I told him I would need to call off if there were a snow emergency again during a night snow.

He told me, point blank, "If you ever call me about the goddamn snow, I will take it as a call of resignation."

And that was that! The very next Saturday, snow fell again. It was a level 2, but would become level 3 by sunup. Level 3 means driving is literally illegal except for ambulances and snow plows. I stared out the window, watching the snow, and I had to make a choice.

"Will I die for this? Will I kill myself to keep this job?" I made $11/hr.

One is using it for cases to gather information, or in some cases just because the people deserve to be uncomfortable (scaring the Yicheng magistrate comes to mind). This works very well for him, because from his reputation people expect him to be straightforward and honest. He even manages to play Hu Xiaochen more than once (first the pretend fight that exposed him, and later getting him to lead them to the Lin house). Fully approved use of manipulation.

Less approved and kind of self-destructive is when he uses those skills to put distance between himself and others. For example, at the very beginning he kind of gently steers Huo Linglong away from the truth of his task, using what he figures out about her from their conversation (way more than she realizes then). At first it works, but she's too sharp and stubborn for it to last, and finally in 13 when he's trying to talk her out of going to investigate the secret area with him and Yuehua, she calls him out on it (at which point he has to basically put it in words that it's because he cares about her).

and everyone is posting their 4th of july manis

except this year its very few american flags and red white and blue and stars.

and a LOT of pond scum inspiration

That is, when an official told you, a rice farmer, that you owed more taxes than you really did, it was very useful if you were good enough at math to know he was lying (and could prove it) and if you were good enough at writing to write a letter to your government defending your case.