#enen

Maomao wants to kiss Enen because Enen brought back a big package of herbs for her lol. Don't worry, ofc she gets rejected 🤣

The first person Maomao ever asked for a kiss was Enen (a woman), the first person she confessed (?) to was Chue (also a woman), and her ideal type is the quack doctor (a man, but castrated), yet somehow Jinshi only gets jealous of men lmao

Jinshi also gets to eat some of the sweets Maomao made, and I think it's really cute how he starts taking small, careful bites to savour them after hearing that she made them.

You can read the full SS here:

I don't have any significant opinion on them, I neither like them very much nor hate them vehemently but I don't understand what they have done to evoke such hate. Because they play substantial part in the story. If the hate is coming wrt comparison with Xiaolan and Shisui, it doesn't make sense. Yao and Enen are in the narrative much, much longer than Shisui or Xiaolan, who were essentially friends of MaoMao and served more or less 'breaking main character's emotional walls' kind of purpose at early stages. On the other hand Yao and Enen are MaoMao's professional peers who become friendlier over time, plus, Yao is a different kind of ambitious person than MaoMao, and essentially serves that purpose. In fact, Yao and Enen are essentially people she meets in a professional capacity and with whom she is on equal standing vis-a-vis her profession, irrespective of their background. So, Yao and Enen actually provide MaoMao with a different category of women wherein they all are being assessed for the same thing and in the same capacity. They are neither women of the rear palace dealing with the politics of the clans nor are they women from Verdigris house dealing with the politics of desire and survival associated with it. So far, MaoMao has met women who are trying to survive in a man's world but Yao and Enen become women who are trying to compete with men in a man's world. So, yes dynamic is different. Yao is way more of an independent woman in a material and traditional sense, unlike MaoMao who is independent and passionate as a function of her emotional and intellectual characterisation. Moreover, MaoMao cannot have all women fawning over her, now can she? I mean, someone has to show that limited agency does not automatically guarantee solidarity. Like a recurring point in the story has been how women can become competitive and sabotage each other even if they were essentially all trapped in a place like a brothel or rear palace. Shared suffering does not always lead to camaraderie. Sometimes, scarcity of choices and resources lead to more fierce competition between contenders, and this is what Yao essentially represents, and Enen, as someone devoted to her, supports this. Before Yao and Enen, we see almost all significant female characters harbouring no competitiveness with MaoMao. So, in that case also, Yao and Enen, and especially Yao becomes important. Moreover, for Enen, her entire character revolves around Yao, despite her being more resourceful and intelligent. In fact, Yao actually growing out of the need to depend upon Enen is going to be a major point in Enen's life. I feel like Yao and Enen are good mirrors to Jinshi and Basen's bond, where both have a similar 'friend-like' relationship growing out of an intact hierarchy like master and servant. Main difference being, of course, Enen's actual romantic interest in Yao which makes her devotion even more fixated.