He’s just glad to see you.

The infamous frog scene has finally played itself out in its entirety now. And it’s easy to see why Apothecary Diaries fans were so looking forward to it. I would call it a fanservice moment to be honest, but it was executed with a good deal of wit so I’m certainly not complaining. This ep was a veritable Noah’s Ark in fact, with dogs and frogs and oxen (part of them anyway) playing important roles. But it would be also fair to say that it left more questions unanswered than otherwise, much in the normal fashion for Kusuriya no Hitorigoto.

There are two main tracks playing out here involving Jinshi’s deception. There’s the personal side, with Maomao. This is much the easier to understand, and his reasons for being so consumed with it no less so. The political side, and the larger questions of Jinshi’s identity, are more convoluted. In practical terms there’s the matter of saving Xiaomao and Jinshi from their hole. This played out more or less in the manner I expected, i.e. dog whistle faction (though said dog wouldn’t be finished there).

Indeed, biology relieved Jinshi of the need to spill the beans verbally. His “frog” did the talking – and in the moment, Maomao got rather snippy about it. This exchange was highly amusing in a Grant and Hepburn sort of way, but the main significance of it is that Maomao can no longer deny reality. She can stop Jinshi from saying it out loud, but she’s humoring herself. She knows, she knows how dangerous it is to know, and she can’t un-know. In the end the fact that she didn’t know already is attributed to her subconscious trying to protect her, which I suppose is about the only explanation there was.

The other thing Maomao probably knows and is still pretending not to is that Jinshi wants her. This too is dangerous, but not only that – Maomao may not be capable of feeling romantic love for anyone. She muses on her emotional illiteracy in general terms, but not in that specific context. After being rescued by Pochi’s new pal Lihaku, she turns her focus to luring out the ones behind the assassination. Which she does a little too easily, using a hapless noble named Lo-en as bait and the dog’s infallible nose as her weapons of choice.

The larger intrigue, however, more stubbornly resists clarification. We learn some things, like Gaoshun being a member of the Ma Clan who was punished for angering the Empress. Quite crucially we learn Jinshi’s true name – Ka Zuigetsu. Gaoshun at least believes him to be the Emperor’s younger brother, and refers to him as the “Moon Prince”. But what was the game afoot with this whole hunting party? One assumes the masked noble’s identity as the Emperor’s brother is no secret, and in fact the ruse here is in place to protect the belief that he and Jinshi are different people. The notion that he has a scar he’s hiding probably serves a purpose too, to make Kousen seem like less of a threat.

What’s not clear to me at all is what Shishou’s game is here (well, he is supposed to be an enigma). Outing Jinshi as having his balls would theoretically serve a purpose, but this isn’t “Jinshi”, it’s Kousen. And presumably no one thinks Kousen is a eunuch – so why all the aphrodisiacs? Then there’s real force behind the assassination attempt, which surely isn’t the plebs the Scooby Gang took down. Discussion for this series is rife with novel/manga spoilers – unfortunately here too, and rest assured I’m going to be cracking down hard on it from now on.

One thing that is clear is that things have fundamentally changed between Jinshi and Maomao. She knows he’s fully a man, and to the extent she can understand it, that he likes her. She knows he’s a man of tremendous importance. As Gaushun muses, Xiaomao has great use as a pawn thanks to her intelligence – and Jinshi’s feelings for her make her that much more indispensable to the team. But she can never love a man like she loves an ox bezoar – even the man who gives her some. And that will always be a source of tension between them.