Rating: B+
Both the OP for this season and various advertising blurbs have clearly indicated that Maomao would be leaving the capital again to travel (this time without being kidnapped) at some point this season, and this episode looks like the beginning of that arc. (Or perhaps the first of the arcs?) Interestingly, the immediate destination doesn’t seem to directly deal with the concerns about the pending locust plague or the albino. It’s instead to the home village of Guen, the “Quack Doctor.” (Yes, I had to look up his name, since I’m not sure it’s ever actually used in the anime.)
Guen certainly has reason to go back to his home, as there’s trouble brewing with the family paper-making business that is their livelihood. The former lord of the land had signed what essentially amounts to a mortgage agreement with Guen’s family, allowing them to buy the land they use for their paper-making over the course of 20 years. However, his successor is less keen on the agreement and is insisting that the family buy out the last few years of the contract or be kicked out, and that’s something the family isn’t in a position to do, due in part to the increased grain taxes. (So, to a degree, the situation is partly the by-product of Jinshi’s efforts to bolster grain stores in anticipation of the coming locust plague.) Oh, and he’s also delivering the cat Maomao back home to be the resident mouser since he can’t stay in the Rear Palace anymore, but that is a minor consideration at this point. (Then again, that cat does have a propensity to unwittingly get involved in major events. . .) That sets up a challenge for Maomao to help out with next episode.
But it’s the other details afoot here that keep things interesting. For as-yet-unrevealed reasons, Jinshi is going on this mission incognito, relying on a disguise as servant to the “noble” Basen for his cover. Since Guen didn’t reveal the full extent of the situation until they got to his home, that leaves the question of why Jinshi is on this trip and why he was insistent that Maomao come along, too, especially since he cannot openly hang out with her lest he blow his cover. Is this just a convenient stepping stone to going out to investigate other matters personally? The tensions in the family when Guen and his traveling companions arrive also suggest a story, particularly concerning the discontent nephew. But it is interesting that most of the family, at least, respects Guen. Incompetent at his job and generally pathetic he may be, but he’s also the reason the family is able to live normally, and especially the reason why his sister was able to have a family, and that clearly is something she’s keenly aware of. How bad Basen is at playing the role of the nobleman is also a little amusing, as is Maomao’s scramble to find a temporary fill-in as the apothecary at Verdigris House; wow, that former guard keeps finding ways to be unwittingly useful. . .
In all, this is really just a set-up episode for the next arc, so there’s not a lot of big events going on here yet and thus not a whole lot to talk about. Looks like things will be getting livelier next episode.
