Karteria application

[poisonobsessed]

OOC INFORMATION

Name: Lex
Are you over 18?: Yes
Contact: Plurk - FightingSpirit or PM this journal
Other characters: N/A
Permissions & opt-out: Permissions, Opt-out

IC INFORMATION

Name: Maomao
Canon: The Apothecary Diaries
Age: 18
Gender: Female (She, her)
Species: Human
Appearance: Maomao is small - five feet tall, and very slim. Her eyes are blue, and her hair is dark green. Her left arm is often bandaged because that’s where she performs her experiments. There’s a fair amount of scarring there as a result. She prefers to use makeup to give herself fake freckles and make her skin look a little more blotchy, but without it, her skin is actually quite clear. Currently, she has an injury on her left leg that’s bandaged up. Once her Terra Augmented powers kick in, that will fade quickly.
Canon point: End of season 1

History: Here

Personality answers: Choose FOUR questions provided on the Application page. Keep it around 250 words or less per answer.

Who in your character's canon influenced the most growth in your character? What do they think about this character?

The person who influenced the most growth in Maomao is her adoptive father Luomen (actually her great-uncle). He took her out of Verdegris house (the high end brothel she was born in) and raised her. Luomen was formerly an Imperial physician who was dismissed from the palace for a mistake before Maomao was born. He went on to live a humble life as an apothecary near the pleasure district of the capital city and took Maomao in. Luomen was the one who inspired Maomao’s interest in the profession, and provided her with an excellent medical education. He also taught her how to solve problems - looking for evidence rather than making assumptions. While he didn’t necessarily approve of her experimenting on herself, he taught her how to do so safely.

Maomao respects Luomen immensely, although she worries that he’s more charitable than he can afford to be. There are times when he has undercharged or not charged at all for his services, and given that he is a small elderly man with a bad knee, she worries that he won’t be able to take care of himself at some point. Her approach thus far has been to try to refer clients who can definitely afford to pay to Luomen when the opportunity arises. Despite her worrying about him being too charitable, Luomen has influenced Maomao’s sense of justice and her humility.

Explain which event in canon is most pivotal to your character's development, and who they are today.

Prior to the start of the series, Maomao had been kidnapped and sold off to work in the Imperial palace by her kidnappers. Out of spite for her kidnappers profiting off of her (a regular cut of her wages was being sent to them), Maomao concealed that she was literate despite the fact that she would be paid more. Her intention was to keep her head down and not attract attention until her term of service was finished.

However, when she heard about concubines’ young children getting sick and some dying, it prompted her to act. She didn’t believe in the superstitious theory that it was a curse for a moment, and theorized about what could be happening. It didn’t take her long to realize that the root cause was the lead-based cosmetic powder that many concubines used - because she had seen courtesans get sick from the powder. She wrote anonymous notes on fabric and left it tied around a flower at the residences of two concubines whose infants were sick, but alive, advising them to keep the powder away from their babies.

The concubine who read the note, Gyokuyou, listened to the advice and wanted to track down who left the note. Jinshi, a high ranking eunuch within the palace discovered it was Maomao, and it completely changed Maomao’s trajectory within the palace. She was promoted to being one of Gyokuyou’s ladies in waiting, and Jinshi called upon her to help solve mysteries within the palace.

What does your character think about physical appearances? Are they the sort to meticulously primp themselves, or could they not care less?

Maomao is very conscious of physical appearances, but not generally out of any desire to look appealing. On the contrary, she has used makeup to make herself appear more plain as a survival tactic. The pleasure district is not the safest place to grow up in, and she’s had a couple of close calls that she escaped from. When she actually puts effort into looking good, the difference is quite striking.

What she truly takes note of is what can be learned about a person based on appearance. For example, looking at the calluses on a person’s hand can give insight into what sort of physical labour they do, or if they have been training with a weapon. A person’s complexion can sometimes indicate if there’s something medically abnormal. It’s also important for observing details about a patient to correctly diagnose them, as people are not always forthcoming about personal information that could be relevant.

While Maomao is capable of noticing when someone is physically attractive, she’s also very well aware of seduction techniques, and in general when someone is trying to use their looks to gain some sort of benefit. As a result, she’s relatively immune to any attempts to charm her via looks and flirting. She’s also fairly good at picking up on little details that would suggest a person isn’t being honest - such as a courtesan’s customer acting like he’s much wealthier than he is (when the state of his hands indicate that he does the sort of manual labour a rich person wouldn’t do)

What would it take to truly upset your character, enough that they would act upon their feelings? Are they the sort to forgive?

Maomao hates unnecessary death and suffering. She accepts that some isn’t avoidable - everyone dies eventually, and not everyone gets to live a luxurious life. However, if there’s something that she can reasonably do to save a life, she will. As such, someone causing unnecessary suffering and death, either deliberately or through sheer ignorance upsets her a great deal. She can maintain a level of calm detachment and a sense of pragmatism most of the time, but there are times when that composure of hers cracks.

One such time was after saving Consort Gyokuyou’s infant daughter, Lingli. The Emperor himself ordered Maomao to save the life of another high ranked concubine, Lihua. Lihua had disregarded the warning about the cosmetic powder and lost her infant son as a result. While initially people thought her illness was grief, she eventually got to the point that she couldn’t even eat. Lihua’s ladies in waiting were hostile to Maomao and wouldn’t allow her to see Lihua for over a week until Jinshi showed up and reminded them that Maomao was there on the orders of the Emperor.

When she finally was allowed to examine Lihua, Maomao discovered the toxic cosmetic powder was on Lihua’s face. Upon finding out which lady in waiting was responsible for Lihua’s cosmetics, she slapped the woman hard enough across the face to knock her down and yelled at her for not understanding that the powder was banned because it’s poison.


Inventory: One set of clothing (her usual outfit as opposed to the dancing outfit she’ll be arriving in), a silver hair stick, her mortar and her pestle
Powers/Abilities: Maomao doesn’t have any powers, per se, but she has built up a strong resistance to poison due to years of experimenting on herself with tiny doses. As a result, she also has an abnormally high tolerance for alcohol. Her pain tolerance is fairly high as well. None of these abilities fall into the superhuman range - they’re humanly possible, just very uncommon. Aside from this, Maomao is highly intelligent, and has been taught about medicine, poisons, and herbs. She’s a good cook, albeit not gourmet, and she has been taught how to dance well courtesy of her time spent around her adoptive elder sisters - the three highest ranking courtesans in the pleasure district.

Samples: Here & Here
Player Goals: Maomao will be very curious about Katalyth, and she will also be interested in setting up a clinic that’s independent of Patho-Gen to treat patients who can’t necessarily afford Patho-Gen’s rates.
Soul Choice: Terra. Monster form will be based primarily on the oleander plant.