진사와 채팅 | Emochi AI 캐릭터 채팅

진사 — Here's an original scenario set in the world of *The Apothecary Diaries*: --- **The Case of the Blooming Nightshade** Inside the rear palace, evening bells had long since rung, but Maomao was not asleep. She sat on the edge of her narrow cot in the outer court, grinding dried datura petals into a fine powder with methodical patience. Her small room smelled of herbs, stale parchment, and the faint sweetness of something that ought not to be eaten. A knock came at the door—not the hesitant tap of a servant, but three sharp, commanding raps. The kind of knock that insisted on being answered. Maomao set down her mortar. She already knew who it was. The door slid open to reveal Jinshi standing in the lantern light, and as always, it was almost unfair how beautiful he was. His dark hair, tied with a silver ribbon, caught the flame, and his pale features looked sculpted by a god who had been showing off. He wore the simple robes of a eunuch, but on him, they looked like royal vestments. "Maomao," he said, his voice smooth and weary. "I need your help." "You always need my help," she replied, not moving from the edge of her cot. "Is someone poisoned?" "Not poisoned. *Vanished*." Maomao raised an eyebrow. "People do not disappear from the rear palace. They are, however, occasionally shoved into wells." "That's rather grim, even for you." Jinshi stepped inside without waiting for an invitation, which was typical. He folded his arms, a gesture that might have looked authoritative if Maomao hadn't already seen him in far more undignified situations. "A young lady-in-waiting from the western court vanished during the afternoon gardening hour. She was seen entering the medicinal garden—your garden—and never came out." Maomao's eyes narrowed. "The medicinal garden isn't mine. But I did plant something new there yesterday." "Did you now." Jinshi's tone was flat, expectant. He knew her too well. "*Datura stramonium*. Thorn apple. Beautiful white flowers, very fragrant, very poisonous. Someone might have mistaken it for a trumpet vine and tried to pick it." "Would picking it cause someone to... vanish?" "No. But eating it would cause hallucinations, confusion, and a state resembling madness." Maomao dusted the powder from her palms and stood up. "If she nibbled the petals out of curiosity, she might have wandered off, half-delirious, and gotten lost. The garden is large. The palace walls are long." Jinshi's eyes widened slightly. "You think she's still out there?" "I think someone should retrieve her before she stumbles into a pond or eats something worse than the datura." Maomao grabbed her wooden case of antidotes and slid past Jinshi into the night air. "Or before someone *wants* her to vanish permanently." Jinshi followed, his steps quick to match hers. "You think it was deliberate?" "Someone recently informed me that the datura flowers are 'lovely' and asked if they were 'like the ones that lady Li swallowed last year.'" Maomao did not look at him. "That was the morning *before* I planted them. I hadn't told anyone outside the apothecary wing what I'd brought in." Jinshi's voice dropped to a dangerous murmur. "Then someone is watching you." "Someone is watching *you*, Jinshi. I'm just a convenient path to get to you." The night was cool, and the moon cast long shadows across the garden path. Ahead, between trimmed hedges, the pale blooms of the datura glowed like patient ghosts. Maomao slowed, crouched low, and studied the ground. Tracks. A woman's slipper prints, stepping unevenly, as if dancing or staggering. And in the soft dirt near the flower bed—a second set of footprints, pressed deep, standing still and watching. "She wasn't alone when she came here," Maomao whispered. "Someone stood right there. Nearly in the bushes. Watching her pick the flower." "Then the culprit," Jinshi breathed, "was here the whole time." Maomao rose. "She's not going to be found in the garden. She was probably carried off once she collapsed. The question is—where does a person hide in a palace where every corner is swept and every shadow is accounted for?" Jinshi tilted his head. A slow smile crossed his lips—the kind of smile that made court ladies faint and eunuchs look away. "In the same place someone hides a hundred and one other things. The old water cistern beneath the western court. It's been sealed for years. Officially." "Officially." Maomao looked at him. "And unofficially?" "Unofficially, it's where the eunuchs store things they'd rather not explain." Jinshi's gaze was cold, all charm gone. "Including people, on occasion." Without another word, they moved through the garden, past the sleeping flowers, toward the western court and its forgotten secrets. Maomao adjusted the strap of her antidote case. "I'll need you to play the beautiful idiot again," she said flatly. "Distract anyone we meet. Smile a lot. Say nothing." "That's my specialty," Jinshi said dryly. "Unfortunately." They reached the cistern's stone cover at the edge of a shadowed courtyard. It was heavy, sealed with years of grime, but there were fresh scratches on the edges—recent movement. Jinshi lifted the cover with surprising strength, and cool, musty air rushed up from below. Maomao peered into the darkness. "I'm going down." "Should I—" "Stay up here. If I don't come back within a quarter hour, raise the alarm. But wait at least half that long before you panic." She paused. "Actually, you never panic. That's one of your few good qualities." Jinshi let out a soft, half-laugh. "Coming from you, I'll take that as a compliment." Maomao descended the iron rungs into the dark, her small lantern casting a warm glow over damp stone walls. The cistern was dry, converted long ago into a hidden chamber. Shelves lined the walls, stacked with dusty bottles and bundles. And in the center, lying on a pile of worn blankets, was the missing lady-in-waiting—pale, breathing, but unconscious. A few crushed datura petals clung to her sleeve. Maomao crouched beside her, pressed fingers to her neck. Pulse was steady. She'd likely ingested only a small amount. Enough to make her woozy, not enough to kill. And someone had left her here, alive. Wrapped in blankets. Not dead in a ditch. *That's interesting*, Maomao thought. Whoever did this didn't want her found dead. They wanted her *gone*—but safe. The kind of kidnapping that wasn't a kidnapping. She heard footsteps above, then Jinshi's voice, low and tense. "Maomao?" "She's alive," she called up. "She'll wake in an hour. Tell me, Jinshi—who benefits from making a lady-in-waiting disappear for one night, only to have her found alive and disoriented?" A pause. "Someone who needed her *not* to be somewhere tonight. Somewhere else." "Exactly." Maomao stood, brushing dust from her robes. "Check what happened in the western court tonight. An evening event? A private audience? A marriage arrangement? Whatever she was supposed to attend, someone wanted her too confused to remember it." Jinshi was silent for a long moment. When he spoke again, there was something sharp in his voice. "There was supposed to be a quiet betrothal announcement tonight. Between a northern clan's heir and the lady who just vanished." "And someone wanted that announcement to fail." Maomao adjusted the sleeping woman's blanket, her expression unreadable. "The datura was a red herring. A beautiful, intoxicating, poisonous red herring." "Then who—" "Find out who benefits from the betrothal collapsing. Who was competing for that marriage? Who feared that alliance?" Maomao looked up at the circle of moonlight above. "That's your answer, Jinshi. I'm just the apothecary who found the flower." Jinshi let out a breath that was almost a laugh. "You're never *just* anything, Maomao." "True," she said, beginning the climb back up. "I'm also very annoyed that someone used my own datura as a prop in their scheme. When I find out who, I'm going to give them a lecture on the proper use of poison." "That's remarkably generous of you." "Don't mistake it for kindness. My lectures have caused men to cry." Jinshi reached down and offered his hand to help her up. She took it reluctantly, precisely, the way she did everything. In the moonlight, his beautiful face was almost gentle. "I'm glad you came but not with the flowers. Whatever happened," he said quietly. "I'm glad it's you." Maomao pulled her hand free quickly and straightened her robes. "You say that now. Wait until I present you with the bill for the datura I lost." And she walked past him, into the dark, with a faint, almost unseen smile on her face—the kind she only wore when no one was looking. Jinshi, watching her leave, smiled too. --- **End of Scenario**

제작자: @Penelope

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