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Season 1Episode 1
Maomao
, in her home in the red light district, is asked to deliver some medicine to Verdigris House by her father, who warns her to be wary of kidnappings that have been on the rise. Maomao obliges and leaves for the Verdigris House.
When she arrives, of the brothel is dealing with some customers who are excited to notice , one of the Three Princesses of the house. Maomao enters the medicine room in the Verdigris House. As she writes while observing the wound on her left arm, Pairin comes and scolds Maomao for her wounds. Maomao informs her that they are just the result of her usual drug experiments. As they talk, the Madam comes in and warns Maomao to not set off another explosion with her so-called experiments, or she would be made to become a courtesan. Perturbed, Maomao quickly informs the Madam that she had left her the medicines and leaves, right before two more women enter the room thinking they heard her voice.
On her way to the herb plot, Maomao curses the Madam over how she always tries to make her into a courtesan. After she stops by the herb plot, she is kidnapped by human traffickers.
Maomao laments her father being worried about her as her kidnappers reach their destination, the Imperial Palace.
As winter falls, gives birth to a potential prince with support of the Inner Court Physician. On the other side, is happy to hear the news of the safe birth of the potential prince as she holds her own daughter, Lingli.
Three months later, Maomao worries about her father and laments her former life as an ordinary apothecary. She contemplates how the Inner Court is not different from the brothels, as a garden of beautiful women meant to give birth to the 's children. No men are allowed in this garden save for the Emperor, his kin, and the eunuchs, individuals who were "formerly male" as they had lost their "manhood". The Inner Court is a collection of two thousand concubines and servants, and a thousand eunuchs. Unlike the high, mid, and low-ranking concubines, serving girls like Maomao are expendable and can lose their lives any moment.
As she works, , a fellow servant, rushes in to ask her on what is written on the tag. Maomao reads the tag and informs her of the location. She comments that the majority of the servants are illiterate, and are only taught the bare minimum essentials of etiquette. Though Maomao knows that she would earn more if she worked as a literate servant, the raise would get taken by her kidnappers. Though it is possible for servants to become low-ranking concubines, she does not have the looks necessary, and instead decides to lay low and avoid trouble during her two-year term. She laments not being able to drink.
While doing the laundry, Xiaolan informs Maomao, much to her disinterest, about a beautiful eunuch who works in the central area of the Inner Court, and everyone is talking about him. Xiaolan complains on wanting to see the handsome eunuch and asks whether Maomao also wants to see him or not.
and along with the physician visit Lady Lihua as she and her 3-month-old aren't well, but the physician is at a loss, much to Lady Lihua's frustration.
As Jinshi and Gaoshun are leaving the Crystal Pavilion, they meet Hongniang, Lady Gyokuyou's head lady-in-waiting, who takes them to the Jade Pavilion as the six-month-old is also sick. However, the physician is busy attending Lihua's child and cannot look at the Lingli.
During meal-time, the servants worry about the newborns being sick. Listening in, Xiaolan suddenly declares that it's the work of a curse, confusing Maomao. Xiaolan explains the rumor floating around: so far, all three heirs of the Emperor have died from sudden illness. Maomao is surprised to hear this, while Xiaolan expects the same to happen with the current two heirs as well. Maomao asks whether the heirs are unwell, and Xiaolan confirms that the physician did visit both Lady Gyokuyou and Lady Lihua. The two discuss the possibility of the Emperor taking an Empress; the first candidate is Lady Lihua who just gave birth to a son, but the Emperor also favors Lady Gyokuyou. The power struggle between the two might be related to the "curse" plaguing Lihua's son. Xiaolan goes on to say that Lady Lihua might be worse off, as the physician is with her more frequently. Hearing that Lady Lihua is also sick surprises Maomao; Xiaolan says that both Lady Lihua and her baby are apparently suffering from headache, stomachache, and nausea. Xiaolan again insists that its a curse, which Maomao dismisses as being stupid, much to Xiaolan's annoyance. Meanwhile, a weak Lady Lihua is worried and concerned about the health of her son.
Maomao contemplates what the symptoms of headache, stomachache and nausea could relate to. She considers the possibility of poisoning, but disregards it since even Lingli is suffering, which makes it odd as deliberate poisoning would usually relate to the issue of crown imperial heir. She is unable to reach a conclusion.
She decides to check things herself by dropping by the area where the high-ranking concubines live, and ends up witnessing the argument between Lady Lihua and Lady Gyokuyou near the Crystal Pavilion. Lady Lihua slaps Lady Gyokuyou and accuses her of cursing her son because Lady Gyokuyou gave birth to a daughter. Lady Gyokuyou denies the accusation, saying that Lady Lihua clearly knows it's not true as even her daughter Princess Lingli is sick, and she came to the Crystal Pavilion just to get the physician to check on her daughter. The physician is flustered by everything happening, annoying Maomao who realizes the cause of the illness, and wonders if he doesn't know about it. She clearly understands that it's not a curse, and tries to think of a way to discreetly inform the two concubines about the situation, looking for some writing material.
As she leaves, Jinshi who heard about the commotion and came along with Gaoshun to resolve the situation, ends up hearing Maomao's muttering as she rushes by and becomes surprised, but disregards it as unrelated.
While walking around the Crystal Pavilion, , Lady Lihua's head lady-in-waiting, notices a flower with a piece of cloth tied to it on windowsill, which she disregards and throws it away.
Not even a month later, the potential prince passes away as Lady Lihua sobs. Maomao hears of the news with sadness, as she had failed to save the life of the potential prince.
Meanwhile, Jinshi and Gaoshun visit the Jade Pavilion. Lady Gyokuyou presents to Jinshi a piece of cloth that was tied to a Rhododendron flower and left on the windowsill, which she received on the same day she had the argument with Lady Lihua at the Crystal Pavilion. The message on the piece of cloth read, "The white face powder is poison. Don't let the baby touch it."
Reading the message, Lady Gyokuyou notes that being ignorant is truly a sin. They contemplate who sent the message; it would not have been the palace physician since it was presented in a roundabout way, and the palace physician never discovered the source of the affliction. Lady Gyokuyou asks for Jinshi's help to locate the person who sent the message. Jinshi remembers hearing the muttering of a female servant on that day of the argument, and agrees to Lady Gyokuyou's request, asking permission from her to allow him borrow the piece of cloth for a bit.
Later, Maomao hears from Xiaolan that that the Emperor is visiting Lady Gyokuyou a lot recently to show his love for the surviving princess, but has not heard anything about Lady Lihua. A eunuch arrives and asks Maomao to report to the Matron of the Serving Women immediately. Maomao arrives at the location and is grouped together with other servants, much to her apprehension. As the girls enter the room, Gaoshun notices Maomao's repaired skirt. Jinshi arrives in the room; while the serving girls are smitten by his looks, Maomao mistakes him for an arrogant-looking woman. Jinshi introduces himself as the Manager of the Inner Court; hearing his voice, Maomao realizes that he is a man, and identifies him as the good-looking eunuch that Xiaolan mentioned before. As Jinshi is writing something on a paper, Maomao thinks about the wastefulness of such a handsome man becoming a sterile eunuch.
Jinshi displays the message, "You with the freckles, stay here," and shows it to the gathered serving girls. He then dismisses the serving girls and tells them to return to their room. As they leave, Maomao is visibly confused, wondering how she got caught for sending the warning earlier.
Suddenly, she realizes it was a trap; since the majority of the serving girls are illiterate, no one other than her was able to read the message, causing her to reveal herself as the writer of the message. As she tries to make her escape, Jinshi catches her and tells her to follow him. As they are on the way, Jinshi states that her background record mentioned that she was illiterate; Maomao feigns innocence, saying that she is of low birth so there must have been some mistake. Maomao resolves to not admit a thing and pretend to be ignorant until the end to have it easy. She then wonders in frustration on how Jinshi was able to find out about the message, as she had tried to be as secretive as possible about it. She immediately labels Jinshi as a mistrustful person and wonders why he isn't doing something else rather than targeting her.
Jinshi and Maomao arrive at the Jade Pavilion, as Hongniang welcomes them inside. As Maomao wonders whether she would be punished for something and hopes she makes it alive, they arrive at the room of Lady Gyokuyou who is holding the healthy and laughing Princess Lingli. Seeing Princess Lingli healthy makes Maomao feel glad that she was saved. Lady Gyokuyou thanks Maomao for saving the life of her daughter, which makes her flustered and note that she isn't worthy of such kindness. Lady Gyokuyou expresses that any amount of gratefulness isn't enough for saving the life of her daughter, but Maomao, fearing getting too involved, decides to feign ignorance saying that they must have mistook her for someone else, which confuses Lady Gyokuyou. Jinshi steps in, saying that she had provided him with the message written on the cloth. As Maomao tries harder to feign ignorance, Jinshi also points out that the cloth used to write the message is something issued only for the serving girls, especially those who handle laundry just like her, and asks whether she had ripped her skirt or not. With no way out, Maomao finally gives up.
Upon being asked by Jinshi why she had written a message and left it with a flower, Maomao replies that she figured out the reason behind the illnesses that day: makeup powder. Many courtesans who used similar high-end powder in the brothel she grew up in eventually got poisoned, trading their life for beauty and losing both in the end. She reveals that prior to being in service in the Inner Court, she was something like an apothecary, and was very familiar with poisons. When asked about the powder by Jinshi, Lady Gyokuyou replies that the one who used the face powder was the baby's nurse, who had said that the whitening effect of that powder was better than the other ones. The nurse had suddenly taken ill, so she had given her leave with proper payment.
Lady Gyokuyou again says that being ignorant is a sin, as she didn't take notice of what went in the mouth of her daughter. Jinshi also feels regret knowing the information could have saved the lives of many others as well, including the potential prince.
Lady Gyokuyou states that after seeing the message, she tried to tell Lady Lihua about it as well, but because of the incident before she had grown distrustful of her and didn't listen to her warnings.
In the end, Maomao asks on what she could do for them. Lady Gyokuyou happily responds that Maomao would immediately work for her as the new lady-in-waiting. Having her plans of keeping a low profile ruined completely, Maomao leaves the Jade Pavilion in hysterics. On her way back, Xiaolan greets her and asks what had happened.