welcome to the "we owe Lakan an apology" arch.

"Dang it anime, don't trick me into liking him" when the anime had already tricked you into not liking him. Heh heh it's one of the red herrings of this show.

This show trolled the audience hard. They kept saying "Don't make conclusions based on conjecture." Yet, by conjecture, they make Lakan look like a total evil guy. Then they do this episode and it is like the author went, "See?! You didn't learn what I was teaching did you? Now I rube it your Face!"

Author be like: "another one!" And it is true that people like to spoil this episode..

Yeah every one hates having to like Lakan, if Granny had told Lakan that Fengxian was still there he would have bought her and Maomao so granny has to share the blame. So now Jessica latches on to Loulan as the new evil resident in the rear palace, you guys looked at her since the Darth Vader lighting and the identical ladies-in-waiting. Yes Lakan is peeved that Jinshi blocked Lakan from buying Maomao so he's looking for some petty ways to cause Jinshi to lose face.

I was impressed that you suspected Lakan being a red herring that early! Also, fun fact, his name starts with the same character as Luomen’s. It’s just pronounced differently. Now consider what might’ve happened if Ah-Duo and the then-empress hadn’t gone into labor on the same day, and Luomen hadn’t had to leave Ah-Duo’s side - meaning she doesn’t lose her fertility _or_ decide to swap the babies, which probably means Luomen doesn’t get kicked out, which means Lakan isn’t sent abroad (to study or for the army, depending on the version), which means he stays in contact with Fengxian, learns about her scheme in time, and buys her out… and Maomao, instead of growing up in a brothel and a poor apothecary’s shack, is born into a prominent noble clan, the child of two board-game-obsessed loonies. (Let’s hope they don’t name her Gambit or something.) Oh, and there’s a good chance of baby Jinshi dying from Fengming’s honey and the current Emperor’s actual brother growing up in his place. _And_ a good chance Ah-Duo becomes Empress. It’s an AU I’d love to see a fanfic in.