When last we left the warlord and the beauty, Wei Shao was not handling his feels well.
Neither was his Mom, who threw a table
Man Man is unfazed and continues her explanation on why she’s a terrible mother. Mom acts uninterested in Wei Shao’s struggles, AND gave him shoes that are too small. Since Cousin is well-dressed, Man Man knows Mom is capable of caring for someone.
Man Man is relieving Mom of her daily duties towards Wei Shao. Mom kicks her out, and Wei Shao stays hidden.
But he’s moved enough to get rid of the stench of execution before joining her for a meal. Man Man tries to reassure him that she was startled, not scared, that night. And she knows what happened was because of the aphrodisiac.
But Wei Shao continues to deny having feelings. Points for trying, Man Man. Also, for making him a belt to replace his worn-out one. He teases her about the embroidery, but later she catches him trying it on in front of the mirror.
Cousin finally leaves. Are we done with her?
Wei Shao decides to skip the canal business and sends a young General. Man Man teases him for staying, and is pleased to be put in charge of Grandmother’s birthday celebration.
New person! The Lady of Bian!
The Lord of Bian is coughing blood. He’s also upset that Xue Tai failed to hold onto Boya or Xiaogang, and worries about Wei and Yan joining forces. He and his Lady seem in love, but his Uncle thinks she’s terrible luck because of everything that’s happened.
Back to Man Man!
Mom has planned all Grandma’s parties, so she holds important information. Luckily, Man Man is good at manipulating people, and Mom is easily manipulated. Mom hands over the information, along with a warning not to let “that man” steal Wei Shao’s thunder.
That Man is Wei Yan, Wei Shao’s cousin, and an illegitimate son
He’s the opposite of his cousin, an irresponsible womanizer who has been traveling for years. Despite that, the cousins punch each other in a friendly way when reunited.
Grandma gives her grandsons each a very rare jade that their grandfather gave her. Wei Shao passes it on to Man Man to use for Grandma’s birthday gift.
This turns into a whole thing. A loud horse startles the shopkeeper into dropping it, and it cracks. The person behind the noise is Wei Yan, though he does not introduce himself. He sweeps in and designs a new bracelet pattern that will work with the cracked jade.
Then he tries to stick a hairpin in Man Man’s hair and boops Tao on the nose. After he leaves, the women learn who that was.
The bracelet is carefully stored away
But when Wei Yan brings his gift to the guarded storage room, the bracelet goes missing!
Man Man tells Wei Shao what happened. He acts cool, then runs to his cousin and takes his jade. Then he goes into town at night and forces the shopkeeper out of bed to make a new bracelet.
The next morning, Wei Yan “finds” the bracelet tucked where he left it, and where someone else should have found it, but whatever.
When he talks about how special the jade is, Man Man points out that he would have recognized it, and her, in the shop. So why pretend? He says some nonsense about wanting to judge her legendary beauty for himself.
The women flinch away before he can boop anyone on the nose.
Man Man doesn’t know how to tell Wei Shao his cousin is awful
Wei Shao has the new bracelet, but hides it when he learns Wei Yan found the original. He wonders why she didn’t tell him about meeting his cousin, but for her, it was a brief, informal meeting.
Wei Yan forces Wei Shao to meet him at a nasty Tavern full of women. (Honestly, it looks like my worst nightmare. I bet it smells.) Wei Yan has a poster of a woman he wants Wei Shao to find so he can settle down. One catch: she’s already married.
Wei Shao takes the poster so he can warn the woman away. Wei Yan makes a clumsy attempt to get it back, but he’s pretending so he can steal Wei Shao’s jade pendant.
Yes, Wei Yan is up to something
Something to do with Bian, because he has a flashback of the Bian Uncle. And some guy lurks around to remind Wei Yan “what he’s there to do”. Not that he looks happy about it.
Wei Yan sends a tavern maid to return the pendant to Man Man, revealing that Wei Shao hid his visit to the Tavern from her.
Wei Liang thinks the poster is of Tao. It’s not. Tao thinks he knows about the nose boop. He doesn’t. They’re confused, but Tao recognizes the poster is of Man Man.
Wei Shao goes to Man Man, who painfully leads him to the conclusion that his cousin might have taken the pendant and handed it to a tavern maid. He has to admit he went to the tavern, but asserts it was not to be with women.
She’s frustrated because he wants her to speak openly with him, but he doesn’t listen. Is he interested in blaming her or his cousin? Wei Shao doesn’t think his cousin did this on purpose, and wants them all to talk. But this can wait until after Grandma’s birthday.
She apologizes for getting angry. He’s done with this mess. I get that he’s bad with feelings, but here he has my sympathy.
Wei Yan is drunk when formally introduced to Man Man
He compliments her beauty, and Wei Shao defensively steps in front of her, which everyone notices with various emotions.
Wei Shao visits Wei Yan and notices a maid who resembles his wife. Despite that, Wei Yan says he doesn’t like Man Man and she’s causing problems. They argue over how much she’s cost Wei Shao and how much control she has over him.
Wei Shao wants Wei Yan to treat her like family and not cause Grandmother worry. Wei Yan says he will.
Meanwhile, the young Wei General sees the canal open and water pour out. Or whatever canals do.
But there’s a new problem, famine in Rongjun. Unfortunately, other places that don’t have famine are also struggling. And Uncle Dian isn’t going to help.
Man Man wants to help, whether Wei Shao wants it or not. She thinks they should extend the canal to the drought area. But he knows she wants to redirect him towards Bian and away from Yan. True, but it’s still a good idea. Wei Shao agrees to consider it.
These people aren’t going to give Wei Shao any peace
Wei Yan is upset when he learns Man Man can enter Wei Shao’s study and grabs the scroll about Rongjun she’s holding. He wants to know that she’s not using Wei Shao, and she says that’s between them.
He gets close and whispers that the Wei will never see her as one of them.
Wei Yan knows a guy who can get Wei Shao some expensive grain. He warns Wei Shao about Man Man’s interest in Rongjun. And that she sent her Uncle a letter. Wei Shao reassures his cousin that she is kind-hearted. Also, he read her letter. She just wants some seeds.
Liang can’t math, and Tao finds it adorable. He tries to hide what it’s about, but she sees through the ruse and even figures out more than he knew based on the numbers.
Wei Yan shows up to harass Man Man again as she is writing something for the birthday banquet. He keeps getting too close, and she backs away.
Caught between a Cousin and a Wife, again
Although I think Wei Shao likes this cousin more. I like this cousin more.
Because we’ve been given and shown a lot more about him. This makes me suspect he won’t be as flatly conniving and evil as the last cousin. Definitely, there’s something with him and Bian and a man lurking around, wanting him to do Bad Things to Wei Shao. But I suspect more to this story.
Do the Bian have something they’re threatening him with? Is he doing this in some misguided way to protect the Wei?
Grandma and Wei Shao like him, so I want to believe in him.
Wei Shao’s inability to admit his feelings is exhausting. But I’ll give him credit for not wanting Man Man to be upset about the jade and rushing to action to fix it. Still, I feel like I need him to rescue her from a venomous snake or take an arrow to the knee or something to make her hard work worth it.
More likely, he’ll end up having to protect her from this latest cousin. At least (or too bad?), no aphrodisiac will be involved this time.
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