lahan is so funny bcs he genuinely doesn't care what lakan does, but he does care that he'd be caught in the consequences of lakan's action and his, "theoretically if you were to threaten an imperial family member, would you be the only one punished for it?" HAS ME IN TEARS BCS IT WORKS???? Lakan just stops 😭😭😭 iconic
lahan exchanging very important info regarding a rebellion from the north just to get jinshi to take care of the bill for the damage lakan did to the gate of the rear palace IS SO FUCKING FUNNY. he gave him stats and everything and then asked on the verge of TEARS can we PLEASE get a discount 😭😭😭
The Complete Apothecary Diaries Baseball Saga: Masterpost ⚾
This is an image compilation and masterpost/directory for my Apothecary Diaries Baseball Saga posts. Light novel spoilers present!
The Complete Series
All posts are written to be accessible to non-baseball fans, and they're more like Apothecary Diaries character studies and mini-analyses framed around baseball. They're available on both Tumblr and AO3.
Main Saga (Mighty Ducks Team-Building)
[Part 1] The Ideal Apothecary Diaries Baseball Team: Part 1 - Defense and Other Roles ⚾
[Part 2] The Ideal Apothecary Diaries Baseball Team: Part 2 - Offense ⚾
[Part 3] The Ideal Apothecary Diaries Baseball Team: Part 3 - Coach Ah-Duo ⚾
Side Stories
[Prequel] Apothecary Diaries Baseball: What if the Emperor, Jinshi, and High Consorts Threw Ceremonial First Pitches? ⚾ - A major prequel post that touches on the history of how baseball arrived in Li. Originally released between Parts 2 & 3.
[Player Analysis] Lahan's Brother & Gaoshun: An Unexpected Duo ⚾ - Covers Lahan's Brother & Gaoshun's relationship as the "battery" (pitcher and catcher), exploring how their relationship would work on the field and off the field.
[Non-Canon] The Apothecary Diaries Cast Play Baseball, with Baryou and Jinshi Commentating ⚾ - This was a fan comic made before all the team-building. It was the first ever baseball post on this blog. Features two haphazardly chosen teams (selected for comedy rather than logical reasons) battling each other. It's fun and sets up the foundation for the baseball saga, but it's not canon to it.
AO3 Version
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
It has been so much fun making this series, some of the most fun I've ever had writing any longform pieces despite how niche it is. The main part of the saga (the team-building) is complete and I don't have any other ideas for this series as of publishing (Jul. 26). However, this series is still open to side stories and additional smaller posts that will be added to this directory as they come!
If you enjoyed the Tumblr posts, consider visiting the AO3 page! And thank you to my friend pinkparentheses (on AO3) for beta reading some of these posts as a non-baseball fan to make sure it's understandable for everyone!
More images after the "Keep reading," including team icons, announcer icons, and more. The terms in the baseball card collage are also explained. There's a link to the full Imgur album at the end!
Mighty Ducks Team Icons
Coach Ah-Duo + Umpires Taomei & En'en
Baseball Cards
See the Imgur Album of Baseball Cards for each individual image!
Explanations of All Terms
Defensive Abbreviations: P = Pitcher, C = Catcher, 1B = First Baseman, 2B = Second Baseman, 3B = Third Baseman, SS = Shortstop, LF = Left Fielder, CF = Center Fielder, RF = Right Fielder. See Wikipedia for more details. The positions are also explained in Part 1 - Defense
Sweet spot (Gyokuyou) = When you hit the ball real good
Contact hitter (Lihua) = A hitter who's great at hitting the ball consistently and rarely strikes out, prioritizing putting the ball in play over hitting for power or home runs
Swing and a miss (Lishu) = When a pitcher swings at a ball but fails to make contact
Ducks on the pond (Sister Lishu) = When there are runners on base, especially in scoring position
Moonshot (Jinshi) = A very high, long-distance home run
Cannon (Ah-Duo) = A player with an exceptionally strong and accurate throwing arm
Worm burner (Emperor) = A hard-hit ground ball that stays low and moves so fast you could say it burns the worms in the ground
Small ball (Maomao) = A strategy of using low-risk plays like singles, bunts, and stolen bases to score runs instead of mainly relying on big hits and home runs
Comeback Player of the Year (Suirei) = An award honoring a player who makes a notable return after a major absence, typically following severe injuries, illness, or personal hardship
Cup of Coffee (Shisui) = A player who is in the Major League for a very brief period before leaving, so brief they could've only drank a "cup of coffee" in the time they were around
Cutter (Loulan) = A fastball that breaks sharply to the side as it reaches the batter, making it hard to hit solidly
Sacrifice Fly (Tamamo) = When a batter hits a fly ball that gets caught (which takes the batter out), deliberately giving up their chance to reach base so a teammate can score
Announcer Icons
Also check out Jinshi and Chue's sports commentary icons here.
Ceremonial First Pitch Chart + Royal Pitcher Icons
From Apothecary Diaries Baseball: What if the Emperor, Jinshi, and High Consorts Threw Ceremonial First Pitches? ⚾
Coach Ah-Duo Single Panel
From The Ideal Apothecary Diaries Baseball Team: Part 3 - Coach Ah-Duo ⚾
Lahan's Brother & Gaoshun Battery Images
From Lahan's Brother & Gaoshun: An Unexpected Duo ⚾
See the full Apothecary Diaries Baseball Image Album for all of the above and additional images!
everyday I think abt how cinematic and ethereal that one scene of lakan getting scolded by luomen for being rude to jinshi was followed by lakan getting on his knees and asking to deploy the royal guards to get his daughter back and how earth shatteringly gorgeous and devastating the cinematography and animation of that entire scene was. More so the fact that lakan:
Maomao keeps trying to forcefemme Jinshi via dart gun so Jinshi can be her wife but Lahan keeps jumping in front of the darts in hopes of becoming Jinshi's wife.
the thing abt jinshi is that he's capable of instilling fear in people very easily. he can be a pretty scary guy whether or not he means to be. Jinshi as a person is a facade anyway - that's always been implied, extremely heavily so in the second season.
During maomao's disappearance he's basically on a controlled rampage where Gaoshun has to constantly tell him to calm down and get it together, he's constantly trying to keep it together but it keeps slipping out. First with the palace woman from the clinic and then with the stand in for loulan and both times he terrified these women.
Imagine a 5'11 angelic maiden with long hair a sweet smile and a voice like honey in your face screaming at you while his grip is continuously tightening and he's progressively getting angrier and these women aren't even that old, ofc it's scary because Jinshi is still a man that is capable of inflicting harm on them, all he has to do is lose control and composure.
For the older women in the palace, he's just a constant reminder of why their lives turned out the way it did and every time they look at him, they only see the man that ruined their lives. It's scarier when you realise that the specific palace woman who was involved in maomao's kidnapping was very much aware abt jinshi's situation. Imagine having to stay in the rear palace, your personal prison ever since you were 10 and knowing that when you'll die, you still won't be free and it's run by the lookalike of the person responsible for all of this and you also know he's walking around with his frog very much intact. It's scary that he's lying and pretending to be "safe" and having the ability to abuse his power and do anything he wants to any of the younger girls anytime he chooses to do.
