Liu

Dr. Liu (劉 (リュウ) 医官, Ryū-ikan^?) is an minor character in The Apothecary Diaries. As a high-ranking court physician, he shares the responsibility of managing the health of the residents of the Outer Court.

Appearance

Dr. Liu is an elderly man with a beard who glares often. Maomao notes that with age, the strong features on his face have turned him into a harsh-looking old man.^[1]

Personality

Liu has a dour, managerial temperament. His praise is not given often, and even his approval is only earned by diligent, hard work. On the other hand, he is always ready to match any grumbling with critique of how his physicians and court ladies could be doing their jobs better. He was opposed to allowing Maomao into physician training, but begrudgingly admits after the fact that she is capable of doing the job.

Abilities

Medical Knowledge: As Luomen's contemporary, he is highly skilled in both eastern and western medical techniques.

Background

During his youth, Liu traveled and studied western medical techniques alongside Luomen. Liu helped Luomen escape back to Li when he was discovered with the dissected body of his teacher.^[2] Sometime after Liu’s return to Li, he became a court physician.

At some point, he and Dr. You recruited Tianyu as a court physician on seeing his skill at animal dissection, and to curb his extreme curiosity.^[3]

When five new court ladies arrived at the eastern medical office, Dr. Liu initially tested their qualifications by watching how they would act without physicians in attendance; Maomao passed to Dr. Liu’s reluctance.^[4] After a month of working, only Maomao, Yao, and En'en were retained as medical assistants. Later, Dr. Liu caught Maomao trying to use a new frog oil-based salve for a patient and confiscated it.^[5]

Dr. Liu regularly held secret dissection lessons to train apprentice court physicians. Before his trip to the Western Capital, Jinshi approached Dr. Liu to recruit more physicians. Though Dr. Liu pushed back, explaining the difficulties of training physicians, Jinshi radically suggested that court ladies could also be trained as physicians. After Maomao, who was caught listening in on the conversation, declared her willingness to train as one, Jinshi forced Dr. Liu to include her in surgery lessons, which he begrudgingly did.^[1] Aside from Maomao and the quack doctor, Dr. Liu selected Dr. You, Dr. Li, and Tianyu as physicians for the western capital expedition.^[6]

Gallery

References