Yup! ねば is just the conditional form of the classical negative ~ぬ.
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To add, this site shows the different conjugations for ない and ぬ, which makes it easy to see which ぬ conjugations correspond with which ない conjugations.
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Alrighty, a few questions on my end:
Chapter 1
まったく強大で迷惑極まりない結婚活動、略して婚活、宮廷の女狩りである。
So this sentence comes immediately after talking about how Maomao was captured by three kidnappers, but then it suddenly jumps to 結婚活動? And then after that it talk about her paycheck, so I’m a little lost as to what this sentence is trying to say.
なんせ人さらいにからわれた者さえいるのだから。
This sentence comes as Maomao’s thinking about all the 女官 who can’t read. I wanted to double-check what the さえ here is doing.
花の園
How is 園 pronounced here? えん？その？
大所帯
The (JP-EN) dictionary I’m using defines this as a ‘large family’; I assume it’s just being used metaphorically here when referring to the large number of 妃、女官、and 宦官 who live in the 後宮?
特に後ろ盾もなく、さらわれて数合わせにされた娘にはそれが妥当なところだろう。
Two questions here: 数合わせ seems to mean fixing numbers (in order to get a count you want); is that correct? In that case, how does it work with 妥当 here? Previous sentence talks about how Maomao was pretty low on the totem pole in terms of rank in the 後宮, so I’m not sure I understand how this sentence fits in after.
I’ve got more questions coming up, but I’ll type those up tomorrow.
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Chapter 1 answers
It means “even”. There are 女官 here who can’t read (previous sentence) because there are even people here who were kidnapped. (By the way, it’s さらわれた, not からわれた.)
I’m not 100% certain on the first part, but I think what you said is right. As in she (and others) were kidnapped to meet a quota basically for how many women they wanted there. Based on that, the 妥当 refers back to the previous sentence about her rank being low. She’s saying her low rank is appropriate for a woman who was just snatched up to meet a quota. At least that’s what I think is going on, but I’m not sure.
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Chapter 1 answers
Yes. That’s 猫猫’s dry sense of humour. Basically, she is calling the kidnaping an (extremely annoying) marriage hunting. The next sentence just went on to say that she still get the normal salary and work conditions, so it’s not so bad… at least it wouldn’t be if she had come from her own volition.
その. As far as I know 園 is always その when alone, except when it’s short for 保育園, then it’s えん. That being said, in this specific instance, it’s easy to remember if you know one of the standard Japanese fonts 花園 (はなぞの). (That might only work for me though)
https://static-cdn.osdn.net/thumb/g/3/748/800x600_0.png
It’s just 大 + 所帯. Definition 2: a place where a group of people live together (there’s even 大所帯 as one of the examples).
what @seanblue said.
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Chapter 1 answers
Just a typo on my end, my bad.
Ah, that would make sense. A quota being fulfilled fills in the gaps nicely.
Aaah, thanks! I’ll have keep that in mind in the future, then; I’m sure her sense of humor will pop up again, haha.
Excellent, I’ll keep that in mind. And thank you for the link; never knew that’s what that font was called.
A victim of not being granular enough, whoops.
Thank you for the great notes so far, @Naphthalene and @seanblue! Will try to get a few more questions up later today.
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A few more:
Chapter 1
…猫猫の持つのはそばかすの浮いた健康な肌と枯れ枝のおような手足くらいである。
(Truncated the sentence a bit for this part specifically.) Just wanted to confirm 猫猫’s description here and pick it apart a little bit:
はそばかすの浮いた健康な肌 → healthy, freckled skin? Just curious how the 健康な works in
枯れ枝のおような手足 → …limbs like twigs, I suppose? Makes more sense now that I type it out instead of it just being in my head, haha.
下妃
What’s the pronunciation on 下 here? した？げ？
位持ちともなれば自分専用の侍女を持つことができるが、位の低い妃はせいぜい二人までしか置くことができない。
Highlighted part is my confusion. Is this a single grammar construction? Two? とも＋なれば? What does it mean/how does it break down in this context?
一方、食指を動かされることなく適齢を過ぎた妃は、よほど実家の権力がない限り、位が下げられるか、または、官に下賜されてしまう。
This comes after the sentences talking about how doing it with the Emperor gets you a higher rank; let me break down this into bits:
- 食指を動かされることなく適齢を過ぎた妃は → is 食指を動かされることなく modifying 適齢 or 妃 here? My gut wants to say 妃.
- 位が下げられるか、または → how are か and または working together here? Are they both being used as ‘or’ for emphasis?
- 官に下賜されてしまう → Finally, I take it that a lower rank is what’s being 下賜されて’ed; how does that work with 位が下げられるか? Normally I would expected a noun of some sort.
(This is the sentence immediately following the previous.)
それが不幸かどうかは相手にもよるが、宦官に下賜されることを官女たちは一番恐れているようだ。
Unsure of the bolded, what parts are at work there and what it means.
This is also the first appearance of 官女 iirc in this chapter. Who are we referring to here? 妃 that have been demoted low enough?
Okay, I think that should be it for chapter 1 for me; I read it and chapter 2 last weekend, and have been slowly re-reading this week to get my questions in. Too slowly. @.@ Hopefully I can pick out a few good questions for chapter 2 before needing to deep-dive into our next reading section.
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Chapter 1 answers
I’m not 100% certain on this but white skin seems to be the ideal of the times and healthy skin implies some kind of coloring so you don’t look ashen
yeah basically no meat on her limbs (or an part of her body)
Pretty sure your gut is correct on this one
The women are being married off. Take a look at
The 相手にもよる is saying that it being a 不幸 or not depends on who the partner is
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Chap 1
I see; something else occurs to me as I re-read my own question for this sentence:
よほど実家の権力がない限り is saying that the girl’s family doesn’t hold much political power, right? That would normally be the opposite of what I would expect for someone being married off to a high-ranking official.
Ah, so it should be broken down into something like 相手 + にも + よる? Or 相手 + に + も + よる?
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Attempt at giving back: Chapter 1 discussion
I read it as this grammar point 【JLPT N１】文法・例文：〜ともなると / 〜ともなれば - 日本語NET nothing special.
You have to compare it to the alternative. Being a concubine to the ruler of the lands is way preferable (current position). And you can end up as a woman for an eunuch, that’s why they say no thanks, if they can. Probably also have to do chores then (Thats how I interpreted the descriptive 食指を動かされることなく in their current position EDIT: fml, I always get caught out by figure of speeches in japanese. See Belerith’s answer below… Some of the words I had no reason to look up and they betray me 
) .
I took it as an 総称 for all ranks of concubines working there. It’s their shared fear regardless of current rank, no?
For the rest I would say the mo is just the “also” particle in Aによる. And か、または is just flavor like you suspect but I’m not too sure for both of them so take it with lots of grains of salt.
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食指を動かす is a metaphor for arousing appetite, or sexual desire. The 妃 that exceed a certain age without catching anyone’s interest (rest of sentence).
Here’s a weblio link detailing that phrase.
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Instead of anyone, that would be a certain someone, in that case 
Considering it comes right after 下級妃嬪 and 下級妃, I assume it’s just an abbreviation and would just read it かひ. At the same time, it never shows up again, so it might just be a typo.
I also assume that’s how the word is being used here. However, that word usually refers to a different group of people (well, women) in universe, so I’m also going to chalk this one up to a mistake from the author.
(My brain auto ignores those, so I can’t really say, but I think it gets better quickly)
Did I miss any remaining question?
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Nice, nice. Just something that hadn’t come up for me yet, then.
Very interesting. 
That one slipped me by completely; will definitely check out the link.
I’m good on my end for the moment; hoping to get some chapter 2 questions up today.
I have to say, too, it’s pretty interesting to see the bits that are getting categorized as “probably mistakes”; my reading level isn’t quite good enough to really catch those, so this has been very informative in all sorts of ways, haha.
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Okay, this should be my last batch of questions, all for chapter 2:
Chapter 2
前に座っている二人は箸も進めず、呪いだの祟だのと言っている。
What’s the bolded saying here? Is it saying that the girls aren’t really eating due to being preoccupied with gossiping?
好奇心に負けて後悔するのはそれからしばらくのことである。
Where is the 後悔 coming in here? The sentence seems to be saying that 猫猫’s giving into her curiosity, but what is the regret referring to?
…And that’s it! Far fewer questions than in chapter 1. I actually did have a few more, but the process of typing them out and figuring out how to phrase my question ended up with me solving my own problem half the time, which was nice. Super excited to start chapter 3~
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Chapter 2 answers
箸が進む can be a set phrase meaning " 1. * おいしくてどんどん食べられる。" in this case with the negation I would agree with your interpretation
She is saying this sentence from the future looking back at all the times she regretted loosing to her curiosity. Basically this sentence is foreshadowing a bit
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Chapter 2
That’s how I took it yes.
後悔 is the topic of the sentence.
好奇心に負けて = Giving into her curiosity
後悔するのは = (And) coming to regret it
それからしばらくのことである = is something that will happen sometime later
Hard to translate sentences like this into English, but hopefully that gets the point across.
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Ah, thank you both! That clears things up nicely; your breakdown of the sentence is also especially much appreciated, @seanblue!
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I just read this chapter today, and my understanding was similar to yours on this part. (Not the talking about it to the 女官, but the content.) @Naphthalene mentioned that 猫猫 didn’t know if it was the water quality or the washing skills, but I thought at the end it said that 猫猫 knew (but didn’t say) that it was how the silk was dried.
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Good catch. I didn’t turn the page when I checked that part and missed both the という (so that it’s the general understanding, rather than 猫猫’s) and that just after, she mentioned the real reason.
Like, literally the next page (should have checked):
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Phew, that was a very hard read! Thankful for this thread, I could clear up any doubts I still had 
not sure I will remember all this new vocab but enjoying it a lot so far!
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