Umm, what now? I know you wrote “6+” and not “6” so is this in reference to something later? Is it just innuendo that I don’t get?
Funny, I also didn’t notice the typo since the meaning was obvious from context.
Not 言わんばかり? I don’t think I’ve seen it with と before.
One question of my own. I did find more than this confusing, but no other specific questions.
説明によると、給金も跳ね上がっているらしいが、その二割は実家こと、猫猫を売りとばした商家に入る。
I was confused by this at first, but with how the end of the chapter went is it saying that since she was sold the 20% that goes home would actually go to the people who sold her? And then if I understand correctly, the end of the chapter basically involved 紅娘 (via the water pitcher incident) docking her official pay so there’s no 20% to give to the kidnappers, but then gave here extra “poison tester danger pay” of equal amount that doesn’t take out the 20%. Is that right?
I’m having trouble with some names and not others, but this one isn’t bad for me. Partly because volume 2 of 魔法少女育成計画 has a “チャイナっぽい” magical girl named 娘々 (にゃんにゃん) so I already knew half of the reading.
I also found chapter 6 to be the hardest since the first chapter, and I agree that nothing really happened.
Still gotta read chapters 7 and 8, but not doing that tonight.
Speaking of weird furigana usage in this book, the beginning of chapter 7 has テリトリー for 領域. This type of furigana usage feels so contrary to the setting. It would make more sense if occasional words were written with a Chinese spelling and had furigana for the Japanese pronunciation so readers knew what it meant. The way it’s being done is just weird.
I agree. We talked about it with @downtimes above in the thread, but yes, I wish the author didn’t do that. Also, why.
The worst part was that I was gleefully ignorant of that problem until y’all made me look at the furigana
Chapter 7 was also pretty uneventful. Does actual plot happen in this book or does the ひとりごと in the title imply just random musings by the main character without any overarching plot?
Chapter 7 question
毒見に加えて、食事も以前より豪華になった。茶会には甘い菓子があり、余れば猫猫にも配られる。
蟻のように働くことがなくなったので、栄養はそのまま肉になっていった。
（家畜にでもなった気分だ）
I don’t really get the middle sentence. First, does the 蟻のように refer to just the part before the comma or to the entire sentence? I can’t tell if she’s just describing not being allowed to work as being like an ant, or if ants that can’t work are like consumed by other ants or something like that. (I don’t know ant lifecycles well enough apparently. ) Second, regardless of which parts are being compared to ants, I’m not really sure what the part after the comma means for her situation. It seems unrelated to the previous sentence, other than 菓子 → 栄養, which is a bit of a stretch. Maybe it’s just completely unrelated, but I wasn’t sure.
I don’t know if you actually want the answer to that, so here’s a yes/no type spoiler:
No overarching plot in book 1
Here’s a slightly more spoilery thing:
but hints of the overarching plot (which exists) are dropped.
Ch 7 answer
just the part before the comma.
She is saying that, since she doesn’t have to work like an ant anymore (since she got promoted), all the food she is eating is turning to fat. Like she is cattle or something.
Thanks for the answer. That’s pretty disappointing and decreases my interest in the book significantly though. I thought the whole “book 1 can be read on its own” thing was because it was a well written single-book story that got expanded to a longer series, not because it was mostly lacking a story…
Chapter 7
Alright, so how was I supposed to know that 蟻のように was modifying 働く and not 働くことがなくなった? For some reason it never even occurred to me that it was only modifying 働く.
I guess that it depends on people. I generally don’t like that format (especially in books like 氷菓), but I thought that here it worked well to show us the setting. I hope you’ll keep reading!
Ch 7
Context, I guess? Ants are supposed to be hard workers, too.
I’m glad I’m not the only one. @.@ I’ll probably be posting my questions into next week; I should be able to finish this week’s reading in time, but I’ve got a lot of highlights and stuff I want to go back to and make sure I’ve got everything straightened out.
Was able to replace my broken tablet as well this week! As much as I love reading from a physical copy, me being able to highlight long tracts of text without actually harming the book is super nice.
Well, readers might not be familiar with 一時 as a unit of time (I know I wasn’t) and wrongly assume 15 minutes instead or something.
If anyone is curious, the actual reading is しはんとき.
Fun fact, that unit of time was used until 1873（明治6年）according to the Internets, so it kinda goes along my idea that the story takes place during the 19th century.
広さはそれほどではないものの、翡翠宮はほぼ四人の侍女で回っている。
Just double-checking the それほど here: “Though the Jade Palace’s size wasn’t great…”. Though that seems to contradict the second part of the sentence saying that there were only four attendants living there?
お腹いっぱいでも粥はおかわりをつがれ、菜の具は他の者よりひとつ多い。
What’s this つがれ here?
傷薬や化膿止めの効能を調べ、毒をすこしずつ飲み耐性をつけ、ときに自分から毒蛇を噛ませることまあった。
What is the 飲み being modified by/modifying? It reads like it should be modifying 耐性, but that doesn’t sound right.
花街に暮らす自分の娘が遊女以外の道へ進めるようにと、薬の知識と文字を教えたというのに、いつのまにかいわれなき誹謗中傷を受けるようになった。
What’s this ようにと?
なんでもいいから言ってみろ、と言われたらなにかしら言わねばならぬ。
So I think I’m getting lost in this verb tangle here at the end. と言われたら + なに + かしら + 言わねばならぬ。“…if she said that, she wondered, she had to say.” (very roughly) (I don’t actually remember who’s talking here, just quickly typing out my questions on my lunch break.)
You’re correct about the first part. The second part is saying that it is pretty much kept running by only four attendants. The connection is that it’s impressive and/or unexpected that it’s kept running by so few, despite it not being that big, relatively.
I believe it’s the non-て て-form of the passive form of 注ぐ. (I don’t know what the non-て て-form is actually called.)
This 飲み is also the non-て て-form. Like: 毒をすこしずつ飲み、耐性 をつけ.
For me it reads as an “in order to.” In order to encourage her along a path other than prostitution.
言われたら is passive, so if she was told to just say something, anything (なんでもいいから言ってみろ), then she had to say (言わねばならぬ) something (なにかしら [–>何か]).
) Second, regardless of which parts are being compared to ants, I’m not really sure what the part after the comma means for her situation. It seems unrelated to the previous sentence, other than 菓子 → 栄養, which is a bit of a stretch. Maybe it’s just completely unrelated, but I wasn’t sure.