#another layer to this is that i noticed shennong and her have the same special expression

[simayeeet]

Word vomiting about an idea that I was letting sit in my head that would make DW Zhang Chunhua more than whatever the canon/fanon thinks of her. None of is this true, just speculating a possibility.

Based on a DW8 convo she has with Sima Yi, she brews medicine for him herself. Sima Yi would rather admit he was faking being sick than drink it, which haha, he's such a little kid. But the other aspect this seems to reveal about her is that she has pretty good knowledge of general medicine. Now it is not confirmed if the medicine she makes works, but they just seem to taste awful. Most Chinese medicine is bitter and awful tasting, but sometimes, the worse tasting means the most effective. (Not scientifically proven, do not come at me for that.)

She also seems to have an understanding of human anatomy based on the anecdote where she killed the family maid that she famously has to her name. She strangled the maid, which is an easy method of killing since it doesn't need that much pressure on the human neck, it just has to be continuous. Obviously, not having blood spill makes a crime easier to hide. But maybe she knew it was a faster way to die.

There is not much information about her family but it can be inferred that she was not poor since her father was a magistrate. Likely she could have had an education or at least can read and write. Being literate would allow her to read medical texts. There is a text that details various plants and their properties called the Shennong Ben Cao Jing that was written during the Han Dynasty. (Sometimes it's said Shennong himself wrote it. And I am going to guess that one is canon in DW China since it seems like he was a real guy in Koeiverse.)

In DW8 Empires, something I thought was strangely neat was that Chunhua exists with good virtue. (It's represented by a smiley face and a 1 or 2. 1 means good, 2 is just very good. It works the same for evil people with an evil devil face. Chunhua had a smiley face 1. Sima Yi has a devil face 1.)

I think as a young girl, Chunhua had wanted to pursue becoming a physician but was discouraged because of being a woman. And then she was also due to get married and all that, so she had to put away those ideas. However, she does ultimately like and want to help people, which she mainly does for Sima Yi. DW mainly shows her when she already has children so there is no idea what she could have been like before so it's free real estate for me.

Her wanting to be a doctor or healer (or acting more into it) would also give her some contrast with Yueying who's main thing is some form of ancient era engineering. (STEM lesbians let's go) Gives her room to interact with Lianshi, who does a breath's version of what I had in mind. (I do not think Lianshi canonically has done any medical healing but she seems to do more mental/spiritual healing with her actions. She has a musou healing rain though so maybe I am wrong.)

Her canon personality is alright, it can stay, but there should be more of an intelligent caring side to counter Sima Yi's.... everything.