The orphanage in Yunping smelled of ink and steamed buns. Wei Xuan watched through warped window lattices as children chanted the Thousand-Character Classic, their voices rising like fledgling phoenixes from the ashes of brothels she'd burned to build schools.
"Heaven and earth, primal chaos; the universe vast and wild," they recited, small fists clutching charcoal sticks.
Steward Liu bowed beside her, his scarred hands – once shackled in a debtor's prison – trembling slightly. "These sprouts grow strong by your grace, Lady Wei."
Wei Xuan's blade hummed at her hip. "Water nourishes roots, not the gardener's name."
The former Poetry Pavilion loomed across the canal, its vermilion pillars stripped of silk lanterns. Inside, women who once sold laughter now taught guqin and poetry. Meng Shi's pipa melodies drifted through open windows, each note sharper than the dagger she kept beneath her teaching robes.
Her son Meng Yao knelt in the back alley, scrubbing ink stains from discarded cultivation manuals. The boy's sleeves were rolled to elbows, revealing forearms mapped with bruises from tavern drunks who mocked his mother's delusions.
"Immortal Realm Secrets," Wei Xuan read the charlatans' title aloud, plucking the soggy booklet from his hands. "Worthless."
Meng Yao's smile cut like a honed blade. "Mother believes."
Wei Xuan tossed the manual into a brazier. Flames licked golden promises to ash. "Belief needs better weapons."
At dusk, she rode her blade over Yunping's waterways. Beneath her shadow, the charity school's newest recruit – a seven-year-old with eyes like frozen lakes – practiced throwing knives at straw dummies.
The moon rose as Wei Xuan reviewed ledgers. Steward Liu's report included a footnote: Meng Yao corrected three accounting errors in the liquor inventory.
She dipped her brush in cinnabar ink, circling the boy's name.