Work Text:
Gao Xiaolian picked up her father’s blade. There was a small patch of rust on the edge after so many years of disuse. She tested the weight and realized her memories of opening her father’s coffin to reveal what remained of his body had not faded. Against the pleas of her uncles, she forced herself to look, and then she held on to that despair until it built into a rage so deep she could not let it go until long after her revenge was complete. Deng Kuan could only teach her to channel it into a sword, until her power elevated Yueyang to glorious heights again.
But Gao Xiaolian had never wielded her father’s sword in all those long years, had never felt worthy, until now, with her hair streaked gray and her knobbed fingers reshaped to the grip of a hilt. Harboring a calm she had not felt since childhood, Gao Xiaolian hefted the blade and met the enemies at her door head on.