Work Text:
舍已为人, 肝肠寸断
“I’ll sacrifice the Jade Chamber.”
The words, Ningguang’s own words, echo in her mind as if she hadn’t just spoken them a heartbeat ago. She leaves the adepti and Lumine as soon as she says them, as soon as the Jade Chamber rumbles to life at her command, soaring further and higher until it comes to rest far above Osial’s serpentine heads. She hears herself requesting for their aid, to gather all of their strength and strike down her dearest friend.
She is not there, though Xiao’s words drift into her ear.
“...I understand.”
No. You do not, Adeptus Xiao.
Ningguang walks the path to her office, running her clawed fingers lovingly over the fine ebony wood that forms the Jade Chamber’s railings. She descends the stairs, her heels making soft clacks with each step. She retraces her thoughts and her feelings each morning as she watches the lovely murals shimmering in the central pillar for the final time.
That peace of mind as she mulls over Liyue's future; the deep breaths of cool, fresh air she takes as she strolls along the corridors overlooking all of Liyue from Bishui Plain to Lishua; the lovely paper snow she gently blows out the window, watching children dance and merchants scramble far below — all breathtaking moments that she has killed with a single sentence, now memories that will live only in her heart.
She presses a palm to the walls, relishing their coolness and feeling the low hum of energy vibrating through every piece. She basks in it all: every single thing from the wooden boards on the floor to the oriental chandelier on its ceiling, fully paid for by her own hand. The sweat and blood that lines every single piece of lacquered wood; every painted mural; every lotus pad blooming in the Jade Chamber's water features. Pure blue ponds, as crystal-clear as her mind, now trembling in fear at what is to come.
She stops in her office, wine-red eyes wandering over the very room that has witnessed her decisions for the last five years, that has been home to arguments, celebration and displeasure. Every esteemed guest she has ever welcomed to Liyue Harbour has set foot in this very room. Their memories are imprinted in the antiques decorating the entire chamber; in the guest table that has served countless merchants and honoured dignitaries; their words ingrained in her mind.
Outside, the roar of energy grows louder. She is running out of time.
She approaches the scale on her table; the scale that has judged the fairness of thousands of disputes, weighting every claim against the book of Liyue’s laws, amended and enforced by her own hand as the Tianquan.
Ningguang tips the scale with a single flick of her finger. There is no fairness here.
She turns, heels clacking across the wooden floor. She pauses at the guest table, picking up a teacup, turning it around in her fingers, looking for a crack along the rim.
There it is.
It had cracked when a certain captain accidentally swung her arm too hard against the wall and spilled tea all over her floor. Ningguang had been displeased, but Beidou had showed up a few weeks later with a lovely apology she couldn't refuse.
It still sits on her shelf now.
The Tianquan sets the cup down, moving on to said shelf of porcelain antiques. Some of them she'd procured through winning auctions; others are gifts that she has deigned to display. One, in particular, stands out from the rest, for it shimmers with the nascent iridescence of mother-of-pearl, its turquoise sheen almost glowing under the Jade Chamber’s warm light.
Ningguang picks it up, turns it around. The ugly scrawl at its base is still visible: from The Crux.
“The Crux,” she had laughed when she’d first received it, looking up at the brown-haired pirate seated across her. Of course this irritating collaborator of hers would sign it like this, after she’d specifically declared she was working with ‘Captain Beidou’, not ‘The Crux Fleet’ in their partnership. “Defiant till the end, you are.”
Captain Beidou had barked out a laugh. It was an uplifting sound, a rare noise that she enjoyed. “That means you like it, Ningguang. So, am I forgiven for cracking your cup?”
The Tianquan had raised a sculpted eyebrow. “You expect to win me over with a mere gift?”
"Yet you're admiring it like I just handed you a big fat pouch of shiny, clinking Mora for losing another game." Beidou had flashed her a cheeky grin, one that made her heart flutter.
Ningguang had huffed then, setting the turquoise vase delicately to the side. "It... will suffice," she'd declared, cheeks burning. "But still, you didn't have to sign it as 'The Crux'."
Beidou had folded her arms. “Hey, it was a team effort. My crew sourced for the craftsman and all, you know? And like I said, I am the Captain of The Crux Fleet. These boys and girls are my family. So when you employ me, you’re employing all of us.”
Family. The Tianquan had let out a low chuckle, covering her lips with her fan. And that was perhaps the first time she’d acknowledged just how different the brunette was. Where Ningguang abandoned family to pursue her dreams, Beidou built one who would fight for her dreams. Where Ningguang saw only pawns, Beidou saw brothers and sisters worth losing an eye for. Where Ningguang dealt with billions of Mora, balancing a country in the palm of her hand, Beidou dealt with lives, risking life and limb to fulfill the people’s needs.
Ningguang had wondered, then, what made Beidou so self-sacrificial, so willing to put herself on the line for people she didn’t even know if she could trust.
Now, holding the vase in her hand and feeling the crackle of energy in the air, so thick the hairs on the back of her neck are standing — Ningguang understands.
The rumble has turned into a roar. There is a deafening crack that tears through her heart. Lumine has channeled all of the adepti’s power and slammed it into the Jade Chamber. And now its very foundations are quivering.
The Tianquan watches the antiques tremble, the scale tip violently back and forth. She watches the countless calligraphy scrolls roll all over the floor. The entire chamber shakes in the throes of death, wooden boards cursing its creator, stone walls breaking down in despair.
And Ningguang wants to stay. She wants to sit right here, together with her life’s work. She wants to let go of all her duties now. If she is to lose everything she has striven for, then she should be allowed to go with it. Liyue will not miss her.
But Beidou would.
Her lips curve into a sad smile as she traces the wavy patterns on her turquoise vase. No matter how ruthless and cruel she is to her pawns, she can’t… leave her behind. Ningguang can't imagine the heartbreak Beidou would go through, or the rage that she would carry in her heart, if she learned the Tianquan of the Liyue Qixing had chosen to go down with her home.
So Ningguang presses her forehead to the wall. “Farewell, old friend,” she whispers softly as the chamber begins to plummet. “Goodbye for now. Let us meet… in the future.”
I will rebuild.
The antiques behind her shatter as she sends herself out in a spark of Geo, landing on Mount Tianheng’s cliffside. The violent storm whips her hair into a frenzy. The rain pelts her mercilessly. She cradles the single vase in tenderly, watching her life’s work shoot down towards Osial.
A lifetime of love and labour, hurtling towards a god.
She wants to scream. No, I do not want this. Let Osial destroy Liyue Harbour for all I care.
But she thinks of the Crux Fleet, sailing into a devastated harbour, of the heartbreak Beidou and all of her crew will face when they find the drowned and puffy corpses of their found families and friends. Of Keqing and Ganyu and her dear secretaries, each and every one of them striving so hard… all for naught.
She thinks of the flood that will bury the harbour deep beneath the waves, all of Feiyun Slope and Yuehai Pavilion, plunging half of Mount Tianheng into a watery grave. Of the hundreds and thousands of lives now watching this horrifying spectacle from the docks, from their houses, praying to an Archon who has abandoned them all.
In her memory, this moment is frozen in time: the moment the Jade Chamber’s pointed tip touches the watery head of an enraged Osial. A heartbeat. She feels the final pulse of plaustrite even from here, the heart of her old friend, ceasing to beat.
The Jade Chamber explodes. Her heart dies with it.
Tears gently fall onto the vase. She blinks, and more tears simply follow. Ningguang stares at the vase, the only piece of her old friend left. The waves churn, hungrily devouring all that’s left. Ningguang has never loathed the sea more than this very moment as she watches this monster engulf all that she has built with sweat and blood.
The skies clear, but the storm rages on within. Pain is collecting in her blood, calcifying around her struggling heart. Each heartbeat hurts more than the last. This agony is beyond anything she’s ever felt, and she knows pain.
She knows the pain of being disowned by the ones she considered family. She knows the pain of being used for her business accumen and the pain of never knowing when her next meal will be. She knows the pain of walking barefoot for a thousand miles from Yaoguang Shoal to Liyue Harbour under the burning sun even though her feet are already blistered and weeping.
But this pain — she is lost and wounded, her heart pounding so painfully she thinks it might simply stop, and she wishes she had stayed in her office till the end.
Curse you, Beidou. If not for you…
She would finally be at rest, together with her dearest friend.
She watches the adepti bring Keqing and the others to safety at the docks. As Tianquan, she knows she must go, to resolve matters with the adepti, but as Ningguang… she just wants to sit here, not eating, not moving, until her body gives out.
She sees Keqing looking wildly around, twintails bobbing about, whispering to Ganyu while the adepti gather around Lumine and Paimon. She sees Madame Ping join them at the docks. She sighs and wills her heart to turn to stone, whispers to herself that there is simply no time to mourn the loss of her heart.
With this act, she has sealed their fate. They have stepped into a new era, one that needs her to stand strong — strong enough to carry the weight of leading an Archonless nation.
Ningguang laughs to herself mirthlessly. As much as she respects Morax and is grateful to him for appearing to her in a dream days before, she can’t help but hate him at this moment. Yes, she hates the very Archon she prayed to as a child, dreaming of doing big business in the bustling streets of Liyue, thanking him for every successful contract she’d signed and every deal she won.
That traitor. He’d blessed her so she could lose it all.
Perhaps Keqing has been right all along.
These thoughts are quite unlike her, Ningguang knows. She’s not one to simply allow herself to be overcome with emotion like this, to base her judgement on feelings alone. She has always relied on facts, on turning a problem over and over in her mind’s eye, balancing every option on a scale until it tips in favour of her goals.
But perhaps, for a few moments, she can allow herself to simply… feel.
Ningguang closes her eyes, sending herself as a spark of Geo back to the docks. Keqing’s eyes widen in relief; Ganyu looks like she’s about to cry. Why, did they both think she had died with her Jade Chamber?
How little faith they have in her.
How well they know her indeed.
She holds her head high, wearing that self-assured smile as she approaches the adepti confidently. As Tianquan of the Liyue Qixing, she will appear nothing short of resolute, as firm and as unyielding as stone. She’ll hold it together just long enough until they settle all these pressing matters.
And after all this, whenever that moment is, whether it’s an hour or thirteen weeks or a year later — she will allow herself to mourn in peace.