Book Nine by Niu Xucao

Thirty years after the fall of Xiangyang, Guo Xiang, founder of the Emei Sect, came upon half of a mysterious iron token while traveling the jianghu. The character "Guo" engraved on its back matched a weapon Yang Guo once used, and seemed to fit the keepsake her mother, Huang Rong, had entrusted to her on her deathbed. As clues hidden in the token gradually came to light, a long-buried secret from the jianghu resurfaced. Back then, near the Valley of Heartlessness, Xiao Longnu was on the brink of death from a deadly poison. While Yang Guo searched far and wide for an antidote, he and Guo Xiang's mother, Huang Rong, who was also seeking medicine for her father, supported one another through their desperate plight, and feelings quietly blossomed between them. This unexpected entanglement made Guo Xiang's origins a secret that spanned the jianghu, and left her burdened from birth by Guo Jing's expectations, Huang Rong's guilt, Yang Guo's concern, and Xiao Longnu's silence. When the truth cuts through the disguise like a blade, Guo Xiang will have to redefine her path, torn between the identities of "the Guo family's daughter" and "Yang Guo's daughter." She will also uncover the sacrifices and choices her parents' generation never spoke of, made in the days before Xiangyang fell.