When I was twenty years old, I sat on the edge of a well and wanted to jump down.
Ten years of carrying water, ten years of repetition, ten years of numbness - I don't know why I am alive.
Until a man with a severed finger died in front of me and gave me a token. From then on, I was hunted, raped, and forced to take a path I had never imagined.
Some of the people I met on the road taught me to live, and some died for me. Ten years later, I returned to that well, looked at myself in the water, and smiled.
This is ten years for an ordinary person. From "not wanting to live" to "reluctant to die", from numbness to truly living.
Concept: How does an ordinary person go from "not wanting to live" to "reluctant to die". This is not a story about a heroine who counterattacks and becomes a legend, but a story about ordinary people like you and me, awakening from numbness day after day. Twenty-year-old Azhao carries water, eats and sleeps every day - just like every working person who is trapped by repetitive work. She didn't know why she was alive, so she sat on the edge of the well and wanted to jump down. A token given to her by a man with a severed finger before his death pushed her down a path she had never imagined. In the past ten years, everyone she met was a mirror: Xiu Niang told her: What you hold in your hands when you die will be worth what you have in this life. Amu taught her: Some things have nothing to do with you, but they will matter after you do them. Shen Zhao made her understand: living is to be the light for others. The mute made her see: if you do one thing without fooling around in your whole life, it is a big deal. The core of the story is not "becoming stronger", but "awakening". Azhao did not become the empress, nor did she change her destiny against the will of heaven. She just woke up from numbness and found the reason for her life - even if it was just to find an answer for one person, even if it was just to give one person a dagger. She wants to tell everyone who feels that they are "carrying water": It is not terrible to repeat. What is terrible is to repeat until the day you die, only to find that you have never lived. The sign of having survived is simple - before dying, you are reluctant to die.