A Beauty in Troubled Times (Complete Short Story)

Woman. What a weighty title.

Those elegant women looked down from the clouds upon the clamor of the mortal world, unwilling to sully themselves with it. Their brows and eyes were sharply defined. Their words and actions were like politicians’ promises: insubstantial, elusive, impossible to fathom. Each was a poem steeped in countless allusions, indecipherable to the unlearned. Some faded into the sands of time, their names forgotten, finding a corner only in folk tales. Others died alone, leaving behind a reputation for beauty that endured for millennia, still delighting countless poets and scholars long after their deaths, who spun one tale of vanished splendor after another beneath their pens. They were clever and graceful, knowing how to measure their actions and when to proceed or stop. They were perceptive and discreet, knowing how to remain behind others without revealing their brilliance. Compared with the long sweep of history, these women were but fleeting lives among countless others, beauties whose youth withered in an instant, whose radiance lasted only a moment. Yet however weak they might be, when countless tiny ants gathered in layer upon layer, they could still shake a towering tree. Their existence left vermilion marks, a cinnabar mole at history’s brow. Though the mortal world twists and turns, those scattered clouds of rosy light cannot be erased. History is a bent balance: even the slightest change is magnified without limit.

Those women... Even if their eyes once shimmered like cold stars and their hearts and pens bloomed with wondrous talent, their legendary glory was long ago swept away by wind and rain. Yet when the arrows of time whistled past, the sound that split the air was more than just the passing of romance. It was the fluttering silk robes of Lvzhu as she danced down from a tower; the iron hooves of Mulan’s jade-white steed drawing near; the treasure chest of Du Shiniang sinking into the green waters... In an instant, towering waves surged toward us. Reduced to stories in books, these women could never escape their confines. But fallen blossoms and broken willows, old trees and withered vines, each have their own romance to accompany them.

Short stories about legendary women from history. I’ll post each one once it’s finished. No abandoned story, so read with confidence.

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