The Imperial Family

-How a dowager empress is made: When peach blossoms fall, revenge is inevitable. The avenger imprisons herself, too.

-Forced possession · A cage and a captive bird · Torturous revenge romance · Powerful heroine and court intrigue · Love and redemption · An ensemble cast · Long-form verse

-A tragic epic about "what happens when the dragon-slayer becomes the dragon, and must destroy herself with her own hands."

[Blurb]

"When there's a flower to pluck, pluck it now. Don't wait until the blossoms are gone, with nothing left to take."

Seventeen-year-old Jiang Baizhi spoke the words with a bright smile at the foot of Hanshan. They were innocent and carefree, a joke.

Later, the emperor in the Divine Dragon Hall repeated them into her ear. They were a declaration of intent, the beginning of the hunt.

-One prophetic verse, half a lifetime in chains.

She was the flower plucked.

Born in the wilds, she was taken by the imperial family and transplanted into the bloody soil of the palace. The emperor's delusions were fire, her lover's cowardice was water, and an old friend's malice was a thorn.

She nearly suffocated in a sea of love, desire, and hatred. In the end, only by grasping power, cold and hard, could she breathe.

She became the one who plucked the flower.

Innocence was refined into poison, tenderness forged into a blade. She turned every scheme into an arrow aimed at the emperor, for her cousin who had died a gruesome death, and for the self that had been trampled underfoot.

She would take not only his authority, but everything he needed to breathe, until his realm was overturned and her hatred could finally be appeased.

But when she had truly dragged her enemy into the abyss and held all power in the land, she saw an even larger cage.

She became both the cage that protected flowers and the blaze that burned them.

As regent, the empress dowager ruled the realm and governed with benevolence under imperial authority: abolishing burial sacrifices, curbing the powerful clans, and opening the path to office for those from humble families. Then a blood-written petition for "reform" seared through her palm.

Suddenly, she understood: the old order she had sustained with her life's blood was still the old order. The phoenix throne where she sat was the deepest and strongest cornerstone and shackle of this magnificent palace.

And so the choice arrived: Would she remain the eternal ruler of this splendid realm, or become the resolute gravedigger of its decaying roots?

Jiang Baizhi took a third path: she threw herself into the flames.

-If her existence had become the last iron bar imprisoning this world, then her collapse should be the first stepping stone toward a new sky.

"When there's a flower to pluck, pluck it now. Don't wait until the blossoms are gone, with nothing left to take."

In the final chapter, she reveals the ultimate meaning of this prophecy to the world.

It has nothing to do with romance or possession.

Instead: May I burn as a torch, clear away the thorns of the old world, and light a wilderness where everyone may freely make their way.

"From ancient times to the present, those who come after us are without end."

"I only hope that those who come after will not have to become me, endure my suffering, or be imprisoned by chains and trapped in cages."

"If so, then though my body burns, I will become spring mud."

"And tomorrow, the land will be green for a thousand miles. It need not remember me."

[Notes]

A long work, and it will be completed. Set in an imaginary history, with no claim to historical accuracy. No real-person comparisons. Characters' beliefs do not represent the author's, and their beliefs at one point in the story do not represent their final beliefs. Rational discussion is welcome; personal attacks are not. Blurb updated 2025.12.31.

[Character card explanations]

1. An empress wielding a sharp sword, trapped in the palace. 2. A dark king who created the world and holds imperial power, a despicable emperor. 3. A cousin, like a fresh breeze and bright moon, reserved and loyal to the throne, yet muddleheaded. 4. An older female cousin who seems clear-eyed and broad-minded, but is stubborn and sensitive, and wastes her life away (on a path toward corruption).

Theme: The most moving thing about humanity is this: with our small selves, we struggle between heaven and earth, and with our dim eyes, we search for the essence of life.