She never had a name. When her master found her, she was lying by the roadside, starving and half-dead from ea…
She never had a name. When her master found her, she was lying by the roadside, starving and half-dead from eating poisonous herbs.
Her master not only saved her but also gave her a name: Qiulan.
Qiulan, like the sweet osmanthus that blooms in winter.
Much later, she learned that her master was the famed doctor known as the "Qiu Shuixian," who had saved countless lives.
Yet, out of all those people, her master only kept her by her side. Maybe, just maybe, her master was a little partial to her.
She learned medicine from her master, and eventually, the art of poisons as well.
Wherever her master went to serve the Lord along with the Hanging Blade, she followed. Her poison was put to use more than once, and each time, her master would look at her with quiet pride.
But then Lord died, and the Hanging Blade was destroyed.
Her master said the lord had died from poisoning, and the symptoms matched her own toxins exactly.
Was her master suspecting her?
No!
She protested loudly. She hadn't done it. She knew how much the Hanging Blade meant to her master. She'd never do anything to hurt her.
Yet her master left alone, clearly unconvinced.
She didn't know what had truly happened that day. She kept asking others in the Hanging Blade, over and over, to help her piece together the events. At first, people answered her patiently. Over time, they lost all interest.
In the end, she started testing poisons on herself, trying to prove that the poison she used wasn't the same as the one that killed the lord.
She didn't know how many years had passed before she finally identified the poison from that day, ready at last to clear her name to her master. But her master and all the others with the Hanging Blade had vanished without a trace.
In the end, maybe the truth about the poisoning never even mattered. She was left wandering the wilderness alone, repeating her innocence to an uncaring world.