the palace still blooms

There's a specific kind of power that doesn't need to raise its voice — or its weapon. I wanted the gigantic guandao to feel like an extension of her stillness rather than a contrast to it: something she carries the way others carry a fan. The palace setting is full of flowers, lanterns still lit, wisteria still in bloom — beautiful and completely wrong, because a palace this full and this empty means something has already happened. She's the only one left standing. The peony in her palm is the detail that holds the whole image: she stopped to pick it up. Whatever she just did, it did not disturb her enough to forget about the flowers.