The Sword of Kaigen

by M.L. Wang

“They were brought here as slaves to farm all that land the Yammankalu stole from the Natives, but when they were emancipated, they weren’t given any property of their own. Some of the Native Baxarians can at least compete with the Kelenduguka physically, but the adyns don’t even have that. It’s easy to judge when you inherit property, and an important name, and amazing powers from your parents.”

“How easy do you think it is to build a life out of nothing?”

I had to face truths that seemed to break the world. That’s what happens when you come into contact with people who aren’t quite like you. You learn over time that the world isn’t broken. It’s just… got more pieces to it than you thought. They all fit together, just maybe not the way you pictured when you were young.”

what am I supposed to think?” “That’s something you’ll have to decide for yourself,” Misaki said. “That’s part of becoming an adult.”

You can learn a great deal listening to people with different experiences from your own.

listening never made any man dumber, but it’s made a lot of people smarter.”

They may have grown up in a culture of denial, but when the bloody truth stared them full in the face, they were more than capable of comprehending it. They were more than capable of anger.

Somehow, he had broken her anyway, but she hadn’t broken quietly like porcelain. She had broken like black glass and ice—jagged and more dangerous than ever.

because how could one possibly hold so much suffering in something as small as a human form? Yet here was this woman who held everything inside a little body of flesh and blood without breaking.