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Master Zhang of Hanfeng’s Ironmongers was the bridge between land and sea for two young women. His father “Cold Blade” was a hardworking man, traveling far away from their home in Qingce village to work at the forge in Liyue Harbour. The family business, while hard and somewhat dirty work, was profitable enough for the old man to enroll his son with some of Liyue’s top educators. This is where he met Ningguang.
As children, class matters were of little concern (much to Ningguang’s parents’ chagrin.) They played and talked often, developing a strong friendship. He and his father taught Ningguang many practical skills such as the art of ore, which she’d used to rise to the top of Liyue’s merchant class, and she taught them what she knew of her parent’s business tactics.
Whenever he wasn’t in school, with Ningguang, or helping his father and learning the ropes of the business, the young Zhang frequented the docks behind the shop. Every so often when her father’s ship would dock, he’d run into his other close playmate, Beidou. He’d once stolen a failed claymore from the blacksmith’s and gifted it to her so she could slay the monster in their games. That greatsword still lives in the cabin of her ship, reminding her of the strength of the working class, and the kindness of children.
He and Ningguang had been browsing the shops looking out over the harbour one night when Beidou’s ship sailed in. Pulling Ningguang along as soon as he recognized the sails, he introduced the two. They hit it off-- terribly.
Both headstrong and stubborn young women, they butted those heads fiercely and frequently. Ningguang thought Beidou was too brash and unfiltered, and Beidou found Ningguang stuck up and self-absorbed. And yet, as long as Zhang was there, so were they, a friendship developing despite themselves. When his father encouraged him to go back to the village to find ‘a nice woman to settle down and start a family with,’ the two women surprisingly kept in touch.
When Ningguang’s personal life came tumbling down all around her, with Zhang hundreds of miles away, there was only one person she felt she could turn to.
“Son of a bitch.”
Ningguang blinked in rapid succession, trying to keep the tears at bay, lest any of her competitors saw her in a moment of weakness. “I stopped in at Mingxing Jewelry and Xingxi was asking me all about this necklace he’d just bought, and I was so confused, until I saw it later that day on her neck.” A tear escaped, and she blinked again, as Beidou sat, stone faced, staring at her cheek. “I think he did it but I just can’t prove it.”
:::
Beidou kept pretty busy, manning her ship. But in the quiet hours of the night, it crept back into her mind. I think he did it but I just can’t prove it.
Whenever they’d dock back in Liyue Harbour, she and Ningguang would meet up at Liuli Pavillion for a glass of wine, courtesy of the rising star of the mercantile world. That’s when Ningguang dropped the bomb.
“We broke up. It was hard living with him when I knew he was cheating, but when he tries to murder you himself? There’s no way.”
Beidou spat out her chardonnay (ever the lady, as Ningguang would say) in disbelief. “Son of a BITCH.”
“Shh, Beidou, there’s people around. I’m glad I had that old geo vision. Somehow, thanks be to Morax, it worked. There was a screen up in front of me, right before the arrow hit. He got away before I could call anyone. I've asked around, but there’s nothing I can do to get back at him. I know he did it, but I just can’t prove it.”
“I saw he’d been staying at her place, but I assumed it was you who broke it off. Rat bastard.” Beidou took another sip of her wine.
:::
Working for the fleet, you had to toughen up. Sea monsters are more real than you’d believe, and Beidou thanked the Archons for all the time she’d spent training with that faulty claymore all those years back. And yet, before Haishan, it was not enough. For her courage, the Archons had gifted her with an electro vision, and her name and the tale of her actions spread across the fleet.
That fight-- it changed her. Once playful and joyfully singing shanties among her crewmates, she now stood silently at the wheel, navigating the ship to the dock. Still in shock, she left the boat, walking and stumbling on her newly-rediscovered land legs, as she headed over to Hanfeng’s.
Back turned, facing the fire, Master Zhang startled when she threw her blade on his bench.
“Long time no see, Zhang! Can I get this old thing sharpened? Also, can you do me a solid?”
:::
Beidou waited at the back of Bubu Pharmacy until night fell, before climbing to the top of Yujing Terrace. Unlocking the backdoor, she snuck into the apartment complex, climbing swiftly and silently to the third floor. Picking the doorknob, she strolled into the suite, searching for the bedroom. Despite the clothes that littered the floor, trailing back to the bed, there was only one figure sleeping. Hearing the shower in the next room over, she materialized her blade and pulled back the covers. She may have needed a vision to best Haishan, but this was something she could accomplish with any shitty old claymore. And she did, folding the covers back over the clothes she’d pulled from his dresser, as she hauled the man out of his own window.
Across the dock, she carried a large crate, making sure to avoid the crowds. She boarded a small ship, her own, built with her father as a young woman, when she and Ningguang still violently butted heads. She sailed out towards the rising sun, until she was less than a blip on the horizon, before pouring the contents of the crate into the ocean.
“Here’s your pity prize, Haishan.”
:::
Word was all over the next day, the only person who hadn’t heard yet sitting in front of Ningguang, chugging her champagne like it was beer.
“Apparently, his new woman,” Ningguang told her, voice dripping with disgust and laced with pain from a wound she was still sewing up, “had just taken out life insurance. For a lot, too. They think she did it, but they just can’t prove it.”
“And you?”
“Who do I think?” She looked over her glass at Beidou as she finished it. “I think you know.”
“You know what they say. No body, no crime.”
She smiled.
:::
The Millelith, despite believing it was his other woman, still had to investigate their suspects. Ningguang was cleared quickly, most people having already forgotten that the newly appointed Tianqian had ever been with the dead man. And Beidou was barely considered, thanks to Zhang’s promise of an alibi.
Beidou didn’t care who they eventually pinned it on, or what happened to the woman. As long as she could spend her time on land, or with Ningguang in her nifty little room in the air, she’d be just fine. And with him out of the way, soon Ningguang could be too.
After all that, Beidou became the Qixing’s go-to for any dirty work, despite the curiosity of Ningguang’s counterparts. And despite the rumors that abounded in the harbour, Beidou gave her time willingly, and always met with the Qixing on equal footing. To this day, most of the people in Liyue still ponder how the two came to work together. As captain of the armada, Beidou was a force of her own to be reckoned with, and no one dared to push for answers to that question, or the question of where she lodged when they docked. Whatever would happen between the two women was decidedly none of anyone’s business, and if anyone heard a sea shanty as the Jade Palace blocked the moon, well, they never said a word.