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21 " He had done what he had to do, and in doing so he had destroyed the world. "
― Shelley Parker-Chan , She Who Became the Sun (The Radiant Emperor, #1)
22 " She didn't just want greatness. She wanted the world. "
23 " She saw someone who seemed neither male nor female, but another substance entirely: something wholly and powerfully of its own kind. The promise of difference, made real. "
24 " Learn to want something for yourself, Ma Xiuying. Not what someone says you should want. Not what you think you should want. Don’t go through life thinking only of duty. When all we have are these brief spans between our nonexistences, why not make the most of the life you’re living now? The price is worth it. "
25 " I can do this. I can learn. I can survive. "
26 " But you know what's worse than suffering? Not suffering, because you're not even alive to feel it "
27 " The body became used to exercise, particular sounds and sensations, or even physical pain. But it was strange how shame was something you never became inured to: each time hurt just as much as the first. "
28 " You never realized that it wasn’t your name they were going to call, exhorting you to reign for ten thousand years. It was mine "
29 " Inside her there was only the perfect, blank brightness of belief and desire. Desire is the cause of all suffering. The greater the desire, the greater the suffering, and now she desired greatness itself. With all her will, she directed the thought to Heaven and the watching statues: Whatever suffering it takes, I can bear it. "
30 " People said that a single day without a dear friend could feel like three autumns. "
31 " She was grieving her life as she never had before, and it was all this monk's fault for having conjured the impossible fantasy of a world in which she was free to desire. "
32 " How could her body be a woman’s body, if it didn’t house a woman? "
33 " The residence’s doors banged and slammed as if by angry ghosts, and Ouyang felt his ancestors’ eyes upon him as he ate with the son of his family’s murderer, the person he held dearest in all the world. "
34 " A woman gambles all of herself, body and future, when she marries. That's more courageous than any risk a bureaucrat takes when it concerns only his face, or his wealth "
35 " Pure emotions are the luxury of children and animals, "
36 " Where's the fun in suffering by yourself?" Xu Da said in his good-natured way. Surprised, Zhu realized he was probably her friend. She'd never had a friend before. But she wasn't sure suffering could be shared, even with one's friends. Watching her father and brother die, digging their graves, kneeling for four days in front of the monastery: all of them had been acts of exquisite aloneness. She knew that when she came down to it, you survived and died alone. "
37 " It would be the biggest gamble of her life. But if she wanted greatness - she was going to have to stand up and claim it. "
38 " She was always going to be expelled into that world of chaos and violence—of greatness and nothingness. "
39 " I need a sparring partner,” Zhu had explained cheerfully. “You’re about my level, in that you know absolutely nothing. "
40 " Why aren’t you happier? I’m just being who you’ve always thought I was. I’m giving you the ending you believed in.” He lingered for a moment, then pulled back. “Goodbye, brother. "