THEY SAY THAT WHEN I WAS BORN, ALL THE WILD geese flew down from the sky, and the fish sank beneath the waves, having forgotten how to swim. Even the lotus flowers in our gardens quivered and turned their heads away, so ashamed they were of their own diminished allure in my presence. I have always found such stories to be laughably exaggerated, but they prove the same thing: that my beauty was something unnatural, transcending nature itself. And that beauty is not so different from destruction. This was why my mother insisted I cover my face before leaving the house."
-- Narration (chapter 1)

Importance: The opening lines of the novel establish Xishi's beauty as both her defining trait and a dangerous burden. It foreshadows the destructive power her beauty will hold, not just over men like Fuchai, but over kingdoms. The link drawn between beauty and destruction introduces one of the novel's central...