One of Jin Ling's most lasting memories was that one time when he was about 11 and just about learned to fly on his dad's sword. He was using his new powers to zoom over the piers of jiujiu's sect, forbidden yet to fly higher than a shoulder-hight, but so excited to have completed this important step in becoming a great cultivator! (Come to think of it, almost all of his cultivation breakthroughs happened in Lotus Pier, under the watchful eye of his uncle).
He didn't remember what happened, did he overcompensate on a turn, or did something got in his way, but one moment he was racing towards his jiujiu just over the lake's surface, water parting under Suihua in a rainbow of droplets... And the next thing he remembered was opening his eyes to look at the sky, laying on the wet boards, hearing his jiujiu yelling enough to make his head hurt.
Well, his head hurt also because it apparently hit the edge of the pier hard enough to make him black out for a few moments.
He didn't remember exactly what happened afterwards, just that he was crying with his face buried in jiujiu's robes, because he was afraid that the healer would hurt his head more, and jiujiu was shushing him and squeezing him. At some point he got distracted by the warm feeling of spiritual power running through him, and kinda nodded off while the doctor worked on fixing the cut in his head.
But that wasn't the most important memory of that accident. No. The most persistent one was of hours later, when he woke up in jiujiu's bed, to find half of his hair stuck to his cheek and matted with dried blood - and he started to cry again, afraid it will have to be cut and he will be even more a butt of his cousins' jokes once he's back in the Koi Tower. It took so long to grow his hair already! Of course, jiujiu told him he was being foolish and panicking for no reason. He brought in a bucket of hot water and showed Jin Ling how to soften the clots, and then sat him down in front of the window to tease the tangles out of his hair.
The clearest memory of his short life was sitting in front of the big window in his uncles bedroom, staring at the sun coming down over the glistening lake, and listening to jiujju's scolding as gentle hands tenderly tended to his hair.
Sometimes he imagined it was his mom's hands. Sometimes he imagined the scolding was in his dad's voice (he didn't know how his dad sounded, but he could imagine it was nice). Sometimes the memory made him cry a little. But it always made him feel warm inside.
Jiang Cheng had a whole plethora of horrible, horrific memories to choose from at any given day. He thought that nothing past the death of his sister could faze him anymore.
But seeing his nephew losing balance on his sword and running into a wooden pier head-first, cradling his limp body and bleeding head in his hands... Jiang Cheng discovered that this wasn't quite the case.