This chapter's epigraph comes from a conversation between chuan tsing and Su Ming. chuan tells Su Ming that he is not done with her yet. He tells her that he has already known about Su Ming's boyfriend, and that he did not tell chuan about it before. He asks chuan if he will believe him, and chuan says that he will. He says that the purpose of marriage is to maintain society and family, but that tools will break over time. The essence of marriage, he says, is love, because people were willing to