The Sena mob’s destruction of Madame Zhou’s Palace abruptly ends the place’s role as a functioning seat of Madame Zhou’s power. Reported to Lin as an attack from ten days earlier, the event leaves the building standing but ruined, its feared former owner alive and without the authority or resources she once possessed.

The Attack

A mob of Sena people entered the Palace, destroyed everything inside, and then set the building on fire. The account Lin receives describes a sweeping assault rather than damage to a single room or part of the property: the interior is devastated, and the fire marks the destruction of the Palace as an operating establishment.

The Ruined Palace

The building does not collapse completely. Its staircases and upstairs rooms remain, but the place is ruined and will never open again. Demolition is expected at some point soon, making the standing structure a temporary remnant rather than a recoverable base for Madame Zhou’s former life.

Madame Zhou’s Defeat

When Lin asks whether Madame Zhou died in the attack, he learns that she survived and is reportedly still at the Palace. Her survival does not amount to a recovery: her power has been destroyed, and she is described as having nothing and being reduced to a beggar. Her servants search the streets for scraps of food to bring her while she waits for the building to be pulled down. The attack therefore strips away both the physical stronghold and the material security that had sustained her authority.