无偿
wú cháng · HSK 7
free
🎁 无 = without + 偿 = repay/compensate, so 无偿 = without repayment = free of charge
偿 carries the sense of paying back or compensating (as in 偿还, to repay). Putting 无 (without) in front cancels it: a thing given 无偿 is handed over with no compensation expected.
无 — top 一 + 林-like middle + fire radical 灬 below
Originally a pictograph of a person dancing while holding ornaments or tassels, meaning 'to dance' — the ancestor of 舞. It was borrowed phonetically to write the negative 'not have / without,' and the dance meaning was reassigned to 舞 with an added foot element. The simplified form 无 comes from an ancient variant.