岂
qǐ
how? (emphatic question)
mountain (山) + self-sound (己) = how could it possibly be?
己 lends the sound qǐ; 山 may have originally suggested a lofty, towering rhetorical challenge — but this character is ultimately used as a grammaticalized emphatic question word meaning 'how could it possibly be?'
山MountainSemantic
己OneselfPhonetic
你岂能这样对待朋友？
nǐ qǐ néng zhè yàng duì dài péng yǒu ？
how could you treat a friend like this?
他岂会不知道这件事的后果？
tā qǐ huì bù zhī dào zhè jiàn shì de hòu guǒ ？
how could he not know the consequences of this matter?