Are All the Emperors in the Court Cheaters? I Start the Tech Tree from the Start

Transmigrated into the young lord of the Northern Desert, an abandoned son of the Shenzhou Dynasty, I open my eyes to see Di-Rong cavalry crushing the original owner's skull. Curved blades press against soldiers' throats as they demand food and women. Ying Zheng's Qin Elite Soldiers are still lying in wait thirty li away, just waiting for me to die so they can "clean up"! Eight emperors are fighting over the throne, and from the start, I'm meat on the chopping block!

Luckily, the Emperor Contest System blares to life! A fine steel saber appears in my hand out of nowhere. I strike back and behead the Di-Rong chieftain. The old craftsman Ou Pu rushes out of the woodshed, and the warehouse is still piled with a thousand jin of emergency rations! In three days, I forge twenty steel sabers and drive Ying Zheng's scouts away!

A volley of matchlock guns routs five hundred Di-Rong cavalry. Walls plastered with cement make grappling hooks slide off like eels when raiders attack at night. Improved Champa rice yields a bumper harvest and ends the food shortage, while my monopoly on coal and iron smelting lets me keep my rivals by the throat! Ying Zheng's centralization, Liu Xiu's thorn-hidden olive branch, Ji Fa's map with a hook concealed in it? I use checks and balances to break up their factions, and expose my rivals' "Mandate of Heaven" scandals in little newspapers!

The System even gives me matchlock gun blueprints and a temporary summon card for Bai Qi! From an overlooked nobody on the frontier to standing toe-to-toe with the Qin Elite Soldiers and the Black Armored Army, I'll use the tech tree to knock down every one of these emperor-level cheaters, seize the rightful position as Heaven's Son, and command the fortune of the realm!

This novel and its characters are entirely fictional. Any resemblance to actual persons or events is purely coincidental. Do not imitate.