Great Ming: The Emperor Confiscates My Estate, So I Burn Down the Ancestral Shrine

After transmigrating as Zhang Juzheng's eldest legitimate grandson, Zhang Zhonghui, he opens his eyes to the scene of his family's estate being seized in the twelfth year of the Wanli reign. His father has hanged himself, the Embroidered Uniform Guard is torturing people for confessions, and seventeen relatives have starved to death. In his six-year-old body, he can barely stand. As the guards are about to storm the ancestral shrine and seize every woman and child, he pulls out a flint and sets Zhang Juzheng's memorial tablet alight.

As the fire eats through the shrine, he bars the doors and screams that the officials are going to burn his whole family alive, dragging the men who came to seize the estate into the inferno: Vice Minister of Justice Qiu Shun, Investigating Censor Ren Yangxin, and Chief Eunuch Zhang Cheng. When the guards break in to rescue the survivors, Zhang Zhonghui is covered in soot, tears streaking his face. He leans close to Ren Yangxin's ear and whispers, "That maid Xiaocui who locked the door, she's one of your people, right?"

Ren Yangxin's face changes. He never planted any maid named Xiaocui. But Zhang Zhonghui is already crying out in front of everyone, "He ordered Xiaocui to lock the door and start the fire, to wipe out my entire family!" In the chaos, Yu Shenxing arrives with the emperor's written order to stop them. Qiu Shun demands a new investigation, while Zhang Zhonghui gazes at the ancestral shrine, now burned to charcoal, and the corner of his mouth curls up slightly.

This is exactly what he wanted: for them to turn on each other.

This novel and its characters are entirely fictional. Any resemblance is purely coincidental. Do not imitate.