Emperor Longqing

If someone asked you whether you knew who the Longqing Emperor was, you might say, “Of course. He’s the one who killed Heshen and confiscated his family’s property.” I’d tell you that’s not right. I’m talking about the emperor with the least presence in history. Some say his name was Zhu Zaihou, others say it was Zhu Zaiji (ji, fourth tone). Some call him the Son of Heaven’s Mandate, because he outlived all his rivals and became the sole heir. Others say he was a ruler who revived the empire: he dealt with the Japanese pirates in the south and the northern raiders, and made his country the richest in the world at the time, ushering in a period of growth and prosperity. Still others call him a transitional figure, since he died after only six years on the throne. Yet this was the man who prolonged the life of a rotten court by more than seventy years. He is the figure the protagonist of this book transmigrates into: the Ming dynasty’s Longqing Emperor, Zhu Zaiji. This book tells the story of the various things the protagonist, Zhuang Ming, does after transmigrating into the Longqing Emperor, from concealing his identity to become a disciple of a Daoist sect leader, to becoming sworn brothers with Qi Jiguang, fighting Japanese pirates, and carrying out a series of reforms to restore the Ming dynasty.