Chen Mo was the king of overwork in the modern education and tutoring industry, a top instructor and regional director whose life motto was, “If work won’t kill me, I’ll work myself to death.” And the result? It really did kill him. He closed his eyes, opened them again, and, hey, he’d transmigrated!
The good news: He was still human, and still called Chen Mo (now written as Chen Mo).
The bad news: He’d landed in the Jiajing era of the Ming dynasty, as a destitute scholar from a poor family: penniless, buried in debt, failing every exam, and in terrible health! From the start, it was a hellish survival challenge: creditors at the door, neighbors looking down on him, and his only “assets” a drafty shack and a stomach on the verge of starvation.
Chen Mo looked at the imperial exam grind before him, more brutal than modern-day education reforms, then at his equally miserable classmates, who could do nothing but cram by rote. The overachiever in him sprang to life!
“Exam prep? This is my old line of work! The eight-legged essay? Just an ancient version of policy essays and composition templates, right?”
“Raising scores? Climbing the rankings? KPIs? I can handle all of that!”
And so, the most hardcore education startup plan in Ming history was launched from a dilapidated shack.
