The First Emperor's Lost Dream: A Chronicle Rewritten by Power

Zhou Qi, a history student writing a paper on the status of women in the Qin dynasty, stays up late and gets electrocuted while touching a replica of the Qin-era “Empress’s Seal” at a museum. When she opens her eyes, she has become Ying Zheng, who has just taken power in his own right. Questioning history’s label of “tyrant” and armed with modern ideas about gender equality and putting people’s livelihoods first, she has to complete the “historical requirements” of building the Great Wall and an imperial mausoleum, while quietly laying the groundwork for “bonus objectives” that can change the fate of the common people: making the Great Wall a defensive line guarded by soldiers and civilians together instead of a graveyard for conscripted laborers, bringing schools to the countryside instead of reserving education for the nobility, and making the law protect the weak instead of serve the powerful. But her reforms threaten the foundations of the old nobility, and they also help Liu Bang, a low-ranking official from humble origins, see the true nature of power. From witnessing her ideals to seizing power amid the chaos, Liu Bang ultimately destroys all traces of her reforms to legitimize the Han dynasty. The story of “Tyrant Ying Zheng” buries the tenderness and strength Zhou Qi left behind in Qin, until a Qin-era brick marked with a special symbol is unearthed a thousand years later.