Li Mingyuan, a student of modern history, accidentally fell into the officialdom of the late Qing Dynasty. He was bound to the "reincarnation system" and became characters such as Zhao Wen, Qian Dianshi, and Wang Daotai in "The Appearance of Officialdom", and was trapped in trials of fate.
He was once a scholar who was rushing to take the exam, but because he trusted the gentry and became a tool for fraud, he froze to death in the wilderness during his exile; he was also a small official in the state and county, but he wanted to be honest and self-reliant, but was framed by his superiors, and the shackles were displayed to the public; when he was in charge of foreign affairs, he tried to be tough with foreigners and was dismissed, but he also learned to be complicit and eventually became a scapegoat; in the high position of governor, being sycophantic would attract public resentment, and resisting foreigners would recruit troops, which would lead to death on both sides.
With each failure, time resets. He came back with scars and memories all over his body. He saw through the exchange of gifts and money of "three festivals and two birthdays", figured out the rules at the level of "the first level of officialdom to crush people to death", and learned to mediate from the swords and shadows of factions. The traps that once cost him his life - the code of cheating in the imperial examination, the tricks in the disaster relief funds, the traps of foreign contracts, and the minefields of disputes between emperors and empresses - gradually became the ladder for him to break through.
When the number of reincarnations reaches a hundred times, he is no longer the foolish young man trying to reverse history. He knew that the chronic illness of the late Qing Dynasty could not be cured overnight. The so-called "perfect ending" was not to be an upright official who took care of himself, nor to be a hero who subverted everything, but to sow seeds in the rotten soil: let scholars like Zhao Wen retain their sense of worldly affairs, let officials like Qian Dianshi find a path to integrity, let Westernization enterprises truly serve the people's livelihood, and let the dynasty end with less war and displacement.
This is a journey that spans thousands of reincarnations
