In the third year of Tianbao, I, Li Mubai, became the Tang Dynasty's number one rebel.
My crime: colluding with regional warlords and plotting treason. The evidence was conclusive, and I was sentenced to execution after the autumn harvest.
At the execution ground, Crown Prince Li Heng offered me a chance to live: not to clear my name or overturn my conviction, but to have me, a “rebel,” investigate a real case of treason.
He gave me a bizarre team: a martial-world assassin who only wanted revenge, a craftsman skilled in ingenious contraptions but afraid of the dark, an analyst who couldn't speak about anything but numbers, and a superstitious street loafer obsessed with the almanac.
Our unit was called the Tang Dynasty Anti-Corruption Bureau.
Our mission: find irrefutable evidence of An Lushan's rebellion before he launched it.
And so, I, the damned rebel, set out on a hopeless mission to rid the country of traitors, bringing four “misfits” with me.
The rebel army's assassins wanted me dead, the powerful men at court wanted me gone, and my only teammate might be the Crown Prince's spy.
Then the An-Shi Rebellion broke out and Chang'an fell. With the Tongtian Register, a book capable of determining the fate of the realm, in my hands, I faced the new emperor, who had come to meet me.
He asked, “Minister Li, what reward do you want?”
Right in front of him, I tossed the register into the fire.
“Your Majesty, I want nothing.”
“I only ask that you tell the world whether I, Li Mubai, was truly a rebel.”
