The Red Tassel Kingdom

In the thirty years between the end of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom and the First Sino-Japanese War, a new generation of Han Chinese officials launched the Self-Strengthening Movement. The protagonist transmigrates to 1872, the twelfth year of the Tongzhi reign, as an ordinary man on the plains of southwestern Shandong. Using his knowledge and riding the tide of the Self-Strengthening Movement, he builds businesses and puts Chinese-made goods in every corner of China. He uses industry to provide relief during the Ding-Wu Famine. Through textiles, dyeing, and other light industries, he seeks to save the country through economic development, weaken Japan's export capacity and hinder its rise, and bring about social revolution through social reform.