In the third year of Hongwu, overworked office worker Lin Yan misses a step and tumbles into a crowd of refugees in Haozhou.
He only wants to keep his head down and survive, but his modern first-aid knowledge saves Zhu Ying, the eldest grandson of the emperor. He’s then dragged into the heart of Ming political power as a “folk wonder.”
By improving farm tools and making simple fertilizers, he fills the granaries of farmers in Jinling. By inventing telescopes and improving gunpowder, he helps the Ming army beat the Northern Yuan so badly they don’t know which way is north. And through public-opinion campaigns and bamboo-tube recording devices, he exposes Empress Lü’s schemes from top to bottom.
Zhu Biao becomes sworn brothers with him, Empress Ma treats him like a beloved junior, and Zhu Yuanzhang both loves and fears him. Even little Ying sticks to him, calling him “Uncle Lin.”
But this modern-day quipster keeps tossing out strange phrases like “KPI” and “clocking in” at court, leaving the old ministers of the Hongwu era bewildered.
See how an ordinary transmigrator uses practical knowledge to stir up the Hongwu era, protect Zhu Biao and his son, and transform a Ming dynasty that favors agriculture over commerce into the prosperous maritime-trading age of Jianwen!
