[Great Song dynasty + no System + factional strife + reform + political intrigue + meticulous historical research + slow start] [Not a conventional wish-fulfillment novel. Enter at your own risk! Don’t read!!! It ended badly! Proceed with caution!]
A scholar of Ming history opens his eyes to find himself a Northern Song court diarist.
The Reformers or the Conservatives? Can’t I just choose neither?
But when he’s driven to the edge, he slams the table and rises to his feet:
“Fine, fine. If you insist on fighting...”
“Then I’ll teach you what real factional strife looks like.”
And so a “third force” emerges in secret, specializing in fiscal audits, impeachments by censorial officials, weapons reform, and intelligence infiltration. He grips a corrupt official’s ledger in his left hand and spreads out a map of the Sixteen Prefectures of Yanyun with his right.
Years later, gazing at a territory wider than those of the Han and Tang dynasties, the protagonist can only sigh helplessly:
“Wait a minute. I was just trying to protect myself...”
“How did I end up as a grand councilor? What do you mean, the entire Great Song, with its four capitals and eighteen circuits, rests on my shoulders?”
In a nutshell: It’s The Great Ming Dynasty 1566 inhabiting Along the River During the Qingming Festival, the tale of history’s most “reluctant” ambitious man, the Great Song’s top weightlifting champion, and a no-nonsense account of reforming the Northern Song.
