(Chapters 11–22 have been revised.)
[Alternate History] [Parallel World] [No Romance]
[The story focuses mainly on career and ambition!!!]
The cold glow of the computer screen in the dead of night was like a pool of stagnant water, reflecting Gu Nanzhi’s face, pale as paper. The word count in the upper-left corner of the document ticked silently upward: 38,927. Just over a thousand words to go, and her thesis, “A Study of Commercial Activity and Currency Circulation in Chang’an’s Western Market during the Tang Dynasty,” would be finished.
She rubbed her dry, aching eyes, her vision growing blurry. The dormitory was so quiet she could hear the faint hiss of electricity passing through the desk lamp’s tube. Her three roommates had long since fallen asleep. Outside, the night was pitch-black, and only a few lights remained on in the distant classroom building, like pieces of driftwood floating on the sea after a shipwreck.
“Just a little longer…” Gu Nanzhi murmured, picking up the coffee beside her and gulping down what had long since gone cold. The bitter liquid slid down her throat, but did nothing to wake her up. She had stayed up all night for four nights in a row. During the day, she still had to go to the library to consult reprints of the Tang Huiyao and the Chang'an Gazetteer. Her strength had been pushed to its limits long ago.
Her fingers tapped mechanically at the keyboard: “In summary, although the early Zhenguan period inherited the devastation of the late Sui wars and the commercial economy lay in ruins, Emperor Taizong’s policies of equal-field land distribution, reduced corvée labor, and lighter taxes laid the groundwork for the revival of urban life. The Western Market in Chang’an was a mix of people from the Hu regions and Han Chinese, trade in silk and horses gradually flourished, and a currency system in which copper coins and silk circulated side by side…”
Suddenly, everything went black.
I have written 5 chapters, and I keep repeating and summarizing what I have written before. Moreover, the low-quality glass beads sold by others cost 10 Wen each, and the heroine decided to give away a high-quality glass bead if she spent 5 Wen/10 Wen on cakes... And the source was also planned to be given by Hu Shang/heirloom. Use the ancestral cakes as gifts? Such a big family business... It is also said that there are local gangsters who may bully the vendors. The heroine said to either be careful or find a boss for help (it must not be written as a boss's wife, the lady does her own business as if she does it for others, and the boss is not a special word for Tianli). People don't know you, so why would they risk the whole family's income to help you?