In the thirty-ninth year of the Qianlong reign, the so-called Prosperous Age of Kangxi and Qianlong is little more than an empty shell, rotten to its core:
The treasury is empty, the Eight Banners are in shambles, and the military is a hollow shell.
Literary inquisitions have silenced the people, corruption in the grain transport and salt administrations runs rampant, and refugees crowd Sichuan and Hubei. The starving lie dead in heaps, while the feudal Manchu Qing's iron hooves crush the people's last hope of survival.
Shen Yanzhi, a modern man, unexpectedly transmigrates as a Han Bannerman stationed in Suzhou. His Eight Banner status is a double-edged sword. He should be able to live comfortably on his stipend and keep his head down through the troubled times, but instead he chooses to defy his fate.
He will not be a reckless old-school anti-Qing rebel, nor will he play games of political intrigue by secretly nurturing bandits. He takes the Three Principles of the People as his banner and revolutionary theory as his foundation, quietly kindling the spark of national salvation in this isolated, benighted feudal land.
He breaks down divisions between Manchus and Han, awakens the common people, unites refugees, and turns the Green Standard Army against the court. He forges the suffering people, ground down by the Qing, into a blade of resistance against autocracy.
Using his Eight Banner status to secretly raise funds, he traffics in military supplies and diverts stolen silver, keeping not a single coin for himself. Every bit becomes provisions for the revolution and kindling for its ideas.
Step by step, he undermines the Qing military and stirs the winds of the dying age, all to shatter the shackles of feudal autocracy.
“I, Shen Yanzhi, have taken my place among the Eight Banners not for wealth or glory, but to become the gravedigger of the Manchu Qing! I will burn away corruption with the fire of revolution, awaken four hundred million people with the truth, overthrow the Qing, and build China anew!”
As the revolutionary spark spreads like wildfire, the rotten dynasty is doomed to collapse. From the ashes of a chaotic age, a new China belonging to the people is about to emerge.
