The Annals of the New Dynasty, Biography of Emperor Taizu, record:
The emperor's personal name was Jiu; his courtesy name is unknown. He was a native of Bianliang. Orphaned young, he made his home in Wazi Alley. He was once beaten by a powerful man's servant and came close to death many times. Yet whenever the emperor hovered on the brink of death, he would have a strange encounter: sometimes he gained superhuman strength, sometimes he learned to read, and sometimes he found a fragment of a martial arts manual. Rising from humble beginnings, he gathered beggars and rallied laborers, contending with Grand Preceptor Zhao for twenty years before finally taking the throne in the Central Plains. He died at the age of eighty, was given the posthumous title “Wu,” and received the temple name “Taizu.”
The emperor once said, “I was nothing but a stray dog. I don't know how I ended up here.”
Those are three lines in the history books.
The real story begins in the mud of Bianliang City
My name is Chen Jiu. I'm twenty years old, with a scar on my right cheek and a crooked smile. When I was twelve, they broke my ribs and left me curled up in a ruined temple for three days without a soul to help. At fifteen, I watched an old beggar get beaten to death. Ten strings of cash were enough to buy the silence of everyone who saw it. From then on, I understood: in this world, someone like me isn't even worth buying.
Until the day I was trampled into the mud and left to die, when a voice suddenly rang in my head: “You may sign in today.”
That thing was called the “Accumulating Small Gains Sign-In.” Each day, I only had to stand somewhere for a while to obtain something hidden there. At the bridgehead, I gained strength. In a teahouse, I learned to read. At the docks, I found a battered martial arts manual. The System wouldn't give me instant success; it only gave me seeds. Watering and tending them was up to me.
I used the strength I gained from sign-ins to haul cargo, the characters I learned to read account books, and the martial arts manual to train beggars like me. We spread our eyes and ears everywhere, weaving a net that covered the entire city.
But every step forward had to be paid for in blood
