Shen Yan, a graduate student in the Department of Modern History, accidentally traveled to Laizhou Prefecture in Shandong Province in the 23rd year of Guangxu's reign (1897) and became a refugee with nothing. Living in the post-apocalyptic late Qing Dynasty, when the world was in turmoil, surrounded by powerful powers, oppressive government, and the people were in dire straits, he had no golden finger and no ambition to change his destiny. He could only rely on his familiarity with history, the survival wisdom of modern people, and the tenacity in his bones to survive step by step in the troubled times, just to survive in peace.
From refugees who were hungry, avoiding exorbitant taxes and war disasters, to hawkers who relied on rudimentary skills to establish themselves in the market, to adapting to the tide of the times, in the afterglow of Westernization, the trend of reform thought, the Boxer Rebellion, the New Deal in the late Qing Dynasty, the Revolution of 1911, the warlord separatism, and the May Fourth Movement. During a series of major historical changes, he carefully dealt with the gentry, officials, foreigners, warlords, revolutionary parties, and the common people at the bottom. He witnessed the decay and collapse of the Qing Dynasty, the short-lived dawn of the establishment of the Republic of China, and the dark turmoil of warlords' melee.
He walked through the famine-ridden road, saw the brutal oppression of county government officials, experienced the fierce conflict between foreign religions and local forces, experienced the conflagration of the Wuchang Uprising, experienced the collision of old and new ideas in the early years of the Republic of China, and struggled to survive amidst the warlords' tyranny. He does not participate in the power struggle, does not dominate the direction of history, but is just a tiny speck of dust in troubled times. From the perspective of an ordinary person, he restores the most authentic human fireworks, sufferings and changes of the times from the late Qing Dynasty to the early Republic of China. In the turbulent torrent of history, he sticks to his heart, survives with difficulty, and writes an epic of survival in troubled times that belongs to a little person.
