Lin Yuan, a history and engineering student, unexpectedly transmigrates into a disaster-stricken region of northern Shaanxi in the first year of the Chongzhen reign. A Little Ice Age disaster has struck, leaving a thousand miles of barren land and corpses strewn everywhere. Factional strife rages at court, the treasury is empty, bandits are about to rise within the passes, and Later Jin lurks beyond them, ready to strike. The Ming Dynasty is on the brink of collapse.
At this desperate moment, a knowledge base for building a powerful China awakens! High-yield crops, epidemic prevention and disaster relief, primitive steelmaking, firearms production, tax and military reforms... He has it all at his fingertips. He also possesses knowledge of history’s future, allowing him to see the broad course of events.
Lin Yuan rises from among the refugees. He uses grain to keep the people fed, epidemic prevention to stop disease, and ingenious strategies to astonish the officials. Chongzhen gives him an exceptional appointment.
He investigates hidden farmland and makes officials and gentry pay taxes, swiftly replenishing the treasury. He promotes sweet potatoes, corn, and potatoes, ending famine for good and cutting off the bandits’ source of recruits. He improves flintlock muskets, builds rifled cannons, and trains a modern new army for the Ming.
At home, he cracks down on corruption, reforms the bureaucracy, and pacifies the realm. Abroad, he allies with the Mongols to defeat his enemies and seals off Liaodong. Leading the new army, he sweeps through the enemy heartland and destroys Later Jin in a single campaign, severing the Qing Dynasty’s destiny!
He abolishes the maritime trade ban, promotes commerce and industry, establishes new schools, and launches industrialization, helping the Ming escape the cycle of order and chaos and embark early on the path to becoming a great power.
He saves the Ming from collapse and China from ruin, erases a century of modern humiliation, and forges a glorious Ming Dynasty that rules the world.
