The Qin Empire: The Peerless Chancellor-Father

[Great Qin] I opened my eyes and found myself in the body of Lao Ai. It is the ninth year of the First Emperor's reign. My execution by being torn apart by chariots is less than a year away. The good news: I'm a PhD in pre-Qin history, and I know every move Qin made to conquer the Six States. The bad news: I'm the Queen Dowager's lover, Ying Zheng's thorn in his side, and a traitorous rebel condemned by the history books. In court, Lü Buwei is waiting for me to die. In the palace, the Queen Dowager is waiting for me to rebel. And my title of "false father" is made up of the two words Ying Zheng hates most. Everyone thinks I'm a dead man. But they don't know that I hold the Six States' vital weaknesses in my hands, a blueprint for commanderies and counties in my heart, and all the answers needed to save Great Qin a hundred years of detours in my head. I won't rebel. I'll bow to Ying Zheng. I'll ride beside him and guide his aim so he can bring down a mighty stag. I'll place the treasury ledgers on his desk. I'll start as the lowliest adviser and let him see with his own eyes how a "doomed royal favorite" becomes the sharpest blade at his side. Some call me a coward. Others laugh that I'm destroying my own Great Wall. Until, at the ceremony marking the fall of the states, Ying Zheng publicly honors me as his minister-father, and the history books carve my name into bamboo slips: not a traitor, not a male favorite, but the true founder of the empire. They say history has no what-ifs. Then I'll make history understand: I've already written this what-if into the record.