In the nineteenth year of Yongle, lightning struck the Three Great Halls.
Emperor Zhu Di is sixty-two. He can't sleep or eat, and refuses to stop. He can't finish the book he wants to compile, the fleet he sends to sea never returns, and the wars he wants to wage keep slipping out of reach.
Everyone tells him, "Your Majesty should..." No one has ever asked, "Your Majesty, are you tired?"
A modern psychological counselor transmigrates into the body of an imperial bodyguard. He doesn't prescribe medicine. He just talks.
"Your Majesty isn't unable to sleep. You're afraid to sleep."
"The book you're compiling isn't just a book. It's a voice louder than all the scholars in the world put together."
This is a story about a man who seized the realm from his nephew and spent his whole life proving he deserved it, only to discover in the end that what he wanted wasn't victory, but to hear someone say, "You don't have to."
Even an emperor needs counseling. So do the rest of us.
