Gu Yuan died twice.
The second time, he became a destitute scholar in Qingniu Village who shared his name. He got back his life, a fragmentary manuscript, half a jade pendant, and a county-level imperial exam.
All he wanted was to pass the exam and secure his place in the world.
But the woman in white he saved was the greatest master under heaven. A poem he casually wrote would later become evidence of a crime before the emperor. And the paper in his examination basket was a death trap laid out for him by someone else.
Everyone took him for a poor scholar.
He thought so too.
It wasn't until a line spoken by the river, "I forbid gray hair in this world," stunned the entire city that he understood: this examination would decide who ruled the realm.
So he kept taking the exams, one level at a time. In the end, the person kneeling at the front before the one seated on the throne was the man who had once sat watching him write his answers.
