Transmigrating to the Ming Dynasty: I Used Farming Techniques to Build a Golden Age

Lin Chen, an agricultural technician at a modern agricultural research institute, falls asleep and wakes up in the Hongzhi era of the Ming dynasty, in a destitute military household in Yongping Prefecture.

His father died fighting on the border, his mother is bedridden, and his 12-year-old sister is about to be sold by the village head to pay off a debt. If he cannot come up with five taels of silver within three days, the whole family will be sent to the frontier army as forced laborers.

Lin Chen rolls up his sleeves: He uses composting and seedling cultivation to triple yields per acre and turns wasteland into fertile fields. He improves farm tools, builds brick kilns, and makes pickles, leading the whole village out of poverty. He builds irrigation works, fights locust plagues, and ends food shortages, going from the village to the county, from the prefectural city to the capital.

Emperor Hongzhi slaps the table as he surveys the granaries overflowing with grain: “A worthy servant of the state!”

Lin Chen: “Your Majesty, I just wanted my mother and sister to have enough to eat, and, while I was at it, for all the people of the Ming dynasty to have enough to eat too.”