Emperors from Every Dynasty Appraise Treasures [History Livestream]

Complete, not paywalled, and free to read in full. If you like it, you can find it in the author's profile.

Currently updating: [A from-the-start Rundown of History's Top-Tier Women, via Historical Livestream], with daily updates and chapters in reserve.

Coming soon: [In the 1980s, I Opened a Bathhouse in Northeast China]. The entire story is written in Northeast Chinese dialect. Blurb below.

It starts with a rundown of ten famous female “victims” from history.

Including, but not limited to:

The ultimate sister-supporter, the pioneer of sister-supporting, Empress Zhang;

A love for an old sword: How did emperors through the ages view Xu Pingjun?

Demoted from wife to concubine: Yin Lihua vs. Guo Shengtong in a contest to see who had it worse;

A notorious beauty blamed for disaster: Yang Guifei takes the fall on the battlefield;

The archetypal beauty: A doomed princess and a spy who cooks, a tragic love story;

Single-handed child-rearing after being widowed: The first wife turns the tables, becoming Empress Dowager Lu;

Recently, a magical screen has kept appearing to review famous people from the histories of various dynasties.

The emperors, who have long since gotten used to it, are now puzzled. Could they have lost their audience in the divine visions?

When things get strange, something must be up.

They put down their memorials, picked up their melon seeds, and looked up at the screen in the sky.

A line of shimmering words gradually appeared:

[The Ten “Unfortunate” Women in History]

Empress Zhang: It's getting cold. Time to bankrupt my family.

Yin Lihua: Looks like she had it worse than me.

Guo Shengtong: Why laugh at someone when you've only walked fifty steps farther?

Dou Yifang: Nine-to-nine-six is bad enough. How dare you make me work zero-to-seven? The next emperor should loudly announce the day he reviews memorials.

After watching the rundown, Ying Zheng says: The imperial harem is full of schemes. Women terrify me. I won't even think of naming an empress. I'll remain an emperor with no empress...

Yongzheng: +1

Liu Bang whispers in Empress Lu's ear: “What is a human swine?”

Liu Che hugs Wei Qing and little Qubing and sobs: “I don't know about feudal superstition, but superstition really does kill people. Boohoo...”

Li Shimin whispers to Li Chunfeng: “This is weird, but how do I stop myself from kind of liking Wu Zhao?”

The blurb below is for this story:

Lyu Can, an archaeology graduate, works reception at a small auction house. On yet another workday spent being ordered around, she suddenly discovers an app on her phone that can identify antiques.

She never imagined that when she casually uploaded a promotional video of the auction's items, emperors from various dynasties in a parallel world would personally appraise them.

Her points keep rising, and she can even redeem them for antiques from various dynasties that have been authenticated as “genuine.” So naturally, she has to make more videos!

[An Overview of Jewelry Through the Dynasties]

[An Overview of Qin Dynasty Bronzes]

[An Overview of Calligraphy Through the Ages]

[An Overview of Paintings Through the Dynasties]

Ying Zheng tosses the ring-pommel sword at his waist into the screen and complains: “When Jing Ke tried to assassinate me, it was too long to draw. I nearly died right there!”

Liu Bang turns over the two mandarin-duck jade cups recently presented by the Minister of the Imperial Treasury. He gives one to Empress Lu and one to Lady Qi, saying: “I've told you both before, I never play favorites!”

Xiao Wangzhi glances at Liu Bingyi, newly enthroned, and thinks: “His Majesty's touching devotion to his first love is probably the most romantic imperial decree proclaimed to the world since the Shang and Zhou dynasties.”

Hongli gazes at the screen hidden among the plum trees, struck by poetic inspiration. He calls out: “One flake, then another; two, three, four, and five; six, seven, eight, nine...”

Liu Che, furious, demands: “Who are you?”

Wei Qing laughs heartily: “I am the great general destined to serve the new emperor. Take this!”

At first, the emperors can't be bothered to participate. But their damned competitive streak gets the better of them, and they all start uploading antiques, fighting to be the top-ranked emperor...

Lyu Can uses Ru ware as a mouse pad and drinks coffee from a pair of mandarin-duck cups just like Liu Bang's. She looks down at the Qin sword in one hand and Fuchai's sword in the other, torn over what to do.

You really can't just wear these things...

Reader's guide:

Parallel worlds, upright values, and love for China.

Coming soon: [In the 1980s, I Opened a Bathhouse in Northeast China]

In her previous life, Zheng Zhennan had a miserable time.

Her family had been the first million-yuan household at the Jiangsong Machinery Factory. Unfortunately, she had a huge pack of awful relatives. Her eldest aunt was a total firebrand, her second aunt was always stirring up trouble, her third aunt loved to meddle, and her uncle was a slick, self-righteous intellectual who flirted with other women but never lifted a finger to help. Her grandmother was shamelessly biased, taking anything she could get her hands on and funneling it to her eldest son's family.

Her father got nothing out of it. Once he finally saw how rotten they all were, he gave up and spent his days gambling and drinking heavily.

Her mother was a sister-supporter, too, and got sick from trying to support both families.

Zheng Zhennan was forced to leave school and work before finishing middle school. At last, she got married, and just as her life seemed about to take off, her bizarre relatives clung to her like a bone-deep parasite and refused to leave her alone.

In the end, they drove Zheng Zhennan and her husband to divorce, and her only child grew up as useless as a poker, attached only to his stepmother.

-

When Zheng Zhennan is reborn, she finds herself back in the winter of 1985, on the day of her grandfather's funeral.

All around her are faces begging to be slapped. Her three aunts are hounding her grandmother, demanding to know where the old man's pay slips went. Her uncle sits up straight, watching his own mother go to battle for him and grab the inheritance. And her foolishly filial parents...

are standing by her grandmother with downcast eyes, meekly paying up whenever they're told to hand over money...

One look at her mother's posture tells Zheng Zhennan what she's about to do. She scrambles out of bed and snatches away the stack of ten-yuan notes. “Throwing money around at a funeral? Is it my dad who died?”

Everyone freezes.

-

After the funeral, everyone realizes that the girl from the Zheng Laogada family seems to have become a completely different person.

Her grandmother comes over to complain about being poor on behalf of her eldest son. Zheng Zhennan grabs a shovel: “You've got money to go dancing and living it up, but you can't get your own life together, and you're still chasing after someone else's wife? Why don't you give your eldest son your coffin money?”

Her grandmother: ...

Her eldest aunt thinks school is a waste of money and goes to nag her father.

Zheng Zhennan smacks her in the face with a Chinese textbook: “The book says, 'Knowledge changes your destiny, and studying lets you serve your country.' If you won't let me study, you're stopping me from serving my country. Be careful, or I'll report you at work.”

Aunt Zheng goes rolling away, her face ashen.

-

Lucky enough to be reborn, Zheng Zhennan only wants to look after her family's bathhouse and live a peaceful life. Who could have guessed that a bathhouse could go public and ring the stock exchange bell?

She successfully gets the upper hand over her bizarre relatives by targeting their weak spots. From then on, every one of them is “filial” to her.

As for the husband she loved in her previous life but couldn't stay with, making up for one regret is enough. After all, she definitely won't be having that useless son again.

Many years later, Zheng Zhennan finally becomes a wealthy woman, with both money and freedom.

But... what's with this clingy, devoted puppy of a man by her side who just won't let go?

Reader's guide:

The dialogue is mostly in Northeast Chinese dialect. If that's not for you, read with caution.

Theme: Make the world a better place.