Mending the Sky: 1853

In 1853, the Taiping Army conquered Yangzhou and besieged the Jiangbei camp. Yangzhou was in dire straits. Chen Yan, who had traveled through the country, did not have a divine weapon, so he could only draw "triple ledgers" with a brush to calculate food consumption, and used lime to prevent epidemics in the name of "exorcism ash". He walked between Cixi's political checks and balances and Li Hongzhang's selfish game, used "practical policy theory" to break the Eight-Party Composition, used the "local law assembly line" to build guns, and struggled to implement the New Deal amidst the resistance of the gentry and the arrogance of the great powers. From the choice of defending the city in Anqing to the compromise in the railway game, from the life and death decision in the refugee ghetto to the implementation of the industrial regulations, every step of reform is stained with blood. When he died of illness in 1880, the imperial examination had not been abolished and the country was still weak. However, the accounts and schools he left behind had laid the foundation for the sinking era. This is an epic of national salvation without any "cheating", describing the heaviness and hope of the system to mend the sky.