Joinery That Holds the Realm Together

The Mu family of Bianjing had overseen the Directorate of Imperial Manufactories for generations. Their ingenious mortise-and-tenon joinery had been used to renovate the imperial palace and build the tombs of emperors and empresses. Their Book of Lu Ban Locks was unrivaled beneath heaven.

But in a single night, water seeped into the imperial mausoleum and all its mechanisms were destroyed. The Mu family was accused of deceiving the emperor and the entire household was executed. The family patriarch, Mu Yuan, died in prison, while his only legitimate daughter, Mu Qingyuan, vanished without a trace, carrying half of a ruined manual with her. Three years later, a quiet young carpenter named A Yuan appeared in a Bianjing woodworking shop. She could open mechanism locks that even nobles and officials could not repair with a casual twist of her hand. She spotted flaws at a glance in mortise-and-tenon structures that renowned masters could not solve. Even when the Directorate of Imperial Manufactories was stumped by a damaged palace hall, she needed only a single blueprint to solve a problem that had baffled people for a century.

Some sneered that a woman who showed her face in public to work as a carpenter was debasing herself. She responded by producing additions to the Standards and Methods of Construction, making craftsmen across the land bow before her. With every mortise and tenon, she restored ancient buildings that had stood for millennia, earning an unprecedented appointment as the Directorate of Imperial Manufactories' first woman and breaking the ironclad rule that women could not serve there. The border fortifications she designed stopped the Western Xia cavalry in its tracks and kept the Song borders safe.

One by one, she uprooted the enemies who had destroyed her family. Step by step, she reclaimed the glory stolen from her.

She never expected that Zhao Yanchen, the Prince of Jing who had kept a close eye on her all this time, rising from Junior Minister of the Court of Judicial Review to a position of power over the entire court, would not only see through her identity but also bring the other half of the Book of Lu Ban Locks and tell her, “Mu Qingyuan, I’ll help you avenge your family. Together, we’ll shape the fate of the Song realm with mortise-and-tenon joinery.”