A Map of the World’s Commerce

After a modern-day MBA graduate, Shen Yi, dies suddenly, he transmigrates into the shopkeeper of a failing general goods store in Chang'an's Western Market, in the Great Sheng Dynasty.

Faced with bad books, piles of unsold porcelain, and creditors at his door, he doesn't beg for mercy. Instead, he turns them into business partners with a "debt restructuring plan." He uses the unsold painted porcelain from Jizhou Kiln to break into the Western Regions spice trade, then hangs a new sign at a prime location in the Western Market: "East-West Exchange."

Shen Qingyi, the legitimate daughter of a Jiangnan silk-trading family, travels thousands of miles to the capital just to ask him one question: "Will you take on the trade route from Jiangnan to the Western Regions?"

Starting with maritime trade and establishing himself through the salt and iron industries, he moves from flying cash remittances to issuing government bonds, making one move after another on the empire's economic chessboard with his modern business acumen. The court fears him, and the emperor tests him, but the financial network he has woven is already embedded in the empire's lifeblood. Kill him, and the whole system will spiral out of control.

"I have no intention of becoming the richest man in the world," he says calmly, standing in the golden palace. "I only want merchants everywhere to stop having to kneel to do business."