America, 1899

In 1899, the age of gunslingers and outlaws had come to an end.

That year, the Spanish-American War had just ended. The United States took Cuba, Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines from Spain, officially becoming an imperialist power and beginning its era of overseas colonization.

That year, America was at the height of the Gilded Age. Industrial capital was growing unchecked, while railroad tycoons, oil barons, and steel magnates monopolized the lifeblood of the national economy. Labor conflicts were fierce, and strikes and union movements erupted one after another.

That year, the anti-Chinese movement was becoming institutionalized. Since the Chinese Exclusion Act passed in 1882, anti-Chinese sentiment in California had continued to intensify. In 1894, America signed a discriminatory treaty with the Qing Dynasty, completely barring Chinese laborers from entering the country.

In San Francisco, Chinese people were confined to Chinatown, subjected to systematic discrimination and violence, and treated as inferiors.

That year, San Francisco was already the largest city on the West Coast.

The city was a gateway to Asia, and the front line of the fiercest racial conflicts.

That year, Xu Qiao transmigrated and became the mayor at the heart of San Francisco’s struggle for power and capital: Maxim Downs.

It was the best of times, and the worst of times.