In the seventh year of the Tianqi era, the familiar rope at Coal Hill had yet to be prepared.
The body of the young Chongzhen, newly enthroned, is suddenly occupied by a modern soul that has witnessed the blood and tears of the Ming dynasty's fall.
Is the fate of a ruler who loses his kingdom already hanging over him?
The land is ablaze with war, the court is rotten, disasters strike like blades, and the Jurchens bare their fangs... The ship called the Great Ming has already sprung countless leaks.
Zhu Youjian laughs.
Repair it? With what?
No System at his side, no immortal arts to shield the heavens. All he has is a ruthless heart tempered by five hundred years of history chronicling the fall of the dynasty, a cool gaze that sees through the future, and a knack for patching things up while clinging to life on sheer cliffs!
A mere patchwork craftsman?
Fine! Wei Zhongxian's blood-soaked bone-scraping knife is just the tool to cut away the festering sores in the rotting flesh and squeeze every last drop of fat from the marrow!
The factional strife is raging? Then he'll turn the upright officials into mud, the corrupt officials into paste, and stir this filthy mire himself to shore up the crumbling foundations of power!
Mend the rift in the heavens?
He will! Open the sea routes to bring in a lifeline of silver, forge new firearms to build a powerful army. Let Xu Guangqi's pursuit of practical knowledge pierce through ignorance, and let Lu Xiangsheng's fearless courage strike in every direction.
With one hand, his political schemes chop through bone like a cleaver, drawing the black blood of eunuch factions and nobles. With the other, his brush shapes mud like Nüwa, piecing together the shattered realm stretching across ten thousand miles.
In this life, Zhu Youjian vows to be the Great Ming's first and only "patchwork craftsman"!
Use corrupt officials to fight corrupt officials, squeeze the powerful to exploit the powerful, use loyal ministers as nails, and burn scheming villains as fuel!
Even if his fingers are worn to the bone and his body is shattered, he will dip his brush in his own blood and patch this broken land beneath the sun and moon...
Piece by piece, inch by inch,
he will put it back together!
And he
