Chapter 7: Bizarre History

Entering the study, Li Si found that the lighting was very good, with sunlight illuminating the room clearly.

The study wasn’t large. It contained a long table with an ink bamboo painting in front of it. This painting was done by the original owner. Though not particularly outstanding, it conveyed the spirit of bamboo in just a few strokes.

Behind the long table was a row of bookshelves holding about forty to fifty books. Most were similar to the ancient Four Books and Five Classics, along with popular poetry collections and scriptural commentaries for scholars, tribute students, and jinshi degree holders, as well as a few history books and miscellaneous texts.

The original owner usually focused on the Four Books and Five Classics, as well as scriptural commentaries, paying less attention to history. Li Si’s purpose in coming here was to look at the history books and see if this world’s structure was related to the real world.

After all, many things here were similar to the ancient world he knew – the written language was Chinese characters, there was an imperial examination system like in his previous life, and the people were of Asian descent. So Li Si felt this world should be somewhat related to the real world.

Li Si took a few history books and sat at the desk, quickly flipping through them. He didn’t need to know specific historical events; he just wanted to find the dynasties he was familiar with from the real world. He vaguely remembered a poem summarizing the dynasties in the real world, and he just needed to find these dynasties.

“Tang Yao, Yu Shun, Xia, Shang, Zhou, Spring and Autumn, Warring States in turmoil long.

Qin, Han, Three Kingdoms, Jin unified, Southern and Northern Dynasties faced off strong.

Sui, Tang, Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms too, Song, Yuan, Ming, Qing – imperial rule done.”

However, after quickly reading through the history books, Li Si despairingly discovered that the history here was completely different from the real world’s history.

In this history, it was initially written that a country called the Nine Provinces ruled this world for 2,429 years. During these 2,429 years, social classes had solidified, and the people suffered greatly, deeply exploited and enslaved by the upper classes.

Finally, in the 2,429th year after the establishment of the Nine Provinces, peasant uprisings frequently occurred, eventually overthrowing the rule of the original Nine Provinces.

Afterwards, there was a period of chaos lasting 278 years. When the situation finally stabilized, twelve powerful countries emerged. This state of twelve competing countries lasted for 329 years. In the 607th year after the destruction of the Nine Provinces, two of the twelve countries, Wei and Yao, swallowed up the other ten countries within 5 years, each occupying the territories of five countries, resulting in a situation where two countries divided the north and south. Now it was the 175th year since the destruction of the ten countries.

What surprised Li Si was that the confrontation between these two countries seemed strange. Although there were constant minor conflicts between them, there had never been any major wars, and they had always coexisted peacefully.

“Unbelievable,” Li Si murmured. But what was even more unbelievable to him was that the Nine Provinces had ruled this world for over two thousand years, which seemed incredible to him.

In Earth’s ancient Chinese history, the longest-lasting feudal dynasty was the Zhou Dynasty, which existed for 800 years, and even then, the last 300 years of the Zhou Dynasty were essentially in name only. Few other dynasties lasted more than 300 years. For the Nine Provinces to rule for over two thousand years was completely abnormal.
Unless this country never lacked food and was free from natural and man-made disasters.

But this was impossible. From the original owner’s memories, he knew that the grain yield in this world was still at about 200 jin(0.5km) per mu(666.67 square meters), which was very low.

In China’s Ming Dynasty, rice yield per mu was over 300 jin(0.5km), and they had two growing seasons. This world only had one growing season and hadn’t developed two-season farming yet, not even matching China’s Three Kingdoms period.

With such grain yields, any natural disaster would surely result in many deaths. So the Nine Provinces ruling for over two thousand years must have some trick to it. These history books must be concealing something.

“Clack!” The paperweight accidentally knocked over by Li Si fell to the ground, startling him out of his deep thoughts. He suddenly remembered that the rice was still cooking.

Li Si quickly put down the history book, bent down to place the paperweight on the table, and hurried to the kitchen.
These matters could be pondered later; the main thing now was to fill his stomach.

Arriving at the kitchen, he found that the fire in the stove had gone out, leaving only a few embers. Opening the pot lid, he used chopsticks to stir the rice and taste it.

It wasn’t undercooked.

Li Si wrapped his hands with a handkerchief and picked up the plates of rice and cured meat, heading towards the main hall.

Placing the rice and dishes on the table, Li Si sat down and began to enjoy his meal.

As he put the cured meat into his mouth, the salty flavor combined with the chili made him feel particularly comfortable. It was a pity he didn’t have many ingredients; otherwise, he could have made other delicious foods instead of eating so casually.

As Li Si was about to pick up a second slice of cured meat, he couldn’t help but think of the corpse he had beheaded this morning.

That emaciated corpse, all wrinkled, did bear some resemblance to this cured meat.

Thinking of this, he suddenly felt nauseous and lost his appetite.

He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, then opened them and continued eating as if nothing had happened. He even ate faster. In this world, wasting food was a sin. Moreover, he needed a stronger body to face the unknown dangers of the future.

Being squeamish now would be irresponsible towards the food and his own life. Li Si saw the pros and cons clearly and could be ruthless with himself.

If he couldn’t ensure his own safety in this world, no one else could.

After finishing his meal, Li Si used the water from steaming the vegetables to wash the bowls and chopsticks.
After washing the dishes, he then picked up a broom and dustpan and began cleaning. He wasn’t this fond of cleanliness before, but since he no longer had a phone or internet, he had nothing else to do. So he could only find things to do.

After cleaning, Li Si took some more money from under the mattress and went out. He needed to withdraw some silver to buy some things.

After leaving the house, he first ordered a knife and a dagger at the blacksmith’s shop. For the knife, he asked the blacksmith to make one in the style of a Nepalese military knife, which would be better for chopping corpses in the future.

The dagger was simpler. Li Si gestured a bit and drew a few lines on the ground with a tree branch, and the blacksmith understood. But for the Nepalese military knife, Li Si explained and gestured for a long time, and the blacksmith still didn’t understand. Li Si could only say he would bring a drawing in a few days.

He left 1 tael of silver as a deposit, with 3 more taels to be paid when the weapons were ready. This was just the price for the dagger. This blacksmith’s craftsmanship was very good, so the price was a bit higher than other blacksmith shops.

But Li Si thought it was worth it. In the system store, a long sword was worth 1 soul point. He had spent just 4 taels of silver to buy a dagger. Even if it was inferior to the weapons in the system store, even if it was worth half, it should still be equivalent to at least 0.5 soul points, right?

What was 0.5 soul points worth? Half a year of lifespan! Buying half a year of life for 4 taels of silver was worth it.
Li Si’s self-justification was very successful.

Note: Jinshi (進士) was the highest and final degree in the imperial examination in Imperial China.