Dawn of the Empire

Chapter 1: Prologue

Ou Yang, male, 18 years old. Political Affiliation: Member of the Communist Youth League. Education: Currently pursuing a bachelor’s degree. Although he loves all kinds of wildly imaginative fantasies, he is indeed a staunch materialist. Well, he used to be. The earth-shattering shift in his worldview began two years ago, and the reason is simple—he time-traveled. If it had merely been a time travel scenario, Ou Yang was confident he could draw on his ten years of reading *Science Fiction World* to find sufficiently persuasive reasons to uphold his values. Unfortunately, however, he had been transported to an utterly unfamiliar plane of existence. Over the past year, he’d encountered plenty of dogs, cats, and cows in this world that walked upright and spoke human language, as well as some half-beasts with animal features—like cat ears. Occasionally, he’d even hear bizarre rumors about “spellcasters” and the like. After witnessing a weirdo in a Taoist robe cast a spell that unleashed an ice spike with his own eyes one day, Ou Yang had to admit that sci-fi concepts like “time vortexes” simply couldn’t explain the world he now found himself in. As a small consolation, Ou Yang had undergone a soul transfer. In this world, he was still Ou Yang—an 18-year-old Han Chinese with black hair, black eyes, and yellow skin. Hmm, there were Han Chinese in this world, too. And they were at the height of their power—having just vanquished the nomadic tribes of the grasslands, they now stood with swords drawn, gazing around in bewilderment. For a fervent Han nationalist, this was simply perfect. So Ou Yang decided to trade his pen for a sword. No joke—Ou Yang had just earned his “Xiu Cai” qualification. Volunteering to serve on the frontier as a Xiu Cai allowed him to become a junior officer immediately. People say life on the frontier is harsh, but in Ou Yang’s view, it simply meant lacking the various cultural and recreational activities of the interior—activities like poetry gatherings and garden parties that he had never been interested in anyway. On the contrary, commanding his slave soldiers to strike against the barbarians held far greater appeal for him. Such battles were safe, earned him merit, honor, and money, and satisfied his personal interests—what’s not to like? It took Ou Yang a great deal of persuasion and time to convince his parents. The Ou family’s elders didn’t harbor any prejudice against the military; they simply felt it would be a shame for their youngest son, having just earned the title of “scholar,” not to try his hand at passing the “candidate for the provincial examination.” However, in the end, his parents couldn’t resist the young man’s determination to achieve greatness. Besides, joining the army didn’t preclude him from taking the Juren exam, so they eventually nodded in agreement. “8th Unit, Anxi Garrison, Lingxi Road—Unit Commander.” Ou Yang carefully read the words on the small iron plaque he’d just received today—this served as his officer’s ID. With it in hand, in this plane of existence so vastly different from Earth, a nation called the Huaxia Empire had gained another junior officer. “How wonderful.” That was exactly what Ou Yang was thinking at that moment.