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During the Tongzhi period in the late Qing Dynasty, the Mancheng system divided the city into heaven and hell. Inside the wall, the children of the Eight Banners did not work in production, but received salary from the imperial court, and acted arrogantly; outside the wall, the Han people were crushed by exorbitant taxes and miscellaneous taxes, natural and man-made disasters continued, official corruption was common, bullies were rampant in the countryside, the people at the bottom were struggling in hunger and despair, and the conflict between the Manchus and the Han was so acute that it was about to break out. The node that the protagonist travels through coincides with a severe drought in the local area and a failure in the food harvest. The government colludes with the banner people in the city to hoard goods, and hell on earth is a foregone conclusion.