Stealing Song

Stealing Song is a historical military web novel by Hanfeng Fujian, serialized on Zongheng Chinese Network from October 2009 and completed in 2011, running about 3.09 million characters in 894 chapters. The story is set in the late Southern Song: foreign enemies press the borders, powerful ministers dominate the court, and the dynasty is beset within and without. The protagonist Gao Huaiyuan is the son of a low-ranking official, coldly treated within his clan, yet through circumstance gradually reveals insight and courage; starting from setting his household in order and recruiting local militia, he goes on to break out and join the military. Thereafter he leads troops against the Jin and the southward-moving Mongol forces on the battlefield while maneuvering among powerful ministers at court; above, he aligns with the imperial clan and helps a collateral branch ascend the throne; below, he gathers righteous armies and eliminates the traitors who ruin the state. After years of campaigning and scheming, the realm gradually settles, and he rises from an obscure clerk to a powerful minister holding the reins of state. And then the problem named in the title emerges: is he a guardian of the Zhao Song realm, or a "thief" who takes it for himself? Around this question, the novel intertwines military reform, court intrigue, and personal ambition, rewriting the survival trajectory of the late Southern Song through alternate-history time travel. The work belongs to an earlier batch of Southern Song historical time-travel "wish-fulfillment" fiction, noted for its length, dense plotting, and fast pace; it is best read as historical romance rather than official history.