In 210 BC, carts of rotting fish trailed a sealed royal carriage to hide the smell of a dead emperor. This deep dive tells the story of the man inside, Qin Shi Huang, from his vulnerable childhood as the son of a hostage prince in enemy territory to the ruler who unified China for the first time.

We examine the merchant Lu Buwei who bought his family’s path to the throne, the fake eunuch Lao Ai’s failed coup, the legalist system of collective punishment, and repeated assassination attempts. Then we explore his sweeping standardization of script, coins, measures, and axle widths, the burning of books, a disputed story of buried scholars, his fatal hunt for an elixir of life, and the Terracotta Army.

• Why later Confucian historians may have spread rumors about his parentage
• Jing Ke’s poisoned dagger, Gao Jianli’s lead-filled instrument, and the giant’s hurled metal cone
• How standardizing axle widths, coins, and the written script bound the empire together
• Modern doubts about the story of 460 scholars buried alive
• Mercury poisoning, the forged decree after his death, and the collapse of the Qin dynasty