China

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China is a sovereign state comprising a significant portion of central eastern region of Asia that is the world's most populous country and one of its largest by area. Historically the cradle of civilization in East Asia, China has been a major regional power throughout its millennia-long history largely characterized by a cycle of dynastic succession.

History

Qin dynasty

In 210 BCE, China was under Templar domination in the form of Qin Shi Huang, who had proclaimed himself the first Emperor of China after reunifying the nation. That year, the emperor was assassinated by the Assassin Wei Yu, who slew him with a spear.

Song dynasty

By the beginning of the 13th century, the Song was the reigning dynasty of China, and it was during this period that China's northern neighbors, the Mongols, emerged as an empire newly-unified under Genghis Khan. With a Sword of Eden in hand, Genghis embarked on a series of conquests across Asia, threatening northern China. In the 1220s, recognizing the peril, the Assassin Mentor Altaïr Ibn-La'Ahad, his wife Maria, and their son Darim traveled to the region, liaised with Qulan Gal, a Mongolian Assassin, and assassinated the Great Khan while he was besieging Xingqing, the capital of the Western Xia Empire.

Genghis Khan's demise, alongside that of many of his sons, did little to stymie Mongol expansion and by the middle of the century, the Mongol Empire had annexed most of China. In 1259, the Mongols led by Möngke Khan, the first Mongol Great Khan to be inducted into the Templar Order, assaulted Diaoyu Fotress. Thanks to the sacrifice of a Chinese Assassin simultaneously serving as a Song commander, the Mongols were forced to withdraw for the timebeing. On 11 August 1259, the late Assassin's daughter, Zhang Zhi, avenged him by assassinating Möngke after being recruited into the Chinese Brotherhood of Assassins by its Mentor Kang. Despite her success, her defiance of Kang's orders in carrying out the mission and the permanently crippling injury she sustained in the escape ensured her expulsion from the Brotherhood.

Yuan dynasty

As with Genghis before, Möngke Khan's death only forestalled the Mongol conquest of China which was ultimately completed in 1279 under Möngke's younger brother Kublai Khan who inaugurated the Yuan dynasty. During his reign, the Venetian merchants Niccolò, Maffeo, and Marco Polo, who had been entrusted by Altaïr with carrying on the Assassin Brotherhood, infiltrated the court of Kublai. There, after many decades, they managed to recover Altaïr's Codex which had been lost to the Mongols shortly after the Fall of Masyaf.

Ming dynasty

By 1368, the Chinese had definitively threw off the yoke of Mongol domination, restoring indigenous rule with the Ming dynasty begun by the Hongwu Emperor. During this time, the Chinese Brotherhood based themselves in the city of Beijing and were led by Fang Xiaoru. In 1402, the throne fell to the Templar-allied Yongle Emperor, who had thousands of suspected Assassins across the country arrested and executed, including Fang Xiaoru. Li Tong, a female Assassin whose parents had also been killed during the purge, was able to escape Beijing with an apprentice and an Apple of Eden.

In 1424, while the Yongle Emperor was trying to suppress a rebellion near the Gobi Desert, Li Tong entered his tent and assassinated him.

By 1524, the Jiajing Emperor was manipulated into succeeding where the Yongle Emperor failed. The Templar eunuchs, known as the Eight Tigers, set up the Great Rites Controversy, eradicating the Chinese Assassins. The Mentor Zhu Jiuyuan and his apprentice Shao Jun fled to Italy to seek aid. The Jiajing Emperor's henchmen found and killed Jiuyuan, but the retired, former Italian Mentor Ezio Auditore da Firenze gave her refuge and advice. After killing her pursuers, an empowered Jun journeyed home to hunt the Templars and rebuild the Chinese Brotherhood.

Shao Jun, now a Mentor, sent Assassins in 1567 to poison the Jiajing Emperor with a lethal dose of mercury, the latter believing to have ingested the elixir of life.

20th century

In 1912, the Qing Dynasty was overthrown by the Tongmenghui, which led to the creation of the Republic of China, with the Templar Grand Master Sun Yat-sen as the Provisional President of the republic. After his death by the Assassins in 1925, the Chinese Rite of the Templar Order attemped to appease the numerous factions in China, but failed to do so. The series of tensions and conflicts eventually led to the Chinese Civil War, fought between Chiang Kai-shek of the Kuomingtang and Mao Zedong of the Communists.

Modern times

In 2012, the Templars were planning to launch a satellite into space with a Piece of Eden attached to it. The Assassins listed China as one of the possible countries where the satellite was located.