The audience for a Chinese influenced part of the realms is not solely Chinese people (and lot's of people of Chinese descent don't live in China of course).
And I'm not arguing that you should make it more historical, just that you miss big opportunities if you don't start with history. My game had Terracotta warforged, and Kenku, a bureau of Chinese Imperial wizards, and a viking who'd travelled all the way down the silk road to recover his folding ship which an official had stolen in order to present to the Emperor as a gift. I
Just to take one example: in early Chinese history while it was silk that went west, what the Chinese most wanted was horses, particularly the horses of the Ferghana valley that legend said were gold, sweated blood and descended from Dragons. That's just one of the cool opportunities for fantasy you miss if don't dig into the history.
You would also I think, be far less likely to trip over yourself, if you choose a particular era of history as your starting point, rathern than Chinese History in general. That whole idea of timelessness is one that leads to all kinds of orientalist generalisations.