She is Liu Yiqiu, a poor orphan whose father died and whose mother remarried. Her stepfather beats her, and her sister was nearly sold into a brothel.
He is Li Mi, a child prodigy at seven and a close aide to the emperor, a proud young noble with the reputation of “the little Zhuge of the Tang Dynasty.”
She should have spent her whole life struggling in the mire, but with her brilliant talent for Go, she defies fate and changes her life
She gambles at Go in taverns to win food, and tricks her no-good stepfather into dancing to her tune.
She plays against foreign merchants at the harbor, accidentally crossing paths with Li Mi, a close aide to the emperor, and is mistaken for a pawn in a “fishing expedition” to catch wrongdoers.
From the docks of Mingzhou to the prosperous capital of Chang’an, she strides across the chessboard littered with the powerful’s victims and forces her way through the iron gates to become a court Go master!
While Chang’an’s powerful treat Go as a mere pastime, she will make these black and white stones into a blade in her hands! She doesn’t just want to win this game. She wants the whole world to see that women, too, can take up the stones and secure the nation’s peace!
