Su He, the daughter of a rice shop in Kyoto, was forced to marry on behalf of her greedy sister, and was forced to marry into a remote Qingzhu Village. She became a nominal couple with Cheng Yan, a rough-and-tumble man who raised his father alone and had his younger sister after his mother died. The two started from a "contract marriage" where they tested each other. Su He relied on the good cooking skills he learned from his father in his previous life to turn mountain wild vegetables and river fresh game into delicacies on the table. Cheng Yan used his hunting skills to build fences, hunt and guard the fields, and led Su He to reclaim wasteland, keep bees and grow vegetables. During this period, the two quarreled over the location of the chicken coop, bickered over the saltiness of the pickles, and had their freshly dried fish stolen by a neighbor's dog. However, they also worked together while delivering tiles back to back when repairing a leaky roof, and gave medicine to sister Cheng Yan who had a fever. When Su He discovered that Cheng Yan's "private money" hidden in the woodshed was actually a new handkerchief embroidered with lotus flowers that he bought for her, and when Cheng Yan ate the sugar cake with double honey specially made for him by Su He, the two people who were originally pushed together by fate slowly warmed each other's hearts in the smoke.
