In the fourth year of the Changqing era under Emperor Jingzong of Tang, the emperor is obsessed with polo and fox hunting.
When dye worker Zhang Shao is given an impossible task to weave and dye a purple robe for the imperial court, he thinks his life has reached a dead end.
Then the diviner Su Xuanming casts a fortune that predicts they will “enter the palace hall and dine together.”
A wine cart belonging to a smuggler of illicit salt, a fake eunuch who has not been castrated, and Zhang Shao's childhood sweetheart, who has been selected for the palace, all become pieces in the game.
When Zhang Shao storms into the Qingsi Hall and takes the throne, he discovers that the imperial meal has long since gone cold. After working like a beast of burden all his life, why not be emperor for a day, enjoy one imperial feast, and have a taste of the high life?
Dipping his finger in purple dye, he scrawls a message in blood on the throne: “This throne digs into your bones.”
Outside the hall, torches held by the Shence Army turn the night sky red. An even greater storm of regicide is brewing.
