Chengqian: The Regrets of the Zhenguan Era

In the prosperous reign of Zhenguan in the Tang dynasty, Crown Prince Li Chengqian walks on thin ice in the Eastern Palace. Clever and filial, with a brilliant mind, he is trapped in a frail, sickly body. His father, Emperor Li Shimin's, high expectations shine like a light atop a mountain, but are also a crushing burden. Prince Li Tai's relentless pressure and their father's favoritism, day after day, leave him feeling as though he's fallen into an icy abyss. He struggles to carry on through coughing fits and the scent of medicine, wielding his brush from his sickbed to govern the realm, all for a single word of approval. Yet misunderstandings take root, and his father's favoritism never changes. In the end, he wastes away, his life cut short in his prime. When he quietly passes away in the cold, silent Eastern Palace, all he leaves Li Shimin is a bloodstained final memorial and endless regret. Can the emperor's belated tears and attempts at making amends bring back that frail, lonely figure? This is a tragic song of a prosperous age, of a father who never understood his son and a son who could never speak his heart to his father.