Hong Chengchou, once a prodigy among boys.
After the Battle of Songjin, the Governor-General of Jiliao became a prisoner.
Yet in the freezing prison of Shengjing, during a late-night conversation beneath Empress Dowager Xiaozhuang’s sable fur cloak,
he forged a shocking pact that would change the fate of the nation for three centuries.
Bearing the curse of “turncoat minister,” he endured humiliation and surrendered to the Qing. He was both a pawn in court intrigues to balance Manchu and Han interests, and the secret biological father of an imperial heir, hidden amid the power struggles of the inner palace. Through the bloodshed of Dorgon’s regency, the power vacuum left by Shunzhi’s aversion to governing, and the iron-fisted rule of Oboi, he advanced carefully as a Han official. While overseeing the southwest, he quietly laid his plans; during his years as regent, he protected the throne from the shadows, ushering his own son, Xuanye, onto it.
Within the palace walls, Xiaozhuang wagered her bloodline in a contest of wits deep in the inner palace. At court, Hong Chengchou used his cunning to defuse crises between Manchus and Han. In the history books lay a shocking secret that Qianlong deliberately altered. From the chaos of the late Ming to the prosperous Kangxi and Qianlong era, this political drama spanning generations and shaping the nation’s fate conceals the most restrained fatherly love, the most perilous palace intrigue, and the most reality-shattering historical truth.
Only when the secrets behind the red palace walls are revealed will we learn that the foundations of the Kangxi and Qianlong era were quietly laid long ago, in that pact forged in the freezing prison!
