Lin Wan, a modern-day office drone, transmigrates and wakes up as A Zhu, the ordinary daughter of a tofu maker in the capital. She only wants to live a quiet life, but unexpectedly falls deeply in love with the young general Xiao Ce. Just as the day of their grand wedding approaches, war breaks out at the border, and her beloved rides off in armor, his fate uncertain.
Before she can recover from the dreadful news that he has “fallen in battle,” Zhao Heng, heir to the Prince of Qin's household, who has coveted her for a long time, threatens her with her family's lives and forces her to become his concubine. On the night of red candles and warm curtains, she catches the heir in an affair with Xiao Ce's cousin, Liu Ruyan, and realizes that the “timid” cousin was in on the plot all along!
A bloody family vendetta strikes on the night of a visit home. Her adoptive parents are slaughtered, and though A Zhu survives, she is framed for their murder. Burdened by a terrible blood feud, she discovers on the run that the crescent-shaped birthmark on her neck perfectly matches the token of a long-lost imperial princess. The ordinary girl who once ground soybeans in a tofu shop turns out to be the emperor's long-lost daughter, born in his old age, whom he has searched for over many years!
When her identity as a remnant of the former dynasty collides with the truth that the general is still alive, and the survival skills she learned on the streets meet the intrigues of the imperial court, A Zhu grips her poisoned golden hairpin and vows to make the Prince of Qin's household pay for its blood debt. But when her blade of revenge points at her former rival in love, and the man she loves returns as her enemy, how can she reclaim what is hers amid imperial power struggles and tangled love and hate?
