On the borderlands of Great Liang, Grand Princess Xiao Yici returns to the capital with her late father's final decree, charged with assisting her younger brother, the frail young Emperor Xiao Yiyan. But the capital is a treacherous place: Chancellor Lin Youzhi holds the court in his grasp and schemes for power; her older brother, Prince Jin Xiao Yijin, secretly covets the throne; and the Empress Dowager joins forces with powerful ministers, hoping to trap her in the inner quarters through an arranged marriage. Assassins strike on the road back to the capital, trouble erupts before the late emperor's funeral cortege, her brother is mysteriously poisoned, and plague ravages the northern lands. One crisis follows another.
Meanwhile, Shen Chao, the General Who Guards the North and commander of a mighty army, is summoned back to the capital. He saves her in a snowstorm and supports her at court, yet seems to be inextricably connected to the key mysteries. From testing one another and working together to break through one crisis after another, to facing life-and-death dangers and political machinations side by side, they gradually come to understand the convictions and sincerity each has held close.
