In the last years of Tianbao's reign, Yuan Ji, a translator from Chang'an, was proficient in seven languages, but could not translate an unintentional remark made by Cui Qingyi, the daughter of a noble family, on a bustling night.
The Anshi Rebellion broke out suddenly, and both language and civilization became ineffective. Yuan Ji moved between various forces with the "Translator's Talisman", translating loyalty, love and humanity on the edge of life and death. He calmly recorded every relationship he forged for survival - with Uighur female shamans, exiled official prostitutes, and rebel widows - and compiled it into "A Collection of Translations in Troubled Times" to anchor his increasingly scattered existence.
Cui Qingyi fled to Shu with her husband. She was reduced from a daughter of a noble family to an exile, and was forced to learn the language of survival. In her husband's tragic efforts to restore the old order, she saw clearly the powerlessness of perfect grammar in the face of reality, and quietly grew from a "written poem" to a "reader" who can revise laws.
At the beginning of the troubled times, the two reunited in Chang'an, which had changed beyond recognition. Yuan Ji presented the "Collection", which he wrote with half a lifetime of struggle, as a translation report on human nature in troubled times.
There is no reconciliation, only recognition. When Yuan Ji sank the old talisman covered with seals into the river, Cui Qingyi asked: "Where are we going?"
They board a ship with no destination. This tiny, moving country is sailing toward an shore that may never exist, but is worthy of eternal pursuit—where there is no need for talismans and nothing is untranslatable. Sailing itself has become the most steadfast answer to a broken world.
