A love that began in bitter old times, a marriage vow meant to last half a lifetime, and an eight-hundred-li fief: could all of it really be enough to erase a promise made in the underworld? From the most distant emperor and empress to husband and wife bound closer than kin, after separations, reunions, life, and death, would anyone return as promised beneath the sunset and smoke of war? It began in blood and swayed in the tides of love and desire. The parasol trees in the south, the tall trees in the north: she bore the most exalted and burdensome title a woman could hold, and gave herself to the rulers of two nations. Eldest Princess, Crown Princess, Empress... A hundred years later, when her beauty had turned to ashes, would the name recorded in the history books be that of a demon empress who brought ruin to her country, or a ruler in her own right?
