In the early 1990s when the Chinese men's table tennis team is at a low ebb, head coach Cai Zhenhua is tasked with forming a new team to finally fight to the top at the 1995 World Ping Championship in Tianjin, China.
In 1948, as China's civil war reaches a critical point and the Kuomintang's economy collapses, Communist agent Fang Meng'ao goes undercover as an Air Force colonel. Assigned to investigate corruption—led by his own father—and later to help transport national assets to Taiwan, he becomes entangled in a complex power struggle. Caught between duty, family, and political shifts, Fang plays a pivotal role in a covert mission tied to the peaceful liberation of Beijing.
The drama begins during China’s Reform and Opening Up era in the 1980s in Wenzhou, south China, an area renown for the emergence of many successful businesses. It charts the progress of a certain family headed by Zhou Wanshun, that lived in Rui’an village. The family had the opportunity for one of their two children to go to Italy to study. Wanshun (quite extraordinary at the time, and even today) chose to let his 13-year old daughter, Ayu, go to study rather than his 16-year-old son, son Maigou. Unbeknownst to his wife, Zhao Yinhua and son he sold their ancestral home cum cottage industry and spent all the proceeds in funding the Italy study trip. Although he had no business plan, he set out with his wife and son to Wenzhou City to “make money”, any which way. Together, they make it to Wenzhou City, while the daughter goes to Italy, each forging different paths, especially the children each persevering through challenges and hardship, achieving individual success.