Two independent stories involving chess wizards are interwoven to satirize the politics of the Chinese Cultural Revolution as well as Taiwan's capitalist boom of the 1970's.

Stretching across the canvas of the Sino-Japanese War of the 30s, the subsequent Japanese surrender in 1945, and the onslaught of Communism, this film depicts an ill-fated romance between a talented lady novelist and a Chinese traitor working with the Japanese who fall victim to the mayhem of war and their tragic inability to reconcile political differences.