In the early 1990s, Bo Wah Chuen (Aaron Kwok) attracts great attention as a business executive in the Imperial East India Company of Hong Kong, his prominence overshadowing even that of his British superiors. However, twenty years ago, when he takes the company’s entry test, all he has to show for himself is the plea, “I could read and write”. His rise to prominence has as much to do with British’s imminent return of Hong Kong to China, as it has to do with his considerable ability.