In 1977, childhood friends Yang Chunxue and Liang Maicha dream of taking college exams together, but Chunxue is forced into marriage due to a family crisis, prompting Maicha to leave home. After enduring hardship, Chunxue finds a new beginning by starting a sewing business in her village, while Maicha returns with brick-making skills to revive the local kiln. Together, they transform their poor village into a provincial model of economic growth.
Lin Zhihua, Xu Weibiao, Wang Lei, and Zhang Peng are childhood friends with different personalities who parted ways and took different paths due to their choices during a time of change, leading them to stand on opposite sides.
Old factory workers from a state-owned enterprise in the North, who, amidst changing times, break free from constraints, innovate, and continually transform as they pursue their industrial ideals.
During the difficult period from 1937 to 1945, two generations of three intellectual families in Peiping make choices and sacrifices in the face of great turmoil and changes of the times. Some people choose to protect Chinese culture and continue the cultural bloodline. There are both idealists and realistic activists. They try their best to save the nation and survive, and actively search for a way out for the country, and finally head towards the light.
