The story begins as archaeologists discover a crudely-made artifact while doing an archaeological study before the entire area was to be flooded following the construction of the Three Gorges Dam. The archaeologists identify it as being made by Mak-zi (also known as "McFat"), an ancient Chinese philosopher who had invented many things, but were arguably ahead of its time - for example, a myriad of electronic devices before the discovery of electricity. However, the crudeness of the artifact has led to the artifact being rejected for every museum in China and abroad, and thus, unwilling to destroy it, the artifact was set on a barge, continuously moving along the Yangtze River. The story continues on to Mak-zi's descendant 18 generations later, McDull (Kwok Kwan Yin), a kindergartener living in Hong Kong.