Toad Village, Hebei province, northern China, the present day. Tian Sheng (Fan Lei) and his old friend Baolai (Li Sibo) are among several workers who are affected when local mine owner Wang Liming (Yang Hua) cuts production and lays off workers, still owing them three months' wages. Baolai decides to look for work in the city; the indecisive Tian Sheng returns to his wife Xia Ying (Yang Jinger) and young son Guagua (Zhou Chenghao) to ponder his future. When the village head (Wang Xiaoxi) announces that residents will be allocated plots of land in compensation for a new motorway that will be built nearby, Tian Sheng ends up with the Northern Plot, the worst of all. However, while having a hole drilled on it to find water for the house he'll build there, he finds there's a hot spring under his plot - a discovery that could potentially make him rich and transform the economy of Toad Village. Suddenly everyone wants to know Tian Sheng and his family. The village head recommends that Tian Sheng brings in the mine owner as a partner, as the latter has the capital and business experience to construct a hot springs resort. Yang Hong (Yan Jie), a long-lost school friend of Xia Ying, turns up and tries to muscle in as a business adviser. When Tian Sheng resists the pressure by the village head and mine boss, things start to get dirty - and Tian Sheng finally has to take a decision in his life and fight back, with Baolai's help.