Heart of Greed

Synopsis

Tong Yan Gai owns a sea-products store. He has 4 children; On, Yat, Foon and Yun. Together, the Tong family run a happy family, full of laughter. He is married Hau and has a concubine Kam. Hau had cancer and didn't expect to survive and wanted Tong Yan Gai to be happy with another woman and wanted Kam take care of him after she dies, but she recovered. Kam thinks that she has no power in the family because she has no true status and becomes a woman stirring a range of petty acts that tend to haunt her in full circle. She seeks the family fortune and in order to do that she causes trouble in the family. Hau, a wise lady pulled the family back together and turned their frowns into smiles. Unfortunately, Hau's cancer comes back and she dies leaving her struggling family behind.

It seems like a peaceful family, but Kam starts planning evil ideas with Sum's brother Sheung Joi Duk and together they cause a lot of trouble in the family. They plotted for years to find a means to take the family fortune and even created public false accusations about her own family in the media. Kam formed her own support group from the worst family members and in-laws to help plot against the Tong household to gain their family fortune. After much careful planning and even going as far as contaminating public opinion about the Tong family, she drove Tong Yan Gai into severe illness and eventually death from stroke. It's there they began a long war against the Tong family in an attempt to invalidate the family will to take the family fortune for their own as a way to punish the Tong family's "mistreatment" towards her. The family is in mayhem for once and they have only one person who can help them, Sheung Joi Sum. So begins the court case for the Tong family's assets with Sheung Joi Sum representing the Tong family and Ching Leing's lawyer rival, Dai Gerk Bat respresenting Kam.

Characters

Tong Family

• Tong Yan-Gai (Ha Yu) – Gai is a 58 year old man who is in charge of the Tong family. He is a bubbly, fun and witty man who tries to run his family with laughs and joy. He is a self-proclaimed happy man of two wives, Ling Hau and Wong Sau Kam, four children, On, Yat, Foon, Yan and a seafood store, Tong Gei. He has a wealthy heritage and enjoys spending and giving the most of his time to his family. However, if things ever go wrong, he is known to chicken out and have no bravery whatsoever, giving him the name of Tong Yan Gwai (turtle). He is extremely protective of his children and would do whatever it takes to keep them safe and happy. Throughout the series, his character matures for the better, leading him to erase his Tong Yan Gwai nickname. Despite declining health due to stroke, he remember's Hau's words of wisdom in keeping his family together and he becomes a brave, generous and smart man, and he uses his new found confidence to confront Wong Sau Kam in his final moments in life.

• Ling Hau (Lee Sze Kei, Louise) – Hau is a 57 year old woman and she is the leading lady of the Tong family. Although she is a loving woman, she is extremely smart and honest and can tell who is a good person and who is a bad person. She is powerful and strong in her ways and would do anything to keep the Tong family running smoothly with smiles on their faces. She foresees Kam's plotting antics and thus she kicks her out. During her declining health and final days of life, she spent them with her family in a happy manner. Even on her death bed, she was very-straight-forward in her act of not letting Kam back into her family.

• Wong Sau-Kam (Susanna Kwan) – Kam is a 52 year old woman who is second in charge of the Tong family and is a mistress of Tong Yan Gai. Kam was supposed to be the spouse of Tong Yan Gai, but because HK law made it illegal to have more than one wife, she was forced to be an unofficial second wife to Gai. Kam is an ungrateful and sinister figure and she strives to her best to retrieve the six hundred million dollar fortune of the Tong family. Kam is an highly petty, arrogant, and ungrateful figure and she strives to her best to retrieve the six hundred million dollar fortune of the Tong family. She's a constant schemer when it comes to making plans to make the Tong family unhappy. She easily likes people that side with her and often surround herself with unsavory characters that appeases her ego and helps her scheme ways to get what she believes the Tong family has long over due owed her. She is a smart thinker when it comes to making plans to make the Tong family unhappy. She is an unhappy woman after thinking that she would have her rightful position of the leading lady in Tong family; instead she is neglected by Hau in her cheeky ways. At the end, she realises that she had been tricked by Duk and turns for the better, regretting her mistakes and becoming family again with the family.

• Tong Chi-On (Moses Chan) – On is a 30 year old man who strives to do his best for the Tong family. He has a helpful attitude toward his friends and family and keeps the smiles on everybody’s faces. Although his manner is regarded as loving and caring, he is gullible in his relationships and trusts in people too easily often leading to disastrous results. His greatest desire is to find his real family as he is an adopted son of the Tong family and not of true blood, it turns out he is really Gai's son with a third woman. His love interest is Sheung Joi Sum and although she doesn't love him, he still cares for her. He is a comic character in the beginning but by the end he matures greatly. He stands in the place of Hau after her death and is also straight-forward in his acts, rejecting Kam's return to the family (much to the dismay of his father).

• Tong Chi-Yat, Tong Chi Foon, Tong Chi Yan (Bosco Wong, Chris Lai, Fala Chen) – The remaining of Gai’s children are 26, 21, and 17 years old respectively. Yat is an ambitious figure who strives to run a happy family with his controversial chain-smoking model wife, Cheuk Man-Lai (Tavia Yeung). Although Yat is ambitious, he listens to his mother and similar to her in the way he is also straight-forward. He is a figure that forgives and forgets. Foon is Kam’s only son and he is a growing filmmaker who has just graduated. Foon is an innocent figure who suffers greatly from Kam’s sudden outbursts which lead to her getting into trouble with family. He is character trying to find his place in a family without his mother. Yan is a youthful and playful figure who is always a pleasure to be around. She is a flirty figure at the beginning but slowly matures during the series. She loves her family members but can be very moody when she discovers that some of them are traitors.

• Ling Lei (Michelle Yim) – Lei is a 45 year old woman. She is the sister of Hau and is extremely biased and moody, especially against Kam. She wants the best for the Tong family and is the main reason for the Tong family’s wealth. She, like her sister is straight-forward and willing to forgive and forget. She stands in place of Hau and Gai after their deaths. She is loving of her family but strict in many ways.

• Ling Bo (Louis Yuen) – Bo is the 37 year-old greedy brother of Hau and Lei. He was a loving uncle when Hau was around, but became greedy after being bribed with cheques by Kam to side with her. He was invited join Kam's side for a stake in the family assets, and created uproars in the Tong family after gambling away large sums of money from his family’s bank account.

• Cheuk Man Lai (Tavia Yeung) and her family (Various) - Lai is a 26 year old woman. She started off as a controversial chain-smoking model, with a violent husband who she had no more feelings with. However, she continued to respect her husband's father and tried to conceal the details about her affair with Yat. After her divorce with her husband, she entered the Tong family, but very few people accepted her, including Hau. After the realisation of her mistakes, Hau accepts her. After she is accepted into the family and through thorough teachings from Hau, she matures to become a woman who loves the Tong family greatly and to be thankful all that she has in life. Lai's family, in return, is a complete contrast to her. As extremely greedy people, they use the Tong family as a bank, and took $5,000,000 HKD in one visit to fund the restaurant that Hau offered them as a gift for Yat and Lai's marriage. Lai's family ultimately combine with Kam and Duk's plot to obtain a share of the Tong assets. They are hated by the Tong's including Lai herself. They never regret their mistakes, even by the end.

Others

• Sheung Joi Sum (Linda Chung) – Sum is a peaceful 25 year old girl and is a friend of Yan and On. She starts off the series as a poor, unconfident and struggling young woman trying to look after her father who suffers from Alzheimer's disease. On who had feelings for her was rejected by her because she loved another man, Ching Leung. It so happens that she manages to end up working with him in a lawyer firm. They would eventually develop a relationship, but because of their misunderstandings they would often argue and break up various times. Their final break up would be after Leung begins a third-party relationship with her best friend, Ha. Later on in the series she matures into a blooming young lady and becomes a confident emerging lawyer. On finally has a chance to confront her with a proposal after Leung's death.

• Ching Leung (Raymond Lam) – Leung is a 27 year old renowned lawyer. He is Sum’s boyfriend towards the middle of the series. He is a moody but vigilant and caring figure who forever strives to do his best. Although he is a kind person, he has an inability to stay faithful and succumbs. At one point he had an affair with Sheung Joi Sum's best friend Shui Mak Mak, but he kept it quiet and reconciled with Sheung Joi Sum without admitting anything about the matter. Eventually information would slip and Sheung Joi Sum actively demands to know who was the other woman, but Ching felt exposing this matter would ruin everything and insists for her to drop the matter since he admitted his mistakes and assures Sheung Joi Sum it would never happen again. Sheung Joi Sum wasn't satisfied with such an answer and whenever he tries to comfort her, Tong Chi On would be around and he becomes jealous. After the big secret was exposed, everyone parted ways for some time and Leung would try to patch things between him and Sheung Joi Sum. He would eventually die from a car crash nearer the end of the series right before Sum forgives him.

• Shui Ming-Ha/Shui Mak Mak (Yoyo Mung) – Ha is Sum’s best friend. She is a self-centered and power-hungry young woman who has experienced many relationships, often with them ending with disastrous results. During the series, she develops romantic feelings for Leung and she eventually helps Leung cheat on Sum by being Leung's girlfriend, leaving Sum hurt when she finds out. Ha went away and said that she married but it wasn't true - she just wanted Sum to be happy. She returns one last time during Alfred's funeral, regretting and appologising to Sum for forgiveness.

• Sheung Joi Duk (Lei Seng Cheung) – Duk He is Sum’s older brother and is the main antagonist in the series. He manages to turn Kam against the Tong family whilst she was living by herself when being kicked out of the family mansion by Hau. He is a greedy, smart but forlorn character who comes up with plans of taking the Tong family to court being hungry for the six hundred million dollars and he suffers from hair loss. In spite of On's constant generous aid to him, he schemes to get a piece of the Tong's family fortune while having multiple affairs with several women in mainland China. It's he that gave the worst malicious plans for Kam to use against the Tong family after all On had done for him. After an unsuccessful court case for the Tong assets (It was Sum's heartfelt speech in court that convinced Kam to give up the case), Duk tried get a reason and convince her to fight for the Tong fortune again, Kam, angry at him for his lies, attempts to run him over. He freaks and is never seen again.

• Lai Cheuk Lan/Cho Bang (Carrie Lam) - Cho Bang is Sum, Ha, and Yan's good friend. She appears mostly in the beginning of the series, and less more into the middle and end. She is a very cheerful and caring friend to Yan, Sum and Ha.