>>96300695>Read Jin Yong and Gu LongExcellent taste my friend, a problem for OP might be length. The first volume (of four) of the Legend of the Condor Heroes translation is 400 pages and OP looks like's after a Cliff's note version of Asian history rather than two lifetimes of work.
>>96300621 (OP)Ubiquitous answer of Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon 2000, though I see some people have already disparaged that.
Hero 2002
Storm Riders 1998
A Chinese Ghost Story 1987, though in some ways I prefer the 2011 version.
You won't learn much history from those but you get a good idea of far out story lines, particularly Storm Riders. They're short episodes rather than ideas for a campaign but they give an idea of the sort of things that happen in Asian stories.
In things like Cinderella there's a happy ending despite the gruesome fates of the stepsisters. A lot of Asian stories have tragedy. Like Butterfly Lovers where the couple can't be together. In modern retellings they end up together in the afterlife, in older versions he dies and she prays at his grave, is swallowed up by the earth, and is memorialised as the example of womanly fidelity.
Throw in some obligation and duty with dire consequences and some stereo-typical acting to save face. Like in Shogun where the rotting pheasant smell is so unpleasant the Japanese feel they have to remove it but they feel it's in direct violation of Anjin's orders so rather than ask permission and risk embarrassing him or seeming disrespectful the old man volunteers to dispose of it knowing that he will be punished by execution.
Stereotypically, Confucianism regarded learning as important and emphasised fidelity within a hierarchy social groupings all the way to Heaven, collectivism rather than Western individualism. Ideally it says people can improve (know better do better). Legalism is pragmatic not idealstic, based on harsh but known punishments, rule through fear, stay in your place, don't question your betters.
