A Grave Sin

In the final years of the Qing dynasty, the people of Guanzhong lived in abject poverty under the incompetent rule of the Qing government. While fleeing famine, Xizi's father was killed by bandits. After the landlord couple, Liu Maocai and his wife, rescued him, he stayed on as their hired hand. In the early years of the Republic, the Liu couple persuaded Xizi to marry their only daughter, Huaihua, who was mentally disabled, offering him the family estate in return. But Liu Maocai went back on his word afterward, hoping to take another wife and have a son to carry on the family line. Chaos soon engulfed the household. The Liu couple died one after the other, and the maid Liu Zhi took Huaihua's place. Yet on the very night Xizi and Liu Zhi married, the ghosts of Liu Maocai and his wife appeared in his dreams. Not long afterward, Liu Zhi gave birth to twins, a boy and a girl, while poor Huaihua gave birth to a stillborn child that same night. Seventeen years later, the twins came of age, and a fateful journey into the consequences of sin began...