During the Wanli period of the Ming Dynasty, Yan Qingshu, a talented girl from Heming Academy in Jiangnan, witnessed the mysterious and violent deaths of two talented senior brothers one after another. Only strange ink marks and broken eight-legged scrolls were left on the scene. Rumors abounded in the academy, and they were all called "eight-part essays asking for one's life." Yan Qingshu does not believe in ghosts and gods. Based on his knowledge and keen observation in the family biography "The Record of Clearing Wrongs", the suspicion points directly to the identity forgery under the imperial examination system.
