Every Ghost Festival night, Shen Ying is drawn against her will to a rendezvous in the underworld.
On the banks of the River of Forgetfulness, a divine beast arrives amid glittering radiance, and countless souls kneel to call it “Lord of the Prefecture.” In a strange shoe shop, an old woman stamps her cane and breaks the seal, warning her sternly that this is no place for the living. Corpses pave the road, while a black dog pulls the sedan chair and fights to hold off their pursuers, telling her to hide and not look...
Three terrifying dreams, each more real and more dangerous than the last. She had thought they were just a strange nightmare that came once a year, something she could forget as soon as she woke.
But this year, the dream seems unwilling to remain confined to the night.
Wet, cold footprints appear for no reason in the corners of her home. A fleeting image of a bridal gown flashes in the mirror. In the dead of night, a low murmur, almost human but not quite, comes from outside her window... Fragments of those bizarre dreams are seeping into her reality, bringing a bone-chilling cold with them.
The Ghost Festival has passed, yet omens of nightmares keep appearing. Are they coincidences and delusions, or are the dreams continuing? Is the divine beast called “Lord of the Prefecture,” the old woman who sells shoes, and the black dog that fought to protect her good or evil? And what secret and karmic burden does her soul carry, to be dragged into the underworld again and again?
As her unreal fears begin to touch reality, she must find the truth amid the crumbling boundary between the two worlds. Otherwise, she may never wake up after the next Ghost Festival.
