The Ming Dynasty Dream-Eater Chronicles

In the tenth year of the Wanli reign, demons and monsters roam behind the lantern-lit streets of Jinling. Tong Yan, a junior official at the Imperial Observatory, finds a strange black cat gravely wounded on a rainy night. With jade-black fur and mismatched eyes, it feeds on nightmares and sees through the demons lurking in people’s hearts. A painted-skin ghost combs her hair night after night, while a seamstress’s fingers are utterly ruined. Hongwu-era coins reappear, and everyone who obtains one dreams of becoming a craftsman who drowns. Silent puppets stage a play of despair across a misty wasteland, leaving their audience terrified out of their wits... Each bizarre murder points to the depths of a dream. Tong Yan and Su Yunshang, a female constable who does not believe in ghosts or gods, are forced to work together. Following the clues left behind by Mo Yu as it devours dreams, they step ever deeper into the all-encompassing killing scheme laid by an ancient organization called the Nightmare Pavilion. An incense shop conceals evil spirits, a high monk’s drunken words hide a secret, and the rouge shop owner is neither wholly good nor wholly evil. Meanwhile, the Imperial Preceptor in the palace seems to be weaving a net of nightmares that will consume all of Great Ming. When swords in the real world cannot cut through illusory nightmares, they can only rely on each other to find a ray of dawn amid countless strange dangers.