A blood-soaked dossier deliberately erased from history. A deadly hunt for the truth spanning forty years.
Li Wu, a veteran, returns to his hometown carrying the mystery of his father's strange death and a rusted five-pointed star cap badge from the People's Liberation Army. The village lies forgotten in the folds of the mountains. What awaits him is no warm homecoming, but a world-shaking secret soaked in blood: a ghost woman in a red gown weeps blood night after night; Nanyang sorcery is used to forge "undying ghost soldiers"; a defeated army's bandit leader conspires with hidden powers, weaving a vast, dark "web" over the mountain town.
The clues are hidden in the red cord his grandmother twisted from her own bloodied hair, in the suicide note widow Tian exchanged her life to leave behind, deep in the sealed classified files of the archives, and beneath the cold, sinister lock engraved with the character "Shu" at the bottom of the Fallen Soul River. From abandoned kilns in deserted villages to ghost markets in ancient towers, from ghost soldiers crossing the road to eerie cocoon chambers, Li Wu discovers in his pursuit that his father's generation made no ordinary sacrifice, and that he has already stepped into a vast trap laid with care over forty years.
"The key is in Luo, the lock is in the Soul River." A madman's muttering is his only guide. As blood-soaked history intertwines with present-day peril, and the lone hunter becomes prey marked for death by the "web," Li Wu can only grip the bloodstained iron shears in his hand. Through the maze of ghosts and human hearts, he must cut through the fog and find the "key" that will bring every chain of cause and effect to an end.
The dark side of history, the trail of sinister sorcery, and the demonic depths of the human heart. This is a blood-soaked reckoning spanning two generations, and a deadly journey toward the ultimate truth.
