The Rules of the Old House

The story takes place in Huaiyin Town, an old town in Jiangnan, where a century-old mansion known as the Chen Family Estate stands. Before the founding of the People’s Republic, the Chen family was one of the town’s most prominent families. They all moved away in the 1980s, and the mansion has stood empty ever since, earning a reputation as a haunted house among local children. The protagonist, Chen Mo, is the fourth generation of the Chen family. After graduating from college, he struggles to make a living in the city, until a letter from a lawyer suddenly informs him that he has inherited the ancestral home. He returns to the mansion he hasn’t seen in twenty years, expecting to sell it and turn his fortunes around. Instead, he discovers he’s trapped in a space governed by some bizarre set of rules.