In the 21st year of the Jiajing reign of the Ming Dynasty, a sudden change occurred in the Forbidden City late at night. A group of palace ladies sneaked into the emperor's palace and tried to kill the emperor with a rope. The assassination failed, and all those involved were about to be executed.
Shen Zhiwei, a female official in the palace, discovered that her sister, who had been missing for many days, appeared on the assassin's list. In order to find out the truth, she secretly cooperated with Lu Tingzhou, the Jin Yiwei who was ordered to hear the case. Sixteen perfectly fitting confessions, a wrongly tied knot, a medicine book that disappeared out of thin air, and palace records that differed by half a quarter of an hour, made them realize that all the evidence was true, but they had been spelled out to be a false truth.
When the old case, the elixir, the harem and the court gradually became connected, they discovered that there was never only one murderer or one purpose in this assassination. Some people want to kill the emperor, some want to use a knife to cleanse the palace, and some are willing to sacrifice all those who know the truth, just to keep the real secret out of the history books forever.
Concept: What the palace wall separates is identity, but what connects is people's hearts. This book uses history as a mirror to explore the game between tactics, emotions and beliefs, and shows the perseverance and choices of ordinary people under the torrent of the times.