* Ancient-era crime investigation / Seven Circles of Hell / Multiple POVs
* Cool, elegant, poker-faced constable x seemingly kindhearted coroner with a hidden side
Ten years ago, forensic prodigy Shen Buhui was framed, then her entire family was slaughtered. Not a single one of the hundred or so members of her household survived.
Ten years later, a brilliant detective known as the Ghost Hand emerged at the Shengjing yamen. Her name was Zhao Rendong, and she cracked one bizarre case after another. Wherever she went, no innocent soul went unheard.
But lately, one case had her stumped.
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The Empress Dowager hosted a banquet for Taoist priests, hoping to find a way to attain immortality. But just a few hours later, she was found dead in her bedchamber.
An initial examination by the Court of Judicial Review determined that the Empress Dowager had died from overeating.
The Emperor flew into a rage and ordered the execution of all the Taoist priests.
One of them took the Emperor hostage, insisting that someone else was the real culprit and specifically demanding that Zhao Rendong investigate.
Forced to take the case, Zhao Rendong witnessed the Empress Dowager's corpse spontaneously combust and burn to ashes that very night.
Rumors spread that a fox spirit was at work, killing people to make corpses for its necromancy.
Zhao Rendong refused to believe in superstition.
But the strange cases she encountered afterward made her wonder if ghosts might truly exist.
Otherwise, why did she see Shen Buhui's shadow in the culprit?
[Bonus Scene]
After Zhao Rendong was thrown into prison, everyone at the yamen was devastated. Only Constable Yun Tian remained as cool and detached as ever.
But at midnight, the supposedly cool and detached Yun Tian broke into the prison, her face just as impassive as always.
She slipped inside, spotted Zhao Rendong, and pulled out a roast chicken she'd been warming against her chest. "Eat it while it's hot."
Zhao Rendong took it with tears in her eyes. "Constable Yun, you're so good to me."
Yun Tian: "Better than Ning Poxiao?"
Zhao Rendong: "...This again?"
Yun Tian: "Give me back the chicken. I'm leaving."
Zhao Rendong: "Do you even have to ask? You're the best, of course!"
Meanwhile, far away at the border, General Ning Poxiao sneezed, rubbed his nose, and beamed. "Dongdong must be thinking of me again."
[Reader's Note]
1) This is an ensemble story with a slow-burn romance. The main plot follows the two female leads solving cases together.
Theme: No one is perfect
