Evidence of Embers

On a rainy summer night, a raging fire broke out in the small building at No. 17 Wutong Lane in the suburbs of Nancheng City. The flames broke through the dark night and opened the prelude to a complicated and confusing murder case.​ At 3:17 in the morning, veteran detective Chen Yan, who had been working overtime for forty hours, was awakened by an emergency call and rushed to the scene with police officer Su Rui, a newly graduated police officer. After the fire was extinguished, a carbonized corpse was found curled up on the bed in the bedroom on the second floor. The bedroom door was locked from the inside and the windows were sealed with rusty nails - this was actually a seemingly unsolvable secret room.​ The owner of the house and construction contractor Lin Zhiqiang has been missing for half a month, and the identity of the deceased is a mystery. No clear accelerant was found at the scene, but the fire point was accurately located around the body. What clues are hidden in the burned photo frame on the bedside table and the black liquid remaining at the bottom of the cup? The preliminary forensic identification pointed to homicide, but how did the murderer escape unharmed after committing the crime in a secret room?​ Under the charred ashes, is it the illusion of an accidental fire, or is it a deliberate conspiracy to silence people? Chen Yan took the fledgling Su Rui through the ruins filled with the smell of burning. A game with the murderer in the dark officially kicked off on this rainy night. Every doubt is the key to the truth, every step of exploration may lead to a deeper fog, and the evidence among the embers will eventually reveal the cruel facts hidden behind the flames.