The Ascetic's Paradox

In the aftermath of Wu Qi’s assassination and King Su’s bloody purge of the Chu nobility, the state is paralysed by fear. A former retainer of Wu Qi is arrested for the murder of a high-ranking aristocrat, the evidence seemingly irrefutable. Desperate, a young defender takes the case and uncovers a far more sinister truth: the real killer is a revered ascetic whose life of clockwork self-denial conceals a monstrous obsession. When the trial reaches its climax, a single, devastating logical flaw in the saint’s immaculate routine is exposed—proving that the most extreme self-discipline can be the prelude to the most deranged form of murder, and that a perfectly ordered life can mask a perfectly chaotic soul.