Detective Dee Flower of Underworld

In the first year of the Tianshou era under Empress Wu Zetian, a string of bizarre deaths shakes Luzhou in Lingnan. The local Sima, Kong Chengye, is obsessed with Daoist cultivation and alchemy. Rumor has it he has discovered a formula for an elixir of immortality-missing only one final ingredient: a rare herb known as the Bian'an Flower. People whisper that this plant is a "death flower from hell," growing year-round in graveyards and shadowed ravines. It is said to induce powerful hallucinations: those who inhale its scent appear as if possessed, spiraling into madness and dying in gruesome agony. Kong posts a lavish reward-one hundred tales of gold-for anyone who can bring him the flower. Hunters and villagers rush into the mountains to search, while Kong himself leads men to dig through tombs and scour remote valleys. Then the obsession turns deadly. Kong suddenly dies in a frenzied state, and several of his military aides soon follow, each meeting a horrific end. Panic spreads through the city: people insist Kong must have obtained the flower and been slain by an evil spirit that "possessed" him. With Luzhou in turmoil, the prefect Lu Yingjie reports the case to the imperial court. At the same time, Detective Di Renjie is inspecting the southern prefectures. Empress Wu orders Di to go to Luzhou and take full authority over the investigation-determined to uncover whether a supernatural curse is truly at work, or whether a human plot is hiding behind fear and superstition.