The story begins in the twenty third year of the Dragon Emperor Suk Lam reign
That night, Fon Chu, the capital city of Varlann empire, the rain kept showering for hours, rain drops hitting the cobble stones of the streets, splattered sound like the sound of rice panning. Cool winds blowing through the quiet city blocks, the streets sank in the thick darkness of the night, there was nothing but the sound of rain falls. Sometime, echoing through the empty streets is the footstep of the city guards on night patrol and their lantern light. The time is late, and everyone in the city had snugged in their warm blanket and their night dreams.
On one of the empty street of the city, after a night patrol party of the city guard has past, from the shadow of a small alley, a mysterious person emerges. That mysterious person pacing down the street under the showering raindrops, on the person is a raincoat made of palm leaf, but that raincoat is clearly too small for the towering statue of the person, making the lower haft of the person soak in rainwater. The person face is obscured behind a veil that attached to the conical rattan brimmed hat on that person head. Beneath that raincoat is a muddy long black cloak, covered the person from head to toes, only the toe cap of the leather boots is visible every time the person took a step. That mysterious person still pacing silently down the street, and nestles time to time in dark corners of the street, to avoid the eyes of the night patrols. After a while, that mysterious person stops in front of the gate of a large mansion, encircled with tiled roof fences, and a pair of stone dog statue guarding the gate. The mysterious person stood there in silent, staring at the panel hung above the gate to make sure that this is the right place.
Moment later, the mysterious person pulled out a small dagger from the cloak and step closer to the gate of the mansion, and proceed to carve a symbol and beneath that symbol is the numeral "5" written in Downers script on the door. When the mysterious person is finishing off the final carves, from behind a night patrol party approaching. Seeing the mysterious person snooping around the mansion gate, a night patrol utters a warning, but the mysterious person pays no heed to his warning, the night patrol approach and grasp the mysterious person wrist. When the night patrol is about to arrest the mysterious person, with a fanning motion of the hand, the mysterious person sent the night patrol rolling on the ground. Witness the mysterious person resisting arrest, the night patrol party, blow their horn to alert other parties and quickly surround the mysterious person. The mysterious person finished the carving and turn around, stares at the night patrols for a few seconds. And with a leap, the mysterious person jumps over the night patrols head, and run off into the night with an unbelievable speed.
Hearing the ruckus in the middle of the night, the servants of that mansion came out to see what happened and quickly alert the owner of the mansion. But when the owner of the mansion set eyes upon the symbol and the number "5" on the gate, his face turn pale and say nothing, just staring at the symbol with eyes filled with anxious and worry. When the servants call him, the owner jolted from his thoughts, and simply told the servants to replace the door immediately, then go back to the mansion.
After the door had been replaced, morning of the day after tomorrow, the servants of the mansion woke up and found that symbol had been drawn on the inner side of the newly replace door, this time with the number "4" drawn beneath it. This mean someone had climbed over the tall roof fences and drawn the symbols in the night. The owner of the mansion become more anxious and worry, he order his servants quickly erase the symbol, then left the mansion without saying where's he going, and only return when the sky is dark.
Then the next night, the servants of the mansion found a towering intruder, likely 2 lias high, wearing a conical rattan brimmed hat with face covering veil, snooping around the guest house in the mansion. When they sound the alert, the intruder jump on to the rooftop with just one leap and disappeared in the night, leaved behind that strange symbol and the number "3" drawn on the guest house doorstep.
Those strange incidents quickly caught the ears of the public, and rumours flare up like amber drop in dry haystack. Some said maybe the owner of the mansion had caused some grudges with some gang and now they're threatening him. And other said, maybe the owner had get involve himself into some weird cult. Rumours quickly spread from mouth to mouth, ears to ears, morphing into countless forms and finally echoing to the palace and came to Emperor Lam's ears, caught his attention. If these rumours was talk about some random rich person in the capital, it wouldn't make Emperor Lam took interested in it, but the protagonist of these rumours is Prince Suk Nin, the step brother of Emperor Lam. So at morning of the third day, Emperor Lam had come to Prince Suk Nin's mansion to pay a visit, and to find out what is happening.