Villain Siblings, But Solving Cases in Hong Kong

In Hong Kong, 1995, Chief Inspector Li Heng of the West Kowloon Regional Crime Unit investigates the discovery of skeletal remains concealed beneath a stove in a Sham Shui Po tenement. The victim, an adult male, died six to seven years prior from blunt force trauma. Li Heng, a young but highly competent officer with a rootless past and recurring dreams of a golden, warm childhood, leads the investigation with her team, including the diligent but slow Lin Jiacong and the well-connected Old You. The case initially points to a missing nineteen-year-old student named Liang Wei, whose family reported him missing around the same time. However, Li Heng discovers a critical discrepancy: Liang Wei’s medical records show a scar on his left brow bone, while the remains have a scar on the right, proving the victim is not Liang Wei.

The investigation shifts focus to Liang Wei’s girlfriend, Chi Huimin, known as Amin, a former star at the Jinxiao Nightclub. Through interviews with nightclub staff and Liang Wei’s night school classmates, Li Heng uncovers a complex social web. Amin presented two faces: a flashy, aloof nightclub performer and a gentle, innocent girl who was deeply devoted to Liang Wei. She had dropped out of the sex work industry to start a normal life with him, but both she and Liang Wei vanished shortly after. The victim is eventually identified as Zhang Pingxuan, a twenty-two-year-old man with mild intellectual disabilities, who disappeared under similar circumstances. His grandmother reveals that Zhang Pingxuan was easily manipulated by bad friends and was obsessed with finding his wealthy biological father, who had abandoned them.

Complicating matters is the involvement of Shen Zhicheng, the arrogant and reckless heir to the Shen family, whose ancestors own the land where the tenement stands. The Shen Group is preparing for a major demolition project, and the discovery of a corpse threatens to delay the signing. Shen Zhicheng insists on monitoring the case, leveraging his family’s influence and donations to the police force. Despite Li Heng’s initial hostility and professional boundaries, Shen Zhicheng accompanies her on key investigative steps, including a trip to the nightclub and an airport intercept of Amin’s former roommate, Maggie. Shen Zhicheng’s presence is partly due to his own traumatic past; he was blamed for the deaths of his parents and twin sister in a car accident when he was a child, a guilt that haunts him and connects him to the theme of lost siblings in the case.

As Li Heng digs deeper, she learns that Amin had a twin sister, Zhang Huijing, who suffered from congenital bone deformities and was favored by their abusive mother. The timeline reveals that Amin resigned from the nightclub and Liang Wei disappeared around the same time Zhang Pingxuan vanished, all coinciding with Typhoon Signal No. 8 six years ago. The evidence suggests that Zhang Pingxuan was lured by his manipulative peers, possibly using his desire to find his father as a hook. Li Heng suspects that Amin and Liang Wei are still alive but in hiding, and that their disappearance is linked to the events surrounding Zhang Pingxuan’s death. The case evolves from a simple identification mystery into a intricate web of deception, family secrets, and hidden identities, with Li Heng determined to uncover the truth regardless of the pressure from the Shen family or the passage of time.