Hanzo is an incorruptible and unorthodox officer in Edo, as famous for his self-discipline and his love shaft as his sword. Against the backdrop of his magistrate's occasional rounding up of vagrants, Hanzo learns that an infamous killer is no longer on his island prison: did he escape or was he never there? Hanzo's investigation leads him to the magistrate's mistress, the killer's former lover. Hanzo pursues political questions that suggest complicity at the highest levels. Using sexual assault, he interrogates the mistress and later the favorite of Edo's most powerful woman. Can he get to the bottom of what's going on before powerful forces get him fired or killed?