A disgraced outcast samurai living in early seventeenth-century Manila, Kitazume is contemplating ritual suicide when a divine force intervenes: Luis, a rogue Jesuit priest and Kitazume's longtime friend. At Luis's insistence, the samurai agrees to help smuggle a Manchu princess to Mexico. But little does he know that he's really been dragged into an epic struggle for power, as several forces have their malicious sights set on the New World's rich silver mines.