Meiji Gekken: 1874

Shizuma Orikasa once lived by the sword, but the world he knew has moved on, leaving him with skills that no longer fit neatly into daily life. In Tokyo he survives as a rickshaw driver, trying to look ordinary while carrying the restlessness of a former warrior who cannot stop searching. His search is personal and relentless: he is trying to find his fiancee, Sumie Kanomata, who vanished during the Boshin War, and every rumor feels like another thin thread that might snap or lead somewhere real. Tokyo is loud, modernizing, and full of people who pretend the past is finished, yet the city is also packed with men who still fight for old loyalties, new money, and political ambitions that turn streets into battlegrounds. Shizuma keeps being pulled into conflicts he did not ask for, because the skills that make him dangerous also make him useful to people who want violence done quietly. His investigation crosses paths with unrest, factions, and power plays that reach far beyond one missing person, and the closer he gets to the truth, the more he risks becoming the kind of man he hoped he could leave behind. What begins as a search turns into a struggle to survive in a city where the rules are changing faster than honor can adapt, and where Shizuma’s blade is both a memory of the past and a weapon the present still wants to claim.