Follow the money. In a time of economic disaster for wage earners, Hanzo discovers a conspiracy among high officials to 'borrow' gold from the shogunate's treasury and loan it out to the destitute, including impecunious samurai - exacting either interest payments or family heirlooms from the debtors. Along the way, Hanzo extracts a confession from a ghost using his assaulting methods, foils thieves, connects with Heisuke Takei a friend from his youth, offers protection to a forward-thinking physician Genan Sugino who has defamed his ruler, discovers a pleasure ring of young wives and a blind music teacher, and cuckolds a corrupt official under his very nose.