The manga opens on a moment of quiet violence — a caravan strung out beneath a bruised sky, a child pressed against a mother’s back, and a stranger whose smile carries the weight of a blade. From there the panels tighten like a noose: faces half-lit by torchlight, a city’s silhouette that feels both vast and suffocating, and an undercurrent of deals struck with more than coin. The art works like a second narrator, using cramped compositions and long, aching close-ups to make each betrayal feel intimate and inevitable.