Dan is dismissed from the militia, without warning or reason. At the same time he is given a message to take home: a village has been burned, and the woods are no longer safe. Yet as he and his friends fear for their home, others watch with interest. Ruins have been discovered, people are disappearing, and a man claims to be the reincarnation of the great hero Kato. People wait to see if he will be captured, killed - or become famous. But as Dan flees the danger, he starts to learn why Kato's legacy is so dividing, why it is linked to the fall of an entire race - and why, now of all times, he is having dreams of a life he had never lived...