A wave of armed banditry swept across the south of Russia in its most severe, boundless manifestation - kidnapping for ransom is perhaps the most common thing, robberies, assaults, bloody reprisals against those who disobeyed against the backdrop of corrupt officials drinking and fattening in front of ordinary people of people. How to survive where the law of the wolf pack applies? The hero of the novel, Yuri Terpukhin, does not kneel before circumstances, even if his life is at stake - either join a gang, rob and kill, or die. Chosen by the Ataman, he turns to the origins, to the roots of his people. A Russian Cossack is a warrior and a hard worker, not a highway bandit.