A wave of armed banditry swept through the south of Russia in its most severe, boundless manifestation - kidnapping for ransom, perhaps the most commonplace thing, robberies, robbery attacks, bloody reprisals against those who disobeyed, against the backdrop of corrupt officials drinking and fattening in front of ordinary 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. Russian Cossack - warrior and worker , not a highway bandit.