Synopsis

After the Masked Demons—a ruthless imperialist gang—devastate the Shinsengumi's Eighth Division in Kyoto, only one member survives: Heisuke Toudou, and he's badly wounded. The division's basically gone. Pressed by the local daimyo Katamori Matsudaira to rebuild, Toudou comes up with an unconventional plan: recruit eight convicts, strip them of their old identities, and have them take the place of the eight fallen captains. Seven agree to it. The eighth refuses and gets executed on the spot by the swordmaster Sakuya. Training hardened criminals to be disciplined soldiers isn't easy though. Toudou struggles to whip them into shape, especially Ichibanboshi—an impulsive, revenge-driven guy whose family was killed by the Masked Demons. His recklessness keeps threatening to derail everything. Meanwhile, as Toudou commits the Shinsengumi to defending the shogunate against imperialists and foreign powers, rival factions like Kogorou Katsura's group start making their own moves. The Edo period is ending, and everyone's got plans to seize power before it does.

Content compiled by AnimeList.moe from publicly available sources.

Genres