Here is the first historically accurate graphic-novel version of a legendary event in Japanese history. In the eighteenth century, forty-seven samurai avenged the death of their master in a plot involving over two years of secrecy. After succeeding in their mission, the masterless samurai all committed ritual suicide. The story, which is a national legend, remains a most potent example of Japan’s deeply rooted cultural imperatives of honor, persistence, loyalty, and sacrifice, and of bushido—the samurai code.