In 1904, the novel opens in Yokohama, Japan. It is 1904, and it is the year of the Republic of Japan. The novel opens with the protagonist, Hiroyuki Mochizuki, in Yokohama. He is in the middle of a conversation with Hiroyuki's father, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, about the construction of a new government building, the "rokumeikan" . The protagonist laments the fact that he has not been treated like a human being, and he laments that he is not the only person in Yokohama who has been born with a certain physical defect. He also laments his inability to communicate with his father, who does not understand the protagonist's predicament. He tells his father that he will not be able to speak to him because he is bleeding profusely from the wound he received in the scuffle.