In a world where three types of swindlers exist, the white swindler, or shirosagi, cheats innocent people out of their money, and the red swindler, or akasagi, preys on their emotions. The third is the black swindler, the kurosagi, whose sole purpose is to target and out-swindle the other two. The story centers on Kōshirō Kurosaki, a young man driven by a devastating past. When he was a child, his father was conned out of their family’s entire savings by a white swindler. Plunged into despair, his father murdered Kurosaki’s mother and sister before taking his own life, leaving Kurosaki as the sole survivor. Consumed by a need for revenge, he grows up to become a kurosagi, operating under the alias Kurosagi.

The series follows Kurosagi as he meticulously plots to swindle corrupt con artists, recovering the money they have stolen and returning it to the original victims. He is not a hero in the traditional sense, as his methods are illegal and morally ambiguous, but his targets are always other criminals. Kurosagi operates from a base of operations that also functions as a legitimate apartment building, where he poses as a landlord. He is supported by a mysterious and powerful information broker named Toshio Katsuragi, who provides him with detailed intelligence on swindlers for a cut of the profits. This relationship is fraught with tension, as Katsuragi was deeply connected to the con man responsible for the destruction of Kurosaki’s family.

The narrative tension deepens with the introduction of Tsurara Yoshikawa, a stubborn and idealistic law student who dreams of becoming a public prosecutor. She becomes a tenant in Kurosaki’s building and, upon discovering his secret life, is conflicted. While she recognizes the pain that drives him and has seen the justice system fail to protect victims like her own father, she vehemently disapproves of his vigilantism and his disrespect for the law. A persistent cat-and-mouse game unfolds between Kurosagi and Masaru Kashina, an obsessive detective from the East Tokyo Department’s intellectual crimes unit who is determined to expose and capture the black swindler.

Throughout the series, Kurosagi takes on a variety of swindlers, from small-time fraudsters to executives at major corporations, each episode featuring an elaborate scheme where he adopts different personas to trap his marks. The 2022 version of the series updates the setting to a contemporary world, reflecting modern scams and technology. While the episodic cons provide much of the action, the overarching story arc focuses on Kurosagi’s internal struggle between his quest for revenge and his growing connection to Tsurara, who represents a possible future outside the world of crime. At the same time, he must navigate his dangerous partnership with Katsuragi, ever mindful that the man who is now his ally once helped the swindler who ruined his life.