The plague drives Dagmara to her reclusive, disgraced-lawyer uncle, Nicolas Zul, in Ostrodek. She gives birth to Jan, who Nicolas adopts when she flees. Meanwhile, King Wenceslaus angers the established nobility by granting minor lordships to loyal commoners, leading to the formation of the rebellious Lords’ Union.

Nicolas Zul, a local bailiff, witnesses the brewing rebellion and forms a sabotage and intelligence network to support the king. When the Lords’ Union captures King Wenceslaus, Nicolas Zul becomes a partisan leader, fighting their plundering armies. The King is freed, and the “Home War” ends.

Years later, Nicolas Zul pretending he is back to his bailiff work, while his adopted son, Jan Zoul, enters politics and recognizes the numerous threats surrounding the Bohemian monarchy. Jan Zoul is imprisoned on false charges but escapes and rallies partisan forces across Bohemia and Moravia.

With the Lords’ Union again capturing King Wenceslaus, another civil war erupts. Coordinated partisan actions quickly secure victory for the king. Jan Zoul and his commanders become guardians of Bohemia.

However, Wenceslaus is captured again. Margrave Prokop attempts a diplomatic solution, but also resorts to hiring partisans to raid the lands of Lord Rosenberg and disrupt supply lines. Rosenberg, driven by revenge and a desire to reclaim his occupied lands, seeks Jan Zoul’s destruction.

A final civil war breaks out, with Rosenberg aiming not for outright victory, but to economically cripple Bohemia and then politically blackmail King Wenceslaus. Though the Zuls win the war, Bohemia’s economy is devastated. Under threat of exposure of a fabricated debt to Poland by Rosenberg, King Wenceslaus betrays the Zuls: returning Rosenberg’s lands, and ordering the death and exile of his loyal partisan leaders.