Part Seven in Jerry Cotton Series. The FBI agent tackles an organisation of assassins who kill to order.

A candidate in a game show is hunted by three men. He will get a Million DMark, if he survives for a week; the hunters will get the money, if they can kill the candidate. The audience of the show is watching the transmissions of twenty camera teams filming the hunt. The showmaster appeals to the TV-viewers to help either the candidate or the hunters, whomever they want.

Krabat, a beggar boy, is lured to become an apprentice to an evil, one-eyed sorcerer. With a number of other boys, he works at the sorcerer's mill while learning black magic. Every Christmas one of the boys has to face the master in a magical duel, where the boy never stands a chance because the master is the only person who is allowed to use a secret spell: The Koraktor.