The Imperial Flower Division isn't a combat unit that performs, it's a theater troupe that fights demons, and that collision is the whole point. Sakura walks in thinking she understands duty because her father did it, then immediately learns she's surrounded by six women with their own reasons for being here, their own scars, their own idea of what strength means. You watch her become part of something she didn't know she needed, one failed rehearsal and one desperate fight at a time, and by episode twelve you realize the show was never going to rush that.

In 1920s Japan, demonic invaders threaten the nation, and young Sakura leaves the countryside for the Imperial Capital to defend it against the Black Sanctum Council, as her father once did. She joins the Imperial Flower Division, a secret force whose members pilot steam-powered armored robots called Kobu, which only young women with the right mix of virtue and spirit can operate. What she did not expect is the division's cover: an art theater whose troupe takes its stage work very seriously. Sakura has the spiritual strength to be a fine pilot, but she embarrasses herself and spoils a production, which puts her at odds with the rest of the troupe. Between costumes, line readings and robot battles, she has to find a way to work alongside the others while stopping the enemy from destroying the shrines that guard the city. The series mixes mecha action, supernatural danger and backstage drama.