Blanche (French: white, here: "ingénue"), a shy, inconspicuous and retiring girl, gets to know Christa at the University of Brussels and they become friends.

It turns out that Christa is the exact counterpart of Blanche: she is talented, brilliant and above all extremely popular.

But it does not take Blanche long to figure out that Christa plays false and loose with her and slowly becomes her "headsman", the Antichrist.

The references and parallels to Christian confession have lost their religious meaning in this novel and are associated with a negative connotation: Christa recklessly exploits the Parable of the Prodigal Son to distinguish herself.

Christa's satanic manipulations within the microcosm of the Hast family reaches an apocalyptic scale.