Set in modern Italy, Gunslinger Girl follows a group of traumatically-injured young girls taken from hospitals all over the country, who are then cybernetically enhanced, indoctrinated and trained to be assassins by a secret branch of the Public Corporation for Social Welfare, Section 2. Each girl is assigned to a male handler who oversees her training, deployments, and general conduct. Each handler is free to "condition" his cybernetic assassin to the extent he sees fit, which increases a girl's lethality and loyalty at the expense of human individuality and lifespan.