The novel begins in 1815, when Dantès is a happy young man, about to become captain of Morrel's ship The Pharaon and is engaged to his fiancée, Mercedes . However, Dantès is unaware that his shipmate, Danglars, is jealous of his success and promotion as captain, and that Mercedes' cousin, Fernand, is jealous of Mercedes' love for Dantès. Danglars and Fernand hatch a plan to make Dantès appear as one of Napoleon's agents, a particularly damning accusation as the king is at this point fighting to retain power in the face of Napoleon's numerous and loyal supporters. Danglars and Fernand send a letter denouncing Dantès as a revolutionary agent to the local magistrate of Marseille, M. de Villefort, a convinced royalist, who learns with horror that Dantès was going, without knowing it, to deliver a letter preparing the return of Napoleon (known as Le 100 days) to his father, a revolutionary. In order to save his father from discovery and gain the king's good graces, Villefort throws Dantès into prison even though he believes him to be innocent, and obtains a good position as magistrate with the king in gratitude for the warning of the impending of Napoleon. arrival.Dantès is thrown into a political prison and forgotten for 14 years, during which time he contemplates suicide, unaware that his father died of starvation during his incarceration, that his employer was unable to find out where he was being held nor having he freed him, and that Mercedes married Fernand. During his last years in prison, he and his prisoner neighbor, Father Faria, plot to escape from prison. As they plan their escape and dig tunnels, Father Faria tells him everything he knows (which represents a substantial sum), makes him understand that Danglars, Fernand and Villefort are responsible for his imprisonment and offers to give Dantès half of an immense fortune that the abbot knows hidden on the island of Monte Cristo. Shortly before their planned escape, Abbot Faria dies and Dantès replaces the abbot's corpse with his own body, thus escaping the prison when the "abbot's body" is thrown into the ocean. After escaping from prison, Dantes spends some time as a smuggler on a boat in the Mediterranean to decide what to do, and during a smuggling trip he has the opportunity to travel to the island of Monte Cristo, where he discovers the incredible treasure.