Etsuji Azuma

The government in Edo era is suffering from a financial crisis. It hires "Kage" to provoke the collapse of small hans (prefectures). "Kagekari" are people who were hired by Daimyos (mayors of local governments) to resist kage. The young mayor of Suwa Takashiwa, Tadamaru was assaulted by a kage on his way to Edo. Zyubei and Gennnosuke, the Kagekaris, try to carry injured Tadamaru to Edo.

This is a story of "Takechiyo," the previous name of Iemitsu Tokunaga, the third Shogun (General). Takechiyo got sick of daily run-of-the-mill tasks, and it put him off being the Shogun, saying "there is no truth". Then, Hikozaemon Ookubo took him to Tasuke Isshin to bring him up into a full-fledged and admirable man.

On a snowy winter night, Soetsu, a blind masseur, and his daughter Shiga visit the nobleman Shinzaemon Fukami. Drunk, he assaults Shiga, and when Soetsu tries to protect her, he’s brutally killed. Later, Soetsu's body is thrown into a swamp, but his spirit returns to haunt Shinzaemon, driving him inevitably toward death.

Fleeing the Ōnin War, Tomone and her daughter Shiori are saved by Ukyō Fujiki. While taking shelter in a house, they are attacked by a greedy servant, Shichibee, but Shiori defends her mother, injuring him. A year later, Tomone and Ukyō reunite and fall in love, but Shichibee, now a bandit leader, returns and brutally murders Tomone and Shiori in Ukyō’s absence.

A re-edit of the 1968 Agon miniseries created by screenwriter Shinichi Sekizawa, who wrote the majority of the original Showa Godzilla films. It was released by Toho Video in the 1980's and on DVD in 2005.