Ichi takes a clandestine message from a fugitive wanted for murder to the man's sister in a nearby village. In the advent of the New Year's festival, merchants arriving in town are being forced to pay an unfair tax by a yakuza gang in league with a local official. Zatoichi shares a room at the inn with a young woman searching for her vanished father, who disappeared after appealing to the authorities about the oppressed farmers. How will these plot strands resolve? Watch and find out.