A ryokan maid is on trial for pushing a familiar guest off a cliff to his death. An eager attorney offers to take the case to gain notoriety.

A community is in turmoil when junior high schoolers barricade themselves in an empty factory to protest the draconian rules of parents and teachers. They're sick of heavy-handed teachers and iron-fisted parents. And now they're going to do something about it.

Biographical story, based on life of Ino Tadataka, a Japanese measurer and cartographer. Ino Tadataka travelled the length and breadth of Japan on foot for 17 years from the age of 55 to perform his surveys. The accuracy of his maps also owed much to the fact that he was the first surveyor in Japan to combine measurements on the ground with observations of the heavens. Ino started the work as a private individual but earned the confidence of the Shogunate and it eventually turned into a national project. His maps were later used for many years as the foundation for maps made by modern survey techniques.

Kamikawa Katsuji, a bank employee, is married to Yasuko, the daughter of a rich family and lives an ordinary married life. But he keeps a lover, Kamiya Ayako, a nightclub hostess, behind his wife’s back and is mired in a web of lust. His life takes mysterious turns after becoming Katsumura Hisako’s disciple. The beautiful and elegant Hisako, a calligraphy instructor, possesses the special ability to tell the fortune of people by looking at their calligraphic styles.

Ippei Akabane (Takaya Kamikawa) is an unpopular novelist. He barely makes ends meet writing serials novels under different pen names. Daigo Kurei (Shinji Takeda) is on death row. He killed four women twelve years ago. During his murdering spree, he sent pictures of his decapitated victims with flower decoration to the police. The murders and photos caused widespread panic in Japan. One day, Ippei is contacted by Daigo from prison. He asks Ippei if he wants to interview him and write his memoirs. Soon, more women are killed in the same grisly manner as the serial murders from twelve years ago. Now, Ippei becomes the prime suspect of the police and Ippei must quickly find the real murderer. Based on the novel "The Serialist" by David Gordon (published by Simon & Schuster; Original edition on March 9, 2010).

Sawatari Shusui saved Princess Hiroko of the Konoe family, who was about to be married to Tokugawa Tsunatoyo. However, Hiroko, a tomboy, disappears. As someone is after Hiroko's life, Shusui pursues her whereabouts... Meanwhile, Sasao Yoshinari and Shusui's sister, Kikuji, who were following Shusui, meet a young man and Kikuji is captivated by him, but they do not realize that he is Hiroko in disguise as a young man. Shusui is set to search for Hiroko with her attendant Orui, but that night they are attacked by a group of ninjas at their inn.

Sawatari Shusui was told about 7,000 ryo of buried gold by Osuke, who claimed to be a princess of the Fujiwara family. Shusui speculates that powerful people in the Date family and the shogunate are planning to overthrow the shogunate using buried gold and gets excited about a major national crisis. He gets separated from Osuke due to interference but with the help of his sister Kikuji and others he tracks down Osuke's whereabouts. He then realizes that Osuke is not from the Fujiwara family but is actually the daughter of Edo elder Itakura Shōken who has been confined under the pretext of an epidemic disease. Having promised to help Osuke, Shusui goes up to Edo Castle and advises shogun Tsunayoshi not to visit Nikkō Tōshō-gū Shrine which has been restored by Date family because "evil spirits are attached". However, Tsunayoshi is furious and orders him to stay under house arrest.

Adapted from Shusaku Endō's novel.

Based on the "2.26 Incident", an attempted coup d'état in Japan 1936, launched by radical ultra-nationalist parts of the military. Several leading politicians were killed and the center of Tokyo was briefly held by the insurgents before the coup was suppressed.