In 1868, after the fall of the Shogun-dominated Japan, the new government orders people from Awaji, near Kobe, to re-locate to the northern part of Hokkaido. These people once supported the now displaced Samurais of the older days. After two years, over 500 of them settled in their new land under the leadership of Hideaki, husband of Shino. However, as crops fail he is to go to Sapporo to learn new techniques of farming, leaving his wife and daughter for 5 years. All this time, the new community is constantly watched by the government which choose to again uproot them from their new homes.

Typically thieves enter a house, steal things and get out. This time an unsuspecting thief enters a home to steal as much as he can and instead is faced with an occupant inside the house. There is a woman within who is going to commit a murder. She is also about to set the place ablaze. The thief stops her and in the process the criminal becomes the one stopping a crime. The situation is connected to a case from some twenty years go.

Teacher Kawashima Haru takes a position on a remote island off the coast of Hokkaido, where she takes charge of six students. However, she is later forced to leave after an accident occurs. 20 years later, Haru learns that one of her former students has committed a crime, and eventually returns to the island once more.

Kohei Miyazaki (Naoto Takenaka), a former railroad worker, has become obsessed with locating the ancient country of Yamatai. His obsession sprouted from a day when he discovered ancient ceramics while repairing railroad tracks. Now completely blind, Kohei relies on his wife (Sayuri Yoshinaga) to guide him through the country and read the maps in their pursuit of Yamatai.

A young Japanese man named Kota Tanaka (Osamu Mukai) works to raise money and then build an elementary school in Cambodia.