In 1554, 23rd year of Tenbun, Jiro Hoshi is busy in helping people in Ii-no-ya. At that time, Ono Izuminokami Masanao, who becomes more powerful in the Ii clan plans to make his eldest son Tajimanokami Masatsugu (former Tsurumaru) marry a daughter of OKUYAMA Tomotoshi, one of the vassals of Naomori. Though Tomotoshi refuses it, Izuminokami tells him calmly that he can be a grandfather of the head of the Iis. Izuminokami tells his sons that his clan will be more influential but he falls ill.
IMAGAWA Ujimasa, son of Yoshimoto marries a daughter of HOJO Ujimasa. Sena, who made a promise of mariage with him in her childhood keeps up appearances but is dissatisfied with it at heart. At that time, a dopey boy stays in the residence as hostage of the Matsudairas. Later he becomes a famous samurai called TOKUGAWA Ieyasu and established Tolugawa Bakufu and future husband of Sena. But he is a twelve-year-old boy at the moment and plays go alone.
Ono Izuminokami (Mitsuru Fukikoshi, in black clothes) shows off his existence in the Ii clan
Naohira visits Ryotanji Temple and asks for Jiro to curse Izunokami to death but she answers it's not priest's duty. Then Jiro asks her father Naomori why Naohira hates Izuminokami. Naomori tells her it's caused by Sana. Jiro visits Izuminokami in sickbed and asks him about it. He says that he made the daughter of Naohira as hostage to the Imagawas to save the situation after the detection of Naohira's secret communication with the Hojos, enemy of the Imagawas.
Izuminokami adds that nobody believes him but Jiro accepts it and tells him that way of thinking varies from parson to parson. He bends his sick body and bows to Jiro and promises that Masatsugu won't be a spy of the Imagawas like him. But after she returned to Ryotanji, Izuminokami tells Masatsugu that his plan worked well. Masatsugu realises that what he said to Jiro is false. He tells his father that he doesn't hope to become a samurai like his father however Izuminokami refuses it. Not long after, he died.
Kamenojo (Haruma Miura, right) returns to Ii-no-ya and meets Naomori (Tetsuta Sugimoto, left)
Meanwhile, TAKEDA Shingen who allies himself with Imagawa Yoshimoto and HOJO Ujiyasu invades into southern Shinano where Kamenojo takes refuge. Naomori decides to make him come back to Ii-no-ya and tells Masatsugu that the engagement with a daughter of OKUYMNA Tomotoshi will be broken off. Masatsugu takes it and says to his lord.
"And the thorn in the Ii's side has gone away, sir. Everything will go well."
The thorn means hid deceased father.
Masatsugu meets Jiro and tells her the return of Kamenojo. Jiro says that she does't have any interest with him any more, for she is a priest now. However Masatsugu points out that she sticks to his appearances contrary to her words and she has evil passions. What is more, she dreams in which kamenojo appears though it is not him but his rugged father Naomitsu. She tries to mortify the passions while Kamenojo returns to Ii-no-ya with his vassal Toshichiro .
Kamenojo meets Jiro (Ko Shibasaki, left), former O-Towa who enters into priesthood
Kamenojo is welcomed by the members of the Ii clan and Masatsugu. He talks about his experience in Shinano at drinking party and gets up from his seat to visit Jiro in Ryotanji. There Jiro returns from training to mortify the passions and finds Kamenojo after a short time. They talk near the well of Ryugu Kozo and Jiro asks him to support her father and the clan as adopted son of Naomori. However Kamenojo hopes to marry her. And Ketsuzan watches them near the place.