Set in the nineteenth century when Tokyo was till called Edo, Yaji is a widower eking out a living sculpting fancy pastries. He's in love with Okino, a popular local courtesan frustratingly beyond his reach. Okino, now past her commercial prime and secretly in love with Yaji, wants to leave her profession but her only option is to buy her way out of bondage and Yaji has neither money nor prospects thereof. Okino lies to Yaji, pleading that he will help her run away to see her dying father. Yaji proclaims he will engineer her secape and deliver her to her native village, when a man appears outside, his head hanging from a rope. He is Kita, Yaji's childhood friend. A second-rate actor, Kita has blown a major role and lost his will to live. Kita decides Yaji and Okino's impending journey is the perfect cure and talks Yaji into letting him join them.As the unlikely threesome hit the road, none has any idea of the adventures that lie ahead or of what will become of the unspoken love between Yaji and Okino.