Two men obsessed with sculpting discover they're locked in a cycle older than either lifetime, competing across reincarnations to prove whose vision matters. The movie doesn't explain this, it assumes you understand that talent and ambition aren't separate from destiny, they're where destiny lives. A Buddhist parable disguised as a character study, where every chisel stroke is both creation and confession.

In Japan's Nara period, the gifted sculptor Akanemaru goes looking for the legendary immortal Phoenix, hoping it will inspire his greatest work. Along the way he meets Gaou, a one-eyed, one-armed bandit who resents the world, and although Akanemaru treats him kindly, Gaou attacks and robs him. Years pass. Akanemaru is pushed into a new commission that means setting his dream aside, while sudden misfortune befalls Gaou, who turns to sculpting as his sole purpose. Fate brings the two men together again, this time as rivals measuring their skill and talent against each other. A drama with fantasy elements, this feature film weighs how each man's past choices come back to shape him.