A small rakugo performance takes place at an inn in a hot springs town. As he performs, Sukeroku feels the warmth of the audience's love for rakugo, and remembers what it means to be a storyteller. Kikuhiko brings and insists Sukeroku wear the 7th Generation Yakumo's montsuki, and he performs the story "Shibahama." Time, which had stopped for Sukeroku and Kikuhiko, begins to move again... As it does for Miyokichi, as well.
