Elegy of Entrapment (Verse 1)

Elegy of the Entrapment (Verse 1) is the 20th episode of Samurai Champloo/Anime. It was release in Japan on Februrary 5, 2005 and Janurary 6, 2006. The episode before this is Unholy Union and the episode after this is Elegy of the Entrapment (Verse 2).

History
During a dark rainy night, Mugen, Fuu and Jin seek shelter within a bar/restaurant where they eat and observe a beautiful performance by a woman with a shamisen: a goze’, a blind traveling musician, according to Jin. While the gang fills up on food, the woman sits next to them and Fuu tries to strike up a conversation. However, two thugs interrupt and begin to harass the woman before Mugen quickly beats them up. The group continue their conversation, learning that the woman’s name is Sara and she’s journeying to Hyuga. She asks for the group to accompany her on her journey in exchange for covering their food and rooming expenses.

The group makes their way to Hyuga, keeping Sara safe as she gives her performances where she can, and eventually the group make a stop where Jin asks about the charm on her shamisen. She reveals that she has a son that she hasn’t seen in an extremely long time, believing that a blind woman can’t take care of children properly. The group eventually finds a place to stay at for the night, with Sara deciding to take bath, eventually being joined by Mugen for a bit until Fuu chews him out, forcing him out of the bath.

Fuu joins Sara as she asks about what Mugen looks like, hoping to confirm her mental image of our obnoxious samurai, but Fuu tells her to just forget about it. After some further conversation, Fuu leaves the bath and offers a begrudging apology to Mugen for earlier. As Fuu and Sara lie awake in their beds that night, Sara begins probing Fuu about her journey, suspecting she has some kind of emotional attachment to her two bodyguards in general as well as one of them specifically.

The next morning they continue on their way, and as the day proceeds, Sara asks a favor of all our heroes: helping her find her son. She makes this clear as they roam through a festival, with a brief flashback going into more detail of her request: she wants either Mugen or Jin (not both) to accompany her, much to Fuu’s seeming displeasure. She eventually runs off to a bridge where Jin tries to comfort her, but Fuu tries to play it off like everything’s fine.

While this is going on, Sara receives an ominous warning/reminder from a masked figure in the festival. Eventually, the four reach a forked path where Jin and Sara part ways with Mugen and Fuu. As soon as they do, Fuu breaks down in tears, deeply saddened that Jin actually agreed to her request much to Mugen's annoyance.

Later on in the night, Jin is suddenly attacked by Sara. As it turns out, she was evidently hired by some mysterious entity to take out our heroes, leading the two to fight on a bridge, as Sara holds her own with ease. The episode ends on a cliffhanger in the middle of this fight scene.

Characters

 * Fuu
 * Jin
 * Mugen
 * Sara
 * Thugs who harass Sara