The
Masaki household awakes one morning to find a deep snowfall covering
the ground. As Sasami and Ryo-ohki have fun playing in the snow, Tenchi
watches, remembering how he used to enjoy the snow as a child. Outside,
in the centre of the lake, a shimmering beam of light is cast from below
the chilly surface into the grey skies above. The lake begins to freeze.
Meanwhile, Ryoko
is not enjoying the cold weather, and is sitting at the kotatsu*,
shivering and looking miserable. Nobuyuki is cooking breakfast, and
asks Tenchi to go to the shrine and ask Katsuhito to join them.
When
Tenchi arrives at the shrine, he is surprised to find his grandfather
still in bed. However, when he tries to wake him, he finds that he has
pulled the old "pillows under the bedclothes" trick, and is
waiting in a closet to ambush Tenchi! After cornering Tenchi with a
skilful manoeuvre, he reminds his grandson that, despite the snow, he
still wants to see him for his usual sword practice.
After breakfast,
Tenchi sets out for his sword practice. Nobuyuki too has duties to fulfil;
he has to go to the office and finish some architectural drawings. It
seems that Sasami is the only one who can enjoy the snow today, and
she busies herself turning Azaka and Kamidake into giant mobile snowmen.
Later,
Ayeka comes across Tenchi and Katsuhito practising swordplay in the
forest. She notices how similar their fighting style is to that used
on Jurai. Taking a break from his practice, Tenchi sits with Ayeka under
a tree, drinking hot tea from a thermos she
brought. Ayeka asks Tenchi why he needs to practise sword fighting,
and he has to admit that he has never really thought about it; he has
simply been doing it since his childhood. They are interrupted when
Sasami meets them. She has noticed the beam of light coming from the
lake, and suspects that it could be from Ryu-Oh. They
arrive a short while later at the lake, and find that a small seedling
has sprouted; Ayeka's ship's life tree, Ryu-Oh, is regenerating itself.
That
evening, the family sit indoors watching the snow and drinking sake
(rice wine). Ryoko and Ayeka's appetite for alcohol means that, between
them, Katsuhito and Nobuyuki, they have finished the whole bottle, so
they send Tenchi out to buy some more. When he finally arrives back,
the long walk in the freezing weather has done him no good, and he passes
out. Since everyone else is asleep from having drunk too much sake,
Sasami is the only one who can help him. She asks Azaka and Kamidake
what to do, and they suggest giving him some sap from the Ryu-Oh seedling,
which is used on Jurai to cure illness. Sasami prays in front of the
seedling, and it responds to her by producing a droplet of its precious
sap.
In Tenchi's dreams,
he remembers the last snowy day when he was a young boy. He recalls
the day that his father came to him as he played in the snow to tell
him of the death of his mother.
Tenchi
awakes with a start to find Sasami fast asleep at his bedside where
she watched over him. After thanking Sasami for looking after him, Tenchi
rushes to the shrine where Nobuyuki and Katsuhito are waiting. They
are praying at the grave of Tenchi's mother, in memory of the day she
died.
Azaka and Kamidake,
having witnessed Tenchi's fast recovery, ponder over the effectiveness
of Juraian life-tree sap on non-Juraian life-forms. They conclude that
since Tenchi is perfectly healthy again, it must work on Earthlings
too.
