Two city-states agree to end bloody and relentless warfare; as a condition of the ceasefire, they exchange one citizen from each state as scapegoats each year, to be punished and disposed of as the rivals see fit. An elderly warrior, once one of his city's finest fighters, is chosen as the offering. As he sets out under guard on a journey through a rugged wasteland, he realizes that all he has to look forward to at the end is ignominious torture and death.