It is spring, by a riverbank, underneath a railroad bridge. At a 20th year reunion of factory workers, the long-lost Yongho appears, disturbing their party. His friends stand by confounded as he, despite the approaching train, climbs onto the railroad bridge, and cries out: "I am going back !" Time runs forward to the past, as if we're riding a train of time travel. Days earlier, Yongho loses his home and family, and spends his last few bills on a gun. A strange man appears at Yongho's makeshift home and takes him to the deathbed of his first love, where peppermint candy provides one last magic moment. The train continues to transport us back in time to reveal the secret of the peppermint candy, and of Yongho's buried past entwined with an intractable Korean history: torturer, soldier, factory worker. A young man at the crossroads of love. A man with blood on his hands. And, finally, we arrive 20 years earlier to the most innocent moment in a man's life.