Daichi Gokujou Chi Dairuma Rikishi

This manga follows the unfortunate life of an extraordinary swordsman - Inoko Gennosuke. Gennosuke was born into a social group called 'buraku' that was considered to be the filth of society, and because of that he was forced to live a life of misery.

From Dark Horse: Japan's samurai past is riddled with stories of great fighting prowess and deeply ingrained systems of honor and discipline. But behind the stern demeanor was a society coming apart at the seams. Clashes in class systems and the need for a nation to come together threaten to break up the old ways of warring samurai--these are tales of such struggles. This is the story of Japan's history, and the beginning of the end of the samurai era.

This one-shot is the adaptation of two movies: Zatoichi's Vengeance (Tokuzo Tanaka) and Zatoichi's Pilgrimage (Kazuo Ikehiro). The Ballad of Zatoichi: Zatoichi comes upon a dying man who asks him to give a bag of money to "Taichi." Zatoichi has no idea who this is but when he comes upon a small town harassed by gangsters, he finds that "Taichi" was the man's young son. Along his travels, he also met a blind monk who makes Zatoichi question his murderous lifestyle. In trying to help the town, Zatoichi kills some gangsters and becomes a hero to the boy. He must make a choice of whether to stay and defend the town or to leave and be on his way. Zatoichi's Pilgrimage: After he's ambushed in a small village terrorized by a gang of thieves, the legendary blind swordsman Zatoichi is forced to kill a young man in self-defense. As fate would have it, his travels soon lead him to Okichi, a woman whom Zatoichi discovers is the sister of the young man whose life he stole. In anger, Okichi attacks the blind swordsman, but her conscience gets the better of her, and as she tends his wounds, the two fall in love.