The story of Ermak Timofeevich, whose campaign for the Ural mountains served to annex the Siberian lands to the Moscow kingdom, in the second half of the 16th century.

The invasion of a village in Byelorussia by German forces sends young Florya into the forest to join the weary Resistance fighters, against his family's wishes. There he meets a girl, Glasha, who accompanies him back to his village. On returning home, Florya finds his family and fellow peasants massacred. His continued survival amidst the brutal debris of war becomes increasingly nightmarish, a battle between despair and hope.