A KNOJ HQ in 1945, sometime after the end of WWII. 3 captured Balists, old man Sok(Petar Prlicko) and Sulejman Tenova(Pance Kamdzik), the president of a Communist committee, are brought before an investigating commission to explain the events before, during and after the attack on a village called Glum in which Tenova works. Tenova starts narrating the story. In 1943, the whole village was exiled for aiding the Partisans. After the end of the war, they finally return to their homes. Tenova immediately calls in Hasan-beg Mulaj(Ilija Milcin), a local landowner who owns the land surrounding Glum. While on his way to the meeting, Hasan-beg meets a local Balist group led by Saban Murtezi(Abdurrahman Sala).Aware that his land will be taken by the new regime, Hasan-beg promises Murtezi and his gang payment in gold if he attacks the village. Murtezi agrees to the deal. The next day, Murtezi and his gang attack the village, killing some soldiers and a lot of peasants.A special KNOJ unit led by Captain Ramiz Lesi(Aleksandar Gavric)is sent in to capture the gang. While searching the belongings of 3 Balists who were killed in their escape attempt,Ramiz finds that each one of them had 3 golden coins. Immediately suspecting his old friend Hasan-beg, Ramiz visits him at his home and finds him packing. After telling him that he must stay until the end of the investigation, Ramiz secretly orders a soldier to watch the house. After the visit, Hasan-beg sends a courier into the hills. He finds the gang and tells Murtezi his boss promised him he will permanently supply him with gold in exchange for the murder of Captain Lesi. Murtezi agrees to the deal, since he has some unfinished business with the Captain. A few of his men try to leave him, afraid to take on Captain Lesi, but Murtezi has them killed in order to prevent them from talking about his deal with Hasan-beg. Meanwhile, Azira(Jelena Zigon), the young and beautiful trophy girl of Hasan-beg, tries to help the nurses tending to wounded peasants. She is sent away by her former friends, who resent her for leaving them in their poverty for a rich life with Hasan-beg. She is defended by Ramiz. During their talk, we learn that they were lovers sometime during the war. As this is happening, in comes a group of doctors led by doctor Branka(Mira Oljenji).Sok is also among them, since Ramiz got him a job in a military hospital. The next evening, a boy brings in an anonymous message for Ramiz. It says that a Balist is waiting for him by a mill with the task of killing him. Ramiz leaves for the mill, but tells Sok to call in some backup.The Balist sees and attacks Ramiz, but he overpowers and interrogates him. He admits that Saban Murtezi sent him, but before he can reveal his location, Ramiz is distracted by the sound of Sok coming with some soldiers. The Balist makes a run for it, but is killed by a soldier. Ramiz immediately starts organizing a manhunt in the hills. Hasan-beg is informed by one of his servants that Captain Lesi survived the assassination attempt. He immediately tells his courier to find the gang in the hills and tell Murtezi he has the gold ready, but he will not give it to him because Ramiz is still alive. However, Azira overhears the conversation in another room. Back in the hearing room, the chief of the commission asks Mefail(Gojko Kovacevic), one of captured Balists and Murtezi s right-hand man, to retell the wartime events that led Hasan-beg to secretly hate Ramiz. Mefail goes back to 1941, when Germany and Italy started their occupation of Kosmet. An outlaw tribe starts robbing and killing local peasants, who eventually complain to Murtezi, who was a gendarme before the war started. Furious for their inability to protect the people, Murtezi starts a fight with some Italian officers and is sent to jail. It is not long before a group of Partisans, led by Ramiz, invade the local prison in order to free an imprisoned comrade(the same chief of the commission). As they are leaving, he talks Ramiz into freeing Murtezi, who then spends 2 years gathering men and fighting on the side of the Partisans. However, he changes sides 2 years later when he is offered a lot of gold. Ramiz secretly returns to Glum with the mission of killing Murtezi. Furious for the betrayal, Ramiz confronts Murtezi and starts a fight with, planning to kill him slowly. However, the fight is heard by the Balists, so Ramiz is forced to flee. Murtezi and his gang are not far behind. When his horse is shot and killed, Ramiz sneaks into the house of Hasan-beg and hides with the help of Azira. They eventually kiss and he sleeps with her. When he returns to his house the following night, Hasan-beg sees Ramiz and Azira kissing and saying goodbye and immediately realizes what happened, leading him to hate Ramiz. Sok continues the narration of the story. After learning about the plot against Ramiz, Azira goes to the hospital and asks Branka to tell Ramiz there is a plot against his life. Meanwhile, the courier reaches the gang and tells Murtezi the deal is off. However, the Balists tie him up and brutally whip him until he tells them where does Hasan-beg hide his gold. He tells them that there are 2 bags of gold:one in his room, and the location of the other is known only by Hasan-beg. After getting the information, the Balists kill him by slitting his throat. After seeing the killing, Kadrija(Dragan Ocokoljic), Mefail s nephew and and an unwilling Balist, takes his shotgun and tries to leave. Mefail catches up to him and starts beating him, but he stops when soldiers led by Ramiz(who have obviously followed the courier)open fire. Kadrija joins the soldiers and helps them take over the Balist camp. While checking the prisoners, Ramiz notices that some members of the gang, including Murtezi and Mefail, are not among them. Kadrija realizes that they are planning to rob Hasan-beg of his gold and tells Ramiz about it. Meanwhile, Balists surprise Hasan-beg at his house, kill his other servant and take him and Azira as prisoners in their own house. In order to get Azira to tell him about the other bag of gold, Murtezi reveals that Hasan-beg is responsible for the murder of her first husband-his own older brother.Jealous because his brother was meant to marry Azira and inherit the wealth of their late father, Hasan-beg paid Murtezi and his men to ambush and kill his brother in the hills. In order to punish her husband, Azira reveals that the other bag is also in his room. Hasan-beg tries to stop the gang from taking the gold, but is mortally wounded in return. In the meantime, soldiers surround the house,planning to use the chance and capture the Balists. Convinced by some peasants, Ramiz decides to secretly enter the house and free Azira before the battle begins. Since the main entrance is guarded, Kadrija calls out to the guard on duty, and when he comes close to him, Ramiz kills the guard and carefully enters the house.After killing another guard as he was descending down a staircase, Ramiz climbs up the staircase, finds Azira and tells her to run through the main doors as he is covering her from up above. However, the half-dead Hasan-beg is consumed by jealousy when he sees Azira running away from him, so he grabs his shotgun, aims through the window and shoots her. Hearing the gunshot, Mefail enters the room and kills Hasan-beg before seeing 2 peasants carrying out a wounded Azira. Realizing they are surrounded, Murtezi orders Mefail to lead the men into the hills through a back exit. Meanwhile, he secures all the gold he found, planning to escape with it through the main entrance as his men are battling with the soldiers. As he is trying to escape, he is seen by Ramiz, who is waiting down the staircase, and a shootout starts between them. As all this is happening, the rest of the gang tries to escape through the back exit. However, they run into a KNOJ ambush and are all killed or captured. Kadrija sees Mefail as he is trying to escape and decides to stop him, resulting in a fight between them. Mefail overpowers his nephew and is about to kill him when soldiers surprise and arrest him. As Murtezi is descending down the staircase, Ramiz tries to get him by surprise when he realizes he is out of bullets. Murtezi is about to kill him, but Sok appears and gives Ramiz an automatic gun which he uses to finally kill Murtezi. After finishing the story, Sok sings a statement and leaves the HQ. Ramiz and Azira, who survived the gunshot, are waiting for him outside in an Army jeep. Sok joins them and they happily leave as the film ends.