Cosa Nostra 'superboss' Salvatore Riina has been arrested after 23 years, and receives a visit in prison from his childhood friend, Biagio Schirò, triggering a flashback.

His father decides to take the bomb home because he wants to extract the gunpowder from inside to sell it to hunters in order to supplement his very low farm labourer's income.

The bomb explodes, killing Riina's father and younger brother, Ciccio, and leaving Salvatore as the head of the family to lead a life of misery.

Tired of living in poverty, Totò, together with his friends Bernardo Provenzano (aka Binnu), Calogero Bagarella (Calò) and Biagio Schirò, begins to work for Luciano Liggio, Picciotto of the boss Michele Navarra, who meanwhile orders the kidnapping and murder of the Socialist trade unionist Placido Rizzotto.

Soon after, Totò gets into a murderous fight with Menico, the son of a miller to whom he sells his grain, and ends up in prison; meanwhile Schirò's change of heart takes him back to school.

One evening, while the Corleonesi are in a night club (where Maino meets a girl, Maria Nigro) Salvatore La Barbera is kidnapped and killed by Michele Cavataio.

Totò promises to Ninetta not to enact revenge on Teresa for the betrayal, but she tells him that she had already decided to break all links to her friend, rather to continue her relationship in secret with him.

Calogero manages to escape but Totò is arrested; he attempts to provide forged identity documents but these fail when he is recognized by Biagio.

Shortly after, Luciano Liggio too is arrested by commissioner Mangano and Schirò, discovered hiding in the wardrobe of Leoluchina Sorisi, the ex-girlfriend of the murdered Placido Rizzotto.

Simultaneously Riina and his fellow mafiosi - Provenzano, Bagarella, Vito Maranza and another man, soldier of Tano Badalamenti, boss of Cinisi - enter the offices of Michele Cavataio dressed with uniforms of the Guardia di Finanza.

The Badalamenti's henchman, nervously lets his gun fire, killing two men and triggering a massacre - no longer under cover, they have to murder three others before reaching Cavataio.

Following a spree of bullets, Cavataio feigns death until Totò and Calogero enter, when he turns and shoots, hitting and killing Bagarella.

Needing cash in order to make key investments in Palermo, Riina decides to kidnap the young lad, Antonio Caruso, from the town hall while visiting now mayor Vito Ciancimino.

On May 5, 1971, Riina orders the homicide of District Attorney Pietro Scaglione, and during the ambush the police escort agent Antonio Lo Russo is also killed.

During her trial, Vito Maranza, one of Riina's men, goes to Biagio's house and kidnaps Teresa and Antonio, holding them to ransom until Bagarella is released.

Luciano Liggio is arrested in Milan by commissioner Mangano, as a consequence Riina becomes the main capo of the Corleonesi Clan, and is chosen by Don Michele Greco as his 'prediletto' (his favourite).

At the end of the episode, Silvio Albertini, a honest colleague of Schirò, chances upon the hiding place of Riina, his wife and Provenzano.

As soon as the police arrive at the airport, commissioner Giuliano receives a phone call in which he is told that it is not possible to stop the two Frenchmen for lack of evidence.

At the airport is found a suitcase full of money, addressed to Bontade, who at this point calls his friends in Rome to complain that Giuliano is going too far and they must stop him, otherwise, he will.

Boris Giuliano sends his family on holiday promising to reach them the week after but a few days later he's killed by Leoluca Bagarella (Luchino) and Pino Greco (Scarpuzzedda).

At Giuliano's funeral, Schirò (left watching it on TV) is unaware of the state of his wife and he has an argument with her, Teresa loses the child and decides to leave Sicily for Rome.

After a speech with Schirò, judge Gaetano Costa signs the arrest warrants for all the bosses of Palermo and he's subsequently killed by the Bontade family.

With the help of Tanino and Peppe, Riina manages to escape all the attacks against him and Stefano Bontade, Salvatore Inzerillo and their families are killed by Mario Prestifilippo and "Scarpuzzedda".

The Second Mafia War produces many deaths so John Gambino, the biggest American boss, arrives in Palermo to try to stop the murders.

The fifth episode begins with Pio La Torre, regional secretary of the Italian Communist Party, which on one hand is a debate in Corleone to prevent the construction of a Cruise missiles base in Comiso and the other side with the full Commission.

Toto then decides to call a few of his soldiers and ordered the murder of Pio La Torre along his bodyguard Rosario Di Salvo.

The first action of General Dalla Chiesa is to send his men to search the collector of Ignazio Salvo, powerful man colluded with the Mafia.

In the following days Scarpuzzedda, now become quite powerful, with his swaggering air, performs two robberies in the area of the boss Pietro Aglieri, one in a jewelry store and the other at Banco di Sicilia.