Original subtitles

There it is!

WORKER AT HINAMIZAWA DAM SLAUGHTERED

There really was one...

Are you okay? Are you?

You scared me.

You said an axe or something would be helpful.

So...

Looks like you brought a big one.

But since it's getting dark, let's continue tomorrow.

Okay...

Don't be sad. You'll get to dig out Kenta-kun tomorrow.

You're right.

SPIRITED AWAY BY THE DEMON

CHAPTER TWO: THE SECRET

{OP}

{Episode}

Festival?

I told you.

The Cotton Drifting Festival.

Rika-chan's on the festival's executive committee, right?

Yes.

So, what's the Cotton Drifting Festival?

It's where we take worn-out blankets or padded kimonos,

thank them, and hold a memorial service down the stream.

Sounds like a boring festival.

It'll be far from boring!

We'll do it again this year!

Cotton Drifting Festival! Battle of Four Evils!

What's that?

Since you'll be with us, it'll be the Battle of Five Evils this year.

Five?

You're going to show off the skills you've honed in our club.

In other words, we'll do club activities while visiting stalls.

I see.

Yeah!

Hello!

Hey, nice to see you again.

Same to you.

Take any good pictures?

A few, I suppose.

Anyway, you're popular, Keiichi-kun.

I envy you, being surrounded by girls.

No, it's not like that.

Will you be staying for the Cotton Drifting Festival this year?

Yes, that's the plan.

I'll go back to Tokyo after taking pictures of the festival.

I hope you win awards for your photos soon.

Oh, man...

Well, I'll see you again at the festival.

Goodbye.

You all know Tomitake-san?

Yep.

He comes here two or three times a year.

He takes pictures of seasonal scenery and wild birds.

Wild birds, huh?

FURUTE SHRINE

COTTON DRIFTING

A few days later, the day of the Cotton Drifting Festival arrived.

Hello, everyone.

Wow, very nice!

You look great this year, too.

So cute! I want to take you home!

So, let's get started!

Yeah!

They're at it. All right.

Eating contest at the food stand!

I won't lose!

There!

Hooray!

Cotton drifting, huh?

The cotton absorbs all the bad stuff from your body.

Then we throw the cotton into the stream, and that's it.

Huh? Where did Rena go?

Tomitake-san!

Hey, where's everyone?

We got split up.

Well, Keiichi-kun? Did you enjoy the festival?

I guess.

Really?

Who is this person?

I suppose you are now officially a resident of Hinamizawa.

I'm not sure.

There still seems to be a lot that I don't know.

About Hinamizawa?

Like about the dam construction.

Hinamizawa was almost underwater.

It was a huge incident, wasn't it?

The dam plans started about seven-to-eight years ago.

It seemed Hinamizawa and areas upstream would be submerged.

That much?

Of course protests occurred.

It went to court, and scandals and corruption were discovered.

While all this took place,

I heard they decided to cancel the construction.

Um, there was a dismemberment, right?

There was.

It was about four years ago, around this time of year.

During the Cotton Drifting Festival, too.

It seems the elders believed it was Oyashiro-sama's curse.

Oyashiro-sama's curse?

It was thought that Hinamizawa's guardian god

punished the dam construction that was trying to submerge the village.

Since then, it's happened every year.

Happened? What has?

Every year, someone dies the day of the Cotton Drifting Festival.

E...Every year?

During the festival a year after the murder,

a resident of Hinamizawa who was a dam proponent

died on vacation when he fell into the water under a cliff.

His wife's corpse hasn't been found.

Furthermore, on festival night a year later,

a shrine priest suddenly died of an unknown illness.

His wife drowned herself in a swamp the same night.

Furthermore, the next year, again on festival night,

a local housewife was found beaten to death.

Housewife?

The victim's family was the dam proponent's brother's.

The one who died from falling off a cliff two years prior.

And the fifth Cotton Drifting Festival is, in other words...

Tonight.

What Tomitake-san said was shocking to hear.

The series of strange deaths in Hinamizawa every year.

But I thought it had nothing to do with me.

I've solved the whole mystery.

"The suspect" is "Rika-chan"!

"The weapon" is "poison"!

"The scene" is "the nurse's office"!

Damn it!

I didn't get it!

I like gentle killing with poison.

That was easy.

Next! Let's go to the next one!

Oh, but I need to go to the bathroom before that.

Take your time with your number two!

Mi-chan, that's gross.

Just kidding. I'll take this time to strategize.

Maebara-kun?

You have a visitor. Please go to the entrance.

A visitor?

Are you Maebara-san? Maebara Keiichi-san?

Yes, I am. And you are?

My car has air conditioning.

POLICE

Why don't we talk there?

So what do you want from me?

If you know anything about this man, please tell me.

Is this Tomitake-san?

Then do you know this woman?

Well, I don't know her name, but she was with Tomitake-san last night.

When was the last time you saw these two?

I talked to them last night at the Cotton Drifting Festival.

Did you notice anything strange?

Please tell me anything you know.

Did something happen?

The man in that picture died last night.

He was killed on festival day.

I'm sure you understand what that means.

What it means?

Could it be "Oyashiro-sama's curse"?

What happened?

Our patrol car found the body on the way back from festival security duty.

The time was five to midnight.

It was where the road leads out of town, the part that's paved.

It had almost no lights.

In that darkness,

we found Tomitake-san's body on the shoulder of the road.

The ground was covered with blood and filth.

The autopsy said his nails slit his throat.

"Nails"?

For whatever reason, he clawed at his throat with all his power.

And he reached the artery that should never be touched.

We suspected drugs, but we couldn't detect anything like that.

However, we found many external wounds on him.

It's possible he was assaulted, possibly by multiple people.

Multiple people?

It seems the estimated time of death is between 21:00 and 23:00.

In other words, right after you saw him.

And the woman?

She's missing.

It's likely she's involved in this incident.

At this rate, Tomitake Jiro-san

will have died from Oyashiro-sama's curse.

During the sacred festival night,

Oyashiro-sama got upset since he was insensitively taking pictures.

It'll be reasoned like that.

That can't be!

Besides, people can't die from divine punishment or curses.

Exactly, Maebara-san.

The help of a resident who doesn't believe in curses is essential.

Anything is fine, even if it's uncertain.

Oh, here's my phone number.

Everything we discussed here is to be kept secret,

especially from Sonozaki-san and her friends.

Sonozaki? You mean Mion?

Why?

I have no idea who's involved in this village, or to what degree.

That's why I don't want you to tell the other villagers.

No way...

Then think of it this way.

Keep it secret so as to not worry the curse-believing villagers.

How about thinking that way?

All right...

Um...

Oishi of the Okinomiya police.

Um... Okay...

I couldn't sleep last night

because I had to hear what Officer Oishi had to say.

I heard she disappeared on festival night...

But there were others too, right?

I'm not sure if it's the curse or if she was spirited away by the demon.

"Spirited away by the demon"? What's that?

If it's Oyashiro-sama...

Am I next...?

You came back though.

But Toshi-kun didn't, right?

That's all in the past.

Let's not talk about this anymore.

Shoot, I have to help my uncle today!

Sorry, everyone! No club activity today!

Helping your uncle?

WEAPON, SUSPECT, SCENE

You're dutiful, despite appearances.

Sorry, everyone.

I'm going home for today.

Then club's canceled today.

Man...

Good day to you all.

Bye.

See you tomorrow.

Be careful on your way home.

I was looking forward to this game.

"Satoshi"?

Who's this?

Rena, have there been students who transferred from this school?

Yeah, sometimes.

Did this Satoshi transfer too?

Sorry, I don't really know.

It seems he transferred around the time I came here.

So I didn't talk to him much.

Hey, Rena.

You guys aren't lying to me or keeping secrets, right?

Huh? No, we're not.

That's a lie, right?

What do you mean, Keiichi-kun?

You're keeping something secret from me, right?

What about you?

Aren't you lying and keeping secrets from us? Aren't you?

Aren't you lying and keeping secrets from us?

Aren't you?

I'm not lying or keeping secrets.

You're lying.

W...Why do you say it's a lie?

During club yesterday,

you said you were called to the teacher's office, didn't you?

I know that you didn't go to the teacher's office.

You were talking to someone in a car near the school gate.

With a man I didn't know.

Who was he?

A...a stranger...

Why would a stranger need you?

No clue.

Then what were you talking about?

Nothing to do with you.

You're lying!

Just as you have secrets and things to hide,

so do we.

Yeah...

Let's go.

It's getting a lot cooler.

Keiichi! It's a call from the bookstore!

Huh? Bookstore?

Hello?

Sorry for calling so late.

I'm Oishi from the Okinomiya Bookstore.

What? Oishi-san?

So, did anything unusual happen?

MAHJONG PARLOR

Um, what does "spirited away by the demon" mean?

It's an expression unique to the village.

It has the same meaning as plain "spirited away."

Spirited away...

Hinamizawa was feared as the "village of the demon" long ago.

Demon? Like the ones in hell?

Um, more like the man-eating ones.

Those that come to kidnap and eat people.

There was an old, scary fairy tale like that.

Rena and Mion were talking about it.

Oyashiro-sama and being spirited away by a demon.

Maebara-san, you know about the first incident, right?

The dismemberment?

Yes, of the six murderers, one is still on the run, right?

What if they weren't on the run, but were spirited away by the demon?

What about the next year's accident?

The dam proponent and his wife dying in accidents.

Truthfully, only the husband officially died in an accident.

The wife's body hasn't been found.

What about the third year?

A priest dying of illness and his wife by suicide.

The same goes for that too.

The wife's body couldn't be found, only a suicide note.

I'm not sure if I can call that "spirited away by the demon,"

but when it's Oyashiro-sama's curse, one person goes missing.

Then with the housewife who was beaten to death last year...

Did someone go missing?

The culprit was caught, right?

Yes, he was arrested. He was a drug addict.

But after the suspect was arrested,

we found out that a child of the victim had gone missing.

Even with the culprit arrested?

He died in the holding cell during the inquiry, so the truth's in the dark.

What about the missing child?

The child's a year older than you and is named Hojo Satoshi-kun.

Satoshi?

He was in your school until last year.

Maebara Keiichi

That's your seat.

It's the seat of a student who transferred.

Hey, Keiichi. Open up here.

Sorry, my dad's here. That'll be it for tonight.

Please let me know again if something happens. Well then...

Hey! Open up!

I'm opening it now.

What's that?

Oh, don't hide things.

Rena-chan was just here, right? I figured I'd bring you some tea.

Hm, maybe I missed her.

Rena was...?

Don't hide it. Weren't you talking to her the whole time?

Did you see her walk up the stairs?

Yeah, I did.

I told her your room was straight up the stairs.

W...What are you doing, Keiichi?

Don't be embarrassed.

Rena was definitely here.

She was right outside my room

and heard my conversation with Oishi-san.

{ED}

{Preview}

NEXT EPISODE

What you can see is the false whereabouts.

What you can see there is a blank look.

What I can see is repeated sadness.

When They Cry.

"Spirited Away By The Demon Chapter Three: Suspicion."

Can you believe it?