Forbidden Siren - Strange Tales of Hanuda - Chapter 2 Analysis

Miyako Kajiro
Kajiro House / Living Room / 1976 / 22:32:23

In Chapter 2, an important character who ties together the core of the entire story, Miyako Kajiro, appears. From her name, you may confuse her as being the same Miyako who appears in the game, but they are different people with the same name. The Miyako from Chapter 2 was to be offered up as a sacrifice in the 1976 ritual, as the Previous Miyako. Since perpetrating the sin of eating the flesh of a god (Datatsushi), the Kajiro family has been cursed. In order to repent for their sins, each generation two sisters from the Kajiro house are offered up in the matrimonial rites, a terrible wedding to the "god"... This is the taboo ritual that has been performed using female descendents born to the Kajiros when they first begin to menstruate. If all goes well, the elder of the two sisters returns to the real world, her sister taken to the Underworld... However due to some kind of failure the siren sounds, and the village is dragged into the Other World.

Summer 1976, the very night the rite of holy matrimony is to be performed... With the help of her maid, Sumiko, the young Miyako escapes from the Kajiro house. Led by Sumiko, the girl who was raised to be offered to the god, coming from darkness into darkness, proceeds down an underground path that will lead her to the outside wrld, where she will no longer lead a taboo existence. The underground path that takes her outside of the Kajiro house... Inside it lurk countless strange beings, degraded, melted, letting out moans of pain - these are the twisted forms of the members of the Kajiro family. Due to the curse placed on the descendents of the Kajiros due to the god's anger, they are unable to find the peace of death. They live eternally, passing the time in nothing but hellish suffering... The area in which these creatures, increasing in number with each generation, are hidden (the dark side of the Kajiros that was to stay secret) turns out to be beneath their very own house.

After separating from Sumiko and exiting the underground passageway, Miyako finds herself in the church of Mana, with a young man called Koichi Shimura, son of the hunter Akira Shimura who appears in the game. Koichi, realising that "something" is using Manaism as a mask to manipulate the village from behind the scenes, decides he must do something about this himself, stealing the important holy implement (Datatsushi's head) used in the secret ritual that is about to begin.

Also, as becomes apparent in Chapter 4, it is the father of Tamon Takeuchi, Omito, who gives Koichi a hint as to the village being controlled. Omito, who appears to have been investigating "Hanuda Village's secret ritual" as a local historian, knew a certain amount about the mysteries surrounding the Kajiros, as outlined in the archive items "The Takeuchi Monographs" (No.26 & 80). Also, as you can interpret from "Old Photo of Akira Shimura" (No.70), the Shimuras and Takeuchis had a close relationship.

Koichi, who has stolen the holy item in an attempt to eliminate the taboo ritual of the village, and Miyako, rejecting her role as the "bride of the god"... Due to both factors in the forbidden ritual failing, the ceremony of 1976 is a definitive failure. Finally, the howl of a beast like a siren rings out, Koichi and Miyako holding hands and starting to run. However, later, Sumiko's final words to Miyako at their separation - "I will return for you no matter what, Lady Miyako" - end up taking a terrible form.

Characters

Miyako Kajiro

A girl who was fated to become the bride of a bizarre god as the human sacrifice of the Kajiro family. It is this Previous Miyako of whom Namiko has visions as she turns into a shibito during chapter 1, the "girl in a black kimono".

Sumiko

As you can probably tell Sumiko, the Kajiro family's maid who assists with Miyako's escape, is the person who wrote Archive No.83, "Kajiro Maid's Diary". She often converses with Miyako, who is shut away in the Kajiro house's living room, but in actuality has another, hidden side to her.

The boy in the church

Akira Shimura's son (Koichi). He acts decisively, trying to shake free of the darkness controlling the village. On the other hand, while his father Akira faintly senses something dark about the village he refuses to get any more deeply involved.

"Old Photo of Akira Shimura"

Shows Akira Shimura, Koichi Shimura, Omito Takeuchi and Tamon Takeuchi. This shows the connection between the shibito Shimura and Takeuchi as he fights back.

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English Translation by Chelsea