First time getting into this series and I had some theories [spoilers if you haven't played Onikakushi]

[reb]

Alright so I picked this VN up recently, and after getting spooked and hooked into finishing the story. I decided to calm down and read the All-Cast discussion thing. It actually got me thinking.

I ended up reading the manga chapters (for tjust this arc) and the anime eps (just for this arc as well) and I've come up with some theories. I don't really want anyone to verify them or what, I just felt like sharing what I've thought up with after passing through the same story arc in 3 different media.

My theory is based on this premise: Keiichi Maebara was going crazy throughout the latter half of Onikakushi-hen. He's displaying signs of extreme paranoia (constantly feeling followed, and feeling shadows following him). It doesn't really help that he finds out that his closest friends are linked to the string of murders in Hinamizawa. Although after looking through all of the string of strange incidents after the death of Tomitake and here are some of my thoughts:

* Rena's first "transformation" - This is probably the one where I'm most confused. Could it be that she just exploded in anger because Keiichi was trying to talk about a topic she didn't want to bring up? This is probably the one where I can't come up with a reasonable explanation of what happened.
* Mion and Rena's evening visit when Keiichi was out sick - The big kicker here is how did Mion and Rena find out that Keiichi ate lunch out? I figure Okinomiya may be pretty close by and I suppose it's not far-fetehed that anyone working near the outskirts of Hinamizawa would go out to lunch at the same place. Keiichi was getting flustered and making quite a scene after all; he may have drawn attention to himself and he was recognized by somebody. Mion or Rena might have run into them in town and told them of that sighting.
* The needle in the mochi - There may have been no needle at all! When Mion admits to fooling around with one of the mochi, she does not mention any needle. It may have been something odd enough to trigger Keiichi's body which was already on edge from lack of sleep combined with his growing paranoia that it made him think he was bleeding. The needle might have been a hallucination.
* The white van attemping to run him down - This is very, very suspicious, and the fact that this same van shows up at the end makes me believe that something else is afoot in Hinamizawa. However, if we go with the Keiichi is crazy theory, he may have hallucinated that the van was trying to run him down (and he could have been a crazy rambling man at the side of the road)
* Rena follows Keiichi home - Revisiting her lines here, it seems that she shows nothing but concern for him. She wants to talk to Keiichi and help him. Rena's superstitious avoidance of mentioning the fact that Satoshi was "demoned away" triggers Keiichi's paranoia though.
* Rena showing up at Keiichi's house and asks if she can make him dinner - Keiichi's parents seem to be very, very fond of Rena. They may have called her and asked her to go surprise Keiichi. This would explain why she knew he'd be alone, and in fact, why she knew the flavor of instant noodles that Keiichi was planning to eat. Worth noting is that when Rena apologizes as Keiichi slams the door on her fingers (poor Rena though :( ) she says that she's sorry for taking the prank too far. This makes me believe that she was fooling around when she said she was right behind Keiichi when he was buying cup ramen. (Bad idea to make a prank like that to someone who's obviously been on edge for the last few days)
* Rena following Keiichi again but this time with the axe - Rena has a very quirky personality. She may have wanted to prove a point to Keiichi about how his bat-lugging is scary. However, what I find curious is Rena's words here. She mentions that she regrets not talking to Satoshi and giving him advice. She doesn't want to lose Keiichi and wants to save him. At this point, I think, maybe Rena is suffering from whatever Keiichi is suffering from? Did she see herself in Satoshi and regrets not doing anything to try to stop him and now she wants to help Keiichi recover from what he is suffering cause she knows what it is?
* The attack by the strangers - It's possible that he imagined all of this. He may have just worn his body out from running (note that he has not been sleeping properly for a while at this point). It could have been possible that Rena found him collapsed after she chased after him.
* Mion's "syringe", Rena and Mion talking about the "manager" - This is one of the first signs I looked at that made me think he might have been imagining things. Rena and Mion were probably talking about a baseball team manager, given Keiichi's sudden interest in the sport. Meanwhile for the syringe, after a bit of re-reading, I've come to think that it might have actually been a marker. Here's why:
- While Keiichi is pinned, Mion mentions that he knows what punishment is coming, which means it's been done to him before (doodles on the face with a marker)
- Mion also mentions that he looked like Tomitake did. Keiichi, in his frantic state, thought of Tomitake's last moments, when Mion might have meant when they scribbled on Tomitake's shirt at the festival.

I'm still confused as to the following though:
- Who were the men in the white van? They went to the trouble of taking out part of Keiichi's will, and took away the "syringe" that was taped to the back of the clock. If it was really a marker though, why would it have been taken away?
- Rena's first transformation. I still can't come up with a logical explanation as to why Rena would suddenly "turn scary."
- what would cause someone to scratch out their own throat? Did Keiichi's mental instability drive him to claw out his own throat similar to how Tomitake died just because he was now convinced of the curse?
- In that vein, Tomitake seemed to be the picture of mental health on the night of the festival. There still seems to be no clues around to who might have killed him (or caused him to do that to himsself). Maybe the shady guys in the white van can shed more light on the mystery.

I can't wait for Watanagashi to make its way to Steam! I can't believe I missed this when it first came out though! I love myself a good mystery!

So to people who knows what happens next (and whether or not I'm spouting nonsense here), do you recommend I wait for everything to come out on Steam first or do I go ahead and continue reading the manga/watching the anime?

EDIT: extra theory: at the start, is that maybe Rena apologizing to Keiichi before getting killed? The repeated "I'm sorry, I'm sorry" seems very similar to Rena's behavior when her fingers got crushed. Did she maybe try one last time to connect with Keiichi (who by then was operating on pure animal rage and could not be stopped)?

[reb]

Again, please don't tell me if any of my theories are correct. I just wanted to share what I thought after just seeing and reading everything Onikakushi.

I mainly wanted to post some of my crazy theories and ask for veterans' opinions on if I should get into the manga or the anime further

[Robbie06261995]

I loved the anime and am mainly getting the VNs as they come out on steam for the greater details the anime lacks.

[Ohagi-Chan]

I've got two theories for who tampered with Keiichi's evidence, one is your white van people, but the other is a character you know very well already. Ooishi has been tailing Keiichi for the last few days, hoping to expose a lead on his case. In the end Keiichi died, but the only evidence he left behind that someone was following him was a note that looked like it was written by a mad man. Ooishi was the first police man to discover the note (in the anime it shows Kumagai for some reason) so he had the best opportunity to tamper with the evidence, beside the people who came to Keiichi's house. Keep in mind, that they might not have stuck around long enough to search his room for anything.

A veteran, guilty as charged, but this is genuinely a theory of mine, not a fact.

[reb]

Originally posted by Theoneandonly Bustablademan:

I've got two theories for who tampered with Keiichi's evidence, one is your white van people, but the other is a character you know very well already. Ooishi has been tailing Keiichi for the last few days, hoping to expose a lead on his case. In the end Keiichi died, but the only evidence he left behind that someone was following him was a note that looked like it was written by a mad man. Ooishi was the first police man to discover the note (in the anime it shows Kumagai for some reason) so he had the best opportunity to tamper with the evidence, beside the people who came to Keiichi's house. Keep in mind, that they might not have stuck around long enough to search his room for anything.

A veteran, guilty as charged, but this is genuinely a theory of mine, not a fact.

No worries! I enjoy the fact that you're helping me pick my brain apart with theorizing with just facts around Onikakushi! I welcome everyone to do so!

Thinking about it now. I'm not sure if Keiichi ever mentioned the clock to Ooishi. I might need to revisit that.

What makes me think that it might have been the guys in the white van though, is that Keiichi may have haphazardly put things away after leaving his last note making it obvious that he stuck something behind the clock (meaning the search wouldn't have taken long)

Another factor is that the doctor was with them. And taking out details about there being syringe makes him very suspicious. In a remote place like Hinamizawa, I would think the only place to get a syringe is at the hospital.

[reb]

Originally posted by Robbie06261995:

I loved the anime and am mainly getting the VNs as they come out on steam for the greater details the anime lacks.

That's cool! How did you find the VN experience compared to the anime?

[Kabocha]

Jesus Christ, it's so hard not to tell you how right/wrong you are. This post is too tantalizing for someone who knows the end.

[reb]

Originally posted by KingPumpkin:

Jesus Christ, it's so hard not to tell you how right/wrong you are. This post is too tantalizing for someone who knows the end.

yeah I realize someone nasty could come around and do that :(

did you check out the manga/anime? or just read the VNs

[ryanjamico]

I feel i should mention that anime version of Watanagashi has spoilers for Meakashi not in manga version of Watanagashi.

[nacho_chicken]

Pretty sure you just set yourself a claymore posting in this forum.

The Spoiler section is for series spoilers; I.E. spoilers from other chapters. Just reading the topic names here will spoil some major elements of the series. Onikakushi spoilers can stay in the main discussion forum, as long as you tag the topic.

Don't expect anyone here to be able to help you without spoilers, because we already know all the answers :P You're on the right track for some things, but a lot is totally off-base. Not unexpected at all.

[Alice]

You should either wait for the steam releases, or pick up the iOS ports. The anime is pretty bad about storytelling. They actually had to make an entirely new arc to explain things they neglected earlier on.

The manga does a decent job, though it's still compressed. The covers alone are spoilerish, though.

The iOS versions of the vn has the old crappy translation, but it does the job well enough until you get to meakashi, where they seemingly forgot to translate whole passages.

[Chaos_Alfa]

I would recommend to just wait for the Steam releases of Higurashi for the best experience. After every arc you should be able to read the corresponding manga series for another take on it. I would only continue watching the anime after having read the Meakashi for the spoiler.

The Watanagashi arc in the anime has a prologue which is a scene from the Meakashi arc. This scene is not included in the manga or visual novel arc of Watanagashi .

[Shelanoir]

As for Rena's first "LIES" incident...

We learn that Rena has an affliction that makes her emotionally unstable. I presume the incident where she breaks the windows and beating her friends was actually her breaking down after being bullied for a long time (I can't possibly believe she had 3 male "friends" to be honest). This would explain why no charges were pressed against her after it was discovered she had a mental affliction.

Unless, of course, all of that was a lie... After all Keiichi is an extremely unreliable narrator. We have to assume most of the unbelievable or scary stuff that happens is him hallucinating things or ignoring reality.

I would assume that Keiichi's interrogation of Rena was less than friendly, or that part of it was omitted outright. Rena did not bring up Keiichi's white lie about him meeting with the officer, so she trusts him to an extent. At this point he is already showing signs of paranoia, so either Keiichi was very insistent about Rena talking about a subject she is genuinely scared of or he was verbally or physically assaulting her to reveal it.

Rena, being attacked by someone she trusts could possibly break down at this point, and to defend herself respond in kind with the whole "you keep secrets from us too". Of course, since some of the conversation or actions taken by Keiichi are hidden from the reader this would lead us to assume that either she is the one that is insane or that she is one of the conspirators...