No case this time. In fact, I think that the nurse from the last episode was the last person to be carried to hell. The last three episodes will probably solve Emna Ai’s problems, and this episode gives a really awesome start. And then to think that we’ve got two episodes left!
This episode basically consists out of two parts. In the first part, Ai invites Tsugumi to the place everything began. She and Hajime take about three quarters of the episode reaching that place, while at the same time they get to know what really went on in Ai’s past, and how exactly she became Jigoku Shoujo. Everything seems to be the fault of a boy named Sentaro, and a ritual named Sending Seven. Our two protagonists stop at a local inn. During the evening, when Tsugumi pays a visit to the local hot springs, Ai suddenly shows up. That really was a scary experience, especially if you combine this with the look Tsugumi had during this visit.
We also see the reason why Ai contacted Tsugumi in the first place: in order to discover what happened to Sentaro, and why she became Jigoku Shoujo. Apparently, she didn’t know this as well. She finds the answer, though. And it’s horrifying. The Sending Seven involved offering a girl at the age of seven, to the gods in order to please them. Ai was this girl. In order to be sacrificed, she needed to be burried alive. She got burried by Sentaro. When Ai finds this out, for the first time in the entire series, she loses her temper.
During the second part of the episode, Hajime and Tsugumi arrive at the place with the Sakura-tree, only to be confronted by an extremely scary-looking Emna Ai. Seriously, when she’s gloomy over the entire series, when she never smiles, or shows any kind of emotion, and then to see her angry like that, truly was SCARY. She didn’t even need to pull the Higurashi-emo-face in order to achieve this.
Her dolls manage to find out in just in time, and manage to temporarily save Hajime and Tsugumi from being sent to hell themselves. At that time, we also find out that Ai’ll be sent to hell herself if she uses her power for her own, personal gain. She then again comes with the statement that she doesn’t care about herself (*shudders*), and she finally manages to avoid her dolls and hit our duo. What happens afterwards? We need the next episode in order to know that.
This episode surely had some incredibly awesome parts. Especially seeing Ai angry for the first time was just absolutely terrific, not to mention if you combine it with her absolute opposite of egoistic type of character. My guess is that the two of Hajime and Tsugumi are the only descendants left of Sentaro, which makes me wonder about Hajime’s parents. Nothing is mentioned about them in the previous episodes, is there? And what is the role of the grandmother?
Ah well, two episodes left. The ending promises to be awesome. It’s just too bad of the irregular releases of the show. Then again, irregular releases have a good point and a bad point. The bad point is that you have to wait so damned long before another episode gets released. The good point is, however, that whenever it’s released, the episode suddenly becomes uttenly incredible. This episode certainly was no exception to this.
In this episode, we find out from the monk, while they’re eating the candy, that Sentaro’s candy store was called Shibataya. Since we already know that Hajime’s full name is Shibata Hajime… Well, this was supposed to be the big first clue. Shivers and all ^_~ I just thought I’d add this because you were asking why nothing seemed to be mentioned about Hajime being related to Sentaro before Ai got all pissed off. Love your blog btw! Hope you read this, I know you wrote this a long time ago.