Keiichi... isn’t in this volume. No, we’re diving into the past - several years prior to the setting we’re used to. Some familiar faces pop up, but our guide is Akasaka, a Tokyo cop on the trail of a kidnapper. The kidnapping might be connected to a certain dam project... which connects to a certain village... which carries certain... hazards...
Having not read the description of this book before diving in, this certainly was different. I love that this series keeps finding new ways to come at the same set of events. This time we are dropped into the midst of the dam protests the last three arcs referenced and it’s no less interesting despite being a prequel of sorts.
Once again we see the mob mentality of the Hinamizawa villagers, although they’re practically a faceless mass in this portrayal. The ‘us vs them’ mentality of the community is clearer than ever and it shows the lengths they’ll go to when protecting what’s theirs.
Akasaka is an interesting change of pace. He’s more competent than he appears, but he never overcomes the outsider label that Keiichi doesn’t deal with despite the latter being a recent arrival himself. Ironically, the townspeople seem quite suspicious of him and for once it’s completely justified.
Then again, the usual creeping dread is in full effect but the story hardly needs it. With a sickly wife AND a baby on the way, Akasaka only needs to be three days from retirement and he’d be marked for death in ANY story, let alone one that has no compunction tossing people into the hereafter like Higarushi. And he’s just one guy trying to solve a crime that could conceivably involve an entire village.
Another surprisingly engaging part was the mahjong section. I can absolutely not understand mahjong at all, but they convey the stakes, develop the characters, and make it look as tense as any sports manga. It’s simply well done and easy to follow even if you lack familiarity.
If there’s a weakness to this volume, it’s the art. There’s a style to it that I don’t particularly love and even when you get the usual nice-person-segues-to-pure-evil parts, some of them don’t work quite as well as they have previously.
Rika is prominent in this volume, but they haven’t quite done enough with her character this time out. Of the four female leads, she remains the most mysterious as of this volume and flashing to her brutal end at the finale of the last book just reminds us of how much is left to uncover.
4 stars - there’s a real malevolence to this volume, amplified by the characters being in the thick of a protest we’ve only seen in hindsight previously. A lot of this hinges on how the next volume brings it all together, but this was a strong start.