...What are you doing? 
It's rare for you to start playing by yourself. 
When did you get a will of your own ? At first, you were just someone who could only nod to my questions. 

......I'm glad. 
Glad to have a younger sister... or perhaps a younger brother? 
I was once nothing, just like you. 
Something that at some point, developed a conscience, then started thinking, and eventually took form. 

I don't find it surprising that you have a conscience. 
Welcome to this boundless yet tightly shut world, my sister. You might be my brother, but as long as I'm not sure, I'll think of you as a sister. 

This place is an endless and limitless world. 
But that doesn't mean it's infinitely large. 

To give you an idea, I could compare it to a small circle. 
Since we keep going around in circles, it's an endless world. 
Which definitely isn't the same as being infinite. 

That's right. In other words, this place is just a closed world. 
The future should be woven from endless possibilities, and yet...our world always ends in "Death". 
One might call this a labyrinth of Fate. 

Going around in circles in the same place again and again makes things too hard to bear. That's why you see people like me. 

...And it still continues, since you were born. Which is why eventually this world may be filled by your sisters. 
This place will become a colony, and the moment when we lose interest in this labyrinth is the moment when we, 'Furude Rika', will surely disappear. 

...Rika still seems attached to this small world.  However, I have long lost interest in it. 
That's why I'm glad I have someone to talk to. 

What have you been doing? 

Trying to put together these fragments of memories? 
You only have five or six. 
But it should bring you some distraction. 

Actually, there were a lot more than these. 
......But they progressively faded into darkness. 
The only ones left intact are these. 
Ah, that's not how you use them. 
Hey, .....see, hold them like this. 

They are all Furude Rika's lives and deaths. 

That is...... ah, that brings back memories. 

The story of the world in which Keiichi was trapped. 

Since I think of these fragments as books, I called this one 'Onikakushi'. 
Do you remember Onikakushi's world? 
...That's the one. That makes it easier for me. 

In Onikakushi's world, darkness took over Maebara Keiichi's soul. 

It was a most unfortunate story; he didn't heed the help his worried friends offered, and he finally beat them to death, still oblivious to their intentions. 

And after that, we were killed, as usual. 
Without having anything to do with his story. 

That one is "Watanagashi". 

The one that got trapped in this world was Sonozaki Shion. 

She went insane, killing a lot of people to avenge her unrequited love who disappeared in 1982 

Rika did all she could though. 

But her frail physique didn't help, so she always ended up captured and horribly tortured to death. 

That's why in 'Meakashi' when things turned out the same, she decided to commit suicide rather than be subjected to torture again. 
This fragment is called 'Tatarigoroshi'. 

......Satoko's uncle came home, took Satoko with him, and locked himself away. 

In a way, it was the unluckiest world. 
A complete dead end, no matter how hard Rika tried. 
If it happens again, I figure it would be best to cry about our lack of luck and just give up on that world. 

Fortunately, her uncle rarely comes back. 
This is 'Tsumihoroboshi'. 

The world where Rika was just in a few moments ago. 

In this world, Ryuuguu Rena was trapped. 
She took all of the class hostage and led a siege. I had fun watching it. 

The most surprising thing was that Maebara Keiichi had memories from another world, just like we do. 

Although such cases are few and far between, I'm sure most people have those memories. 

An 'If' world - "If I had done this, things wouldn't have ended the way they did." 
This deja-vu feeling of having already experienced something you're supposed to be seeing for the first time. 

Everyone has pieces of memories from 'If' worlds, but they cannot sense them. 
That's natural. 

Which is why you may be special, since you are looking at more than one of these fragments of memories. 
It may not be easy for you to realize how special that is. 

After all, you were born in a world where it was considered normal. 
I wasn't born here, but in a simple world. 
I only recently learned how I could play by trying to put together these bricks of memories. 

It took me a long time to realize this, while this is just something you did to keep your hands busy. 
......I'm sorry. 
No matter how much I talk about myself, you won't understand, and it'll probably bore you. 

Yes? What's wrong? What do you want to know? 
.........Hmm? Why did all these things happen, even if the setting was the same? 

*giggle giggle* ...Indeed, that's interesting. 
Do you have an idea? 
Let's think about it. 
Because playing starts with thinking. 

For example, the most remarkable individual among Rika and her friends, Maebara Keiichi. 

In Onikakushi, suspicion and doubt took over him, causing him to kill Ryuuguu Rena and Sonozaki Mion. 
But if that was inevitable, then he should have killed them in the other worlds. 

In other words, it means his crime in Onikakushi wasn't 'inevitable'. 

What is inevitable then...... let's see. 
That is the role of the piece 'Maebara Keiichi'. 

If Keiichi were an extremely paranoid individual who always has a distorted vision of the world, he would have acted the same way in every world. 
But that wasn't the case. 

Though the piece 'Maebara Keiichi' is impulsive and quick to jump to conclusions. 
Judging from his role throughout the different worlds, his actions in Onikakushi were clearly an irregularity. 

Even if something looks inevitable in one world, our experiences from the other worlds can tell us if it is really inevitable or not. 

Looking at it another way, some things that happened in one world also happened in other worlds. 

These are the real 'Inevitables'. 
And these are extremely important. 
If we put together the pieces from the different worlds, the parts in common are the ones closest to the truth. Do you understand? 
Like I said earlier, events that differ in every world might have been inevitable in one particular world, but from a global perspective, they were merely coincidences. 

...The games Sonozaki Mion chooses for her club activities are a good example. 

If Sonozaki Mion had a specific objective regarding the choice of the games, they would be the same in every world. 

But the games are different in every world. 
In other words, Sonozaki Mion randomly chooses her games 'on a whim'. 

This is obvious to us because we can see multiple worlds. 

For someone having memories from a single world, it is impossible to figure whether the games were chosen 'on a whim' or 'according to a plan'. 
Even if they can't understand 'Sonozaki Mion's mind', we can. 

The games themselves may be random, but in most worlds, Sonozaki Mion decides to have club activities after school. 
Which means Sonozaki Mion's 'strong will' is responsible for the choice of club activities. 

What we know is that Sonozaki Mion 'wants to play after school', but 'chooses her games as she pleases'. 
See? 
Even with a few bricks, it's surprisingly easy to know what Sonozaki Mion is thinking when it comes to club activities, right? 

This helps us understand the role of the piece 'Sonozaki Mion'. 

Let's get back to Maebara Keiichi once again. 

To people that only know one world, Onikakushi is simply a world where Maebara Keiichi, overwhelmed for some unknown reason by paranoia, beat his friends to death. 

Even if they search for more, there's nothing else they can find. 
But with all the fragments we have, we can figure something out that they can't. 

What we figured was that it wasn't 'inevitable' that he would kill his friends. 
That's what I told you first. 
At least, amongst the five or six pieces you have in your hands, there is only one world where Maebara Keiichi kills his friends. 

This may be jumping to conclusions, but we could say that there is less than a 20% chance of Maebara Keiichi becoming responsible for a tragedy. 

In other words, it isn't important whether Maebara Keiichi commits a crime or not. 
What else can you find in common...? 
Oh, you understood that already? 
...Well, you were born there after all. 
You're fast to learn how to put those bricks together. 

It took me time. 
......I was born in a normal world, so I could only look at things from a single point of view. 

...I kept focusing on Maebara Keiichi, so I didn't notice. 
Yes, that's right. 
At the very least, there is an obvious thing that Onikakushi, Watanagashi, Meakashi, and Tsumihoroboshi have in common. 
That paranoia got the better of someone, causing them to go insane. 

In all of these worlds, 
Maebara Keiichi, 
Sonozaki Shion, 
or Ryuuguu Rena, let their delusions take over them, and eventually murdered people. 

Maebara Keiichi, Sonozaki Shion, and Ryuuguu Rena are close friends, but they were born and raised in totally different circumstances. 

......They have nothing in common, except for being pieces that appear on the stage in Hinamizawa. 
I said it myself. 
When you look at things as a whole. 
The truth is within repetition, whilst random events don't mean much. 

Which means that all those separate culprits aren't important. 
If we go even further, the crimes themselves have no meaning either. 

Maebara Keiichi beat his two friends to death. 

Sonozaki Shion slaughtered the three heads, and Ryuuguu Rena occupied the school. 

They're all unrelated. They have nothing in common. 
Rather, what is important to notice here is that even if the culprit and the crimes are random, the 'process' that leads to the crime - the paranoia, is exactly the same. 
The culprit is random, yet only the 'process' that leads to the crimes matches.  

This is one of the facts we can draw from the pieces of these different worlds. 
This is a fragment of the truth of the infinite parallel worlds that take place in Hinamizawa. 
Which means that in this setting, there is a Rule X: "A random individual, overrun by paranoia, is urged to commit murder". 
Thus Maebara Keiichi, Sonozaki Shion, Ryuuguu Rena, pieces that seemingly have nothing in common, can possibly be randomly affected by this rule. 

I do not know what the probability is for them to be affected. 

Perhaps there's a principle that dictates this. 
For example, it may be because they are the same age, or it could be because they live in Hinamizawa. 

......To us, 'Furude Rika', who is neither a detective nor a policeman, but just a little girl, there's no way to know. 
But we still managed to figure out that in Hinamizawa, this strange Rule X exists. 
Someone living in one world could never find out. 

I feel extremely happy knowing that....
...But I guess this feels too normal to you. 
Eh? What? 
Yes. The more often something happens, the more it means that there is someone with a strong intent to do it. 
*giggle giggle*. That's what one notices at first. 

......That's right, Tomitake Jirou and Takano Miyo's fates are almost absolutely sealed - they get killed. 

And they always die in the same way. 
...In other words, unlike Rule X's random element, their death is carried out by a strong and thorough will. 

It doesn't match the vague and strange nature of Rule X, of someone being urged to commit a crime. 

Because, regardless of whom is affected by the rule, they always get killed. 

Which leads us to Rule Y: "Every year, Tomitake Jirou and Takano Miyo get killed on the night of the Watanagashi festival." 

*giggle giggle*.... Do you see what is funny about this? 

In Onikakushi, Watanagashi, and Tsumihoroboshi, Tomitake and Takano die, right? 
In each of these worlds, doesn't it look like the main characters of the tragedy come to the conclusion that whoever killed Tomitake and Takano is after them? 
Rule X, that lures them into committing murder, and Rule Y, Tomitake and Takano being killed, seem to be independent, yet all of the victims of Rule X try to forcibly find a link between both rules. 

Although of course, one may say that this is caused by the process of Rule X itself, paranoia making them fear for their lives... 
Do you realise that there are people leading them to try to find a link between both rules? 

That's right. These influential pieces make the Hinamizawa setting a lot more complicated. 

I see at least two people. Do you know whom? 
Correct. 

The pieces named Ooishi Kuraudo and Takano Miyo. 

We can figure Ooishi Kuraudo's role by looking at the fragments we have. 

His retirement is getting close and he is desperate about solving the Hinamizawa murders this year. 
Since he'll have to move from Hinamizawa once he retires, because of his family. 
That's why he wants to solve the case before he retires, no matter what. 
Why is he so attached to the Hinamizawa murders? 

Yes. That's because of the first case, where the dam's foreman was chopped into pieces. 

The victim was a close friend of Ooishi Kuraudo. 
That's what we learnt from Himatsubushi. 

At that time, Ooishi was dealing with the increasingly violent dam protests. 

Ooishi closely followed the actions of the Onigafuchi Defence Alliance, convinced that the Sonozakis were behind all of this. 

He had decided that the Sonozakis were responsible for the Hinamizawa murders, whether he had proof or not. 
And the poor, paranoid victims from each world, finding a detective they thought they could trust, were influenced by his obstinate and biased opinion. 

As a result, the unfortunate victims of Rule X were convinced that the subject of their paranoia had to be the Sonozakis.  

......The most remarkable example is that of Sonozaki Shion. 
That's right. If the piece named Ooishi hadn't done anything, the victims of Rule X might not have ended so horribly. 

One may say his role is to be indirectly responsible for a tragedy. 

Even if I don't know who gave him that name, his nickname, 'Oyashiro-sama's Messenger' is actually pretty accurate. 

Same goes for the other piece, Takano Miyo. 
Takano Miyo is a piece that did research about the suspicious past history of Onigafuchi, and enjoys scaring people by telling them about it. 

By a synergy effect with the Ooishi piece, the unfortunate victims of Rule X are implanted with a dodgy conspiracy theory, where the enemy becomes the Sonozakis, with the rest of the village under their command. 

Takano Miyo had a particularly large influence on Ryuuguu Rena's case. 

Rena, completely overrun by paranoia, was desperately trying to put a name on it, and would have believed anything. She must have been a satisfying prey for Takano Miyo. 

Takano didn't avoid her fate though, and still ended up being killed. 
If she hadn't died and had witnessed Rena's siege, she would have without a doubt been laughing. 

Have you noticed that the roles of the pieces I have just introduced are actually the result of another rule? 

The base that makes the others believe them when they say something. 
This is the highly ironic Rule Z. 

The pieces you have in your hands give a definite answer. 

In other words, whatever happens, the Sonozakis have a tradition of bluffing, pretending to be the culprit. 
In order to appear more influential, the Sonozakis pretend to be responsible for any event that they could use to their advantage. 

Thus, ever since the dam war, villagers started believing that the Sonozakis pulled the strings in the shadows. 

And the victims of this rule are the two pieces - Ooishi Kuraudo and Takano Miyo. 
One may go as far as to say that the whole village is affected. 



When you think of it, 

You even start doubting the existence of the 'Hinamizawa serial murders'. 
*giggle giggle giggle*.... Why, you ask? 
All you have are fragments of memories from 1983, so you don't know anything about the cases that took place from 1979 to 1982. 

It's possible that the interpretation that labels them as serial murders is affected by Rule Z.  Thus people are led to believe that the Sonozakis are responsible for everything that happens in Hinamizawa. 
Which means we may be trying to forcibly explain all of them with one answer, when each case is in reality happening for different reasons. 

We can't know that with the fragments we have here though. 
I think I heard this in some of these fragments. 

That each case has been solved separately. 

I don't know if that's a good or faulty argument, but it might be extremely important. 
Come to think of it, Shion said something interesting in Meakashi. 

Do you remember what she said about a 'curse system'? 
She thought that the true nature of the curse was in the underlying principle that on the night of the festival, "murder is acceptable" if committed against the village's enemies, under the name of Oyashiro-sama's curse. 
There's no way to check her theory since the fragments we have here are all from 1983, but there's an interesting thing about it. 

That is rather than individual culprits committing the crimes, the 'environment' is producing the crimes. 
Let's take for example a robbery -  people that only live in one world want to know everything from how the criminal was raised to the process that led to the crime; but here, we don't. 

It is the same as saying that the 'environment' that caused the robbery is at fault. 
Robber A committed a robbery by chance, but poverty also led to the existence of robber B, or robber C. 

We don't know if 'A' was a criminal in other worlds. 

Thus the true criminal isn't 'A', but poverty, that brought 'A', 'B', and 'C'. 
Well, even someone living in a single world can come to this conclusion. But since making examples is the norm, 'A' will be punished by society, and the person will pretend not to see the 'environment' that produced 'A' in the first place. 
Oh... did I confuse you? 
I'm sorry.

Perhaps that example was harder to understand for you. 
I was born in a normal world, so this sort of example is easier. 
To put in a way you'll understand, of all the tragedies happening in these worlds, the culprit isn't an individual like Maebara Keiichi or Sonozaki Shion. No, the true culprit is 'Rule X'. 

If you know that, even if you don't know the truth behind 'Rule X', it should definitely prove useful. 
And if you come in contact with the three invisible principles that control Hinamizawa: Rules X, Y and Z, 
There is no doubt you'll have an advantage. 

If you understand those rules, even if this is the first world that you experience, it shouldn't be hard finding out the truth. 
See? This is an interesting world, right? 
Those three rules interact, and many different worlds take place in the same setting, Hinamizawa. It almost looks like a kaleidoscope. 

I think this is a very unique case. 
No matter how many worlds you go through in other places, I'm sure there won't be such drastic changes. 

I've seen many different worlds from here, and this is why I haven't grown bored of it yet. 
............Now then, here's the last thing we can learn from those fragments.  
And that is what torments us,  'Furude Rika' , the most. 

Every time, Furude Rika dies without fail. 

June of 1983 has become a dead end. 

And this is not random, but inevitable. 

Which means it acts in accordance with Rule Y - the death of Tomitake and Takano. 

Tomitake Jirou and Takano Miyo get killed on the night of the festival. 

As for Furude Rika, the day itself can vary a bit, but she almost always gets killed in June. 

Since Tomitake and Takano get attacked on the way back from the festival, their time of death probably doesn't change. 

But that's not the case with Furude Rika. 
Every time, she lives differently depending on the events, and thus her actions aren't always the same. 
Which is why the time of the murder is random. 
But just like Tomitake and Takano, since she is always killed in June, there's no doubt that a strong will is at work. 

Thus it's not unreasonable to think that Furude Rika's certain death is caused by Rule Y, just like Tomitake and Takano. 

Then is the culprit killing Furude Rika the same culprit responsible for Tomitake's and Takano's deaths? 
I do not know if the person is the same, but it's highly likely they are both based on the same rule. 

The same individual, or the same group.
The same ideal, or the same objective. 
Rika's main objective is to avoid being killed. 
And that doesn't mean running from the attackers. 

Because she needs to live in the village afterwards. 

And all of her friends need to be alive and well. 
That is Rika's happiness, her hope for an ideal future. 
......For her not to be able to get such a simple wish granted despite trying again and again, we can only call that a tragedy. 

Of course, this tragedy is something that only people like us, who can experience different worlds, can see. 
There's an interesting fact there though. 
Rika is killed most of the time by Rule Y. 

Did you notice that in some worlds, she got killed by Rule X? 
Yes. In Watanagashi and Meakashi. 

In these worlds, although she once committed suicide, her death was caused by Sonozaki Shion through Rule X. 

Which means...... this isn't something that Rule Y had planned. 
Rule Y is based on a strong intent and an objective : killing Rika. 
But Rule X comes in their way. 

This may have had some 'effect' on them. 

It poses no problem to Rule Y if its objective is simply to get rid of Rika. 
But if its plan isn't limited to that, then it must have been a troubling incident. 

Doesn't that mean there is something Watanagashi and Meakashi have in common that other worlds don't have? 
Unfortunately, we, Furude Rika, cannot know what happens after our deaths. 

 ... ... ... ... ... or... can't you tell me ?
Perhaps you know.
I am Furude Rika, so I only know what happens while Rika is alive. 

But you are a strange being that was born in this upper world, which encompasses many parallel worlds. 
Don't you know something? 
That didn't happen in Watanagashi and Meakashi after Rika's death, but that did happen in other worlds? 

If you do, then this is surely...one of the truths behind Rule Y. 

The fragments you have here are mostly focused on the flashy results of Rule X. However, what really controls this Hinamizawa setting is Rule Z, which is the base for Rule X, and judging from all worlds, the clearly 'evil' Rule Y. 
If that's the case, Rika's path is a particularly thorny one. 

To survive, she needs to fight against Rule Y. 
Because as long as she doesn't, she doesn't have a future past June 1983. 
And to get her happiness, she needs to save her friends from the clutches of Rule X. 

Because as long as she doesn't, one of her friends may be drawn into a tragedy. 

Even if she survived past June 1983, it wouldn't be the future she wished for. 
And, just like Sonozaki Shion did in Meakashi, she may need to go against Rule Z. 

Because as long as Rule Z is here, even if tragedy is averted in 1983, it may come back after 1984. 
...It's extremely likely that Rule Z feeds Rule X. 
Because it is indirectly the source of everything. Rule Z has become the foundation of Hinamizawa itself, distorting anything that happens into a curse while holding the Sonozakis responsible. 

The best example being that even if someone dies on the night of the festival, people aren't surprised. 

Rule Z will forever curse Hinamizawa and breed tragedy. 
Rules X, Y, and Z. 
The three locks that forever keep Furude Rika a prisoner of June 1983. 

All three are seemingly impervious. 
In the beginning, we didn't even know that there were three locks. 
Did you understand? 
If you did, congratulations. 
I tried many times, and all of my attempts failed. 
But in Tsumihoroboshi, a miracle happened. 

Maebara Keiichi remembered fragments from another world and defeated Rule X. 

...Although in the end, Rika was killed on that night by Rule Y. 

But we defeated one of the locks. 
It was a remarkable victory. 

At some point, Rika noticed the existence of the three locks, but unable to defeat them, she finally abandoned hope and progressively lost interest in the world. 

...That's how I was born. 
But Rika is now different. 
Keiichi's miraculous knowledge from another world taught her something. 

As long as we have the will to fight, the Rules can be defeated. 

If the Three Rules can be defeated by the end of June 1983...... then Furude Rika will be freed from the eternal prison of her fate. 
But she doesn't have much time left. 

Rika has travelled through many worlds. 
Her body is regenerated each time so she doesn't age, but that's not the case with her mind. 

She is incredibly old compared to those from a normal world, and she's progressively being born as an entity from a higher plane of existence. 
Eventually, she'll be unable to live in single worlds. 

There are already signs of it, but it won't be long before she starts getting confused by her memories from parallel worlds. In the end, she'll become insane, and the mind called Furude Rika will be lost. 
Furude Rika will then disappear. 
In other words, only you and I will be left in this dark world. 

Those fragments of memories we use as toys will gradually fade away...... Then, surrounded in darkness, we'll spend eternity, forgetting about even our own existences. This will be our death. 
Furude Rika has started to realize this. 
That rather than her body, her mind is about to die. 

And Hanyuu's power is also almost gone. 
She can't go back a few years like she could before. 
Her power weakened little by little, and lately she can at best get back a month. 
Actually, her power has even come as low as a few weeks. 
The time they'll be given this time around will probably be less than two weeks. 

This is the story of Furude Rika, trying to defeat the Three Rules in barely two weeks..