After recently moving to the rural village called Hinamizawa, Maebara Keiichi joins a club and makes new friends. He soon learns about the village's dark secret, Oyashiro-sama's curse, where one person dies, and one person disappears every year, and he also learns that his friends might be behind it...

After moving into the quiet town of Hinamizawa, Maebara Keiichi spends his days blissfully in school often playing games with his local friends. However, appearances can be deceiving. One fateful day, Keiichi stumbles upon news of a murder that had occurred in Hinamizawa. From this point on, horrific events unfold in front of Keiichi, as he soon learns his close friends may not be all that they seem. Based on the amateur mystery game by 07th Expansion, the story is told in a series of different scenarios. 

After moving into the quiet town of Hinamizawa, Maebara Keiichi spends his days blissfully in school often playing games with his local friends. However, appearances can be deceiving. One fateful day, Keiichi stumbles upon news of a murder that had occurred in Hinamizawa. From this point on, horrific events unfold in front of Keiichi, as he soon learns his close friends may not be all that they seem. Based on the amateur mystery game by 7th Expansion, the story is told in a series of different scenarios. 
Onikakushi is the first in a series of manga following the different scenarios of the Higurashi games. It focuses on Maebara Keiichi's arrival to Hinamizawa.

By this chapter, the reader should have an overall idea of how life in Hinamizawa is like. Once again, this chapter begins innocently, with the Watanagashi Festival again marking the start of the sinister events in Hinamizawa. An ancient curse strikes, and a pair of sisters are not what they seem. Shion Sonozaki makes her first appearance in this chapter, while Mion Sonozaki is portrayed as the villain.

In the recesses of mountain... there's a bus stop at outskirts of a village, it's called "Hinamizawa bus stop". Rika, a female high-school student, together with her junior, Mion visit this place. Twisted relationships that are concerned with the dam construction in Hinamizawa, and the stories of the curse of "Oyashiro-sama" that takes root in this area. What waiting for them is a tragedy, or else...? 
This manga adapts Hinamizawa Teiry&#363;jo, the unreleased stage play that Ryukishi07 wrote and eventually tranformed into the Higurashi no Naku Koro ni game/anime/live-action franchise.

Taisho year 12 (1923). A tragedy occurring in Hinamizawa changes the fate of a lone girl and her friends. The turbulent early life of Oryou, head of the Sonozaki family, one of the Three Great Families, who would later be feared and known as Empress Sonozaki. A missing link connected to the original Higurashi story revealed now.

Kataribanashi-hen is an anthology, illustrated by several artists. The stories are fanfictions, submitted for Higurashi no Naku Koro ni Awards.

It’s an “Higurashi no Naku Koro ni” anthology series, released by Softgarage.
 
The volumes contain the following chapters:
 
Volume 1: (2005/7/29)
 
#Cover illustration: Ikegami Akane 
1. #Illustration: Azuma Yuki 
Cherish: Anata wo Aishete (Cherish〜あなたを愛して〜) by Majika 
2. #Illustration: KAhara Nanami 
"Shoseiki" no Nazo wo Abake! (「諸世紀」の謎を暴け！) by Yotsuya Masamune 
3. #Illustration: Uchimura Kaname 
Hasami wa kami awazu, shikashi surudoku kirisaku (鋏は咬み合わず、しかし鋭く切り裂く) by Yagami Keiichirou 
4. #Illustration: Izumi Rei 
Hito Oni (人鬼) by Touya Rizuki 
5, #Illustration: Nanami Ayame 
Ooishi Keiji no Sousa Memo (大石刑事の捜査メモ) by Moriyasu Hiroya
 
Volume 2: (2005/11/14) 
#Cover illustration: Kyourin Takanae 
#Illustration authors: Takatori Umi, Takehito Mizuki, Mori Keiji, Amou Mari and Maruchan..
 
Volume 3: (2006/2/15) 
#Cover illustration: Azuma Yuki 
#Illustration authors: Izumi Rei, Uchimura Kaname, Nanami Ayame, Azuma Yuki Nanami Kahara.
 
Volume 4: (2006/5/25) 
#Cover illustration: Kyourin Takanae 
#Illustration authors: Takatori Umi, Takehito Mizuki, Mori Keiji, Amou Mari and Maruchan..
 
Volume 5: (2006/8/25) 
#Cover illustration: Ikegami Akane 
#Illustration authors: Azuma Yuki, Uchimura Kaname, Kirishima Riona, Kahara Nanami and Suihei Kiki.
 
Volume 6: (2006/11/24) 
#Cover illustration: Kyourin Takanae 
#Illustration authors: Takatori Umi, Takehito Mizuki, Mori Keiji, Amou Mari and Maruchan.
 
Volume 7: (2007/2/23) 
#Cover illustration: Ikegami Akane 
#Illustration authors: Izumi Rei, Uchimura Kaname, Riona Kirishima, Kahara Nanami and Chiha Ayami.

The story is set in a middle school in Shishibone city. Tomohiro Miyajima, the main character of the story, and his group of friends are busy studying for an exam. One day, in search for a thrilling mystery as well as easy money, they take several donation boxes and fabricate a curse to scare everyone: "Ohone-sama's curse". After scrawling 骨 (bone) all over the chalkboards and spreading rumors of the curse, the donation boxes are quickly filled and the curse becomes a major legend of the school. Of course, only Tomohiro and his friends knew the curse was fake. It wasn't possible for anything to happen. 
 
That is, until they receive a donation of 50,000 yen and a letter to go with it, reading: "Please curse Tanashi Miyoko" 
 
Immediately after that letter, bullying and crimes in the school escalated, strange incidents occur, and Tomohiro and his friends are left with a much bigger mystery than they wanted to have, that they are forced to investigate by themselves. What happened shouldn't have happened. Those who are alive should not be alive, those who know what they know shouldn't have been able to know, and familiar faces are hardly what they seem, but why? And how?
 
Note: First released as a novel, it was later one released in a LN label.

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