In response to your final suggestion If his actions were being affected by the curse, he'd be behaving exactly the opposite, so that isn't an excuse that holds up here.

The only thing I can really say in defence of his character is that he is by nature, extremely desperate to trust his friends, sometimes making decisions that don't make sense to them, or even hurt them, in his hysteria. The series will come to show this, especially in the next chapter, in which there are three times where he makes illogical decisions because of trust, one of which is similar to following Mion through the forest.

the part where he blatantly forgets her warning, and eagerly meets up with her outside the house is a little bit ridiculous, no matter how you look at it. Maybe he was half asleep?

I understand where you guys are coming from, saying that the protagonist Keichi wants to trust his friends to a fault. I think he also wants to find the truth behind the mysteries and murders, even when he's warned multiple times to drop it. Indeed, his last words were again a plea for anyone listening to simply find the truth behind the incidents.

Well, there is also the fact he didn't see the murders taking place in the first place, that still matters a lot, combine that with trusting a friend and it can works pretty bad. The story with the demon controlling her made him way too incautious, yeah. As said, the night scene can be explained by the fact he just woke up.
And don't forget he was much more lucid in the epilogue about accusing Mion.

Power of friendship. That's all you need to know.

I actually think that in this chapter, unlike the first chapter, Keichi was less confronted by mystery and horror.
In the first chapter, it all goes south once Tomitake dies, followed by Rena's crazy 'LIES!!!!!' which was terrifying.
I think that because in this chapter he was given much more details about the murders, unlike in Onikakushi, made it more bearable for him. There's mystery in the second chapter, but it's much more subtle. Throughout the first chapter, Keichi really doesn't know if it's people or demons responsible for that. In the second chapter, all evidance lead to the fact that it was humans who did it. The more details he has, the less mysterious it becomes. The less mysterious it is, the more it becomes comprehensable for Keichi.
I think it's just the almost completely different setting that made Keichi act differently then in Onikakushi.

I actually think Keiichi's actions are perfectly plausible. Sure, they're not the most rational, but they make perfect sense for him in this context. Now if you *want* the characters to be making completely rational and productive decisions, then sure, I can understand being frustrated.

I thought he was losing it at the end.Not being able to accept the reality.Especially evident for me in his last talk with Rena.While scenes before that could be attributed to him trusting in you-know-who to overcome their split-personality/possesion/curse/whatever by not blaming or lashing out on them,after that-he's clearly quietly going insane.Which is not at all surprising,all things considered...

Originally posted by MindfulOcean:

I really enjoyed the first chapter, and I actually thought the story in this chapter was even better. But the behavior of the MC at the end of the chapter was so ridiculous I couldn’t believe what I was reading. After confronting Mion and learning that she was directly responsible for all of the murders, he is still supportive of her, still cares for her, and lets her lead him away into the forest, away from Rena and away from help. I can understand still loving someone even after they do something horrible, but did he not notice that she wasn’t sorry for what she did? Did he forget that he was also one of the people Mion was targeting?

The scenes in the dungeon were even worse. Shion was screaming at him and trying to warn him of the danger, and he just calmly tells her everything will be all right. Even after Mion subdues him, he still thinks what’s happening isn’t happening. And throughout the entire ordeal, both before he confronts Mion and afterwards, he thinks what’s going on his is somehow his fault. Uh, no it isn’t. Not even close. The fact that Mion and Rena both support this notion that part of what happened is his fault is ludicrous.

But the final confrontation with Mion (or Shion, or her ghost, or whatever) is WAY worse than the rest of it. He is actually happy to see his murderous, torturous friend again, and skips straight down to meet her, even though she gave him advance warning of her intentions during their last encounter. Nobody, and I mean nobody, is that stupid. And how can anyone survive getting stabbed in the stomach with a meat clever and being left to lie there all night without receiving medical attention?

Higurashi is a horror novel, and I appreciate the fact that characters in horror stories have to be naïve and make obvious mistakes in order to build tension and move the plot along. But what happened at the end of the story was just too much. Am I the only one who felt this way after reading the story? I’ll take these complaints back if there turns out to be a good explanation (like him secretly being drugged, or his actions being dictated by the curse ).

With you all the way. His behavior was ludicrous. When he died again, I was like "Oh well." He deserved it for being such a moron.

I was *disgusted* by the ending. I had to take a break and go breathe some fresh air, because I was literally shouting at my screen and the neighbors will think I'm losing it here.

Now, unbelievably incompetent protagonists seem to be a recurring trope in Japanese VNs. Not exactly certain why. Are they meant to make the player feel good about themselves, by comparison? They just frustrate the heck out of me. I want to be able to relate to the person through whose eyes I experience the story.

Frankly, I wish they made Ooishi the protagonist. The man is the sweetest, smartest, most principled, hard-working, skilled with people ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ around, and all he gets for his efforts is attitude and negative commentary. Keichi should be so honored that this detective was sharing insider, classified info with him, trusting him completely for some reason I don't entirely fathom, and all he does is be an uncooperative brat, for no particular reason.

As for the deal with Mion, I think there's two things at play here. The Japanese are big about "gender roles" and stuff. If Mion was male, can you IMAGINE this scene being written, with this shocking degree of leniency? Course not. But she isn't, so Keichi has to white knight and excuse all her faults away. So what if a bunch of children were tortured and murdered. Girls are angels.

They are also suckers for "tradition". Implicit in that scene is that "That's just the way things are done here, this is my role - which I HAVE to fill because clans and families and feudalism. You don't get to question the tradition. You don't get to stray from your role. So, don't responsibilize me. I'm just following (implicit) orders."

That's what I make of it. It's really ♥♥♥♥♥♥ up, no doubt.