At the baseball playing ground, Hanakasa the school ace pitcher is in the midst of practice when girls are screaming to get his attention and professional scouts come to observe his performance. Fellow team members Iwashita and Muroi are marvelling at his abilities and popularity and wish that they could be like Hanakasa.Unknown to everyone, Hanakasa uses his position in the team to carry out physical abuse against the other members. He beats up Muroi with a baseball bat and forces Iwashita to send Muroi home. Hanakasa even wants Muroi to hide this matter from everyone and claim that the injuries were caused by a fall due to his carelessness. Iwashita wants to voice his objection with regards to Hanakasa's actions but Muroi stops him. If this gets around, not only will Hanakasa be held responsible, the team will have to be suspended from the tournament. For the sake of the team, Muroi chooses to keep quiet like the others but Iwashita is still indigant over letting Hanakasa have his way just because he's the ace pitcher.
When Iwashita sends Muroi home, the latter's mother scolds Iwashita for pushing her son down while they were fooling around. As Iwashita promised Muroi to keep the beating a secret, he can only apologise while Muroi tries to convince his mother that this is not intended.
However, Muroi dies as a result of those injuries thus Iwashita tells Hanakasa to own up to his wrongdoing. Hanakasa can't be bothered about this and dares Iwashita to expose him if he has the proof. He reminds Iwashita to be more concerned about his own situation which leaves the latter bewildered.
Iwashita goes to attend Muroi's funeral where the police questions him for pushing Muroi down. According to the autopsy report, Muroi had died of injuries caused by beatings from a bat so they wish to find out more on this matter. Just then, Muroi's mother rushes out of the house and accuses Iwashita of murdering Muroi. Despite excruciating pain on his deathbed, Muroi still said that Iwashita was innocent. Iwashita gets angry at Hanakasa who is putting on an act in front of Muroi's altar but his father grabs hold of Iwashita and beats up him. Iwashita's parents apologise to Muroi's family as if they believe that Iwashita had killed Muroi. This makes Iwashita realise that nobody will listen to him thus he runs away before the police can arrest him.
Iwashita returns to the school and uses the computer to access Jigoku Tsushin at midnight so as to take revenge against Hanakasa. Ai appears in front of him and explains how the procedure works after giving him the straw figure with the red string.
The baseball team is banned from taking part in the tournament as a result of Muroi's death. Iwashita calls Hanakasa out and wants him to admit to his deed. However, Hanakasa refuses to do so since nobody will believe Iwashita anyway and he doesn't feel guilty about killing Muroi. He even remarks that thanks to Muroi and Iwashita, he won't have to take part in the tournament so that he can rest well for his professional career. This proves to be the last straw as Hanakasa is admitting that he deliberately caused trouble in order to get the team suspended. Iwashita takes the plunge by undoing the red string which sets Ai and her team into action.
At night after a discussion with the scouts, Hanakasa is left alone in the playing ground. Just as he is feeling thrilled at the possibility of being a professional player, he hears chants of him being a murderer and is shocked to see the surroundings change. He is treated to a game of horror baseball but he still refuses to admit to his mistake. As such, Ai sends Hanakasa to hell as per Iwashita's wishes...
After Hanakasa's disappearance, Iwashita decides to transfer to another school so as to get over the entire episode. However, he knows that it will be some time before he can do so...
Actually, among the "baddies" in Jigoku Shoujo so far, this really got me quite irritated because I couldn't help but feel like strangling Hanakasa who thought he could get away with anything just because he is talented. Being at the top in a particular area doesn't give anyone the right to gain something at the expense of others. Besides, he was unrepentant about causing someone's death so he really deserved to be sent to hell. I just feel sorry for Iwashita who has to live with the blame and that he will go to hell once he dies. He wasn't in the wrong, neither was Muroi. Both were just victims in this game of manipulation played by Hanakasa.
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