Jigoku Shoujo Ep 07: Hibiwareta Kamen (The Cracked Mask)

Kurenai Midori, the owner of a theatre group is at a party with her adopted daughter-cum-successor Ayaka when they are greeted by an manager from a talent agency and an upcoming actress Kurushima Kaoruko. Kurushima expresses her interest in Kurenai's new production, "The Actress Detective" before excusing herself. Upon hearing Kurushima's comments, Kurenai reminds Ayaka that she should work harder so as not to disappoint those who are looking forward to the performance.

At night, Kurenai lashes out at Ayaka for being unable to meet her expectations during the practice which leads the other members of the theatre group to wonder if Kurenai adopted Ayaka for the sake of bullying her or to let her be the successor. In the eyes of the onlookers, they pity Ayaka for suffering under the autocratic ways of Kurenai.

Unable to take the torture, Ayaka accesses the Jigoku Tsushin website and types Kurenai's name in it. Ai appears before Ayaka and explains how the system works. Although Ayaka wants to pull the red string on the straw figure, she gets cold feet once she hears that she will go to hell and asks Ai for some time to consider.

Ayaka is sitting at a playground where she thinks over how Kurenai treats her after the adoption and gets so angry that she is prepared to pull the red string. Just then, her friend from the orphanage, Takeshi calls out to her and asks Ayaka for a loan of 100,000 yen. Ayaka gets the idea of getting Takeshi and his gangster friend to kill Kurenai instead of relying on Jigoku Tsushin and sacrifice her afterlife. Ayaka agrees to the loan with a condition which the guys agree readily.

At night when it is raining heavily, Kurenai returns home where Takeshi and his friend barge into the house to ask for money. However, Kurenai knows some self-defence skills and manages to overcome one of them easily. Seeing that the situation will go out of hand, Ayaka steps in and signals at her friends to leave. Unknown to them, Hone-Onna and Ichimoku Ren are sitting on the fence of the house and comment that Ayaka is no simple woman.

Kurenai asks Ayaka bluntly if the robbers are her friends from the orphanage. Ayaka admits that she has been blackmailed by those guys and puts on an act in front of Kurenai. Although Kurenai is sceptical about Ayaka's words, she does not show it and tells the latter to rest since it's very late at night. Meanwhile, Ichimoku Ren says that they have to report this to Ai and Hone-Onna wonders what Ai will do in this case.

Ai sneaks into the theatre group and tries to find out more on Ayaka's background and relationship with Kurenai. One of the members tells Ai that Kurenai adopted Ayaka for her acting skills and the latter is likely to be selected as one of the leads for the new play and take over the theatre group when Kurenai retires.

Just then, Kurenai calls for a meeting where she announces that the young girl role in the play will be taken on by Kurushima Kaoruko. Ayaka is stunned by this development and hates Kurushima to the core for snatching away what should have belonged to her.

Unable to take this lying down, Ayaka confronts Kurenai about this decision who tells her directly that she's not good enough. In addition, Kurenai points out that she has seen through Ayaka's pretence and tells her to stop making a fool of herself. When Ayaka walks past the dance studio, she gets the idea that the role would come to her once anything happens to Kurushima and hatches a plan to get rid of her rival. She then calls Takeshi for help and promises to give him double the original remuneration.

Kurushima is hurt by the tacks placed in her shoes where Ayaka pretends to stand up for her so as to earn her trust. They head for drinks and then to a game arcade. Kurushima wants to go home as it's getting late but Ayaka would not hear of it. Takeshi and his friend then grab hold of Kurushima while Ayaka walks off without a care for her well-being. The guys drag Kurushima to a deserted building and force her to drink some unknown liquid which causes her to lose her voice.

Ayaka is certain that the role will come to her now that Kurushima is unable to speak. However, Kurenai calls for a meeting and announces that she will cancel the performance and disband the group at the same time. Last but not least, she will sever all ties with Ayaka. Kurenai points out that Ayaka is responsible for what has happened so far and refuses to accept the latter's explanation. Being unable to contain her anger, Ayaka scolds Kurenai who tells her that she is doing this for her own good. Ayaka wouldn't hear Kurenai's rationale for doing this and declares that she won't pretend to be a good daughter if she's not getting Kurenai's inheritance.

Ayaka makes up her mind to kill Kurenai via Jigoku Tsushin but is shocked to see the red string missing from the figurine. Ai appears before Ayaka and reveals that she no longer has the right to take revenge on Kurenai. It turns out that Kurushima had accessed Jigoku Tsushin and pulled the string to exact vengeance on Ayaka instead. Ayaka is horrified to find herself on stage where there's an evil face revealing her true thoughts as she tries hard to conceal that. Ayaka then gives up trying to lie and scolds Ai and her associates instead. In the end, Ai sends Ayaka to hell for the misdeeds that she has done...

The major discovery in this episode about the Jigoku Tsushin system would be the fact that the order of when you get the straw figurine is not the determining factor when it comes to the handling of the revenge requests. In this case, Ayaka got her figurine first but Kurushima pulled the string earlier thus resulting in her being the target of revenge. This leads me to think of another issue though. Ai and her associates are well-aware of Ayaka's evil intentions but they probably won't do anything to her unless someone asks them to do so. If Kurushima had not asked Jigoku Tsushin for help, that would probably have meant that Ayaka will get her way and Kurenai will die as a result. As such, justice doesn't seem to be a consideration factor when accepting such revenge requests since the intention of the applicants is what gets Ai and associates moving.

In this case, Kurenai had kind intentions for Ayaka as it's so obvious that she was putting on an act. Even someone like me who knows nuts about acting could have seen through the unnatural behaviour so to a veteran actress like Kurenai, it's impossible to fool her. It's just too bad that Ayaka wasn't able to appreciate Kurenai's efforts and in turn brought about harm to herself.