Sagako Outbreak

The Sagako Outbreak (嵯峨子発生, Saga ko hassei) is the outbreak of Sagako Curses that happened during the mid-90s, which was dealt with accordingly by the Saga Sagako Busters.

Summary
During the 80s, a brave legendary girl begins her legendary story and death. ''Another story. The same Saga to save.''

For an onion farmer, an ordinary day turns into a battle to save a cursed Saga.

60s Outbreak
About a decade ago, Tae's parents worked as folklorists at Saga University. One day, her mother found a strange creature, something that looked like a baby. So, they raised and studied the strange creature in their university labs, turning it into some spooky research. Because of that investigation, Tae was spending even more time alone at home. Despite Tae asking them multiple times to stop this project, they continued to investigate this unknown creature.



On Tae's birthday, several people from the health department arrive looking for a strange organism in Tae's parents' house. Tae manages to hide a photo that her parents had with that baby and evades the health workers, whom she hears going to the university where her parents work. Realizing what is happening, Tae quickly runs off to tell her parents while she hears more details about the investigation they are conducting.

When she arrives at the university, there are already numerous guards trying to take the baby from Mrs. Yamada, who tells them that this creature is just a baby. Suddenly, the baby transforms into a huge spider-like Sagako, killing Tae's parents in the process and destroying the facility where they were. Thus giving rise to the birth of the first Sagako.

Mid-80's
Now an orphan, she is taken in by Jofuku, who trains her to combat these curses and prevent them from claiming the lives of more people. He is very overprotective of Tae and this makes their relationship gradually weaken.

Years later, Tae meets Yuko during a battle in some desolate part of Saga. Yuko is willing to help Tae combat these curses and the two grow closer, even working together a few years after they met. To improve the effectiveness of the group, they search for new members along with Hanako and manage to attract Anna, who mysteriously showed up in Saga. Although they don't know anything about her past life, the new member was an excellent support for the group by fighting the Sagakos intelligently.

Onions and Curses
Eikichi Hyodo works on the family farm after suffering a shoulder injury that prevents him from playing baseball and keeps him away from his friends. His twin sister, Yuko Hyodo, helps him harvest the family crop and mentions how important onions are. Yuko works as an exorcist for a girl group called the Saga Sagako Busters, who deal with the curses that plague Saga constantly. Unfortunately, during one of these battles, Yuko finds herself weak and is sealed with a Sagako inside an onion. Now it will be her younger brother's turn to combat these curses.



After being kidnapped by the group and forced against his will to fight these curses, Eikichi gradually gains the power “Misogi” that allows him to properly seal these curses. The curse grows more powerful every day, increasing the power of the Sagako. With the introduction of Jofuku back to the group, he reveals to Eikichi part of the truth behind the Sagako. A curse that was born hundreds of years ago as a result of seeking immortality. The Sagako are manifestations of the curse that seek the destruction of Saga.

A false alarm of human possession by Sagako causes the party to accidentally attack Takeo Go, thinking it was one of these curses. However, they were not that far from reality, since in his school there is a Sagako that affects students who want to confess. Takeo is about to give up on his attempt to confess to Sachika, but thanks to the efforts of the Busters, he manages to confess to Sachika. This relationship would lead to the birth of Lily Hoshikawa years later.

A mysterious man
The peace of the group is about to be disturbed by a Tokyo police detective, Keiji Higashino, who comes to Saga upon being demoted from his detective position and sent to the middle of nowhere. He meets Anna, a former fugitive whom he used to track down possible robberies in Tokyo several years ago. While their meeting is somewhat abrupt and unexpected, he finds something better in the “empty” Saga.



With Higashino on the loose in Saga, the group of Sagako Busters knows that he could get in trouble with the Sagakos and affect the operation to seal all the Sagakos. Although they decide to split up to search for Higashino, this operation ends in failure when he brutally beats Eikichi out of action. Keiji continues with his plan to investigate the Sagakos and see what kind of creatures they are. He comes to the conclusion that these beings are not life forms, but supernatural beings, just as Anna had previously told him. He decides to carry out a test by launching a Sagako at the border with Fukuoka. With this experiment, he comes to the conclusion that these beings are only limited to Saga because the Sagako explodes shortly after leaving the prefectural border.

Keiji makes a deal with Magatsuhi, who offers him to fulfill a wish that he wants in exchange for eliminating all of Saga's Sagakos to regain her old powers. When she finally regains her former power, she destroys the Busters' house by manifesting inside their mansion. The giant spider that killed Tae's parents decades ago is back. Higashino approaches Magatsuhi for her to grant his wish, but she seems to have no intention of granting it to him. Higashino threatens her, but is killed by Magatsuhi, since she found him useless. Tae tries to fight the Sagako, but she is quickly defeated, but not before leaving her badly injured.

The First Sagako
After the giant spider manifested, no sightings of Sagako have been reported. On the other hand, the cases of missing women in Saga are on the rise. The Busters have to find a home in the Hyodo house while they recover.



The Saga Sagako Busters recover and go searching for the elusive giant spider, which disappeared after manifesting. They reach the Takeo Mountains, where they split up to search for the spider. Anna and Hanako are kidnapped by Magatsuhi when they mistake her for a missing girl, leaving Eikichi and Tae alone. They go to seek police help with Araki to get further details about the disappearances; however, he refuses to help if they are going to involve Sagako in the investigation. On their own, Eikichi and Tae begin to investigate and realize that the cases of missing women occur in prosperous or tourist places, so they decide to set a trap for the Sagako.

To accomplish this, they go to Arita Porcelain Park, where Eikichi disguises himself as a woman to attract the Sagako's attention. The Sagako takes the bait and kidnaps them and brings them to the Takeo Ureshino Marchen Mura Village Amusement Park. Tae and Eikichi wake up in the park, where they see the kidnapped women asleep. While going through the park, they find a sinister playground in the statue of a squirrel. There, Tae finds a photo of her parents, and that is where she realizes that the girl is just another form of the spider Sagako.



Eikichi pitches the idea to Tae of talking to the Sagako, and though she initially refuses, she says it's something Yuko would do. Suddenly, the spider manifests and attacks them both. Tae defends herself against her attacks and manages to hurt her, immobilizing her for a while. Eikichi, wounded by the attack, speaks to the Sagako about her motives, who responds unintelligibly. In one last attempt, he gets up and shows him an onion, confusing and scaring the spider, causing her to attack them again. To their surprise, Anna and Hanako arrive at the location, along with the previously sealed Sagakos on their side. It turns out that the blanket Eikichi had put on them made them hatch like an egg. Now, it's time for the final battle.



The Busters and Sagako battle the spider, who takes the form of a giant heart with Magatsuhi at the top. No matter how much damage they do to her, she seems invincible. The remaining Sagakos are destroyed by this new form of Magatsuhi. Hanako prepared a Sagako anti-spider cannon that manages to hurt the Sagako, but also damages the team. Eikichi then gives part of his Misogi's power to Tae, thanks to Yuko. Tae receives the power and asks Eikichi to scale the heart to the top. Upon reaching the top, Tae touches Magatsuhi and realizes her motives; she's a curse looking for her mother. Just as Tae always wanted with her parents. Realizing the reasons for this curse, Tae decides to sacrifice herself. Forgiving herself and accepting Magatsuhi to seal the curse within her own body.

By 1994, 5 years after the Sagako outbreak, no Sagako have reappeared and Saga is once again at peace. Tae, on the other hand, received the curse on her body and died in the process. Saga has been saved from the Sagako. But the curse is still out there.

Sequels
The Sagako outbreaks take place 3 decades before the events of the anime, and thus there are still people in Saga who remember the times when the Sagakos roamed the prefecture and spread stories about them. This explains why almost everyone who sees the girls in their zombie states immediately classifies them as monsters. As for the various reactions to the supernaturalness of the girls, that could depend on the age of the characters.

Policemen and rappers, who were young adults, would not have existed when Sagako were prevalent, yet they would have heard stories of monsters attacking people in Saga. When a group of reanimated corpses move around at night, naturally their reaction would be: to get scared.



In the second episode, the audience in Saga's castle hardly reacted to Tae's head falling, which could be attributed to special effects. However, since they would have been old enough to live in Saga when the Sagako were prevalent, they may have recognized Franchouchou as something supernatural. Clearly, the Franchouchou girls weren't hostile, with Tae's head only eating the squid and not chasing after the humans. Thanks to Sakura and Saki's performance inspiring them to make the most of their lives with their rapping, they decided not to make a fuss about it.



The Hisanaka Pharmaceutical Company Manager in the bathhouse, like the old ones, would have been living in Saga during the Gaiden manga. Unlike the old men who would see the girls in a more neutral setting at a performance, the lady of the company had the misfortune to see the girls at night with them, apparently acting hostile (yelling and chasing her). The fact that the bathhouse was apparently the previous site of a Sagako attack, as depicted in Gaiden's manga, would only have reinforced the escort lady's fear that these “beings” were clearly malevolent.



Then there's Maimai, who immediately recognizes the girls as zombies and accepts them. Like the policeman, she would have heard stories of supernatural monsters prowling Saga. Unlike the policeman, who had no idea who these zombies were, Maimai recognized them as Franchouchou and, being a fan of them who had been regularly attending their concerts, she wasn't afraid of them; it also helps her that she wasn't wearing her glasses, so she couldn't clearly see their zombie forms, which made them look less hideous.



Finally, the children at the shelter did not believe that Franchouchou were real zombies at all. Ironically, compared to the older characters, being young children, they would not have existed when Sagako existed in Saga and their families might have avoided telling stories about Sagako to avoid scaring them. Not knowing that real monsters like zombies could exist outside of fiction, they wouldn't be scared. Like Maimai, they would have gotten used to Franchouchou so as not to see them as a threat. Furthermore, the zombie reveal takes place during a performance, making it easy for Franchouchou to pass her off as zombie makeup.

Trivia

 * Sagako's outbreaks intensified proportionally to the more known Saga. The economic bubble of the late 1980s that greatly affected Japan's economy also positively affected Saga, and since the power of the curse also depends on the prosperity power of the prefecture, it eventually gained enough strength to manifest itself in physical form.
 * Both the prosperity and the curse gained a lot of power after Franchouchou's revenge concert and thus, the supernatural phenomena in Saga became active again. In this way, the curse would have manifested new beings that would attack Saga.