<Regarding the Houjou Family>
There are two victims each year with regards to the Oyashiro-sama's curse. This has continued for four years so far, and the toll is now at eight victims. It is interesting to note that half of the victims have the Houjou surname.
*On the 2nd year's curse, the dam supporter Houjou himself died by falling off the cliff, and his wife's body is yet to be found. (Decalred legally deceased the following year on the basis of perilious disappearance).
On the 4th year of the curse, the foster mother/aunt of the two Houjou siblings died, and the son of Houjou went missing.
The Houjou family was rather poor, and it was hard to say that Houjou's job was going well. He had planned find a new job elsewhere with the help of his relatives and to move to his own mother's birthplace. Under their financial situation, the large compensation money offered by the government for eminent domain and relocation expenses for the Hinamizawa Dam Project would've been a very big help to Houjou.
Hence, Houjou dealt with the Ministry of Construction from the beginning, and lead the group that supported the dam construction proposal. It is rumored that he may received some backdoor funds from the Ministry of Construction for this, but this has yet to be proven.
However, the dam supporters made up only a small minority. When the Sonozaki family began to plant strong ground against the dam project, every dam supporter except for Houjou defected over to the anti-dam group. As a result, all of Hinamizawa was bounded strongly against the dam construction, and Houjou became an object of attack for supporting the dam. It is safe to say that he became a scapegoat in order to strengthen the anti-dam alliance.
In the end, the dam project came to an indefinite hiatus with the first Oyashiro-sama's curse;
the Hacking-Mutilation Murder case.
However, the retaliation towards to the enemy of the village that supported the dam construction continues to this day... There is no one left today that supported the dam project, lest people which had a negative image upon the villagers. The remaining candidates would then be of the following:
- Houjou Teppei, the husband of the victim that was beaten to death last year.
- Houjou Satoko, the daughter of Houjou.
Strangely, the last remaining candidates is also two. Will this year's curse befall upon these two...?
It will be worthwhile to pay close attention and observe these two....