Discussion Dark Gathering

Episodes: 25 | Source: Web Manga | Genres: Horror, Supernatural, Gore, Shounen​

Synopsis​

Spirits have always been attracted to Keitarou Gentouga due to his strong spiritual presence. A traumatic encounter with one had caused his right hand to be cursed, forcing him to wear a glove at all times. Now a college freshman, Keitarou is trying to live as normal a life as possible. With the encouragement of his childhood friend Eiko Houzuki, he becomes a private tutor. Since he is at the top of his intake class, his first client is the tutoring firm's most promising student, Yayoi Houzuki.

To Keitarou's surprise, Yayoi is Eiko's cousin, and she possesses two pupils in each eye—allowing her to see into the spirit world and purposely seek vengeful spirits to exorcise. Ever since a car accident killed both her parents, Yayoi has been searching for the powerful spirit that kidnapped her mother's departed soul. Seeing that spirits are so attracted to Keitarou, she ropes him into helping her collect other evil spirits that will assist in her future fight. Although her quest is dangerous, Keitarou reluctantly decides to join her, even as each new spirit they meet has him questioning his resolve at every turn.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

 

Episode 1 was good. Started out with some creepy looking girl making vague threats towards what we aren't yet sure of.

We're introduced to the main character Keitarou at this point, making a speech as the highest scorer of the entrance exam. It consisted of him saying he hates the supernatural. Turns out he can see spirits. In middle school he was involved with a nasty one with a friend of his that was also dragged into it. It caused him to isolate himself for two years. With the help of his family and friend Eiko he was able to recover a bit back to some semblance of normal. Eiko pushed him towards applying as a tutor for a school, and it's one she also works for. Keitarou ended up getting assigned to be Eiko's cousin's tutor. The cousin is the girl from the start named Yayoi.

Yayoi has an incredibly high iq and can also see spirits. Thanks to her, Eiko and Keitarou were roped into going to a supposed haunted phone both where a hostess was murdered after she put her customers into debt and ghosted them. It is confirmed to be curse/haunted after Keitarou rang the phone booth. Yayoi threw her doll thing into it to distract it while the group fled.

It's revealed that Yayoi is obsessed with spirits as she's searching for her mother's. Her mother and father died in a car crash when at truck collided with this. Somehow, the crash is what elevated Yayoi's iq so high. Unless I'm wrong, it seems like Yayoi's mother might have been pregnant. Yayoi's version is that some spirit killed/took her mother, but the way it was connected, makes it seem like the spirit's origin was a foetus.

Going back to the phone booth, they were able to deal with it, although it seemed like Keitarou almost was strangled to death before Yayoi saved him. He says he's terrified, but according to Eiko, he gets a thrill at dealing with them.

 

Episode 2 was good. Yayoi wants to go somewhere spooky, but Keitarou already has plans to visit his grandmother, to help with his cursed hand getting exorcised. Yayoi ends up going with Keitarou and Eiko, even thought Keitarou really didn't want it.

When they arrived, it was evident that Keitarou's grandmother wanted nothing to do with Yayoi, viewing her as cursed due to her own supernatural abilities. Under Keitarou's glove, the nerves constantly grow, which is why he wears the glove. The exorcism was successful.

The basement of Keitarou's grandmother is filled with dolls filled with bad spirits. She intended to intimidate Yayoi with the story about them, but she liked it. Yayoi realised that Keitarou ended up in the basement after being possessed and came upon him being attacked by the most dangerous doll. Yayoi saved his life when he was being choked.

Yayoi ended up taking that doll with her, and even repaired it. She also showed Keitarou the collection of cursed dolls she has.

 

Episode 3 was good. After Yayoi asked for Keitarou's fingernails, he got the **** out. He ended up coming back though, because he owes his life to her. When Yayoi and Eiko tried to drag him into another adventure, he left. After leaning that Keitarou can't get rid of the spirit, Yayoi wants to help.

After arriving at their destination, Yayoi ordered Eiko to stay in the car for her safety. She continued alone to the shrine of a goddess, who has takin in lots of souls of the unborn. Even prepared, it almost seems too much for Yayoi.

With Yayoi in the bind, Eiko ran to find Keitarou to help her. At first he was hesitant, but when Eiko informed him that Yayoi was doing this to help him, he caved. After Keitarou got there, he got them all to chase him, before looping back around to get Yayoi and run. Eiko got them out of there quick with the car.

Yayoi shoed Keitarou the room again, this time explaining that each doll has a bit of her in it, such as hair or fingernails, which means, any damage delt to her, goes to the dolls. This keeps them all in check. She also got a finger from the goddess, and had the other spirits in the room attack it to show that it could be damaged. She then made a contract with it.

 

Episode 4 was good. Yayoi picked up the photo that Eiko showed her wasn't of Keitarou's cursed hand, but her own. Keitarou and Eiko were off to start collage, and Yayoi tagged along still being on break. Everyone loves Eiko and she's real popular.

Eiko dragged Keitarou into some creepy urban legends class. The teacher showed an allegedly cursed video, when reviewed, the person watching it would be cursed to die after spontaneously combusting. The video was of a real student that was bullied and made to light himself on fire. Seems that he cursed one of the bullies then moved on, and the current curse was one of the bullies.

With Yayoi's help/plan of forcing it to watch the video to curse itself, Eiko driving and Keitarou sticking his arm out the car so the clothing around his arm can catch fire before being put out, they managed to defeat the spirit/curse.

At the end, Eiko goes into a room she has which has loads of pictures of Keitarou and spirits around him. I guess she can see them after all. She seems almost like a yandere but not quiet, I wonder if her curse is messing her up.

 

Episode 5 was good. Started out with Keitarou trying to make friends. Eiko bought him glasses and some stuff to help out. The reason Keitarou is trying to make friends is to get more of a normal life back, before coming up with a plan to remove the curse from Eiko and himself.

Yayoi caught Eiko red handed stalking Keitarou with her creepy pc/monitoring set up. The glasses she gave him even have a built in camera lmao. This was lucky though, as the male that Keitarou went with, was part of a suicide cult. Each year a student is possessed and then carries out more suicides to sustain itself. It's been going on for a long time with over 100 suicides.

Thanks to the monitoring, Eiko and Yayoi arrived in time to save Keitarou and defeat the spirit, along with saving the lives of the other students.

 

Episode 6 was good. Keitarou, Eiko and Yayoi went camping together. The tents went up without issue, then Keitarou and Yayoi went fishing to try and catch dinner. Unfortunately, they caught everything but fish. Luckily, Eiko was prepared and cooked some bbq up. Keitarou also opened up a bit to Yayoi about him being fearful of the dangers for them all when being involved with spirits, but overall he wants to remove the curse. Keitarou and Eiko also had a nice moment where they kind of confessed to each other. As they were returning to the tents, Eiko spotted a spirit on the bridge, but Keitarou didn't seem to nice it.

When they all slept, a spirit approached and possessed Eiko. It's a spirit that controls people to the bridge then to jumping to their deaths. Thanks to Yayoi's plan, they captured the spirit, but it wasn't just one spirit, but a group of about ten. With some preparation, they evened the numbers up as a single spirit even if strong generally can't take on multiple, as it just gets overwhelmed. Things were bad when Keitarou was in the water with Eiko, as he ended up being dragged under and almost possessed. Thankfully the sacred sake allowed him to break the possession. They were able to triumph in the end. Keitarou and Eiko also grew closer.

 

Episode 7 was good. So it seems that groups of spirits are pretty rare. Spirits are usually alone to stay in the world longer. Some spirits don't know they're dead, or are tied to certain locations. Some also group together due to a bigger thread in the area.

This time, the trio of Keitarou, Eiko and Yayoi went to investigate reports of a spirit in some tunnel. The reports were a little mix, but it did end up being the lady with long hair. Yayoi ended up slamming the gas on the car when they spotted it, to run into it. Spirits may either pass through when struck, pass through the car and end up inside, or get hit. In this case, it was hit. They thought they had captured the spirit then and there, and so Keitarou ended up going home with them not realising the spirit was trailing Keitarou.

Turns out, they captured another spirit and it had fooled them. Keitarou was almost killed, but fortunately Yayoi realised before it was too late and saved him, taking care of the spirit.

 

Episode 8 was good. The new student seems a bit ditsy, but she's nice. Seemingly a gal. When Keitarou is doing some rudimentary testing at a cafe, she really struggles to answer anything correctly. When she called on the waiter, Keitarou noticed a spirit made the waiter crash into her. Ai just wants to show her brother that she can look after herself since he died and hasn't passed on. Ai was soon introduced to Yayoi, and they also got along well. Yayoi seemed to have taken care of the spirit problem.

When Keitarou is sleeping, his dream is invaded by a spirit warning him that Ai's brother will try and kill her. Keitarou wakes up to Yayoi calling his phone, telling him that Ai is in danger. They arrive at the apartment and Yayoi breaks in while Ai's brother is trying to strange her. He ends up ascending. He was seemingly trying to kill her, so she isn't taken and killed by a god spirit, which is said to happen in 4 years when she's 20.

The spirit that Yayoi captured, was the god spirit, and it fought the spirits in her room and broke out. Other strong spirits are coming to Ai's apartment, so they're in a bad spot.

 

Episode 9 was good. Keitarou just ignored the dangerous one that appeared in front of him while he was going to the toilet. He did pretty well holding it together, and rushed back to hurry the girls along. They all took the elevator down and it followed them to outside the door. It seemed like they were in the clear on the lower floor, before it appeared. The spirit dragged Keitarou into the elevator and the girls were trying to pull him away from it, before he shook their hands off to protect them. Yayoi followed him into the elevator and was able to deal with the spirit by restraining it and having the spirit's victims spirits tear it appear while it healed so it was infinitely getting torn apart/healed.

Ai tried to separate herself from Keitarou and the others due to feeling like she got them involved, but they reasoned her away from that line of thought. When they returned to Eiko and Yayoi's home, t hey saw the aftermath the god spirit left from breaking out. Yayoi vowed to take care of it, and it appeared again. All of her spirits want to kill it.

 

Episode 10 was good. The aftermath of the god that is after Ai was brutal. Yayoi wants it to serve them all, gladly. Yayoi drags both Keitarou and Ai out of the room, as the devouring is about to begin. Due to every spirit being damaged along with the power balance, the weaker spirits will be devoured by the stronger ones, so that they can survive and eventually only one remains. The remaining one is called a graduate, and extremely strong.

A spirit somehow made Eiko's phone be rung by "Yayoi" and Keitarou's phone too. If either answered it, they would be dead. Luckily Yayoi captured the graduate before anything bad could happen. So they need to catch more spirits to get another graduate to then be able to catch the god. Currently Yayoi has 5 graduates and will use them to capture every spirit in Japan. She has also killed a god before, although killing is easier than capturing. When they have the god, they will defeat the spectre of death.

Yayoi and Keitarou made their way to an S-rank threat location now. Things seem like they might be bad.

 

Episode 11 was good. Keitarou and Yayoi made it to the Castle H Ruins, their first S rank location. What's special about S ranks, is that every single S rank can keep them in that location forever or curse them forever. Damn. Soon after entering, they meet some creepy old lady, who is used to corroborate different accounts. Yayoi instructs Keitarou to follow her, so they both do. Soon after, Yayoi and Keitarou end up separate, and Yayoi doesn't seem to notice, as she still sees the old lady as Keitarou.

Keitarou was attacked by the spirits and stabbed through the throat, like the spirits of the girls when alive killed themselves in that manner and through themselves off the water fall. He ended up coming back to reality and his doll had also been sliced through the through and he was slightly wounded.

Keitarou ran around frantically looking for Yayoi, just to find her hanging from a noose and goes into full despair. It seems Yayoi isn't dead though.

 

Episode 12 was good. Yayoi didn't die. She fought back against the old lady. She almost was overwhelmed, but Keitarou's shouting snapped her out of it and she was able to overcome the old lady. The Yayoi that Keitarou found was just a fake set by the spirit and it attacked him. The real Yayoi came in and took it out.

With the spirit being incredibly powerful, Yayoi unsealed the high priest of the evil tongue. It sings a sermon which kills those who hear it. Even as teh sermon was in progress, the spirit was trying to kill it, but the thing projecting the sermon kept moving around, so it couldn't be stopped. In the end, the high priest was successful in taking out the spirit so Yayoi could capture it. The priest nearly killed them too, but continuing to do the sermon. Keitarou was barely able to reseal it.

It turns out the spirit had been corrupted by an evil talisman placed in the area, and it is thankful to be out of the position it was in and will aid them. They're onto an even worse place next.

 

Episode 13 was good. Eiko went full creepy on Keitarou again. We also got a peak at some sketchy guys who were the ones to plant the talisman at the Castle H Ruins. They're after using it to bring forth the Seed of the Moonless Dawn, an extremely strong spirit. Eiko, Yayoi and Keitarou are off to another S-rank haunt, the Old F Tunnel

They're picking up another S-rank spirit, one that is already on good terms with Yayoi before proceeding to the tunnel. The spirit is of a man who fought in a war in the South Pacific. Lots of people he killed endlessly trying to tear him down/consume him, but he just regenerates. They're always thirsty, so the group picked up water to prepare along the way.

When they arrived, Keitarou got into a bind by an illusion of sorts and him consuming his water. But Eiko snatched up what the spirit was in before flinging it to Keitarou who sealed it while Yayoi held the other spirits that were trying to consume Keitarou at bay. They were successful.

 

Episode 14 was good. They were straight onto the Old F Tunnel. So there's the New F Tunnel, the Old F Tunnel and the Old Old F Tunnel, which is blocked off. The group was still together before entering the tunnel, when Eiko gave a rundown on why people thought it was haunted. An intruder wielding an axe slaughter an entire family. Some thing people say about the tunnel are: A woman wearing a white kimono, look behind themselves and they'll see a scary ghost chasing them, blood marks on the wall from a truck hitting an old woman, voices coming from within, A curved mirror causing an accident to those that look into it and people going missing.

As they're all outside together, Eiko mentions loosing service and suddenly both Keitarou and Yayoi are gone. She gets spooked by an approaching light but it seems like a nice girl and a content creator. Anna, the girl confirms seeing Yayoi and Keitarou in the tunnel, so she and Eiko agree to go back in. When inside they seem to make it out of the tunnel quickly, only to appear at the start of the tunnel again. When they go in again, they appear at the exit again. When just Eiko goes in, it appears to Anna that she's at the exit, so it's off.

Switching back to Keitarou Yayoi and another Eiko, Yayoi points out something is amiss and Keitarou finally notices that Eiko isn't the real Eiko, but a spirit. Yayoi quickly deals with it and they rush to go to the Old Old F Tunnel to help Eiko. Here, it's revealed that Anna was already killed and Eiko is being attacked by the spirit. Yayoi and Keitarou arrive in time to see the spirit taking Eiko back into the tunnel while baiting them to follow.