Tousei Ryuuzaki

Shadow Priestess Character Tousei Ryuuzaki "Don't you want to go check it out?" Kanji/Kana 龍崎冬星 Alias — Occupation Supernatural Photographer Status Alive Cause of Death — First Appearance Chapter 1

Tousei Ryuuzaki is a character in Fatal Frame: Shadow Priestess. He is a 25-year-old supernatural photographer who has an interest in Sara Washizuki.

Background

Tousei is the older brother of Kanon Ohtori. After their parents were divorced, he moved to Tokyo with their mother. His father was a photographer and the co-founder of the photography club at Karasawa Elementary, and Tousei also had an interest in photography as a boy. He visited Karasawa Elementary to see Kanon's school sports day and take pictures of her. However, taking a picture of Sara, the Shadow Priestess, awoke some latent power in him, allowing him to capture images of the future in photographs. After he took a picture of Kanon and Sara, every other photo on the roll of film showed the seminar group and Moebius exploring Karasawa Elementary ten years in the future. Sara finds these photos displayed in the darkroom and guesses their origin, but has only vague memories of the boy who took them.

After Kanon's disappearance, Tousei kept searching for her. His new spiritual sensitivity manifested only through the photographs he took, so he became a supernatural photographer. Years after Karasawa Elementary had been closed down, he made another visit to the school to investigate, and captured an image of Kanon in the swimming pool.

Shadow Priestess

At the beginning of the manga, Tousei arrives at Fujisawa University and asks Professor Koutari where to find Sara. When he meets Sara and Beniko in the library, he shows them several spirit photos, including the one of Kanon. He encourages Sara to return to her elementary school to find out the truth about what happened to her friend, and reveals that he knows she is the Shadow Priestess. He leaves the photos with Sara and tells her to think about it.

After their meeting he appears to be following Sara around and taking pictures. He is outside Beniko's apartment while Sara is exorcising a spirit with the Camera Obscura inside, and also at the station when the modern architecture seminar group is leaving for Karasawa Village.

When the group arrives at the village shrine, they find his car already there. Mr. Koutari recognises him from before, and Tousei says that when he heard about the class's overnight trip, he decided to follow them and do research. He responds with good humour when Mr. Koutari calls his photographs fake, and Mr. Koutari agrees that he can tag along as long as he causes no trouble.

Mr. Koutari and the rest of the group are making their way to greet the inn owners when Sara notices a ghostly hand emerging from a water trough. Tousei quickly takes a photograph of it, and remarks that it seemed to be trying to help Sara. When she registers surprise that he can apparently see spirits, he admits that he can only see them through a camera lens.

After Kumi Suzumori goes missing, the group find a Sanskrit character on the wall of the bathhouse, formed from hair. Tousei quickly takes some photos of the room, and in the developed images, the bath is filled with hundreds of black snakes. At Karasawa Elementary, Tousei helps Sara rescue Narumi from a spirit that tries to drag her down into one of the old-fashioned pit toilets.

While exploring further, they meet the urban exploration group Moebius. Both groups head to the pool together, but almost immediately, a girl is spirited away, and as a sudden darkness falls, many dead spirits begin to emerge from the water. Everyone scatters, and Sara, Beniko and Tousei end up with the remaining members of Moebius, separated from the rest of the architecture class. Tousei continues to show an unusual degree of knowledge about Sara, much to her discomfort: he tells everybody that she is the Shadow Priestess, and even reveals that Sara's mother attended Karasawa Elementary, and was president of the photography club. Following Tousei's suggestion, Sara agrees they should make a point of looking for the club room, as well as locating the keys to the Dark Seal in the twelve cardinal directions, but she begins to suspect that Tousei is the necromancer.

While Tousei, Sara and the others continue to explore and search for clues, they are approached by two evil spirits who appear not to be affected by the Camera Obscura. Tousei takes a picture with his own camera, which reveals that the ghosts are in fact Narumi and Jun, disguised by the necromancer's illusion. Sara uses a Spirit Stone Flashlight to dispel the illusion, but not before using up most of her film on the two false spirits. This makes it a matter of urgency to find the Photography Club room; fortunately, at this moment they are rejoined by Professor Koutari, Midori, Mozu and Tsugumi, who happen to have a map of the school, so they can go there right away. Sara warns the others to control their fear, or they will become more vulnerable to the ghosts' illusions.

At the end of Chapter 21, it is revealed to the reader that Tousei is not the necromancer. In fact, the necromancer considers Tousei a threat, since his camera might be able to reveal their true identity. However, Sara's suspicions reach a tipping-point when it is revealed that everyone in the group has some connection to Karasawa Village. She angrily confronts Tousei, asking how he knows so much about her and what his role is in everything that has happened. He tells her that she will know soon, but if he tells her now she will be unable to keep calm. Before Sara can question him further, the ghosts attack again, using an illusion to separate her from the rest of the group.

Tousei's group continues to wander the school, plagued by hostile spirits and illusions. Their hope is rekindled when Tousei finds empty boxes for strobes and film on the floor, and concludes that Sara has been able to replenish her supplies. Rather than trail around helplessly searching for her, however, he decides that they should take a proactive approach to investigation, try to solve the Necromancer's riddles and hope that their paths will eventually cross. He mentions that he and Sara both have a benevolent spirit - Kanon - wishing to help them.

This is confirmed when he, Midori and the Professor follow one of the clues to a statue in the school courtyard. Kanon's hands emerge from a nearby puzzle to point them in the direction of clues they have missed. Tousei confesses to the others that she was his sister, and he has been searching for her ever since she disappeared. With Kanon's assistance, he finds a buried box with a very old library card inside. All the remaining survivors meet up at the library, the location of the final puzzle. Tousei notices that in the final entry on the library card, the book was checked out but never returned, and guesses something significant must have happened on that date; this guess leads the group to a news article about the disappearance of Suzume Umishima in 1936.

Tousei's spirit photos reveal that Suzume was murdered by the school principal and buried under the foundations of the school, in the area that would eventually become the library. While helping Tousei develop the pictures, Sara notices that in the very first spirit photos Tousei took as a boy, Beniko only appears in the negatives, not in the developed photos. From this, she guesses Beniko must be the Necromancer. Sara confronts Beniko and purifies her with the Camera Obscura, releasing her from Suzume Umishima's vengeful influence. At the moment the Dark Seal breaks, the school begins to collapse. The group flees outside, and Tousei guesses that the way out is through the pool. One by one, the survivors dive into the water, and as they do, Kanon appears once more to show them the way. They all emerge safely in the grounds of Karasawa Shrine, in the same trough where Tousei and Sara first saw Kanon's hands emerging from the water.

With the curse lifted, Tousei and the others return to their ordinary lives. In the final scene, Tousei approaches Sara with some more "interesting" photos he has taken, asking if she wants to see them.