Taruho Saginomiya

This article is about a character in the novel, Fatal Frame: A Curse Affecting Only Girls. For the corresponding character in Fatal Frame: The Movie, see Mayumi Asou.

Media Mix Character Taruho Saginomiya Kanji/Kana 鷺宮 足穂 Alias N/A Actor N/A Status Alive Occupation Teacher/Nun Appears in Fatal Frame: A Curse Affecting Only Girls

Taruho Saginomiya is a character in Fatal Frame: A Curse Affecting Only Girls. She is a nun and language teacher at Saint Loudun's Academy for Girls, and the students address her as "Sister". She is described as having an unlikeable appearance, with a thin, hard mouth and no warm feelings evident on her face. Ever since childhood, Taruho has suffered a recurring nightmare in which the spirits of children killed by exposure lure living children into the water, where they dismember and devour them.

Backstory

Taruho's had intensely possessive feelings for her younger brother, Takashi, and it was her obsession to ensure that no other girl could have him. When she was a student at St. Loudun's, she murdered a girl in the shrine for attempting to seduce Takashi. The Headmistress caught her in the act, but Taruho had witnessed the Headmistress's own act of murder, and the two agreed to a mutual silence. They conspired to destroy the shrine and the evidence of Taruho's murder, and rebuild it with funds from a donation which Taruho would make to the school. However, the old worship hall, along with the Ghost Marriage photos and the picture of the Headmistress and Mio that began the Ophelia Album, reappeared in a secret underground shrine behind the painting in the Headmistress’s office.

A Curse Affecting Only Girls

Six years prior to the first chapter, Taruho brought the Ophelia Album to Takashi. She told him that placing photos in it side by side would bind two people together in the afterlife. She said he could choose any picture he wanted to be his bride, and in exchange, he must never let any woman near him in life. Takashi chose the picture of the girl the Headmistress had killed, Maya Tsukimori. Shortly after, he found the girl floating in the river, and carried her to a water tank so that he could visit her. Taruho was aware of his obsession, but rather than being jealous, she was pleased, since a corpse to her was not the same as a living girl. It is implied their father had a similar obsession once.

One day, six years after Maya's corpse resurfaced, Aya Tsukimori confessed to Taruho that she had been visited by a ghost that looked exactly like her. Taruho realised that Aya must be becoming aware of Maya, and in order to protect Takashi's "relationship", she locked Aya in a hidden room and drugged her, intending to kill her later. Meanwhile, the curse affecting only girls began to spread through the school. Taruho believed that the girls who disappeared were attempting to come between Takashi and his beloved, and so she tracked them down and hacked them to death. When she was about to kill Michi, she was caught in the act by Mary, who had been friends with Taruho's very first victim and had been searching for proof against her ever since.

Taruho and Takashi fled together. Takashi explained that he sensed Maya, the girl he thought of as Ophelia, was lonely, and cursed the girls himself in the hope that she would find the one she was looking for. The curse was lifted, but the sins Taruho committed still weighed on Takashi, so he placed their photos side by side in the Ophelia Album, cursing them both. Together, they walked into the lake and drowned. Their bodies surfaced later, hand in hand.