Hiyori, a young orphan left mute by the traumatic shock of losing her parents in a New Year’s Eve car accident, is sent to live with distant relatives. Their home is destroyed in the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami, forcing her into an emergency shelter where she forges a bond with a teenage runaway and an elderly woman—a surrogate family offering fragile stability.

Her silence, rooted in unresolved grief and fear, deepens amid the upheaval of her transient life. Yet she finds comfort in her companions’ presence, drawing security from their physical closeness during sleep, a small but vital step toward healing.

Hiyori’s arc revolves around confronting shared and private trauma. A turning point arrives when a supernatural entity preys upon the town’s collective guilt, mimicking lost loved ones to lure survivors toward despair. In a climactic act, Hiyori shatters her silence with a scream to halt a possession targeting her surrogate sister, breaking the grip of her internalized anguish. This defiance, paired with her collaboration with mythic guardians to vanquish the threat, signals her shift from passive endurance to active reclaiming of agency.

Her unresolved fears of abandonment mirror broader themes of dislocation in post-disaster recovery. As she adapts to rural life, her gradual integration into a community intertwined with folklore guardians aids her in navigating loss and reconstructing trust.