Toshio Ozaki

Toshio Ozaki is one of the main protagonists of the Anime/Manga Shiki. At the start of the show Toshio is the head doctor of the only clinic in the small town of Sotoba. Suddenly an outbreak of bizarre deaths begin to plague the town and as the doctor he must try and help the people of the village survive. Every person he tries to save shows the same symptoms but Ozaki is helpless to find a way to prevent their deaths. Wanting to get to the bottom of things Toshio enlists the help of his good friend Seishin Muroi to get to the bottom of the mystery. As the two of them uncover many of the facts surrounding the deaths an encounter with Natsuno, a boy in the village who had been experiencing horrors and who knew the truth about the weird events going on in the village changes Ozaki's perspective. Despite his rational mind between what Natsuno said and all of the different facts about the deaths, Ozaki begins to suspect that the village has been invaded by vampires (or at least something similar). Noticing how the victum's improve when staying in his hospital, Ozaki decides to keep one of them over night in his clinic to prevent the Shiki from reaching her. His plan works at first, but one night when Seishin stays with him to observe the patient the Shiki attack the hospital to try and claim her. Some of the Shiki are even formerly deceased village members. Toshio tries to stop them but is prevented from doing so by Tatsumi, a young man with great strength who works with the Shiki. The woman is fed upon by the Shiki and Ozaki and Seishin are made aware of the terrible truth of what is going on in the village. After this occurance Ozaki slowly watches as everything around him falls apart. One woman who seems to have the truth is ridiculed by everyone and Ozaki can do nothing to help her. The deaths reach a very high number and even his wife falls victum to the Shiki and dies.Taking advantage of this Ozaki decides to tie her corpse up so that he will have a captured Shiki once she rises again. It takes a long time but she comes back to life as a Shiki just as he had desired. This is when he takes a dark turn from a man simply trying to protect his village into a ruthless vengence seeker. Doing painful and torturous experiments as she screams in pain, Ozaki feels no empathy for his former wife as he tries to discover the Shiki's weakness. To him she is already dead despite having the same personality and emotions as his wife. All of this culminates in him driving a stake through her heart and executing her. Seishin witnesses Ozaki covered in his wife's blood and abandons his friend, never speaking to him again. Having learned the secrets as to how the Shiki work Ozaki tries to convince the villagers of what is going on but they scoff at him. Ozaki ends up meeting Natsuno who has been transformed into a Jinrou (a more powerful Shiki that can survive in sunlight). One night Tohshio is confronted by Chizuru (the mother of the Shiki's leader Sunako) and she bites him turning him into her mind slave. When Ozaki seems defeated he tricks Chizuru into coming to a festival held in the village with him. Thinking he is her mind slave she comes along but is horrified when she discovers that Ozaki was already bitten by Natsuno and her mind control had no effect. Toshio reveals the Shiki to the village using Chizuru and the villagers proceed to kill her. Afterward the brutal manhunt for the Shiki begins with Ozaki as its leader. The villagers travel around Sotoba and mercilessly kill every Shiki that they can find. Whenever the group does something heinous that Ozaki morally objects to he puts little effort into preventing it. The villagers become out of control during the manhunt, even killing people that the Shiki mind control. This does not matter much to Ozaki and his mind becomes focussed on the single goal of killing all of the Shiki. After he sucessfully wipes almost all of them out he runs into Seishin on the road who is seen driving away. Ozaki betrays his old friend knowing that he is working with the Shiki and allows some men in his group to go and hunt him down. Ozaki never learns the fate of his friend and goes back to the village. This is when a fire breaks out that begins to consume all of Sotoba. Toshio tries to save his village but it burns to the ground and he can do nothing but escape. As he leaves the burning village Ozaki ponders whether he lost or not.