Saga Floods

The **Saga floods** (**佐賀洪水**, *Saga kōzui*) are floods that happen in the Saga Prefecture, which are all presumably caused by The Curse of SAGA.

## Summary

Less than a month before the concert of the zombie idol group, Franchouchou, massive floods suddenly occur throughout the prefecture; leaving the entire population affected and communication lines cut. The curse tries to prevent the group from saving Saga at all costs, but the curse itself is not prepared for the iron will of these idols.

## Flooding

### A cloudy day

Kotaro is taking the group's next concert (scheduled for the anniversary of the disastrous first attempt) very seriously, investing in Saga-wide publicity campaigns to attract sales, using merchandise sales as a predictor of audience attraction, and, this time, allowing pre-sold tickets. He apologizes to Franchouchou for his personal failure last time, insisting that it will be different this year as he himself has seen how the group has grown on its own and how they themselves have become more dependent on him, holding spectacular events that called the attention of the entire nation.

Later at Ekimae Stadium, Ookoba corners Kotaro to confront him with the evidence that all of Franchouchou is made up of zombie girls, as he thinks he is intent on abusing the dead for profit. Kotaro is indifferent, insisting on proceeding with the concert anyway; which Ookoba wants to cancel to expose Kotaro. Later, he goes to Jofuku's bar, where the nature of Saga's curse is revealed and how Saga itself is doomed to ruin. The girls in the house watch as a sudden storm is hitting the coast quite hard.

Meanwhile, Ookoba already has the report ready to expose Kotaro, but suddenly, a strange storm arrives which causes the power to go away. Jofuku agonizes in pain at the same time, saying that it's starting. The power outage begins to spread to the rest of Saga, then to Ookoba's office, just before he can post his story about Franchouchou being zombies.

### The next morning

The group's mansion drifts before reaching a beach, where it collapses, destroying the girls' supplies and makeup. On the beach where they were, they are found by Ai's friends, who worked together with her at the food factory. They take them to a makeshift shelter in a city mall for those who lost their homes and power during the storm.

Ookoba looks in horror at the storm damage as he unsuccessfully attempts to call his co-worker; Kotaro and Jofuku meanwhile find themselves trapped in the bar, which unfortunately flooded the next morning, leaving them up to their necks in water.

### Shelter

The next day, Ookoba arrives at the shelter after meeting with his partner only to be surprised by the news agency of the neighboring prefecture, Fukuoka, who are interviewing the refugees. Before long, he becomes aware of Franchouchou's presence and that the girls are acting of their own free will. After several days, the last of the girls' makeup wears off, and they fail to keep up their costumes even though they previously made clay masks. However, the kids don't believe they are actually zombies and accept them anyway, moving the girls as they allow Ookoba to understand Franchouchou's courage to act at the constant risk of exposure. Meanwhile, Kotaro and Jofuku are rescued from the flooded bar; While Jofuku is hospitalized, Kotaro meets with the girls and reapplies his makeup to them with his special technique to make them look more human, telling them that their revenge concert is still scheduled to restore Saga's morale.

## Aftermath

At the Saga Special Operational Group Headquarters, the authorities discuss the current difficulties Saga is going through after the flash flood. Although part of the infrastructure has been repaired, the difficulty of transportation has hindered repairs throughout the prefecture. From one moment to another, Kotaro enters the meeting demanding that they repair the Tosu area as quickly as possible since he plans to do a benefit concert with his idol group, Franchouchou. To raise funds to restore Saga; however, he is withdrawn of the meeting shortly after the scandal.

That same night, Saki remembers the radio program that she manages. But when they arrive, the director of the radio station tells them that their broadcast day was 3 days ago, but since the disaster happened, he will let them pass because they have only been broadcasting news since then. On the radio, Saki lets out her heart to the people of Saga about the Franchouchou benefit concert and how she wants the whole prefecture to unite to let Saga and the rest of the world know about the disaster that is happening.

On the day of the concert, the girls arrive at the Ekimae Fudosan stadium, after walking for an entire day and seeing Saga destroyed, they arrive at the stadium surrounded by rubble. After what seems like a small disappointment to not see anyone inside the stadium, thousands of people arrive at the concert promoted by various famous people and the news of the disaster in Saga spreads throughout the world. After the spectacular concert, Saga is restored thanks to the funds that Franchouchou raised, while they continue to help the affected inhabitants. As thanks, they help them with rebuilding their previously destroyed home, with Takeo's help included.

## Trivia

* The Saga floods are based on the common floods in southern Japan, which have affected the country continuously for several decades.
	+ To be more precise, this flood is based on one that occurred in August 2019, which was the largest in Saga on record.
* In addition to children, there were adults, presumably some of them parents, who witnessed Franchouchou's inadvertent reveal as zombies. We never see how they react, aside from a brief surprise when the masks break, or if they bought into the “zombie makeup” story.
	+ Since the first episode of the series, it was assumed that being exposed as zombies would put the girls in danger of being hunted down and killed. After all, most people would probably take them as the typical Hollywood flesh-eating zombie. However, Franchouchou's audience of young children not only do not believe them to be zombies, they warmly accept them despite their undead appearances.
* As if a flood weren't bad enough, a UFO comes out of nowhere and unleashes a laser attack on a remote part of Saga. Whether it's related to the curse, as a manifestation of Sagako, or if it's part of a larger-scale invasion on Japan or Earth as a whole, remains to be seen.
* For the writers, it was difficult to develop the story in a catastrophe setting because both the citizens and Franchouchou were victims of it. They wanted this to be a way to show that zombies and humans are no different. At the time of proposing it, they were aware of how delicate it was to represent a natural disaster, and they had problems with MAPPA to finally decide it.