Blood-C
Blood-C is set in an isolated rural town on the shore of Lake Suwa in Nagano Prefecture. Saya Kisaragi is the shrine maiden of the Shinto shrine run by her father Tadayoshi, and is outwardly a friendly and clumsy high school girl—her circle of friends include neighbor and cafe owner Fumito Nanahara; school friends Yūka Amino, twins Nene and Nono Motoe, class president Itsuki Tomofusa, the taciturn Shinichirō Tokizane; and Saya's schoolroom teacher Kanako Tsutsutori.
But while living a normal school life by day, Saya and her father spend the night defending the village against Elder Bairns, monsters who possess inanimate objects to stalk humans and feed on their blood. Saya's skills in the "art of the sword" enable her to defeat the Elder Bairns, but those capable of speech accuse Saya and the humans of violating a covenant dubbed "Shrovetide". Saya also encounters a talking dog which says it is here to grant someone's wish, and suffers from blanks in her memory and is pained by headaches whenever she tries to remember.
Saya's battles with the Elder Bairns become increasingly desperate as they begin attacking during the day, and both Nene and Nono fall victim, leaving Saya deeply hurt. Shinichirō eventually learns of Saya's burden and offers to help, but is later killed himself. An attack on Saya's school results in everyone but Saya and Itsuki dying before Saya can kill the attacking Elder Bairn. Saya later realizes that only her class and their teacher Kanako were present in the school. Due to the blanks in her memory and comments from the Elder Bairns, she begins questioning her identity and mission.
After the attack that kills Shinichirō, Kanako asks to see Tadayoshi's library, which contains information on the Elder Bairns. They find that the library is a fake, then Kanako confronts Saya with the living Nono, Nene and Shinichirō before forcing her to drink Elder Bairn blood. It is revealed that the town's entire population, including those close to Saya, were actors in an experiment organized by Fumito, and that Saya is actually an Elder Bairn in human form. She had agreed to take part in the experiment, swore an oath not to kill humans, and then was implanted with false memories of her past "human life," all with the goal of seeing whether her inner self could be altered so the oath could be broken. Whenever Saya began relapsing and remembering her past, Fumito used drugs and hypnosis to make her docile again, and all the Elder Bairns she faced were controlled by Fumito using her blood. Kanako had wanted to save Saya and prove the existence of Elder Bairns, suborning Nono, Nene and Shinichirō to help her.
Fumito, Itsuki and Yūka then confront them, with Fumito unleashing an Elder Bairn that brutally kills Nono, Nene and Shinichirō for their treachery. Saya saves Kanako from the Elder Bairn while killing it, but Kanako is then killed by Tadayoshi, revealed to be a human-Elder Bairn hybrid driven berserk by an overdose of Saya's blood given by Fumito. Saya—now back to her true self—is forced to kill Tadayoshi, and witnesses Fumito release an artificial Elder Bairn which slaughters the town's population before Saya kills it. Fumito's soldiers attempt to shoot Saya, but Itsuki sacrifices himself to save her as he had grown to love her. Fumito and Yūka—who participated so as to achieve political power with Fumito's help—escape on a helicopter. When Saya tries to stop them, Fumito shoots her. Recovering on the lakeside, Saya learns from the dog that her wish was to remain herself when in Fumito's experiment, and that she must now pursue her next wish. Saya sets off in pursuit of Fumito.
violence, alternate reality, flashback