Oryou Sonozaki

Oryou Sonozaki is the current head of the Sonozaki family in Higurashi no Naku Koro ni Kai, mother of Akane Sonozaki, and grandmother of Mion Sonozaki and Shion Sonozaki. Family tradition dictates that whoever leads the house carries the kanji for "demon" in her name. Elderly, reportedly in her seventies, she first appears in the Himatsubushi chapter.

Though the Kimiyoshi family has officially held the post of village head for generations, Oryou is the true power behind Hinamizawa, and officials defer to her judgment. During the Dam War she led the resistance, and her fury at the Houjou family head's disrespect helped turn the village against them for years. Despite suspicion from residents and Detective Kuraudo Ooishi, neither Oryou nor her family had any hand in the deaths marking each Watanagashi Festival or the wartime kidnapping.

In public she is severe and unyielding: she disinherited Akane for marrying outside the family and long kept a stern front even against Keiichi Maebara's pleas to help Satoko Houjou. Privately she is gentler — she stays close to Akane, eventually intervenes for Satoko, accepts Shion's apology and her bond with Satoshi Houjou, and never meant her grudge against the Houjou parents to fall on their children.

She is raising Mion to succeed her, though tradition demanded killing one twin granddaughter at birth, a fate Oryou spared for reasons never explained. She sold ancestral land, later bought by the Maebara family, to draw newcomers to the village, and has grown fond of Keiichi's determination, even urging Mion to confess her feelings to him.