Tonight’s story deals with something called ayashimi. I chose not to translate this word, because it is vague even in Japanese. Ayashimi means something strange or mysterious, and doesn’t really refer to any specific type of monster or phenomenon. It’s written with the kanji 怪, which is one of the kanji found in the words 妖怪 (yokai) and 怪談 (kaidan). I think it carries with it a nice sound that works better and sounds more mysterious than simply translating it as “strange phenomenon.”

This story is another one that I find quite funny. Or at least absurd. Dōkan’s explanations and brushing off of these strange occurrences gives off some real “ackchyually” vibes. Especially how he just casually handles the revelation at the end.

How Ōno Dōkan Was Unfazed by Ayashimi

One day, a man named Ōno Dōkan went hunting. In the mountains, a single matsutake mushroom the size of an umbrella sprouted up in the path after Dōkan passed by. His servants saw this and were astonished, and called out to Dōkan.

Dōkan turned around and said, “There’s nothing strange about this. Matsutake mushrooms can grow to this size. Now if it had sprouted upside-down, that would be strange…”

He continued on his way, and ahead of him he saw on the path ahead another matsutake mushroom, growing upside-down.

His servants grew even more astonished, but Dōkan said, “Since I was just talking about them growing upside-down, there’s nothing strange about this either.” Then they returned home.

On the first day of the following year, the iron trivet in the hearth started to dance around the room. The servants were astonished and called out to Dōkan.

Dōkan said to them, “Humans walk about with just two legs, but a trivet has three legs, so there’s nothing strange about one walking around or dancing.” And he didn’t let it concern him at all.

However, in the summer of that year, his only daughter died. It occurred to him later that this may have been due to these mysterious phenomena.