Tonight’s yokai is another daija — a word that covers serpentine creatures all the way from large snakes to dragons. I’m always torn over how to paint these — more snake-like, or more dragon-like? The images in Shokoku hyakumonogatari tend to favor dragon-like depictions, as you can see in the original illustration for this story:

How Baba Kurōzu Defeated a Daija

In Kyūshū there was a rōnin named Baba Kurōzu. He hoped to serve Hosokawa Sansai, but so far his desire had gone unmet.

One day, he went river fishing with four or five men, and along the edge of a certain mountain they found a roughly 1.1 square kilometer marsh. They cast their nets into this and began to relax, when all of a sudden a great roar was heard from the marsh. Smoke began to billow out of it, and then some unknown thing came straight towards them. Everyone was startled and fled. Kurōzu was not the least bit afraid, and he wanted to see what it was no matter what. When he investigated, he discovered a six meter long serpent. Kurōzu thought he would catch the serpent, so he leaped at it, but the serpent coiled itself around Kurōzu and pulled him into the marsh.

The men who fled told everyone about how Kurōzu had been taken by the serpent, and everyone of high and low rank was talking about this story.

Three days later, around noon, Kurōzu came out of the marsh. All of the water in the marsh was stained with blood. When the nets were pulled out, inside of them was the six meter long uwabami, slain by Kurōzu and cut into seven or eight pieces.

Sansai saw this and declared, “Kurōzu is a real warrior.” And he awarded him a salary of 3000 koku. To this day, it is said, his descendants are still serving in Kyūshū.