Teito Monogatari:
The Tale of the Imperial Capital
Part 1: Great Spirit of Tokyo
Author: Hiroshi Aramata
Part 1: Night of the Divine Possession
Chapter 2: Daytime at Mitarashi Pond 1
“Oh, you’ve finally come! Brother, over here, over here!”
Bright sunlight sparkled on the surface of the pond in the new center of Tokyo, Ōtemachi. Ōtemachi was synonymous with the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Internal Affairs. These were the two main pillars of the Empire’s domestic administration, which stood side by side separated by a strip of lush forest. Many talented people from all over the country gathered here daily.
Yukari beckoned her brother over to the pond. She was the younger sister of Tatsumiya Yoichiro, a bureaucrat serving at the Ministry of Finance. “Brother, you didn’t even come home yesterday! Father and mother were both so worried! I heard there was a fire at the Ministry of Finance last night, too. I worried that something had terrible had happened to you."
Yoichiro hurried over to his sister, who was waving her hand beside the main gate. Her eyelids were swollen. It was evident that she had worked through the night.
“Sorry, sorry. I’m glad you came to see me, Yukari. I don’t think I’ll be able to come home today either because of work. Could you please give my regards to our parents? Tell them I apologize.”
“Oh, you can't come home again?” his sister asked, puffing out her cheeks.
“The Ministry is in an uproar right now because of the fire.”
“You don’t look well, dear brother. But I’m relieved you’re safe," she said. "Is the fire a well-known event already? I haven't heard too many people talking about it."
Yoichiro shrugged. "Every time something bad happens at the Ministry of Finance, everyone says it's the curse of Taira no Masakado. Then the Ushigome Association barges in and it becomes newspaper material.”
“The Ushigome Association, huh? How troublesome.”
The Ushigome Association refers to the Himon Association. Its leader was an old man named Oda Kanshi who worked at the Ministry of Finance when the Meiji government was recently established. This old man venerated Taira no Masakado, the guardian of Edo, Satō Nobuhiro, a reformer from the end of the Edo period, and Ninomiya Sontoku, an agriculturist whose ideas had rescued various domains from financial ruin. There was a popular movement to have the Meiji government recognize the significant contributions of these three men.
However, since all three were deeply involved with the Tokugawa Shogunate, the new Meiji government was reluctant to honor them. Taira no Masakado in particular was known as an enemy of the Imperial Court and the Emperor.
“What’s going on with the Ushigome Association, Yoichiro?”
Before Yoichiro could answer, a young man stopped in the shadow of the main gate. He smiled and waved.
Yoichiro stared at the young man. He recognized him: it was his old friend Narutaki Junichi. He was enrolled in the Experimental Physics Department at Tokyo Imperial University.
“What, hey, it's Mr. Narutaki!" Yoichiro said. "I thought Yukari had me meet her to be considerate after I didn't come home last night, but it seems that she planned for us to meet. How have things been, Mr. Bachelor of Science? Are you going to see the cherry blossoms?"
Narutaki Junichi was the same age as Yoichiro, twenty-five. He was born loving science, very much unlike Yoichiro. He did not care about government service or politics much at all. He spent most of his time commuting to his university and running physics experiments. Narutaki was a scruffy scholar with long hair and wrinkled clothes, but his eyes sparkled with lively intelligence. He was tall and rather handsome.
Strangely enough, Yoichiro looked more like a scholar than he did. He wore black-rimmed glasses and was somewhat short and wiry.
Yukari looked at the two of them, making unspoken comparisons. She laughed. She was a lovely, tomboyish girl who had recently turned eighteen. "What are you accusing me of, brother? Why would I set up a meeting without telling you first?"
"So this is just a coincidence? It sure doesn't seem like it."
Their sibling squabble was broken up by Narutaki. "No fighting now. I thought I heard something about the Ushigome Association."
Yoichiro nodded. "You're a science geek, so you should know all about it. Have you heard about Oda Kanshi and his plans? He used to be in the Ministry of Finance, so you could call him our senior."
"Why would Oda Kanshi's association be involved with the latest incident at the Ministry of Finance?"
"Well, that's the thing. Hold on a second before we get into that. Hey, Yukari, take care of this for me."
Yoichiro threw over a bundle wrapped in brown paper that he'd brought with him. Yukari caught it against her chest with a muffled thump. She unwrapped it curiously, revealing a sweat-stained shirt. She frowned and then glared at her brother. "Awful. You're terrible!"
Yoichiro pushed up his glasses with one finger and coughed once. Then he turned back to his friend. "How ironic for us to be discussing the Ushigome Association here," he said. "Just look at this pond."
Narutaki looked into the clear waters of Mitarashi Pond. He gave his friend a bit of side-eye, thinking that he was being tricked in some way.
On the south side of the courtyard just inside the front gate of the Ministry of Finance there was an old lotus pond. The pond was quite large; three hundred tsubo at least.2 On the south side of the pond, slightly to the west, there was an old burial mound. Below the mound sat a single stone lantern. From there, a small moss-covered stone staircase led up to the top of the mound. Behind the mound was a dense grove of trees. Beyond that grove were the grounds of the Ministry of Internal Affairs.
“It’s an ancient pond, Yoichiro. I see nothing remotely ironic about it.”
“The people at the Ministry of Finance call this the ‘Mitarashi Pond of Kanda Shrine.’3 Really look at the pond. On the south side, there's a rock sticking out, see? Look inside the pond. On the south side, there’s a rock sticking out, right? It’s called Chidori Stone.4 By that rock, there’s an old well. When the water in the pond goes down, the wooden frame of the well appears, so you should take a look sometime. About 960 years ago, Taira no Masakado's head was washed in that well. Kanda Shrine is partly dedicated to Taira no Masakado, but that very spot is where his head is buried. Can you see the mound across the pond? That is Taira no Masakado’s burial mound.”
Narutaki's bushy eyebrows twitched. The two began walking closer to the pond without another word. They went around the pond and approached the burial mound to the south. Yukari followed them warily from behind, frowning deeply.
“I never knew there was such a ghastly historic site right outside the Ministry of Finance," Narutaki said.
"It doesn't only have historical interest. This place is cursed."
The pond was completely still and serene, sparkling in the afternoon sunlight.
"Don't give me that look; I know it's cursed. I didn't believe it at first, either. But last night, I had a harrowing experience--no, never mind that. You're a scientist. You've studied, so you know that Taira no Masakado was a traitor who raised his banner here, declaring independence from the Ritsuryō system right here in the Kanto region of Japan.5 But this hero was struck in the forehead by an arrow shot by Tawara Tōta and killed. Relatives from Shibazaki Village received Masakado’s severed head that had been put on display, washed it in that well and buried it in that mound. The traitor's head brings curses now that memorial services have ceased. In the past, people fell ill or suffered injuries. Fires broke out suddenly. The villagers were at their wits’ end.
"Then, one day during the Kagen era, a monk of the Ji-shu school named Shingyo Shonin came.6
"Kagen era? What years are those on the Western calendar?"
"Heh, you really are a science geek. I don't know much about the Western calendar, so I can't say for sure. But Shingyo Shonin was a descendant of that Fujiwara Michinaga."7
"Michinaga lived in the Heian Period," Yukari put in. "That's when the terrifying Night Parade of One Hundred Demons happened. It seems obvious that Taira no Masakado's head is cursed."8
"So Shingyo Shonin performed memorial services in front of Taira no Masakado's mound, and when he bestowed the Buddhist name Ren Amida Butsu upon the vengeful spirit, the curse finally ended. That's the story."
Narutaki shuddered. "Is there really an old well by that rock where they washed the head? How terrifying."
Yukari pointed at the southern edge of the pond.
It was not a scene that two young men and a woman should be viewing in the cherry-blossoming part of April.
"Ever since this lotus pond became the property of the Ministry of Finance in the fifth year of Meiji, interference with the pond or the mound causes suspicious things to happen. Laborers get injured, officials suddenly fall ill, and then fires break out."
"Fires aren't just a problem for the Ministry of Finance," Narutaki said. "In fact, you could say that the Imperial Capital Renovation Plan started as a fire prevention strategy. Take the storehouses around Nihonbashi, for example. Those black earthen walls weren’t lined up for show or out of eccentricity. They serve as fireproof walls. Brick construction has become dominant for similar reasons, so the black earth-walled storehouses are being demolished now. Earthworks are more prone to collapse than brick and need more maintenance, so brick is better."
“Are you lecturing me about the Imperial Capital Renovation Plan? You know I'm an official member of the Tokyo City Temporary District Reform Bureau, right?” Yoichiro asked.
“It's been a year since that Reform Bureau was established," Narutaki said, nodding. "It's good to see all the change being done, but a year is not much time. You must be busy with fundraising, being a finance man. Make sure you have enough so that none of the renovations are slipshod or stopgaps."
"I don't need you to tell me that," Yoichiro said. "But we're busy. It's mostly an Internal Affairs project, but if you trace it back, the Ministry of Finance has put the most effort into it since the start of the Meiji Restoration."9 Yoichiro wiped his mouth with a handkerchief.
His younger sister, Yukari, had already passed the two of them and reached the mound. When her brother called out, “Don’t go too far alone,” she laughed, waved a white handkerchief, and called back, "I'll be fine!"
Translator's Notes
1
Daytime at Mitarashi Pond at Kashima Shrine in Ibaraki is a mystical and spiritual experience, featuring a clear, spring-fed pond that is said to never overflow or run dry. Visitors can see the bottom of the pond due to the incredibly clear water and can even receive sacred water from designated areas. While the shrine grounds are open 24/7, the daylight hours offer a tranquil and impressive view of this "crystal clear" and sacred natural feature, though it can be crowded during holidays.
↩
2
坪: A tsubo is a unit of land measurement
that corresponds to 3.95 square yards or 3.31 square meters.
↩
3 神田明神: Kanda Shrine is a Shinto shrine located in
Chiyoda, Tokyo, Japan. The shrine dates back 1,270 years, but the current
structure was rebuilt several times due to fire and earthquakes. It is
situated in one of the most expensive estate areas of Tokyo. Kanda Shrine
was an important shrine to both the warrior class and citizens of Japan,
especially during the Edo period, when shōgun Tokugawa Ieyasu paid his
respects at Kanda Shrine.
↩
4
千鳥岩: Chidori Stone literally means "thousand birds stone" or "plover
stone."
↩
5
The Ritsuryō system was a legal and administrative framework in ancient Japan,
modeled after China's Tang Dynasty, that established a centralized
government under the emperor. It consisted of a criminal code and an
administrative and civil code, which organized society into a hierarchical
structure and outlined a system of ranks and punishments. This system was
implemented from the late 7th century and remained influential, though in a
weakened form, until the 10th century.
↩
6
時宗: Ji-shū (literally "time sect") is one of four
schools belonging to the Pure Land Buddhism in Japan The Kagen era was a
Japanese era that lasted from August 1303 to December 1306.
↩
7
藤原 道長: Fujiwara Michinaga (966 – 3 January
1028) was a Japanese statesman. The Fujiwara clan's control over Japan and
its politics reached its zenith under his leadership.
↩
8 百鬼夜行: Hyakki Yagyō,
literally "Night Parade of One Hundred Demons" is an idiom in Japanese
folklore. Sometimes an orderly procession, other times a riot, it refers to
a parade of thousands of supernatural creatures known as oni and yōkai that
march through the streets of Japan at night. The Heian period is the last
division of classical Japanese history, running from 794 to 1185.↩
9 明治維新: The Meiji Restoration was a political event that
restored imperial rule to Japan in 1868 under Emperor Meiji. Although there
were ruling emperors before the Meiji Restoration, the events restored
practical power to, and consolidated the political system under, the Emperor
of Japan. The Restoration led to enormous changes in Japan's political and
social structure and spanned both the late Edo period (often called the
Bakumatsu) and the beginning of the Meiji era, during which time Japan
rapidly industrialized and adopted Western ideas, production methods and
technology.↩
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