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The Witch of Watanabi

A Japanese fairytale.

Once upon a time, oh, so long ago...

...A small Japanese city was tormented by the presence of an obtrusive witch. This city, as most cities of the time, was surrounded by great walls of stone, which opened on a single set of gates. Now over these gates, stood a watchtower, and in that watchtower, lived the previously-mentioned evil witch. How she had ended up there, of course, was a long story; but I shall attempt here to resume it briefly.

The witch had been born and raised in that small city. Because of her unspeakable, grotesque ugliness, however, she had always been rejected by its inhabitants. During her adult age, she had begun to rely on the dark arts of magic to find her solace. When her fellow citizens, who had always shunned her, began to show hostility and even went so far as to threaten to kill her, she retreated into the single old, abandoned watchtower that loomed over the city. From there, she found she had control over the city gates, and used this knowledge to gain her revenge. When she saw robbers approaching the city, she opened the gates and gladly allowed them in, relishing the sight of them murdering the townsmen, raping the women, torturing the children, and setting the small Japanese cottages on fire. When she saw merchants approaching, however, she kept the gates tightly locked, preventing them from accessing the city and providing its inhabitants with drinks, weapons, and victuals.

The townspeople died, by the tenths and thousands. A reward was offered to the hero that could rid the city of its misfortune - by killing the witch.

Now I may have mentioned before that the witch was ugly - but I may not have described her ugliness in sufficient detail. The witch was more than ugly; she was a grotesque, sickening creature, with features so exaggeratedly deformed that she hardly even looked like a human being. A mere glimpse of her was enough to send dread in the heart of the bravest warriors, and several men had died at the sight of her face - so horrible was it, so appalling, so dark.

Therefore, few warriors dared to penetrate the witch's tower, and of those who did manage to surmount their fear and ascent the watchtower's stairs - most died immediately after having caught a glimpse of her face. At the hideous sight, indeed, all courage left their hearts, and they allowed themselves to be torn apart.

The witch mutilated the dead warriors' pretty, pale faces. She devoured their entrails and defaced their lifeless bodies, before leaving them lying - oh, morbid spectacle! - across the staircase, about the hallways, in her torture rooms.

Now one day, a renowned warrior, named Watanabi, happened to hear of this dreadful creature. Since he was a skilled and fearless man, and fond of glory, he decided the witch's head would be, for him, a worthy trophy. He therefore set off for the small Japanese city, and, once he had found it, entered the dark and sinister witch's watchtower.

The sight of the rotting, disfigured bodies that lay strewn across the bloody hallways did, for the first time, make him uneasy, but he dismissed the feeling and walked on. In the upper room of the watchtower, he found a dark and hooded figure. “Behold, there!” said Watanabi; and, at the sound of his voice, the figure turned around, and lifted its hood.

Now Watanabi had seen ugliness before. He had seen darkness, he had seen monsters, he has seen villains; he had lived through war and he had lived through strife, he had witnessed great pain, great suffering, great torment. And yet! in spite of all his training, nothing had prepared him for the dreadful sight.

A greenish skin, covered with round, oozing red sores, covered the inhuman face; the mouth was an impossible, beaming gap, the nose was huge and crooked, one eye was thrice larger than its misplaced twin. The hands themselves were large, much too large for the rest of the body, which was thin and sticklike; and they reached, they reached, they reached for Watanabi’s face.

(God help me, I can see her right now, reaching, gaping at me…)

Watanabi’s heart paused in his chest, and he thought, for one moment, that it would fail him; but he banned his fear and took a battling stance.

The Witch looked as if she wanted to jump upon him and tear his brain out with her huge, beastlike claws. And yet she did not move.

As Watanabi learned to acknowledge, for the very first time, fear, the Witch learned to acknowledge another feeling entirely. The Witch saw Watanabi’s face, and the Witch relished it. The Witch discovered a feeling quite opposed to fear; the Witch discovered Love.

“What do you want?” she asked; and her voice, although rough and unpractised, was quite beautiful.

“Your life,” said Watanabi: an answer taught to him by his years of fighting.

“That you cannot have. Marry me,” said the Witch, “and I will spare you.”

Watanabi, repulsed by the proposal, drew back and refused.

The Witch repeated her proposal three times. After the third, she gave a great roar, and rushed towards him, her great hands outstretched.

Now what followed was of little importance; the Witch fought Watanabi, and Watanabi fought back. The combat lasted the entire night, and the day that followed, and part of the evening, with neither opponent either gaining or losing valuable ground. On midnight of the second day, however, Watanabi surged forward, and, with his great sword, slit the Witch’s right arm off. The Witch gave a great cry, and with this vanished.

Watanabi brought the Witch’s arm home, as his war trophy. He showed it to his town’s medicine man. The medicine man shuddered at the sight, and told Watanabi that the arm held great danger for him; the Witch was still alive, he said, and, in a year from the day of the fight, at exactly midnight, she would return to Watanabi to steal it back from him. Watanabi heeded his advice to hide the perilous trophy. He wrapped it in a blanket of large vine leaves, and locked it in his ancient bedroom, which he then condemned.

Years passed.

Watanabi’s curiosity tormented him, to the point that he could no longer sleep at peace at night. The Witch’s arm’s image remained strong in his mind. Often, he would approach the condemned bedroom, and rest his hand over the locked knob; he would then sigh, and turn away, and know no rest until he came back.

Ten years after the date of his combat with the Witch, Watanabi decided he could no longer resist his curiosity. He opened the old, condemned door. He walked up to the chest that held the Witch’s severed arm. He unlocked it. He unwrapped the leaves. He uncovered the arm.

The one-armed Witch instantly appeared, as if she’d been summoned. She seized the arm from him. And Watanabi, oh! Watanabi…

Watanabi was never seen again.

What happened to him is subject to guessing; you will of course imply the Witch has killed him.

For myself, I prefer thinking they married, and, if such a thing is possible, lived happily ever after…

For what else could be the point of this fairytale?

- Aum

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