Good Yokai

A childlike house spirit whose presence brings a family fortune.

It lives in the storehouse rather than the parlour, and guards what is kept there.

A red-haired child yokai that moves into houses, sometimes called kin to the zashiki-warashi.

A white puff that drifts through the air. Keep it in a paulownia box and feed it face powder, and it brings luck.

A water jar with a face that never runs dry—the rare tsukumogami that signals good luck instead of punishing anyone.

A three-legged, beaked mermaid-like being that rises from the sea to foretell and ward off epidemics.

A chimeric, tapir-like beast that devours nightmares when called upon after a bad dream.

A stone at the edge of the village, given offerings at New Year, standing where the road stops being yours.

A tanuki enshrined as a guardian of cattle and horses—worshipped, not hunted.

The spirit that dwells in an old tree; felling its host brings misfortune.

A mountain spirit that appears only on clear days and simply cannot be seen when it rains.

A colossal giant whose footsteps shaped Japan's lakes, hills, and valleys.

A shrine bell grown into a dancing woman—the sound of kagura, finally given a face.

Footsteps with no body that follow a person walking a dark road at night. Step to the side, let it go first, and it leaves.

Something small and dog-shaped that winds between your shins as you walk a wet Okayama road at night.

A childlike, one-eyed monk yokai that startles people on lonely roads.

A harmless boy yokai who trots through the rain carrying a block of tofu.

A voice that suddenly bellows 'Uwan!' from an empty, dilapidated house—and nothing more.

A carp in a temple pond whose markings looked like a human face, and the 1990 media storm that made it famous.

A small yokai that creeps into dirty bathhouses at night to lick up the grime.

A long-tongued yokai that licks ceilings; later books blame it for the dark stains overhead.

The idler's yokai: a man who did nothing with his life, reborn as a thing that licks lamp oil and does nothing still.

A jolly shapeshifting raccoon dog, rival prankster to the fox.

The tanuki of Yashima, who would replay the Heike's last battle in the air for anyone who fed him well.

A river otter that shapeshifts and plays tricks, a smaller cousin of the kappa.

A shapeshifting tanuki that holds out a giant tobacco pipe and demands a toll from river boats.

The temple tea kettle that sprouted a tanuki's head, tail and legs—and would not stop boiling.

A one-eyed, one-legged umbrella come to life—an icon of tool-spirits.

A split-mouthed paper lantern spirit with a lolling tongue.

A little general armored in cast-off cups and plates who marshals the household crockery.

A two-tailed cat wearing a hearth trivet as a crown, puffing the embers back to life.

A rice paddle thrown out after long service, which gets up at night and makes trouble.