Yuki Onna floats across the snowy landscape, leaving no
footprints. In fact, in some accounts, she doesn’t have feet at all, a common
characteristic for Japanese ghosts. She might be the ghost of a woman who froze
to death in a snowstorm, or maybe a spirit of the snow itself.
Despite her beauty, Yuki Onna is a deadly entity, ruthlessly
killing unsuspecting humans who cross her path. She often appears to travelers
lost in snowstorms, breathing a gust of frosty air to turn them into frozen
corpses. At other times, she leads them astray to die from exposure. She may
even appear holding a child, and when a well-intentioned individual takes it
from her, they will instantly be frozen solid. Sometimes she tempts men with
sex, only to drain them of life or freeze them to death through a kiss.
Yuki Onna does have a softer side. For example, in one
popular legend she lets a
young boy, Minokichi, go because of his beauty and age, threatening to kill him
if he ever tells anyone about her. A year later, Minokichi marries a beautiful
girl named Oyuki and has many children with her over several years. Strangely,
she does not seem to age at all.
One night, after the children have gone to bed, Minokichi tells
Oyuki of the time he saw the Snow Woman: "Asleep or awake, that was the only time
that I saw a being as beautiful as you. Of course, she was not a human being;
and I was afraid of her, very much afraid; but she was so white! . . . Indeed,
I have never been sure whether it was a dream that I saw, or the Woman of the
Snow."
Oyuki suddenly stands up and bows over him, screaming
"It was I - I - I! Oyuki it was! And I told you then that I would kill you
if you ever said one word about it! . . . But for those children asleep there,
I would kill you this moment! And now you had better take very, very good care
of them; for if ever they have reason to complain of you, I will treat you as
you deserve!"
Then she dissolves into white mist and disappears, never to
be seen again.
Image by yazukiwolf
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