Story 29
The Little Bottle Monster
I heard this story from my great-grandfather. Apparently, when he was little, he kept a tiny monster in a small bottle.
He found the monster in a rice field. It was some kind of 15-centimeter-tall humanoid mouse. He put it in a bottle that he had at home—he just used whatever bottle was available.
Its nose was pointed, and it had long whiskers. Its ears were perfectly round, like a mouse. Its whole body was covered in faint, short, dark gray fur, and despite being a mouse, it wore something like a tattered linen robe—probably clothing similar to that of a farmer in the Edo period. Its hands and feet were human-like and bare, and it had a long tail.
Sometimes it would squeak “kyu-kyu,” and when angry, it would cry out in a “gii” kind of voice. When it was hungry, it would say, “I’m hungry, give me food. Hurry. Hurry.” That was all it ever said.
It ate anything, but it especially loved rice. It also liked corn and potatoes.
Not only my great-grandfather, but also my great-great-grandfather, great-great-grandmother, and my great-grandfather’s siblings all knew about this mouse-human. Its movements were cute, scurrying busily around inside the bottle.
He apparently kept it for about a year.
Over time, the mouse-human’s fur slowly turned white, and it became unable to walk, taking on the appearance of an old man. In the end, it stayed in bed all the time and refused to eat. Eventually, it died.
According to my great-grandfather, since mice have short lifespans, the mouse-human also had a short life. That’s why it died after a year.
After that, my great-grandfather wanted to have another mouse-human, so he searched the rice fields and mountains, but he never found one.
