You've spent a great week in Kyoto. It may be the first day of February, but the temperature as the forecasts would have left you believe, and on your last day in the old imperial city, you have this sudde impulse to just leave the crowd for a moment of peace with the enchanting japanese nature. Packing your belongings into your rucksack, you go to the station and take the first bus for Takao decide to make a trip to the famous Arashiyama.

There, you can't help but stop for a while to visit the Kozan-ji temple and see for yourself the famous Choju-giga, maybe the earliest "manga" from Japan ("The country’s first undisputed masterpiece of cartooning was created by a Buddhist bishop, Sojo Toba, in the early 12th century. His work, Chojugiga [“The Animal Scrolls”], incorporated humor into the Chinese art form of the narrative picture scroll. Chojugiga featured anthropomorphized animals in antics mocking the Buddhist clergy.", from PhilTicknor.net). After laughing at all the rabbits and the frogs mimicking too human attitudes, you finally set on foot for your final destination.

The path isn't very steep, and you can enjoy at leisure the beautiful landscape. Soon enough, you hear the crystaline sound of a waterfall singing nearby and you discover the Kiyotaki, where the renown writer Basho is said to have written some of his famous haiku. You are not surprised as you take in your surroundings. There is something increadibly inviting and soothing about this place, where the pale greens of the forest, the clear turquoise of the water and the grey of the rocks make for an ethereal composition, both out of this world yet the perfect embodiement of the japanese nature. You decide to stop, sit down on a boulder and relax. Lulled by the appeasing sound of the water, you soon fall asleep.

When you wake up, it is dark already; it is hard to tell though, what time of the day it is, as you're surrounded by a mist so thick that you can't even see the path you have come from. Panicking a little, you call but no sound answer you, as if the mist was absorbing them all, even that of the cascading water. Trying to find your way back, you walk for a while but before long, you realize that you are indeed lost, and have yet to meet someone, anyone, on the deserted mountain path. With little food and no sleeping bag, you are determinded to at least find some trace of civilization, when all that you can see are bamboo trees all around you.

You do not know how long you were idle, but suddenly you perceive a light piercing the fog. You run more than you walk towards its source and from the night emerges a small temple that appears to be quite old when you finally reach it. By the temple is a little house where the light comes from. As you were about to knock, the door is opened and reveals an old man with a long white beard and mirth in his eyes. Before you can introduce yourself, he begins "Welcome, weary traveler. It is not a night for anyone to stay outside. Please come in! My meal is certainly frugal by your standards, but it is warm, and there is enough for two." He steps aside to let you walk in, and soon enough you find yourself sitting on a tatami in front of a bowl of fuming miso soup. After a while, the voice of your host rise again "It's at times like that, when the elements seem to close in on you, that some of the tales of old take a life of their own....would you like to listen to one?"