Big Book of Mythology (Yokai Edition)

Funayūrei

Translation: Ship ghosts/Boat spirits

Other names: Ayakashi

Type: Unknown

Preference: Edo Period/Yamaguchi/Saga

Habitat: Seas, oceans, and bays

Diet: None

Danger zone: Yellow (Hostile)

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About Funayūrei:
Funayurei are ghosts (yūrei) that have become vengeful spirits (onryō) at sea. They have been passed down in the folklore of various areas of Japan. They frequently appear in ghost stories and miscellaneous writings from the Edo Period as well as in modern folk customs. In the Yamaguchi Prefecture and the Saga Prefecture, they are called Ayakashi.

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Appearance:
They are the shadows of drowned sailors, remaining in this world to find their former friends and comrades, to bring them down into the sea with them. Funayūrei usually appear as dead bodies wearing white funerary robes. They appear as an eerie, luminescent mist at first, which gets closer and closer until it forms into a ship with a ghostly crew.

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Behavior/Interaction:
Funayūrei ghost ships attacks in different ways, sometimes charging headlong towards the other ship, causing it to steer away so sharply that it capsizes, other times carrying a ghostly crew who cling to the side of the other ship and try to drag it down under the water. The ghosts themselves carry large ladles and buckets which they use to fill ships with seawater, sinking them and adding more souls to their crew. Occasionally funayūrei strike not as a large crew of man-sized ghosts, but as one very large ghost who rises out of the water to capsize a ship immediately. This ghost often demands a barrel from the crew, which it uses to flood the deck and sink the ship.

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Abilities:
(None in particular)

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Target(s):
Sailors

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Escape plan:
It is said that a clever crew can outsmart the funayūrei by carrying buckets and ladles with holes in the bottom, so that despite their efforts the ghosts will not be able to flood the ship. Encounters with ghost ships can also be avoided by boldly sailing directly through the phantasm instead of turning to avoid a collision - though this runs the risk that the other ship may actually be a real one and not a phantasm. Some crews have also escaped the funayūrei's wrath by throwing food and provisions overboard as offerings to the hungry ghosts, who chase after the food instead of the crew.

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Origin story:
Unknown

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NOPE Rating:
5/5