Lightning doesn’t just strike in Japanese folklore. It arrives with something.

Today’s Myth of the Day is Raijū, the thunder-beast that rides the storm like an animal made of voltage: small, clawed, lightning-wreathed, and tied to Raijin himself. The detail that made me laugh and then immediately stop laughing: some stories say it likes to sleep in human navels, and Raijin’s lightning to wake it is what injures the unlucky “host.” So people sleep facedown when the thunder gets close.

Also: there’s actual folk procedure here, not just vibes. Mark a lightning-struck rice paddy with green bamboo and a sacred rope to give the raijū a path back up.

Myth of the Day: Raijū