Countless eyes opening in ruined shoji screens
Mokumokuren
An eye opens in every square of the torn shoji. Is the house watching, the obsession of a go player, or a strange thing that can be sold?
Overview
Mokumokuren is a yokai in which countless eyes appear in torn shoji screens and abandoned homes. Sekien's image is later joined to Tsugaru tales of a merchant collecting eyes, making it a yokai of looking and being looked at.
Encounter
A person staying alone in an empty house finds eyes opening in every square of the torn moonlit shoji. The house one thought one was observing suddenly looks back with countless gazes.
Lore
Toriyama Sekien includes Mokumokuren in Konjaku Hyakki Shui. Yamada Norio's Tohoku Kaidan no Tabi adds a Tsugaru tale of a merchant collecting and selling the eyes, while researchers also note Sekien's creative role.
Traits
It dwells in the house or shoji itself, returning every gaze. The eyes do not merely look like a pattern; some tales treat them as tangible things that can be plucked and bagged.
In the corners of a house where someone once lived, many eyes appeared.
Toriyama Sekien, Konjaku Hyakki Shui