Let me tell you a story I remembered. It's something I saw on TV a long, long time ago. If anyone living in Shikoku knows this story, I'd love more details.
First, about 20 years ago or so, Manno Pond—often called the water reservoir of the people of Kagawa Prefecture—dried up due to a severe drought. Manno Pond is a reservoir constructed by the legendary Kobo Daishi himself, a lake that practically never dried up, even when many other irrigation ponds in the vicinity did.
And from the dried-up bed of Manno Pond, a skeleton wrapped in a blanket or something similar was discovered. An investigation was launched treating it as a murder case, but with no leads whatsoever, it seemed destined to become an unsolved mystery. Around that time, locals were whispering things like, "The Buddha must have wanted to be found," or "No, Kobo Daishi is angry because someone dumped a body in Manno Pond."
From that period on, eyewitness accounts of ghosts increased dramatically around the Manno Pond area—unprecedented numbers. They were all sightings of a woman with similar features.
Meanwhile, as a last resort (or rather, clutching at straws), the investigation headquarters decided to try facial reconstruction—building a likeness of the face in life by applying clay to the skull. When a photo of this reconstruction was published in the newspaper, a woman living in Okayama contacted the police, saying it looked exactly like her missing older sister.
Detectives tracking the missing woman's footsteps discovered she had been working at a snack bar in Matsuyama. When they showed the facial reconstruction to the bar's owner, the proprietor confirmed it looked exactly like the woman who used to work there, that she had disappeared suddenly one day, and that she had been living with a man at the time.
However, shortly after the police began tracking down that man, he turned himself in with an exhausted, worn-out look on his face. When questioned, he confessed that as soon as he realized the police were investigating his circle, he tried to run, but from around that time, the woman he had murdered stood by his bedside every single night, making it impossible for him to sleep.
Just like that, in a whirlwind of events, the case that seemed headed for a dead end was solved. Immediately afterward, heavy rain fell over the Sanuki region, and Manno Pond, which had remained parched for so long, filled up with water to the brim in the blink of an eye. That was the story—that people called this rain "Kobo Daishi's Tears."
To everyone living in Shikoku, especially Kagawa Prefecture, have you ever heard of this? Since I live in Northern Kanto, I don't know the full details, so corrections, further details, cheers, or jeers are all welcome. Thank you.