Ninety-nine Steps

The Ogre Who Cried is highly unusual in the tradition of ogre tales. Although not part of the narrative, lurking in the dark corners of the telling are stories of lustful ogres who capture beautiful brides on their way to weddings, insatiable ogres who extract huge feasts from poor priests, and mean - spirited ogres who torture lonely farmers. These other, less friendly, creatures more truly follow the behavior expected of ogres.

In an older Japanese folktale, a rapacious ogre goes to town each day to catch humans and eat them. The townspeople live in constant fear of the ogre and finally decide to challenge him to a bet. They challenge him to build a staircase of one hundred stone steps up the mountain in a single night. The terms are that if he completes the task before dawn, the town will surrender a citizen to him every day forever. If he fails, he must never eat another human being again.

When the appointed night comes, the ogre sets to work with unparalleled energy. It must be understood that he has already taken the precaution of putting the town’s roosters in burlap bags. After completing ninety - nine steps, he begins to feel tired. Confident that his trick will delay the coming of dawn, he lies down and falls asleep. Luckily, the gods are on the side of the townspeople. They uncover the burlap from the roosters’ heads. When morning comes, the roosters crow in the day, and the startled ogre realizes that the bet is lost. The townspeople are saved. In every version of this tale, the townspeople win the bet when the rooster crows. In every version, the ogre builds ninety - nine steps—not eighty steps, not ninety - eight. Always ninety - nine. This detail is the seed of the story

In some versions, there are actually two ogres, husband and wife, and the wife is the one who ties the bags over the rooster 's heads. In other versions, the ogre actually wants to stop eating the humans, and torments himself whenever he is driven to his cannibalistic orgies. If the storyteller should feel inspired, the ogre will haphazardly build the steps in a great nighttime haste or a god may hold a lantern before a rooster so that it will crow before dawn actually comes. Yet, whatever else one wishes to add or subtract, it is crucial to include the detail of the ninety-nine steps.