In the old lunar calendar, Minazuki -- the sixth month -- was a time of purification. The rains had come, the air was heavy, and people sought rituals to cleanse away the misfortune that gathered in the wet heat of early summer. On the last day of June, shrines across Japan held Nagashi-no-Harae: paper dolls cast into rivers, carrying impurities away with the current.

Presiding over all of it, lurking in the shallows with bright eyes and a water-filled dish on his head, was the Kappa.

The Kappa is one of Japan's most recognisable yokai -- a river creature, roughly child-sized, with a turtle shell, scaly skin, and a hollow depression on the crown of his head that must stay filled with water or he loses his power. He is mischievous, dangerous, and oddly honourable: if you bow to a Kappa, he will bow back, spilling his water and becoming helpless. Farmers once blamed him for drowning livestock and pulling children into rivers. Doctors once credited him with teaching humans the art of bone-setting.

He is not entirely evil. He is just very, very wet.

In Yokai Match this June, Kappa has claimed the board. A stone-ringed pond sits at the heart of the grid -- twelve tiles counting down with every match made nearby. Let them reach zero and the flood comes. Clear them in time, and the waters recede.

Ten levels. Increasing dread. A finale shaped like Nagashi-no-Harae itself.

Collect this month:

🌿 Haraigushi -- the purification wand used in Shinto cleansing rites, paper streamers catching what the eye cannot see

⭕ Chinowa -- the great ring of grass you step through to leave misfortune behind, a June tradition at shrines across Japan

📖 Kappa Lore -- unlocked at the finale. His full story, waiting in your shrine.

Minazuki runs all of June. Find it on the Matsuri Calendar.

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