“Kagome Kagome” can be translated to mean “circle you, circle you.” This children’s game is very similar to the game of “Ring Around the Rosy.” While the song has a very dark meaning, the song is simply a fun game to children. This Japanese song dates back to World War II at an orphanage in Japan’s Shimane Prefecture.

During the Nazis reign, they would conduct many experiments on various individuals to attempt to make them invincible. One of these experiments took place in an orphanage in Japan. The goal of this experiment was to find a “kill switch” in the human brain to slowly stop aging and death, in other words, make someone immortal. The Nazi doctors would perform the experiments on countless children and when their attempts failed, they would bury the bodies in the woods surrounding the orphanage without telling anyone about that child’s death.

After many innocent deaths, one girl finally survived. Her heart would stop repeatedly during the procedure and during her sleep, but she would be revived immediately afterwards. The procedure was repeated on more children after that success. For the most part, the children were normal, but the doctors reported that the children all seemed to have some kind of secret. The children would walk around the orphanage with a calm smile on their face, only changing their expression when alone with one of the doctors. The expression would change to be one of pure hatred and the child would begin to repeat the phrase “Kagome Kagome.” This turned into a game that the children would play with the doctors and other caretakers.

When the experiment was shut down, no explanation was given as to why the orphanage was abandoned and what happened to the children. One caretaker later wrote that the final time that the children approached him asking to play “Kagome Kagome,” the faces that the children made were beyond horrifying. This lead the caretaker to run from the building without coming back.

There is no official documentation to support this story, but the orphanage still stands today. Locals do not go anywhere near the building or the woods surrounding the building. The children are rumored to still be living inside the building as immortals. Those who have explored the grounds describe the children as looking normal, only bearing scars from surgeries that the doctors put them through. The children will invite visitors to play “Kagome Kagome” and tell them the rule of the game: “If you flinch, you lose.” Those who play the game claim that the children’s faces morph into terrifying inhuman expressions. Not every visitor has survived this game. Many individuals that have explored the area have been reported missing and never found.

Below is a Japanese vocaloid of this terrifying song. This describes the events that lead to the creation of “Kagome Kagome” and what happens to those that do not win the game.

Japan’s “Suicide Forest” is one of the most talked about legends in recent years because the YouTuber, Logan Paul, decided to film a dead body while vlogging in the forest. Filming a man who had just hung himself was not a very good idea for his reputation, but it brought even more attention to his urban legend. Certain aspects of the Aokigahara Forest are factual, while others are creepily coincidental to those facts.

Firstly, the qualities of the location of the forest are unique. The Aokigahara Forest is located at the base of Mount Fuji. This mountain causes the ground to be a floor of compressed volcanic rock with soil so thick that it is impossible to dig into. Iron deposits in the volcanic soil lead to issues using any form of technology. The trees that form the forest are very special thanks to this soil. There are so many trees that another name for the forest is the “Sea of Trees.” The foliage block out the sun, along with views of trails, making it very easy to get lost. The trees also block out most sounds, including wind. There have been reports of ghosts moaning in the eerie silence. Being devoid of many nutrients because of the poor soil and lack of sunlight lead the forest to have nearly no wild animals. The forest also includes icy caverns below ground with freezing temperatures. The features of the forest are almost as unique as its history.

The Aokigahara Forest is known for being the second highest rated suicide-central in the world. There is no exact number of how many people have killed themselves in the forest, but it is estimated to be over 500. Forest workers pick up around 70 corpses every year, but many are thought to have disappeared in the foliage. In Japanese folklore, it is said that those who commit suicide cannot join the spirits of their ancestors and so they turn into a spirit called yurei that haunt the forest. The popularity of the forest has lead to many deaths of various types of people who want to die for various reasons.

As previously stated, when a body is found, the forest workers are forced to carry out certain procedures and rituals that have become a tradition in order to pay a certain respect to those who die. The workers carry the bodies down to the police station where the bodies are placed in a room to house bodies from suicides. The workers play janken (rock, paper, scissors) to decide who has to sleep in the room with the corpse so that the spirit is not left alone overnight.

Suicides in the forest have been a problem for a very long time. This has lead to the addition of anti-suicide signs to the forest. Everyday, new precautions are made often to try to limit the amount of people that commit suicide in the Aokigahara Forest.

Originating in ancient Japan, the Himuro Mansion lies in the southern region of the Himuro Mountain, surrounded by five shrines of five different gods located on other mountains. This mansion, as stated in The Toast article, is “said to have been the location of one of the most gruesome murders in Japanese history. Seven people were murdered after an occult ritual went horribly wrong. The Shinto ritual that the Himuro family practiced at their mansion was known as “The Strangling Ritual.”

The purpose of  The Strangling Ritual was to seal off bad karma that was believed to be coming out of a portal in the Earth every fifty years. The ritual started from choosing a maiden at birth and raising her isolated from the rest of the world. On the day of the ceremony, the maiden was bound by ropes around her neck, ankles, and wrists. The ropes were then attached to five oxen. The oxen would then run on cue, pulling off all of her limbs. The ropes that bound her were then soaked in her blood and placed over the portal to seal it off for the next fifty years.

The last Strangling Ritual did not go as planned. The maiden chosen to be isolated from the world fell in love with a man who tried to save her life. This bond to the Earth made the maiden impure, and destroyed the ritual. The master that chose the maiden realized that the ritual was a failure and murdered his entire family by his own sword, then ended himself.

With the family brutally murdered, the mansion became haunted by the souls of the family. The souls are said to wander the mansion in hopes of repeating the failed ritual. People have reported seeing blood splashes on the walls from the sword. Many have also reported seeing ghosts dressed in white, preparing the grounds for the Strangling Ritual.

In 2001, Tecmo released a game for Playstation called Fatal Frame. This creators of the game say that the game was based on a true story. The story of the Himuro Mansion. One of the main characters, Miku, goes to the mansion and discovers that some of the people that she was searching for were murdered by the ghosts of the mansion. Those individuals were discovered with rope burns on their wrists and ankles. The game goes further into the ritual explaining the entire story behind the Himuro Mansion. While we do not have official records to back up this legend, the haunted Himuro Mansion is still present in today’s society.