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Japanese fairy tales Cat Guardian Once a wealthy merchant lived in Osaka with only one daughter. Now she was so kind and dear that he loved her and looked after her like she was his own eye. Now he also had a very nice cat which was loved by everyone in the house and was pampered. The cat was most attached to the merchant’s daughter and slept in her bed so they were almost never apart. The girl never suspected any evil from the cat she loved but the father soon came to worry that the cat might be a sorcerer or monster which had come into his house to kidnap his daughter. So he decided it was best to kill the animal to be safe. After he had decided this however, he had a dream in which the cat appeared to him with a sorrowful countenance. “Dear Lord, I must appear to you in a dream because I suspect you mean to act against me,” the cat told him. “I have come to warn you not to commit this injustice for I was sent here by a kami to protect your daughter from a magical rat which lives in your store house and which seeks to cause her harm. I am far too weak however to attack the rat head on and thus I must stay by your daughters side in order to keep her safe. Please listen to what I advise, send for your friend and comrade in the Aijikawa trade to lend you his big beautiful cat named Butschi. Then Butschi and I will go and hunt the rat together.” The next morning when the merchant awoke he lost no time but followed the promptings of the cat quickly and sent for his friend asking to borrow the cat Butschi. The friend gave her willingly and so the two cats went to the place where the rate lived. The next morning when the door to the store house was opened all three animals had torn at each other so greatly that none could stir. The rat made desperate efforts to escape as she heard the people come in but the cats firmly clutched her fur and bit into her neck so she couldn’t run. She was larger than the cats and so the first cat had been quite right when he had said he could not beat the rate alone. The people on seeing the giant rat immediately took a sharp knife and cut the rat’s throat and threw the corpse into the water. The cats were now free of the rat but were so weak that they barely move and eventually died of the wounds they had suffered in the desperate battle with the rat yokai. So they were given a burial with full honors and their portraits were placed in the shrine to commemorate their bravery and faithfulness.