第3話: 阿古は将棋大会で文太と出会い、翔は霊怪話を玲子に語る

3

The meal in this episode is introduced by the Ghastly Widow. Goodbye Ako meets Bunta at his school, where he is participating in a Go tournament, elimination style. Bunta's first opponent is Michio Sakai, the runner-up of the previous year's tournament. Meanwhile, Michio is running late to the tournament. He runs into a crowd, who have gathered around an accident scene. Michio squeezes his way through, and makes it to the school just in time for the first match, although when he arrives, Bunta points out that he is looking unnaturally pale. The first match ends with Bunta conceding, and Michio advances his way through the bracket, but during the later matches, Michio's hand starts disappearing as he plays his piece. During the final match, Ako sees a news report saying that Michio was hit by a truck earlier that day, and had died in the hospital a few minutes ago. At this realization, Michio insists the match is finished. He wins, and his spirit moves on, saying he is finally "number one"... The Midnight Princess Ako and Reiko go to Sho's house, which turns out to be a funeral home, to do homework. They go to Sho's room, which is filled with shelves covered in ghost stories written in many languages. Sho reads one of them, called The Midnight Princess. At the beginning, a princess of a foreign country dies. Before she does, however, she instructs that at the event of her death, the should be put in a coffin in the church, and her coffin should be guarded by a single guard every night. Her wish is honored, but every night, the guard would disappear at midnight. One day, a guard named Joseph was assigned to guard the coffin. His mother reassured him, since he had his father's rosary, which he prayed to every day. On the way to the church, Joseph meets a stranger that tells him to hide under the pulpit until the hour after midnight. He did so, and at midnight, the princess rose, searching for him, but could not find him. The next day, he was asked to guard the coffin again. The stranger appeared a second time, telling him to hide behind the altar this time. Again, he did so, and again, the princess could not find him. Joseph is asked to guard the coffin one last time. The stranger appears, telling him to hide in the confessional. He reveals that the princess is possessed, and the demon will die if it doesn't eat for three days. He does so, and when the demon appears, it transforms into its true form, scaring Joseph and causing him to drop the rosary. She sees him, and advances on him. He recovers the rosary just as the clock strikes one. The demon disappears, and the princess is revived. The king marries her to Joseph. The stranger appears one final time, and reveals himself to be Joseph's father... Passenger On A Rainy Night Sho tells the story of a taxi driver, who picks up a young girl next to a pond. She asks him to drive her to Yotsuya. She is completely silent during the entire ride. When they arrive at Yotsuya, the girl asks the driver to wait while she gets money to pay for the fare. The driver agrees, but the girl does not return for a while. Finally, he walks up to the door, and an older woman answers it. He asks about the girl, but when he describes what she was wearing, the woman reveals that it was her daughter wearing the clothes she wore on the day she died, the taxi she was driving in having crashed in to the pond. The driver rushes back to the taxi, but immediately after he closes the door, the car fills with water and the girl reappears in the back seat. Sho ends the story by saying And the girl said, please take me back to the pond... (Source: Wikipedia)