The kappa of The Eye of the Dragon, which eventually found their way into Dragon Warriors, owe very little apart from their watery habitat to the creatures of Japanese folklore. For one thing they live in the sea, whereas Japanese kappa haunt ponds and streams. Not to mention the unhealthy obsession with mortal posteriors, as in the illustration above where a kappa is looking at an bow trap baited with a corpse whose arse is positioned directly under the arrow tip.
The way it came about was this. I probably first came across kappa (the original variety) either in Richard A Lupoff’s Sword of the Demon or the roleplaying game Bushido. As the setting of The Eye of the Dragon is vaguely Graeco-Egyptian, at least architecturally, and kappa is a Greek letter, some circuit tripped in my brain. That combined with The Tempest’s “of his bones are coral made; those are pearls that were his eyes” and gave us the DW kappa.
For our Tetsubo book (I won’t recap the story here, there are enough old posts about it) Jamie and I naturally had to include to genuine Japanese kappa, supposedly spawned from the ghosts of the Heike after the clan’s destruction at the sea battle of Dan-no-ura.
According to the Morokoshi Kinmō Zui, these creatures resemble a small child or monkey with a back entirely covered in scales, look like a tiger when resting on the sand, and have long claws that they keep hidden in the water. But folk tales, like dreams, are elusive and protean; another description claims the kappa has the body of a tortoise, the limbs of a frog, and the head of a monkey. Just to confuse things even more, the Suiko (a Bugaku theatrical mask) depicts the creature with flat ears, a pointed eagle nose, and a coxcomb covered with tiger's skin.
In the river of Kawachi Mura, a kappa was once caught in the girth of a horse. After being rendered harmless by spilling its fluid, it was forced to sign a bond promising never to attack a man, woman, child, or beast again. Another tale tells of Rokusuke of Keyamura, a retainer of Taiko, a strongman who captured a kappa. In prints he is seen surrounded by a number of these creatures.
Poems by Sugawara no Michizane were held in great esteem in Kyushu as protection against the kappa. Before departing for exile in Kyushu in 901 AD, Michizane cast a final glance at his plum trees and composed the following verses:
“Kochi fukaba Niwoi okoseyo Ume no hana Aruji nashi tote Haruna wasurezo.”
The sources translate this as:
"When the eastern breeze passes, load her with perfume O blossoms of my plum trees; even though the master is far away, never forget the spring."
According to legend, the poem was so powerful that one of the plum trees uprooted itself and miraculously flew to Chikuzen to be with him. This tree became known as Tobi Ume, or the "jumping plum tree". In exile, Michizane was crossing a river when a kappa seized his horse’s bridle and tried to drag him underwater. Michizane sliced off the creature’s hand. The mummified hand can be viewed to this day at the Kitano Tenmangū Shrine in Kurume, Fukuoka.
That’s all a long preamble to the Tetsubo entry for kappa, which (like the baku and gaki) I have converted to Dragon Warriors rules.
Kappa
Kappa are amphibious goblins that inhabit the rivers, lakes and ponds of the Ikaido islands. Honourable but vicious, they prey on the blood of land-dwelling creatures -- not just mankind, but also cattle and horses. Their favourite sustenance, however, is the blood of human children. They drink this through the rectum, so if a drowned corpse with a distended anus is found this is always blamed (on the whole justifiably) on the kappa. These creatures are ferociously proud of their martial ability. They will sometimes challenge a person to single combat, and if the kappa is bested it will undertake to teach secret skills to its opponent. It is important to be very exact about the terms of a duel, as kappa are sticklers for the letter of an agreement and if they can gain any advantage (such as by insisting the duel take place underwater) they will not hesitate to do so. Kappa are not communal. Always encountered singly, they are the Oriental equivalent of the kelpie of Elleslandic folklore: a genius loci, really a water sprite rather than a simple water-dwelling animal.
Physique: Kappa are spindly beings rather like monkeys, except that they have no fur but instead are covered with silvery-grey or yellow-green scales, like those of a fish. Their hands are webbed and, in some cases at least, a carapace like a tortoise’s shell protects the kappa’s upper body. Kappa have a bowl-shaped depression in the top of their heads. This is used to carry water when the kappa emerges on to dry land, as otherwise it would quickly lose its strength.
Behaviour: Kappa fear fire, which desiccates their bodies. A kappa faced with brandished flame must roll 6 or less on d20 or give ground. Any fire-based attack which strikes a kappa, whether or not it inflicts damage, dries its body; it loses 1 Health Point and suffers a cumulative −1 from ATTACK until it can next immerse itself.
Special Rules: Kappa breathe underwater and are excellent swimmers. Either through sorcery or stealth, they are seldom seen on their excursions to human settlements. Renowned for their fondness for cucumbers, they can be bribed or distracted by an offering of them; the kappa resists the temptation only if it rolls 17 or more on d20.
They are able to survive short forays onto land by means of the hollow on their heads, which holds water to sustain them. If this water is spilled, the kappa quickly becomes too weak even to move. It is possible to trick a kappa into spilling its water simply by bowing: kappa are so polite that they almost invariably bow back. Roll d20 against the kappa’s Intelligence of 6; on a success it realises the danger and keeps its head level as it bows, otherwise the water spills out and the kappa can be caught. (As with most creature vulnerabilities, players should not have their characters make use of this ploy without first checking to see if they know it. Obviously anyone can read it here, but the Tetsubo rulebook is unfortunately not available in Yamato! A character must be versed in Shinto doctrine and make a successful Intelligence check at difficulty factor 13 to remember this weakness and exploit it.)
Kappa invariably know Unarmed Combat, Kawashi, Koppo, Atemi-Waza, Heal Wounds and Surgery (skills defined in the Tetsubo rules), and in most cases they are better at these skills than humans. They are also innate spellcasters, casting without gesture, incantation or ingredient — though their magic, like their strength, fails entirely while the water is spilled from their heads. Each kappa has 3d4 Magic Points and commands the following: Curse, Lesser Healing, Command, Tangleroots, Peer, and Illusion (all as the Sorcerer spells of those names, at the usual Magic Point costs); Wave Mastery (as the Water Elementalist spell; a kappa uses it to part or still the waters of its pool, 2 Magic Points); and five lesser dweomers of its own, each costing 1 Magic Point and lasting until a Spell Expiry Roll: marsh-lights (a drift of pale flames that wander where the kappa wills, luring or misleading travellers by night), the zone of cold (a clammy chill within 10m of the kappa, numbing fingers: −1 from ATTACK for all within), the zone of silence (no sound carries within 10m of the kappa), the reek (a concealing fog rises over water within 50m) and dousing (every open flame within 15m gutters out).
As Tetsubo is not going to be out before next year, anyone looking for a good RPG of the Sengoku and early Edo period is advised to check out Stray Crows from Portmortem Studios. The Kickstarter is launching soon and there's a free preview on DriveThruRPG.
