The legend of Aka Manto

Aka Manto, also known as Red Cape, is a malicious spirit according to Japanese urban legend. Aka Manto haunts public bathrooms, particularly the female bathrooms in public schools. He asks his victims a series of questions before killing them.

Aka Manto used to be a handsome young man when he was alive, most likely a high school student. He was often seen wearing a distinctive red cape. Because of his good looks, many teenage girls admired him and constantly hounded on him.

Unable to deal with his flock of admirers, Aka Manto concealed his face with a white mask so that those girls would not be able to notice him.

It is unknown what happened next, but it is most likely that while hiding in the last stall of a female bathroom to hide from his frantic admirers, Aka Manto somehow died.

After his death, Aka Manto returned as an evil spirit and promised a brutal death to anyone who entered the last stall of a female bathroom.

Anyone can summon him when he/she uses the last stall in a female school bathroom. He appears in front of his victim, wearing a red cape and a white mask.

He then asks his victim "Which one do you prefer, the red cloak or blue cloak? Alternatively, he asks, "Which one do you prefer, the red toilet paper or the blue toilet paper?"

If the victim chooses red, Aka Manto slits their throats or decapitates them with a knife. The blood, which flows from their necks and onto their clothes, makes it appear as if they are wearing red clothes.

If the victim chooses blue, he strangles them until their face turns blue or they die of suffocation. In some versions, his hands emerge from the toilet instead in order to strangle them.

Alternatively, if the victim tries to outsmart him by choosing a different colour, the floor cracks open and a pair of hands drags the victim into hell.

If the victim somehow decides to choose the colour yellow, Aka Manto shoves his face into the toilet, making it yellow like the urine and eventually kill them.

The only way to escape this ghost and ultimately survive is by choosing no colour. However, to this day, there is no method to completely defeat or kill Aka Manto.

There have been many variations of the urban legend and the most famous variation tell the story of two police officers investigating the rumours of a strange man lurking in the female bathroom after one of the students heard a strange male voice utter "shall we put on the red vest?"

The male police officer waited outside and the female police officer entered the stall and heard the same question from the same man again.

Wanting to get over with it, the female police officer exclaimed, "Ok, put it on!" Suddenly, a loud scream was heard, followed by an abrupt thump. The male police officer rushed in, opened the door, and was horrified at what he saw. The female police officer was found decapitated and her police vest was stained red with blood.

Many stories influenced the lagend of Aka Manto. One of them was the story of Kainade, another toilet dwelling monster. Kainade lurks in the bathrooms of old houses in Kyoto and will only show up on February 3rd, the Setsubun festival in Japan (Kainade). When someone squats over a traditional Japanese toilet, a pair of hands come up to touch you bottom. The only way to stop him is to squat and ask "white paper or red paper?" Then he'll leave you alone.

Another version of Aka Manto has him kidnapping and killing people. The story goes that a man wearing a red blanket visits a small shop late at night (The Red Cape). He explains that he is a servant from the main house and that his master is very sick. He convinces the father to come help him, and comes back for the mother a few hours later. He comes a third time to get the kids, but the neighbors insist that they sleep. The man in the red blanket grudgingly leaves. The couple is found dead and the red blanket man is never found again.

This story is based off the true crime story of "ao getto" murder, or blue blanket murder (Japanese). In Fukui, Japan in 1906, three family members were taken by a man wearing a blue blanket over his head. It was assuming they were brutally murdered. Due to the documents never being released in English, I am unsure how the investigation of the crime ended.