There was once an old couple that prayed and prayed for a child. Finally, their wish was granted. However, the child was born only one inch tall, and never grew any taller. So his mother and father lovingly named him “Issun-Bōshi”, the One-Inch Boy.
Growing up, the boy dreamed of becoming a great warrior.
Each time the children in the sea-side village saw Issun-Bōshi, they would ask:
“Tiny boy. Tiny boy. What can you do?”
“I can fight!” would be Issun-Bōshi’s reply – to which the children would simply laugh.
Issun-Bōshi, however, was never discouraged, and trained each and every day.
One day a girl from the village was kidnapped by an ogre and taken to the ogre’s island home. The village-folk feared the ogre and dared not go after the girl. Issun-Bōshi, however, asked his mother for a bowl, a chopstick, and a needle. Using the bowl as a boat, and the chopstick as a paddle, he made his way to the Island. In a dark cave, Issun-Bōshi found the girl in a cage, guarded by the giant red ogre. The boy approached the ogre and said “Ogre! I challenge you to a fight! If I win, you must open this cage!”.
But the ogre simply laughed and said “Tiny boy. Tiny boy. What can you do?”
The ogre then picked up the boy and swallowed him whole. The boy, however, was not discouraged.
From inside the ogre’s stomach, he used the needle his mother had given him as a sword and slashed at the ogre. This caused the ogre so much pain that he coughed out the boy. Angry, the ogre tried to squash the boy with his hand, but at the last moment, Issun-Bōshi raised his sword and the ogre stabbed himself instead. Whilst the ogre fell back in pain, the one-inch boy ran up the ogre’s red hand. He ran past the ogre’s elbow, past the shoulder, past the sharp tusks, and onto the ogre’s nose. In one fell swoop slashed both the ogre’s giant red eyes, blinding the ogre. The ogre, now fearing the boy, clumsily ran out of the cave.
Victorious, Issun-Bōshi then approached the girl’s cage, but try as he might, he could not open it.
“Oh!” said the girl, pointing at a colorful mallet the ogre had clumsily dropped. “Try that!”
“What is that?” asked the boy.
“It’s a magical mallet that can grant wishes.”
“How do I use it?”
“If you can strike it on the ground, your wish will come out!”
So the one-inch boy, using all his might, lifted the mallet above his head, and said “I wish I had something to open this cage”.
As soon as the mallet hit the ground, Issun-Bōshi started growing in size. Soon he was one foot tall, then two, then three… eventually he grew to six feet tall.
Issun-Bōshi, no longer the one inch boy, opened the cage with ease. He and the girl returned to the village where he was celebrated for defeating the ogre. The magical mallet brought great fortune to the boy, and he and his family lived happily ever after.
This story is based on “Issun-Bōshi”, a Japanese Folktale from the 12th Century.