The Land of the Dead (Yomi-no-Kuni)

When Izanami perished from the burns inflicted by the fire god Kagutsuchi's birth, Izanagi was consumed by grief. In his anguish, he wept until his tears became a deity, then drew his sword and slew his newborn son—from whose blood and body sprang numerous new deities. But the act of vengeance could not restore Izanami, who had already descended to Yomi-no-kuni, the shadowy realm beneath the earth.

Refusing to accept his loss, Izanagi followed her into the underworld. In the darkness of Yomi, he found Izanami and pleaded with her to return. She replied that she had already eaten the food of the dead (yomotsu-hegui) and could not simply leave, but she would petition the deities of the underworld for permission. She asked only one thing: that he not look upon her while she made this request.

Izanagi waited, but as time stretched on, his impatience grew unbearable. Breaking the taboo, he tore a tooth from his comb, lit it as a torch, and peered into the darkness. What he saw was beyond horror: Izanami's body was rotting and writhing with maggots, and eight thunder deities clung to her limbs and torso. The beautiful goddess of creation had become a decomposing corpse.

Terrified, Izanagi fled. Izanami, humiliated and enraged that he had seen her shameful state, sent the Ugly Females of Yomi (Yomotsu-shikome) to pursue him. As he ran, Izanagi cast objects behind him that transformed into obstacles—his headdress became grapes, his comb became bamboo shoots, and both distracted his pursuers who stopped to eat them. Finally, at the pass of Yomotsu-hirasaka—the boundary between the living and the dead—Izanagi sealed the entrance with an enormous boulder.

From opposite sides of the rock, the estranged couple exchanged their final words. Izanami swore she would strangle one thousand people in Izanagi's land each day. Izanagi countered that he would cause one thousand five hundred births each day. Thus, from the bitterness of a divine marriage's end, the balance between death and life in the world was established.