There are some legends you never want to verify in person. Teke Teke is one of them. The urban myth of a woman who fell onto a railway line, her body severed at the waist, haunting train stations and underpasses, moving unnaturally fast on her hands—or elbows, or whatever she uses to drag herself—is terrifying in stories. In person… it’s catastrophic.

We were called to a rural station outside Osaka. The local authorities had sealed off the tracks after multiple reports of sightings. Witnesses described hearing the “tekete-ke, tekete-ke” sound before disappearing. Nothing left behind, not even footprints, just the echo of scraping concrete and terror.

Morizumi didn’t even glance at the warnings. “She’s not dangerous unless you notice her wrong.”

I laughed nervously. “Notice her wrong? What does that even mean?”

We arrived at the deserted station just after midnight. The platform lights flickered in the fog, and every surface seemed wet with mist. The first sound I heard was that scraping—the unmistakable, horrifying rhythm of elbows against concrete.

“Shigure,” Morizumi said quietly. “Stay calm. Don’t stare at the tracks too long.”

I wanted to argue, but the instant I looked down the tracks, I saw her. The lower half of her body was gone. Her upper half hovered unnaturally, elbows digging into the platform as she propelled herself forward. Hair obscured her face, but one slit of eye glinted red in the dim light.

The scraping stopped. Silence.

Then she laughed. A sound high and brittle, echoing across the foggy platform. I froze. My camera shook in my hands.

Morizumi stepped forward, calm as a monk in a burning temple. He drew a circle on the ground and whispered something under his breath. The air thickened. I could see the fog bending around him, as though even it feared crossing his path.

The Teke Teke lunged. Faster than I could react, she was upon him—but Morizumi didn’t flinch. With a hand raised, he pulled the ambient energy of the platform around him, a shimmer of light bending in the fog, and she froze mid-motion, a scream ripped into the air.

“She doesn’t like being caught,” Morizumi murmured. “But fear will never save her.”

He advanced carefully, chanting under his breath, the runes on his satchel glowing faintly. The ghost shrieked and twitched, dragging herself forward with impossible speed, but he was faster. With a flick of his wrist, he bound her hands with a shimmering cord of light, forcing her to kneel.

The final exorcism wasn’t loud. No explosions, no screams that carried into the town. Just Morizumi’s steady voice, repeating an incantation older than the rails themselves. Slowly, she dissipated—her hair falling into mist, her upper body dissolving into nothing, leaving the platform utterly silent.

I exhaled. “She’s… gone?”

Morizumi simply shook his head. “Not gone. Just… returned to where she belongs. Until someone else notices her wrong again.”

As we left, I could still hear a faint scraping sound in my mind, like echoes of her laughter bouncing down endless tunnels. I realized then that some legends never truly die—they just wait for someone else to hear them.

And Morizumi? He never looks worried. Not even for a second.