The Sea of Ghosts is the great inland sea of eastern Akanegumo, fed by the Ayuri River out of the Yūreimori — which means everything that floats out of Yanagihama eventually passes across it. Cold, deep, and fog-prone, it earned its name long ago: the lake folk hold that the drowned do not rest in its waters, and that the fogs that walk its surface at dawn are not entirely weather. Their rules are old and simple — lantern lit before dusk, voices low in the fog, and never answer a hail you can't see the source of.

For all that, the lake is the province's lifeline. Its fisheries are rich and uncomplicated, fishing villages cling to its coves, and lake traders run its length in shallow-drafted junks between Shiosaki's harbor and the far shore. Kappa hold the river mouths and expect their courtesies; the deeper water has older tenants the lake folk feed and decline to name.