Portion of famous waterway mysteriously takes on an ominous hue.

Like a lot of cities of historical significance, Kyoto is situated next to a river. The Kamogawa River runs along the east side of downtown Kyoto, and just about every visitor to the city spends at least some time strolling or driving by it.

Ordinarily, the river looks like it does above, but on Wednesday afternoon a portion of it looked like this.

Around 2:30 p.m., locals started reporting that a section of the river in the Kami Tobakanjinbashi-cho neighborhood, not far from Fushimi Inari Shrine, had turned blood-red.

The disturbingly hued liquid was found to be seeping into the waterway from a sewage pipe, coloring the waterway for several dozen meters before congregating on one bank.

Officials were unable to determine on-site just what exactly the substance is, and so they collected samples for lab-testing to investigate its chemical makeup and whether or not it’s harmful. The source is also still unknown, and no reported accidents or sightings of illegal dumping or animal corpses have taken place in the area.

With lab results yet to disclosed as of this writing, it’s up to online commenters to speculate, and current theories include:

“Well, the Kamogawa River used to be an execution ground, so…”
“Wasn’t there a story in The Kindaichi Case Files where a river turned red after a homicide?”
“Wasn’t this one of the disasters Moses proclaimed would happen?”
“First-born sons, run for your lives!”
“I’m not sure what’s going on, but I think first of all we should erect a statue of the Buddha, just to be safe.”

Others saw parallels to video games such as Siren and ActRaiser.

But by far the most prevalent theory is that we’re all suddenly living in the world of Evangelion, in which much of the planet’s water has been turned into the vermillion liquid known as LCL.

But even though it’s just a few days until the final Evangelion movie comes out, this would be a marketing stunt too crazy even for that franchise, and hopefully investigators can find the reason for the discoloration, as well as a solution, soon.

Sources: Kyoto Shimbun, Asahi Shimbun Digital, Livedoor News/Tele Asa News, Twitter/@livedoornews, Twitter/@kyoto_np
Top image: Pakutaso
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