I read it in second grade (which would mean it was available circa 1976/77). It’s the story of a chinese (or perhaps japanese) woman who is cooking a dumpling for her meal when an earthquake shakes her hut. The dumpling rolls down into a fissure and underground, and the woman chases after it (presumably, she was very hungry & very poor!)
The woman pursues the dumpling (which keeps rolling further & further underground) into the Underworld - wherein she encounters a few Gods (portrayed in the pictures as unmoving statues). Eventually, the woman gets a hold of the dumpling, but demons (that look like Ogre Magi from D&D) chase her out of the underworld and all the way back to her little hut.
Why this slight little book has recently been plaguing my memory, I can’t explain. But I’ve been trying to remember the title for like a week now. Does this sound familiar to anyone?
I remember when I was ten or so, it hit me ‘Statue of Lord Jesu! This story has obviously been altered and Buddha has been replaced by Jesus!’. Years later, it turned out that there was a Lord Jesu, and the similarity of names was just a coincidence.
OTOH, the Oni probably are the basis for Ogre Magi. The Kenku are one of the variations of Tengu found in Chinese and Japanese folklore.
