Ninjago Sons of Garmadon Oni Mask Cultural AnaIysis.

[MagicNinja6195]

Major edit: PLEASE NO SPOILERS FOR SEASON 8, IK THEY ARE OUT FOR AUSTRALIA ALREADY, BUT PLEASE WAIT UNTIL THE EPISODES HAVE AIRED IN THE UNITED STATES, JUST BECAUSE THE EPISODES ARE ONLINE, DOESN’T MEAN THAT EVERYONE IN THE COMMUNITY HAS SEEN THEM. CAUSE I, LIKE MANY OTHER, MORE CIVILIZED AND PATIENT NINJAGO FANS, AM WAITING FOR THE EPISODES TO COME OUT ON TV, TO WATCH THEM.

IF YOU HAVE FOUND SOMETHING, BECAUSE YOU EITHER LIVE IN AUSTRALIA AND WATCHED IT ON TV THERE, OR YOU LIVE OUTSIDE OF AUSTRALIA AND WERE TOO IMPATIENT, SO YOU WATCHED THE BOOTLEGGED EPISODES, THEN PLEASE KEEP YOUR MOUTH SHUT, UNTIL THE EPISODES ARE OUT IN THE US, SO YOU DON’T SPOIL IT FOR THE OTHERS THAT ARE BEING PATIENT.

SO, PLEASE NO SPOILERS. I’VE ALREADY HAD SEASONS 3 & 6 RUINED FOR ME, BECAUSE OF SPOILERS, AND I ACTUALLY HAVE A TENDANCY TO GO ON A RANT ABOUT THAT, WHEN TALKING ABOUT SPOILERS, SO UNLESS YOU WANT CLUTTER, NO SPOILERS.

(I’d like to mention that I posted this WAY BEFORE I have seen the sneak preview on TLNM DVD. Once I have seen it, and analyzed it, I will update this topic with the info that I have found. I also hadn’t seen any of the set descriptions for the sets, so this stuff was just based on the images that we’ve seen.)

Ok, guys, we know that Season 8 of Ninjago, Sons of Garmadon, is going to be focusing around these Oni masks that we have in the sets this year, and the 3 we have are the Oni masks of Hatred(purple), Deception(orange), and Revenge(red).

Credit to the person that originally made this image.
Yet, Oni masks are an actual thing, in Japanese culture. So, about 2 weeks ago, on November 29th, I went and did a bunch of research on Oni masks and Oni in general, to see if I could find anything on oni IRL, that could relate to what we are seeing in the sets, based on the images we had gotten around that time.

Now, before I dive into this, I’d like to link this video that Gaijin Goombah did on Genji’s Oni skin in Overwatch, to get a basic understanding about Oni and Oni (or in the case of that video Hannya) Masks. Just gonna warn you guys of some weird imagery in there. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ifbdvxTYmPQ&t=37s and don’t worry about it being from one of the guys from The Game Theorists, because Gaijin Goombah is actually the better one on there.

Now, we’re gonna do this by looking at the set first, then look at the real life comparisons that I found, and we’re gonna start with this wave’s big-fig, Killow my research has led me to thinking that he is sort of inspired by the actual creature/yokai, Oni. Now, if you watched the video, you will know that oni are big, muscular, ogre-like creatures, tend to have long horns, mostly naked with those lion/tiger loin-cloths, and at times extra-limbs, eyes, etc.
If you look at Killow, he’s big and a bit muscular, much bigger than a normal minifig. We also see that he doesn’t got any ■■■■■ on under that biker jacket he has on, and with that Oni Mask of Deception on, he’s definitely got 2 long horns on his head.

You will also know, from the video and image, that Oni wield the giant, iron clubs called Kanabō. Now, the weapon that Killow has, to some, might just look like a “spiked baseball bat”, and even the Ninjago Wiki calls it that.
but if you look at real life kanabō,

they basically look like “spiked baseball bats”. And considering the fact that Oni will beat you up(lightest way I can think of for putting it) with these things, I can imagine Killow really swinging at the ninja with his kanabō.

Now, we’re not done with Killow yet, we still have those Oni mask tattoos to go over, but I’ll go over that later on, as that is a bit of a broad subject itself.

The next thing I want to cover, before we have a look at the other 2 figures we see with Oni masks on, I would like to cover Oni masks themselves.
Now, these are some examples of Oni masks

and some Hannya masks

Both are mask types used in Japanese Noh Theater, and they portray a character that has become something vengeful or evil, and you can kind of see the resemblance with these masks, minus the noses, of course.

But just to clarify, as Gaijin said in the video, Hannya masks portray women. Even my research states that

“the Hannya mask portrays the souls of women who have become demons due to obsession or jealousy.”

And based on my research, Oni masks portray men. And according to the Japanese ghost and monster database, Yokai.com,

“Today, the word oni generally only refers to this specific category of male demons.”

Now, while these are called Oni masks in this wave, it is a good idea to look at Hannya as well, especially since we got a female in the S.O.G. gang, Ultra Violet, and this will lead into my analysis on her and our last figure. According to Yokai.com,

“Hannya refers to demons or oni; more specifically to female demons called kijo—even more specifically to those kijo which appear in noh theater.”

and it says that there are 3 grades of hannya: namanari, chūnari, and honnari.

“Namanari hannya are kijo that still resemble human women. They have small horns and use dark magic to perform their evil deeds, such as summoning ikiryō to attack their enemies. They are not completely evil; there remains a chance for these beginner demons to return to humanity.”

“Chūnari hannya are mid-level demons. They have long, sharp horns, tusk-like fangs, and more powerful magic. However, they are still vulnerable to prayers”

“Honnari hannya are true demons and the most powerful of the three. They have serpentine bodies and breathe fire. Honnari hannya have embraced their jealousy so deeply that there is no calming their fury.”

Now, this leads us to my analysis on Ultra Violet herself.
This is Ultra Violet in the S.O.G. Headquarters set when she doesn’t have the Oni mask of Hatred on:

and this is Ultra Violet in the Ninja Nightcrawler set with the Oni Mask of Hatred on:

and Yokai.com says that Kijo,

“are female demons. They resemble human women in most ways, although they are usually hideously ugly to behold.” “Some have red or yellow eyes, blue skin, sharp horns, long claws, or other supernatural features. Usually they dress in rags and wear their hair long and unkempt, living like savages far from civilization.”

I went ahead and made some notes on an image I managed to find of the full minifigure of Ultra Violet

the features here do seem to match some of the descriptions that the data base has given us.

but, the page also says:

“Kijo refers chiefly to women who have been transformed from humans into horrible monsters – either out of intense jealousy, wicked crimes committed, or a terrible grudge that twists the soul into pure hatred.”

Now, that mention of pure hatred right there, makes it even more fitting for Ultra Violet to be wearing the Oni Mask of Hatred. But the transformation part is what will take us into the look at the minfig we see with the Oni Mask of Revenge, who was actually in the trailer, Mr. E.

This is an image I got of Mr. E in the Temple of Resurrection set, without the Oni Mask of Revenge on.
and this is Mr. E in the Street Race of Snake Jaguar set, with the Oni Mask of Revenge on.
Notice the extra arms he has, when he has the mask on, I mean, even in the set, the mask is on a display stand with the extra set of arms
and if you remember when I was talking about Oni earlier, I said that they tend to have extra limbs. Yokai.com also says that,

“occasionally, when a human is so utterly wicked that his soul is beyond any redemption, he transforms into an oni during life, and remains on Earth to terrorize the living.”

So, based on these findings, my theory is that these Oni masks will turn the S.O.G. members that wear them, into demons/oni/kijo(in the case of Ultra Violet) of some sort, and based on what we have seen, and what I saw in the animatic for an upcoming brick film on the S8 sets, I’m believing that this is the case.

Now I did say that I would go over the oni mask Tattoos that Killow has on his left arm,

but it’s getting really late at the time I am writing this, so I will have to go over that later on, but I will leave a link to where I found info on oni and hannya mask tattoos and their meanings. But I do want to clarify, that I’m not saying you should go get a tattoo, you really shouldn’t be getting a real tattoo, especially if you are under the age of 21, at least. I’m just showing what meanings the hannya and oni mask tattoos have, and how they could relate to the ones that Killow has so that you guys can try and come up with your own ideas on the meanings of Killow’s tattoos, if there is any. https://tatring.com/tattoo-ideas-meanings/Japanese-Hannya-Tattoos-Concise-Info-on-the-Origins-Meanings-Ideas

Update: I have watched the Sneek Peek now, and I have not seen anything that adds to my theory as of now.

Update 2: I have just re-watched Gaijin Goombah’s video where he analyzes Aku from Samurai Jack, and he actually talks about the Hannya mask more in the video. I’m gonna leave a link to the video here for those that are interested https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nSkGngZs_pY&t=62s

[ToaNoah_Wafflemeister]

Man, I’m happy I looked at these this morning, I would not have been able to sleep if it was last night. Cool theory though, I would not be surprised if Lego was inspired by these!

[TheRockBrick]

Wow!

This is honestly incredible. You’ve gone to such an extent in your research on this segment of Japanese culture and I absolutely love it. I only did a couple of quick searches to see the inspiration, but this is incredible theorising! You truly are a Dedicated Ninjago Nerd/Fangirl. xD

[Bloodarchmage]

kunai where used for digging

[Willess12]

only where shovel used for cutting?

~W12~

[Bloodarchmage]

what?

[MagicNinja6195]

Update 3: This update was originally gonna be an analysis on the set descriptions on the Toys R Us website, which I got some screenshots of, but, as I was trying to find them on the Toys R Us site again(and it turns out, they’re no longer there), I happened to stumble upon the sets on the LEGO Shop@Home site, and managed to get screenshots of those descriptions, which are basically the same as the ones that I got screenshots of from the Toys R Us site, but the ones on the Shop@Home site have more info.

So, instead, this will be an analysis on the descriptions from the Shop@home site, and there are a few things in these descriptions that I want to address, and to make this easier for me to go over, I will be looking at certain related parts of each set description, that has some relation to oni, individually. Now, for each of these, I’ve underlined each part of the description that gives us something related to Oni.

The set descriptions that I will be looking at here, are the S.O.G. Headquarters, Street Race of Snake Jaguar, Killow vs Samurai X, Ninja Nightcrawler, and Katana V11 sets.

The first thing that I will be looking at, is the bikes in the S.O.G. Headquarters, Street Race of Snake Jaguar, Killow vs Samurai X, and Ninja Nightcrawler sets.

here, in the description for the S.O.G. Headquarters set, we see that the bike we get in this set, which is being ridden by Skip Vicious on the box art, is called an Oni Bike.

Now, the stuff that I crossed out on the description for the Street Race of Snake Jaguar set, is stuff that I’m gonna go over later, but for now, in this description, we see that the bike that Mr. E is riding, which we see in the preview that we got of episode 75: Mask of Deception, is also called an Oni Bike.

Here, in Killow vs Samurai X, the description calls Killow’s bike the Oni Chopper.

Now, these names might seem a bit odd at first, but if you look closely at Killow’s Oni Chopper:

you can see that there’s a design of what looks to be a oni on each side of the front of the bike. Now, unfortunately, I don’t have either the Street Race of Snake Jaguar or S.O.G. Headquarters sets, so I haven’t been able to find any details of the 2 Oni Bikes, outside of what we are able to see in the official set images that we got of them, so I am not sure if there are any details on the bikes that appear to be related to oni. If any of you guys have the sets, and are able to find something on the bikes, take a picture and share it here.

Now, I do also want to address the bike that Luke Cunningham has in the Katana V11 set.

Because while the description for the Katana V11 set just calls it a regular street bike, if you look closely at the bike…

you can see that it also has a decal of what looks like an oni, and in that red circle, are the letters D and S written in the Ninjago Language.

Although, it might not look like an oni at first, since you can’t really see the oni teeth on it, but if you compare it to the oni decal on Killow’s Oni Chopper, you can see that the oni teeth are actually farther back in the mouth, so the decal on Luke Cunningham’s street bike, is just the front of an oni’s face. So, basically, these bikes being called Oni Bikes and the Oni Chopper, isn’t actually referring to the Oni Masks, but the creature Oni .

As for the Ninja Nightcrawler set:

The set description calls Ultra Violet’s bike, the Stone Booster Bike. Now, looking at the bike, it doesn’t have any decals on it that are related to oni, in fact, the Stone Booster Bike looks it has completely different color scheme than the Oni Bikes. Yet, if you notice, all the figures that are on the Oni Bikes are male, and we only get Ultra Violet’s Stone Booster Bike in the Ninja Nightcrawler set, which is the set that she, the only female in the S.O.G. gang, just so happens to be the only S.O.G. member that is included in it.

Now, if you remember what I said in my last post about Oni and Hannya/Kijo, you may recall me saying that, according to Yokai.com, “Today, the word oni generally only refers to this specific category of male demons.” You may also recall me saying that, according to Yokai.com “Hannya refers to demons or oni; more specifically to female demons called kijo—even more specifically to those kijo which appear in noh theater.” Now, how does this relate to Ultra Violet’s bike being much different from the other Oni Bikes? Well, if you had read the page that I linked on Kijo, you might remember reading this bit on the original section of the page:

“Though their name might suggest that kijo are the female counterparts to the male oni, there is nothing substantial to support this. While tales point to oni working either as tormentors of the (censored) or as menaces to human society in the living world, kijo do not seem to have any connection to (censored) or the afterlife; kijo generally work solo and have their own motives.Further, kijo and oni are not commonly seen together[…] Rather, it is likely that kijo are entirely separate creatures from oni, other than the fact that both are commonly born from a corrupted human soul.”

So kijo and oni are really separate creatures, but are still demons and created in a similar way.

So what could the name of the Stone Booster Bike be referring to? The most likely thing that I could think of, is how Ultra Violet appears to have that stone armor on her in that set, which brings me to the next thing that I want to address with these set descriptions: the Oni Masks.

I went and underlined the parts of the description that mention the most important details of the Oni Masks in pink

On both the S.O.G. Headquarters and Ninja Nightcrawler sets, the description says to

“Attach the Oni Mask of Hatred transformation element to the Ultra Violet minifigure to make her even more evil!”

On the Killow vs Samurai X set, it also says to

“attach the Oni Mask of Deception transformation element to the Killow big figure to make him even more evil!”

So based on that, it would appear that the Oni Masks do, in fact, make these two wearers more evil/turn them into monsters(or if we are keeping to the oni/kijo-theme, yōkai) of some sort, based on how different Ultra Violet’s appearance is, when she is actually wearing the Oni Mask of Hatred in the Ninja Nightcrawler set, compared to when she isn’t wearing it in the S.O.G. Headquarters set.

But the description for Street Race of Snake Jaguar is what really caught my attention, when I was reading through these descriptions.

The description says it

includes a podium with the Oni Mask of Vengeance and Demon Torso transformation elements for the Mr. E minifigure to wear. And to “attach the Demon Torso (with 2 extra arms) and Oni Mask of Vengeance to Mr. E to make him even more evil.”

Right there, it says Demon Torso, and what did the site say that the word oni refers to? Male demons. Even the mention of the 2 extra arms on the Demon Torso, make it seem as if Mr. E actually ends up turning into an oni, when he puts on the Oni Mask of Vengeance, because if you remember back in the last post, I said that Oni also tend to have tend to have extra limbs.

Based on this info, it would appear that these 3 Oni Masks will, actually, be turning their wearers into demons/oni(kijo in the case of Ultra Violet), especially considering the fact that Killow’s already got the body-shape and weapon of an oni(which is what the description calls a “spiked baseball bat”), all he’s missing is the teeth and horns, and if you just put the the mask on him, then you have the complete oni appearance, minus the usual red or blue skin.

But that red and blue skin color, that oni usually have, might also explain the red and blue colors that are on the S.O.G. gang’s Oni Bikes(the purple in the color scheme might be to help blend the red and blue colors into it and give it a more evil look).

Edit: If you guys ever end up finding any info that relates to this, go ahead and post them here.

[MagicNinja6195]

Alright, after doing a bit more research, and seeing the trailers for S8, and the changes to the Ninjago website, I felt it would be good to update you all on the stuff that I found.

So, I have managed to get the Street Race of Snake Jaguar Set, and haven’t been able to see anything on Mr. E’s bike that relates to Oni. But, I have been able to get a good look at the Ninjago writing that is on the bike.

and on both stickers for the bike, that have writing on them, the writing says “D81” on them, in the Ninjago language.

Now, I’ve been doing research on the oni masks, and what the relation between their name and powers could be, and so far, I have found some things that could connect these powers.

Now, for those that don’t know, the powers of the 3 Oni Masks are as they are described in this picture that I got of issue 33 of the Ninjago Magazine:

I went and did some research, and had talked with a few friends of mine, from the Ninjago Subforum on the LMBs, about this, to try and figure out why these masks have these names and powers. This is what we came up with.

For the Mask of Hatred, which gives the wearer invincible Lava-stone skin, the best connection that I can find, is a bit of symbolism. When I think of hatred or rage, I tend to think of volcanoes and lava.
I looked it up, and found this page on lava in dreams: http://weknowyourdreams.com/lava.html
according to this,

Lava represents anger, frustration, hatred and short-temperedness.

When lava cools, it turns into rock, so I think that basically explains the connection for the Mask of Hatred.

For the Mask of Vengeance, which makes the wearer a sword master and gives them an extra set of arms, I had to talk with my LMB friends about it, and this was what my friends said:

For vengence, the “master swordsman” seems to be the important bit.
Have you seen “the Prince’s Bride?” There’s a famous character, “Intigo Montoya”. He was a master swordsman, that was his thing, and the whole point of his character is that he’d spent his whole life training for revenge against one man.
Vader, turned to the power of the Darkside in persuit of revenge. It’s a common trope.
The “swordsman part” makes the most sense for “vengeance”.

So, basically, the main thing thats connecting the Mask of Vengeance with it’s power, seems to be the trope of Swordsman seeking revenge. As for the 4-arms, that is probably just a reference to the actual yokai, Oni, which tend to be depicted as having multiple arms.

Now, as for the Mask of Deception, which gives the wearer telekinesis(the power to control solid objects with the power of thought), this took both some discussion with my friends, and some of my own research to figure out the connection between Deception and Telekinesis.

I first went over this with my friends, and the first thing that my friends came up with, was this:

Deception is probably assossiated with “things that go bump in the night.” Mischivous spirits often trick people by moving things around.

This does kind of explain the connection between deception and telekinesis, but how does that relate to oni? Well, I thought about that, and then I remembered how it connects to Oni. The original interpretation of Oni.

If you watched the entirety of Gaijin Goombah’s video, that I linked to, on Genji’s Oni skin in Overwatch, then you might have heard about this.

But, for those that haven’t, Oni weren’t always the red/blue Japanese ogres that we known them as, today.

According to the Yokai.com page on Oni,

Originally, all spirits, ghosts, and monsters were known as oni. The root of their name is a word meaning “hidden” or “concealed,” and it was written with the Chinese character for “ghost.” In the old days of Japan, before the spirits were as well-cataloged as they are today, oni could be used to refer to almost any supernatural creature – ghosts, obscure gods, large or scary yokai, even particularly vicious and brutal humans.

Even the Wikipedia article on Oni mentions this:

The word “oni” is sometimes speculated to be derived from on, the on’yomi reading of a character (隠) meaning to hide or conceal, as oni were originally invisible spirits or gods which caused disasters, disease, and other unpleasant things.

Yet, here’s the bit of the article that the one on Yokai.com doesn’t mention:

These nebulous beings could also take on a variety of forms to deceive (and often devour) humans. Thus the Chinese character 鬼 (pinyin: guǐ; Jyutping: gwai2) meaning “ghost” came to be used for these formless creatures.

Even Gaijin Goombah mentions this bit of info in his video, when he’s connecting Genji’s Oni skin to ninja. Oni, were originally just the name for anything associated with bad luck.

As I said earlier, one of my friends, who helped me in this research, said that

Deception is probably associated with “things that go bump in the night.” Mischivous spirits often trick people by moving things around.

The word deceive, means to cause someone to believe something that is not true, typically in order to gain some personal advantage, or to give a mistaken impression. Basically a form of trickery.

Now, what do ghosts tend to do? Trick or deceive people by moving things around on them, and sometimes ghosts do this through means of telekinesis.

So, bringing this back to the Oni Masks, the Oni Mask of Deception gives the wearer, the power of telekinesis, and in old Japan, the word Oni was used to refer to any supernatural creature, including ghosts. It was even written with the Chinese character for “ghost”.

Based on this info, we could say that the Oni Mask of Deception’s power, is a bit of a reference to original/old meaning/interpretation of Oni.

[Sokoda]

My theorie is that those names are chosen in Ninjago, because they are the attributes they bring back from lord Garmadon.
So by using the masks of hate, vengence and deception to revive him, it will only revive those traits of Garmadon

[MagicNinja6195]

SPOILERS FOR NINJAGO SEASON 9: HUNTED!

ok, so I have watched Episode 90: Two Lies, One Truth, and Episode 91: The Weakest Link, and there are some things that I feel should be addressed.

The first thing that I would like to address is the Oni Statue, that we see in Episode 90: Two Lies, One Truth.

This statue actually resembles some of the depictions that I’ve seen of the actual Yokai, oni: http://www.yokai.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/4/2013/06/026-oni-229x300.jpg

so the Oni that are in Ninjago, might actually end up looking like the actually Yokai.

---

The second thing that I would like to address, from this season, is Mystaké being an Oni.

Now, if you guys remember what I have said about Oni, in my last few posts, you’ll remember that

@MagicNinja6195

according to the Japanese ghost and monster database, Yokai.com,

“Today, the word oni generally only refers to this specific category of male demons.”

and that, along with Oni Masks portraying male demons, there is a Noh Theater mask that portrays female demons, the Hannya Mask.

You’ll also remember that

@MagicNinja6195

According to Yokai.com,

“Hannya refers to demons or oni; more specifically to female demons called kijo—even more specifically to those kijo which appear in noh theater.”

Now, while the show says that Mystaké is an Oni, based on this info, technically, she is actually a Kijo.

---

I also went and did more research into Kijo, do see if this is the case, and found this:

“They are normally considered to be women who have turned into oni as a result of karma and resentment”

Now, the karma & resentment bit, doesn’t really seem to fit Mystaké, but there are still 3 episodes left, in Season 9, so we’ll see on that bit. Yet I did find a bit on Kijo, that does resemble Mystaké, a bit.

In the Behavior section on Yokai.com’s page on Kijo, it says:

“Kijo refers chiefly to women who have been transformed from humans into horrible monsters – either out of intense jealousy, wicked crimes committed, or a terrible grudge that twists the soul into pure hatred. These transformed women retreat from common society into more secluded places where they continue to perpetrate their wicked deeds. They can be found living in remote mountain caves, abandoned houses, or along mountain roads where they can receive a steady supply of victims. Kijo are stronger than most humans, though their strength pales in comparison to oni. Where these demonesses excel is in magic. They accumulate powerful spells over their long lives, and are capable of bestowing hexes and curses, the ability to brew poisons and potions, and the weaving powerful illusions. Some kijo dedicate themselves to personal vengeance or some political goal, but just as often they keep to themselves and go unnoticed by humankind for centuries.”

This section here, has bits that do resemble Mystaké.^

The stuff that is in Bold, might fit with where we’ve seen Mystaké, and the stuff Bold & Italics, seems to fit with how she is known to make magical teas.

How, yo may ask? I’ll explain.

---

Starting with these bits:

“These transformed women retreat from common society into more secluded places where they continue to perpetrate their wicked deeds. They can be found living in remote mountain caves, abandoned houses, or along mountain roads where they can receive a steady supply of victims.” “Some kijo dedicate themselves to personal vengeance or some political goal, but just as often they keep to themselves and go unnoticed by humankind for centuries.”

Aside from the victims, and vengeance/political goal bits, this mention of seclusion and keeping to themselves kind of fits with where we’ve seen Mystaké.

In her first appearance in Episode 7: Tick Tock, we see that her tea shop is in a secluded part of town

and in season 8, episode 77: The Oni and The Dragon, we see her tea shop here, in a while not entirely secluded, still more quiet part of the city:

So she does fit the “retreat from common society into more secluded places” bit, in this aspect.

Now for the “keep to themselves” bit, we can look into her personality, and from what we’ve seen, she pretends not to have or know things like Traveler’s Tea, but after being paid or recognizing people she knows, she either gives warnings about the teas she sold or gives advice. There are two episodes in the previous seasons, that I remember this occurring:

• We see the “being paid and then giving a warning” thing in episode 7: Tick Tock, when Master Wu visited her shop, requesting Traveler’s Tea:

• At first she claimed not to have heard of it, but upon receiving payment, she brought the tea out from behind the counter, warning him of the consequences before Wu tells her he will not bother her again.

• And we see the “recognizing people she knows” and “giving a warning” bit in episode 77: The Oni and The Dragon, when Lloyd, Jay, Zane, and Cole visit Mistaké’s Tea Shop for the Tea of Truth:

• At first, she tried to claim not knowing her own name, but upon seeing Lloyd, she apologized for her rudeness because she didn’t recognise his voice. Knowing they were after the tea, she goes in the back, warning them that the truth can be dangerous beforehand.

So, she does fit the “keep to themselves” bit here.
Now that all explains how Mystake fits the “Seclusion and keeping to themselves” parts of Kijo behavior.

---

The next bit of Kijo behavior, that we’ll look at is this part:

Kijo are stronger than most humans, though their strength pales in comparison to oni. Where these demonesses excel is in magic. They accumulate powerful spells over their long lives, and are capable of bestowing hexes and curses, the ability to brew poisons and potions, and the weaving powerful illusions.

This mention of magic and potions, fits very well with the Magical teas, that Mystaké is known for making & selling.

And for the “Long lives”, in the beginning of Episode 90: Two Lies, One Truth, she explains that she has lived so long because of her Oni blood, and has basically been around since the First Spinjitzu Master arrived in and created Ninjago. This makes for plenty of time for her to perfect her magic in the realm of Ninjago.

She also says that she has the ability to transform. While the page doesn’t specifically mention transformation, we can assume that this is either a part of her magic abilities, or is a form of the powerful illusions, that Kijo can weave.

So that explains how Mystaké fits in with the “magic” part of Kijo behavior.

---

Now, during my research for this I began to wonder how close the Ninjago Oni are to the actual Yokai Oni. So, I went and looked up the actual monster, a bit more, to see if there is anything on them that mentions magic or shapeshifting (as Oni are male demons, and it seems that, in Ninjago, shape shifting applies to both male & female Oni), but I wasn’t able to find anything on the actual monster being able to shape ■■■■■ or use magic.

The closest thing about Oni, that I could find, to explain the Ninjago Oni’s ability to shape ■■■■■, isn’t with the actually monster, but the origin of Oni, which, if you remember my explanation for the Mask of Deception’s name and power, I said this:

@MagicNinja6195

If you watched the entirety of Gaijin Goombah’s video, that I linked to, on Genji’s Oni skin in Overwatch, then you might have heard about this.

But, for those that haven’t, Oni weren’t always the red/blue Japanese ogres that we known them as, today.

According to the Yokai.com page on Oni,

Originally, all spirits, ghosts, and monsters were known as oni. The root of their name is a word meaning “hidden” or “concealed,” and it was written with the Chinese character for “ghost.” In the old days of Japan, before the spirits were as well-cataloged as they are today, oni could be used to refer to almost any supernatural creature – ghosts, obscure gods, large or scary yokai, even particularly vicious and brutal humans.

Even the Wikipedia article on Oni mentions this:

The word “oni” is sometimes speculated to be derived from on, the on’yomi reading of a character (隠) meaning to hide or conceal, as oni were originally invisible spirits or gods which caused disasters, disease, and other unpleasant things.

Yet, here’s the bit of the article that the one on Yokai.com doesn’t mention:

These nebulous beings could also take on a variety of forms to deceive (and often devour) humans. Thus the Chinese character 鬼 (pinyin: guǐ; Jyutping: gwai2) meaning “ghost” came to be used for these formless creatures.

This is the best/closest thing that I can find on Oni, that could explain why both male & female(technically Kijo) Oni can shape ■■■■■. The fact that Oni was originally used on the formless creatures that caused disasters, disease, and other unpleasant things.

Yet, Kijo are also stated to be able to use magic, and are capable of weaving powerful illusions.

So, based on all of this, it seems that the writers took aspects of both versions of Oni(the original meaning of Oni, and the actual monster of today), and aspects Kijo, and used them for the Oni that we see in Ninjago.

---

Edit: Oh, another thing that I found on Kijo, that I forgot to mention:

“They are normally considered to be women who have turned into oni as a result of karma and resentment, with the younger ones being called “kijo” while the ones that look like old ladies are called onibaba (鬼婆, “demon hag”).”