Once upon a time, there were seven sisters and three brothers. The sisters were very lazy. They played continually from morning to evening. They did not work for their family at all. Meanwhile, the three brothers worked very hard, plowing their fields from early morning to late evening.

The brothers asked their sisters, “Please help us to plow the fields.”

The sisters replied, “No, we won’t. If we plow the fields, our hands will get dirty. We will never do such dirty work.” One brother said, “Don’t worry. You can wash your hands with river water.” The sisters said, “Oh! How terrifying! We could fall into the river if we washed our hands there.” Another brother said, “No problem. It’s easy to grab grasses on the riverside so that you would never be swept away.” The sisters replied, “Oh! The grasses could cut our hands.” Finally the sisters said, “We want to become stars, because they have nothing to do”.

The three brothers got so angry that they ran after their seven sisters to catch them. The seven sisters got into a boat and escaped from their brothers. The three brothers got into a boat and chased after them. However, it was hard to catch up with their sisters’ boat, because they had seven rowers. Eventually the seven sisters rowed their boat up into the starlit sky. The three brothers followed them into the sky. When the seven sisters reached to the western sky, a kamui, a god of the Ainu people appeared, in front of the seven sisters and said, “How lazy you are! Halt!” Their boat stopped immediately.

The kamui turned the seven sisters into a group of small, faint stars called “Iwan-no-chyu”, the Pleiades. As punishment for their laziness, the kamui let them rise into the sky when people finished their work in the fields and cold winter approached. The youngest sister was ashamed of herself and covered her face with hands. Therefore, one of seven stars became unable to see. The kamui praised the three brothers for their hard works, and turned them into a straight line of three bright stars, which are the three stars of Orion.