Upon seeing this, the greedy old couple rushed over.
"Give us that mortar." Stealing the mortar, they returned to their house and began to make rice cakes. When they pounded rice,
however, it turned into black mud right before their eyes.
"What on earth?" cried the old man. Furious, he took an axe and chopped the mortar to pieces. Then he tossed the pieces of wood into the stove and burned them.
The honest old man was disheartened. He gathered up the ashes from the mortar, put them in a box, and carried the box carefully back to his house.