A TO Z CHALLENGE 2016 -- VOUGH

You watch the human.  Hate fills your heart and you want to destroy him, but something stops you.

His glowing happy eyes are blue as your home. You want to rip them out of his head, but you can't seem to make yourself.

You want him, and you will have him.



The Vough are Scottish water spirits.  They inhabit both sea and fresh bodies of water.  They are nocturnal, but sources are conflicted if the sun can kill them or not.  Iron, on the other hand, they're pretty much goners.

The Vough are in a group of fey called the Fuath or Fuath-Arrchd.  Also they usually hate humans, but sometimes the want intellectual or sexual congress.  Some clans claim that they have Vough blood in their lineage.

With no noses, yellow shaggy hair or mane, and having a tail with a spike, they are described as deformed humanoids.  They are said to dress in green. Similar creatures ar Kelpie and Uisages.

A TO Z CHALLENGE 2016 -- TENOME

Your friend was supposed to meet you here.  He is late.  You didn't even want to come out here.

You call out his name, hoping he's playing a trick on you.

Going against your better judgment, you enter the graveyard.  Your so going to beat the crap out your friend when you find him.

A strange sound reaches you.  You jump but ignore it as you get closer to the grave you guys wanted to see.

Closer now, the sound reaches you and you swear it's an inhalation like that of a scenting dog.  Strange.

There's something on the ground before the grave.  His jacket?  You shuffle closer.  And then you see it.  It's not just his jacket.

Pained terror stabs your chest as your heart accelerates when you see it's him.  His skin puddled on the ground.

You back up to run away.  As you turn, you see the eyeless face.



This creature is found in the first book of Toriyama Sekien's series, Gazu Hyakki Yakō, which translates to basically Night Parade of A Hundred Demons.  He did not write a single thing about this creature, but his inspiration may have come from older stories of a creature that fits this description.

One version of the origin story says that a blind man was murdered.  His lasts words stated he wished he saw the one/ones who did it even if his eyes were in his hands.  

Well, he got his wish. Tenome literally translates to eyes on hands.  They hang out in graveyards and open fields and they like to eat fresh from the body bones.  

The creature looks like a blind zato, a type of guildman.  They are quick but not powerful, blind as a bat, but with a vicious sense of smell.  

One story has a priest locking a victim in a chest to protect him, but the creature somehow sucked his bones out leaving the skin in the chest.

Yes, this nasty monster did inspire that blipping freaking s.o.b. in Pan's Labyrinth.  

A TO Z CHALLENGE 2016 -- GASHADORKURO

Your heart pounds in your chest as a chill crawls up you spine.  You didn't want to to travel this road tonight, but there was no other choice.  Message of the slaughter has to reach the shogun.

The night falls silent.  Gaichi Gaichi.

Silence.  Gaichi Gaichi.

Silence.  Gaichi Gaichi.

Your guts churn in terror at the unnatural sound.  You will your legs to move, but they are jelly.  You wait for it again even as you continue down the road.  Nothing. You take a deep breath when the sound doesn't repeat again.

SNAP!  You cannot scream as your chest is crushed.  A flying sensation as you are lifted from the ground.  Your last image is the giant creature's skeletal mouth.


In Japanese legend, a Gashadokuro (or ōdokuro (giant skeleton)) is created from soldiers that have rotted on the battlefield or from those who die of famine and do not receive funerary rites.  They are reborn as hungry ghosts and resenting humans.  They grow stronger as their hate grows until it becomes a supernatural force.

Their bones will mass together to form this monstrous creature full of malice and hate.

It will wander the countryside and will crush their victim or rip off his head.  Some stories suggest that the monster will drink the victim's blood and may even add it's victim to their body.

There is no way to kill such a monster.  Its rage must abate, but with hundreds of dead amongst the the Gashadokuro's body, that is not very likely to happen.