May 23rd, 2018
I arrived in town and immediately sought Miss Tanaka. She greeted me like an old friend, even though we’d only had a brief encounter previously and it was during a time of grief for her. I daresay that she’s recovering from the loss of her husband. She emailed me an article, since I was more than a day out, for me to look at.
It also gave me a region to start my research on, so I could hit the ground running.
While the death she sent me was the most recent, it’s far from the only one. It turns out that there were a handful of other mysterious deaths in the area. To be specific, there were 7 with a single disappearance. 6 of the 7 deaths involved burns to some degree, while the last was suffocated without any marks on the body whatsoever. The disappearance might be unrelated, but happened in the same vicinity of the deaths, so I’m willing to count it.
It took some digging, what I found was in historical records over the last 70 years, but I uncovered that all of the victims, including the most recent, were Caucasian men. Might be a pattern, might be nothing. Some monsters definitely have a type.
Also puts me right in the crosshairs for tackling this thing.
The anomaly would be the disappearance. That was an African American male. Might be why he disappeared instead of ending up as a snack for this thing.
I brought all this information to bear when I caught up with Miss Tanaka. She appreciated that I took her seriously instead of brushing off her claims like some other officials had. I insisted that it was my job to look into the strange and occasionally occult.
Which it is.
She gave me her theory and what information she’d been able to gather on it. Her text had referred to another yokai haunting the area. She, in person, identified the entity as an Onibi. She went on to tell me a story from her grandmother about the Onibi.
It frequently manifests as a ball of light, tempting travelers off of the path and devouring their very essence.
This sounded just like a will-o-wisp of European folklore to me. She was adamant that the pattern I’d identified was coincidence rather than anything telling about the creature. It’s not like it attacks and targets Caucasian men on purpose.
She still expressed concern for my well-being when I left her home.
Being a pseudo-expert in ghosts and spirits, and since this deeply resembles a will-o-wisp, I figure I can handle it in a similar fashion. That means: bring salt, iron, shovel, and lighter to find and salt the bones of the thing this is actually risen from. Ghosts are dealt with the same way, hard part is often figuring out where to dig.
May 24th, 2018
I am willing to admit when I’m wrong. A hunter’s life is all about adaptation and flexibility. A willingness to hustle for cash (saving people from the supernatural doesn’t pay well) and go places typically off limits indicating a morale flexibility as well as being able to pivot to take on new and exciting threats.
See, I went out to the location of the most recent victim (nailing down anything past the second most recent, which happened to be relatively close, was impossible) and started scouting it with an EMF reader checking for hot spots. I brought my shovel, shotgun, and an iron club just to be thoroughly defended. I also went out at dawn since the attacks had all occurred at night.
I wandered the woods and the clearing where the victim was found all day long. Even found a nice little pond to have a late supper at. Under different circumstances, it might’ve even been pleasant.
As day melted into night, I’d circled back to the original clearing. In it I found my will-o-wisp, but it wasn’t a will-o-wisp.
Thing certainly hovered with a hypnotizing sway, glowing like a miniature moon in the middle of the clearing. I approached from the forest and soon as I was certain to be in range of my rocksalt round, I hefted the shotgun and blasted it.
To say it had no effect would be a lie. The singular ball of light splintered into a thousand angry little fireflies. I emptied my shotgun while fleeing the vicious little beasts. Only a couple managed to land on me and it looks like someone burned me with a cigarette.
Definitely time to do some more homework before going back after this thing.
May 27th, 2018
Called in some favors for some extra information. Seems a lot of Yokai are sensitive to silver (knew this from my encounter with the Azuki Baba), but when the spirit in question almost lacks a physical form? Best to craft a silver net to catch it.
But how to dispose of it? Same hunter buddy suggested, since this thing burns folk, to try drowning it. I’m expecting to come away from this with a couple new scars.
If you’re reading this and it doesn’t have a conclusion entry, try something else. Get in touch with Miku Tanaka and ask her for all the information possible on Onibi. If you speak Japanese, ask to speak with her grandmother directly.
Alright, so you don’t make the same potential mistake I’m walking into: I’ve woven together a bunch of silver chains I picked up a couple days ago into a net. It’s definitely not my best work, but I don’t exactly have a workshop anymore. The brunette I bought the chains from was a great help and better distraction.
Anyways: net the Onibi, drag it to water, and drown it. Might sound farfetched, but its essentially a spirit of fire, so dousing it in a local natural lake seems the best bet.
If you’re trying this again: bring a fire extinguisher instead.
May 28th, 2018
Welp. The scars up my right arm’ll look cool eventually. Right now, they still burn bone deep. My net worked, but I should’ve tied on a longer lead. It was something akin to dragging a balloon with a sense of self-preservation. I dunked it in the little pond I’d found during my scouting session. Half an hour later, that was a fight (bring weights next time), the Onibi’d sputtered out and was no more.
Time to get some rest. Though, do wonder if this would work on will-o-wisps too. Definitely would save time on the digging front.
Used in this post is a newspaper template from TheGoodocs.com
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