Rare Monsters

  The Ninki Nanka is a river monster from west Africa, especially Gambia. It’s an important figure in the Mandinka people’s mythology. The Ninki Nanka has varying appearances from place to place. Sometimes it’s snake like with a horse’s head, other times it had legs but is completely reptilian and dragon like. One variation that, which has become how the Ninki Nanka is mainly known by outsiders, is that of a horse headed, giraffe necked reptile with an unusual arrangement of horns on its head and a mane done its neck. The exact arrangement of horns varies, but its usually drawn with two horns on the back of its head and a unicorn like horn on the front. The Ninki Nanka has colourful and reflective scales that allow this massive creature camouflage and hide easily. The Ninki Nanka is said to live in bodies of water, whether that be rivers, swamps or mangroves, and is most active during the rainy season. Much like the basilisk, the Ninki Nanka is said to have a deadly gaze, anyo...

 The hagg worm was a type of flying serpent found in Cumbria, in England. It’s considered a dragon, but most acknowledge it’s quite different from the typical idea of a dragon. They didn’t breath fire like a normal dragon, and they may have been venomous, but it’s never mentioned. These creatures were large hairy, flying snakes. It’s never said whether they flew on feathered or bat like wings, but the more ghoulish option the better. The exact size of these flying serpents is never stated, but they are large enough to swallow magpies in one quick gulp like a swallow catching flies. And large enough to be a threat to people. You might hear the name hagg and immediately think of hags, those hideous old crones from Scottish legend who would eat children. Although the word hagg is from old English, meaning swamp, and was later applied to both hags and the hagg worms, because that’s where they lived. Specifically, the hagg worms lived in the forested swamps outside of the town of Ar...

   Campe was a primordial monster and guardian of Tartarus in Greek mythology. She appears in the Titanomachy. Campe’s name means twisting or crooked one. She was known as the nymph of Tartarus. Campe is described as one of the more confusing monsters from Greek mythology. She had the qualities of several other monsters mixed together. Campe had the head and torso of a human woman, albeit covered in reptilian scales. She had snakes for hair like Medusa. She had eagles talons for hands and wings as black as the night, alternatively wings like the sphinx. Her hips were wreathed in the heads of animals, similar to Scylla, but instead of dogs it was an assembly of every fearsome and vicious animal possible. She had snakes for legs like Echidna, specifically it was said Campe had one hundred snakes for legs. Finally Campe had a scorpions tail, which she held high over her head. It’s unknown if she was supposed to be beautiful apart from her monstrous features or a hideous hag. ...

  The Mississippi monster is one of those old time cryptid stories that appeared in 19 th century news papers. And like many of these stories it pushes the limits of what can be believed. Although I find this monster in particular pushes those limits more than most. Stories like the Swan Valley monster had a bizarre creature that defies biology, but only a small number of witnesses and ultimately the creature didn’t do very much. The Ape Canyon attack has lots of action and damage, which should leave a paper trail of police reports and insurance claims that can be verified if someone where to look deep enough, but involves big foot, one of the more reasonable cryptids to exist. The Mississippi monster involves both a confounding monster that is like nothing else alive, and over the top damage, which should be able to be verified by its own paper trail. However the story takes place long enough ago that such things like insurance claims and repair reports of company owned ships wo...

   The slide rock bolter is a fearsome critter from Colorado. It’s whale like in shape and size, in spite of being an entirely land based creature. On the ends of its tail fins are hooks that allow it to grab onto mountain ridges. It has tiny eyes and a large gaping mouth, much like a sculpin. The bolter also constantly drools out an oily slippery saliva that surrounds it. The slide rock bolter lives only on the steepest cliff sides, ones that are over 45 degrees. There it remains in wait, hanging high up on the cliff side watchful for its prey. The slide rock bolter’s primary prey is tourists, although it will eat practically any creature it catches unaware. When it spots prey in the valley bellow it lets go of the cliff with its tail hooks and slides down the side of the mountain like an avalanche, flattening anything in its way and leave and trail of destruction. Helping the slide rock bolter slide down the hillside is the ample drool it left behind before, as this a...

  The shussebora is a yokai from Japan. It is a mythical version of the triton conch snail. The name means promoted conch, because it was believed to transform into a dragon as it aged. Many monster in Japanese mythology, and regular animals too, were believed to transform into different, more powerful monsters when they reached a certain age. The triton conch would start out as a land snail living in mountain meadows, make its way down to the ocean and transform into a conch, then when it became a thousand years old it would transform again into a dragon with a conch shell. Many other animals in Japanese mythology also had complex transformations, such as bats, foxes and other more traditional dragons. So now you know what Pokemon evolutions were inspired by. The belief that the triton conch started its life high in the mountains was probably inspired by finding fossilized shells high in the mountain rocks, pushed up by tectonic lift. Before plate tectonics or the science b...