Asian Folklore Creatures

The Philippines' most feared shapeshifter hides as your neighbor by day and hunts as a beast by night.

A fat, stumpy snake that supposedly jumps, speaks, and has a taste for alcohol.

A short, bipedal ape covered in golden-brown fur walks the jungles of Sumatra, and credible scientists have spent decades trying to prove it exists.

A towering skeleton formed from the bones of the unburied dead, rattling through the night to bite off heads.

A divine chimera of dragon and deer that only appears to herald greatness or disaster.

A vampire that tears its own torso free and flies through the night on bat-like wings, trailing its entrails below.

A 400-year-old spider that takes the form of a beautiful woman to lure men to their death.

China's Bigfoot roams the thick forests of Hubei Province, backed by thousands of reported sightings.

Nomadic herders across Mongolia and Central Asia have described encounters with a stocky, hairy humanoid that walks upright and avoids civilization.

The people of Flores Island describe small, hairy cave-dwellers who stole food and children, and the story gained credibility when Homo floresiensis fossils were found.

A towering horse-headed giant that leads travelers in circles through the Philippine wilderness.

A colossal red octopus lurking in Funka Bay, revered by the Ainu as both healer and destroyer.

A serpent with a woman's head that haunts riverbanks, cradling a phantom baby to paralyze its prey.

A foul-smelling ape-man stalking the misty slopes of Mount Hiba in rural Japan.

Japan's answer to Nessie lives in a volcanic crater lake on the southern tip of Kyushu.

A foul-smelling ape-man reportedly abducts women and kills livestock in the remote mountain passes of northern Pakistan.

A blood-drinking creature from the Philippines that walks backward and hides in the shadows of its owner.

A tiny, wizened mummy-like figure found across Indonesia, said to be alive and fed with human blood.