Japanese Urban Legends

Gashadokuro

You're walking around the countryside by yourself. As you tread along the fields, you find yourself looking up into the night sky at all of the stars. Without warning, you hear a loud ringing sound that is almost deafening. It echoes through your head for what seems to be an eternity, but then you look up and realize that the ringing is the least of your worries. Through the moonlight, you see a gigantic figure suddenly appear from thin air in front of you. It is roughly ninety feet tall and stares at you, gnashing its teeth with an insatiable thirst for blood. The beast crouches down and reaches out to you, its bony finger ready to snatch you and make you its next meal.

What would you do? Run? Scream? Fight? According to the legends, there's not much that can save you from the grips of a Gashadokuro.

Stemming from Japanese folklore, a Gashadokuro is a powerful yōkai that takes the form of a huge skeleton. These skeletons are extremely tall, typically being fifteen times taller than the average human. Their name comes from the Japanese term for "giant skeleton", along with the "gachi gachi" sound they make whenever they grind their teeth together. 

Gashadokuro are created from the bones of people that have died from either starvation during a famine or being killed during a battle. Most of these people have not been buried, which prevents their souls from having a peaceful rest. Their terrible deaths along with the lack of burial has caused them to have an incredible amount of anger and rage. As a Gashadokuro, all they have is malice and an unfathomable craving to drink blood from humans. They wander just about anywhere, although the most common areas they visit are battlefields and countrysides. 

Creeping along in the middle of the night, they hunt for victims to quench their thirst. The skeleton can also become invisible, making it almost impossible to notice them skulking in the moonlight. They are surprisingly silent while moving, only making momentary chattering sounds with their teeth. A way that a victim can know a Gashadokuro is approaching is if they have a ringing sound in their ear. Although it is unknown why this sound appears while they are nearby, it serves well as a warning of their presence.

Once they spot a human, they will sneak up to it with an inhumane stealth. From there, they will grab the person and lift them up in the air, pulling them closer to their gaping mouth. The Gashadokuro will then bite off the person's head and drink the blood spraying out of the wound. They will then suck the body dry and then toss the lifeless remains onto the ground. A writer named Andrew Kincaid described this process as similar to how humans eat lobsters or crawdads- the way that people suck out the meat and juices gives an uncanny resemblance to the idea of a Gashadokuro sucking gore out of a decapitated human.

Andrew Kincaid, if you're reading this, thank you for giving us that pleasant image.

Now, typically there are certain procedures that stop Japanese yōkai from brutually murdering someone, but for Gashadokuro, there isn't a guaranteed method. Some have said that Shinto charms can ward them off and make them visible, but that's about it. At most, all a victim can do is run for their lives. Then again, the thought of trying to outrun a ninety foot skeleton in the middle of the night is a nightmarish scenario. If one would try to fight a gigantic skeleton by themselves, they aren't going to get much of a reward for their courage- Gashadokuro are practically indestructible until their hatred and energy is burned out. When that happens, they fall apart and return to being a normal pile of bones.

Fortunately, because of how the days have changed, there aren't as many soldiers and starvation victims as there were in the past. Along with this, burials are given frequently to people that have passed away during battles and famine. Since a Gashadokuro needs many bones from restless spirits in order to maintain their form, the possibility of one manifesting in modern time has become extremely rare due to these circumstances.

They have been referenced to in many shows, books, and Japanese folklore. This includes Yo-Kai Watch, Kubo and the Two Strings, Pom Poko, Nurarihyon No Mago (Nura: Rise of the Yokai Clan), and more.