Creature #1388 Haitu | Midmonth Donatationpet

[feralkiwi]

omg yay! i was so hoping we'd get a water bunny doni for the lunar new year and these do not disappoint love them!

[DarkstarWolf]

ooh very pretty! Gonna need to wishlist this pet!

[Airasyraye]

Gorgeous. Very well done.

[CrystalOrange]

Mod edited to remove spam

[Kestrad]

Is now a good time to play spot the reference? I put a little fairy tale reference in the description First person to figure out what it is gets a haitu! Bonus points if you can figure out why the reference is in there

[Moon487]

Is now a good time to play spot the reference? I put a little fairy tale reference in the description First person to figure out what it is gets a haitu! Bonus points if you can figure out why the reference is in there

I'm not sure if it would be considered a fairy tale per se so this might not be it at all, but the whole parts that say "sometimes disappear for weeks at a time into the sea, leading to speculation that they might change form during that time" and "Haitu molt every few months," remind me a bit of the Selkie myth, since Selkies shed their skin to change form and come ashore as a human, and live in the ocean otherwise (albeit as seals not rabbits lol).

[Revan]

I'm thinking selkie as well rather than a particular fairy tale. 'The selkie-folk have come to be regarded as gentle creatures, with the ability to transform from seals into beautiful, lithe humans.' This essentially matches up with the Haitu's description.

Uh...my mind seems to be going dark places. Is the reference that happens to be there regarding selkie shed skin and uh...the seal fur trade...?

[sceries]

Is now a good time to play spot the reference? I put a little fairy tale reference in the description :lol: First person to figure out what it is gets a haitu! Bonus points if you can figure out why the reference is in there ^.^

this is a bit of a stretch, but the adult haitu description kinda sounds like it's referencing the twelve dancing princesses? it also might just be because it says twelve tracking spells, so i immediately thought of fairy tales that involve twelves-- but it does mention the haitu mysteriously disappearing and reappearing... i might be overthinking it lol
i agree that the part about speculation about changing forms sounds like selkies, though! :)

[Kestrad]

Good guesses, but it's not selkies or the twelve dancing princesses! But I will say that the twelve dancing princesses guess is on the right track.

Edit: After some googling, this reference may be a much deeper cut than I expected. So an additional clue is that figuring out where the creature name came from will be an extremely helpful place to start!

[Moon487]

Feeling a lot more confident in my second guess with that hint! It’s to do with this line of text here:

Keep folklore has it that one researcher placed twelve tracking spells on her haitu, each more advanced than the last, in the hopes of figuring out where it disappeared to underwater, only for each spell to flicker out, one after the other, at which point the haitu reappeared in her room.

I think it’s referencing the Brothers Grimm fairy tale, “The Sea-Hare.” The story talks about a princess with a tower that had 12 windows, which essentially let her find stuff/people, and each window was stronger than the previous (ie the tracking spells). In the story, due to a challenge from the princess to evade her window’s ability to the point it was impossible to find him, a man ended up disguising himself as a sea-hare to get into her tower/room.

Link to the story here: https://www.grimmstories.com/en/grimm_f ... e_sea-hare