So I tried to think up a new character, starting with their species. I didn’t want to go with anything too standard… like kitsune. Kitsune has become my standard first-thought creature, even before vampire and catboy. You know me, I always want to try something new.

And I couldn’t think of a darn one. My mind utterly blanked.

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Photo by Kittenpuff1

Every culture has it’s superstitions (even the ones that balk at such things). Some of them can be really fun, and others… not so much. With number thirteen for example, you could match it with a low birth rate that year.

And why thirteen? Just because it’s an unlucky number

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Photo by Dave

So what, or rather, who is Tsukiyomi? I’ve named my blog after him and more than a few people visit this blog to learn more about him. I haven’t written about who he is before, even though I’ve wanted to, because he’s just so gosh darn difficult to encapsulate. Since there’s so little (in English) about him, you need to fill in the gaps a little.

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Three years after finishing CLAMP’s Tokyo Babylon series, I still feel that Seishiro handicapped his bet. I mean, come on, how could the winner also be the judge? How fair could that be? If you bet someone that you won’t fall in love with them after a year, of course you’re not going to fall in love… or at least, if you’re as heartless as Seishiro, you’d never admit it.

After all that, how could he not love Subaru?

One of the fascinating things about CLAMP’s works like Tokyo Babylon, X/1999 and xxxHolic is the onmyouji, like Subaru. Wizards are fun, but onmyoudo puts a whole new interesting twist on magic.

Onmyoudo is traditional Japanese esoteric cosmology. In rougher words, onmyoudo is Japan’s answer to the wizard. Their practices are based on Shintoism, Taoism, and Buddhism. During the Muromachi period (1336-1573), essential texts were destroyed and schools teaching onmyoudo were closed. However, onmyoudo can still be found in Japanese literature and media, like CLAMP’s Tokyo Babylon. Some individuals as well (even in the West) are also trying to bring back onmyoudo.

So what makes an onmyouji?

• Vegetarian. Every creature, from the smallest ant to the largest elephant, is important to the world. Partaking in death can leave the body with impurities.
• Cold showers. Before major magic working, they take a cold shower to cleanse themselves of any impurities.
• Natural order. In the West, magic is used to dominate and often to create chaos. An onmyouji uses their magic to bring order to a small pocket.
• Nature-oriented. They’re close to nature. Everything in nature possesses a spirit, called a kami.
• Sees beyond. Yes, onmyouji are some of the special few that can see demons, kami and other supernatural wonders. They see worlds beyond the ordinary. It can be a birth gift or something to be trained or developed.
• Not every thing’s a demon. Most spirits are actually human emotions. Human emotions can leave imprints on the world to the point where it can be mistaken as a ghost. If the person who left the imprint is still alive, then helping them realize (and overcome) those emotions will help sort out the problem, along with a simplecleansing ceremony. (If you’ve read The Ghost She Least Expected, you can see that kind of thinking in Yuri over the Western thinking of Cain, who automatically believes it’s a ghost.)
• Understands first, attacks second. If it is a spirit, the first step is to communicate. If a ghost, spirit or demon haunts a place, there’s a reason. These reasons can range from the spirit just wanting to live in the place to very specific reasons.
  

  Ofuda

• Ofuda. Ofuda are magic in calligraphy form – a paper talisman. They can be used to create wards or attacks. Have you seen Sailor Moon? Mars uses ofuda (they’re the pieces of papers she throws around).
• Shikigami. Witcheshave cats as familiars, like onmyouji’s have shikigami – spirits that they can summon to aid them. Subaru’s shikigami is of a bird, but they can be of any shape – demon, animal or human.

Those are just a few of the things that make a onmyouji. There’s a lot more to learn, but these are my favorite. If you’d like to learn more, visit Onmyoudou Awakenings, an English website for Western people interested in becoming onmyouji.

This past week, I’ve imagined what Torchwood would be like if they a kistune agent (who I named Kaine). Torchwood seriously needs more non-humans on their team – especially some that Jack won’t automatically outlive.

Kaine would be a great weevil hunter, since his foxy aura would scare weevils into submission and his fast legs could hunt them down quicker. He’d also add worth as a supernatural advisor, someone who can help Torchwood with the preternatural creatures born on Earth, like fairies.

He’s quite young for a kitsune so he’d enjoy few powers. He rarely smiles and, as the team would discover, smiles only when Ianto gifts him with a children’s toy. Like temari, a paper ball, which Japanese children used to play with, because Ianto is just awesome like that.

After his true form is discovered at the beginning of season 2, Kaine can’t shift back to human form. So he uses his cute little foxy face to distract Ianto from Jack, believing that Jack could never be good enough for Ianto until he could say those magic words “yes, we’re a couple.” (And yes, Jack’s difficulties with acknowledging their relationship in Children of Earth bothered me.)

So, after such inspiration, I’ve decided to blog about kitsune. If you’ve read anything about Japanese mythology, you’ll have come across kitsune at least once. They’re that common.

What are kitsune?

Kitsune are fox spirits. Not dearly departed fox ghosts, but spirits, meaning possessing supernatural powers.

In their fox-form, they have up to nine tails. The more tails they have, the stronger and older they are. Kaine, not being very strong or old, would only have three tails. When a kitsune reaches nine tails, they turn white or gold. Think back to Pokemon. Vulpix is foxy brown colours and only has six tails. Then she evolves into Ninetails, with nine tails and golden-white colouring.

3 Kinds of Kitsune

By behaviour, there are about three types of kitsune (more when you take local legends into account). Generally, you have zenko (servant of Inari), yako (trickster), and ninko (possessor).

Zenko foxes are benevolent and celestial creatures associated with Inari, the Shinto deity of rice. They’re the sort of fox you wouldn’t mind meeting in a dark alley. If you’re having trouble with a yako fox, you can petition a zenko fox for help. They’re also notoriously good at dispelling evil energies, and kitsune statues are used for that purpose in feng shui. To thank them for helping with your troubles, offer them aburage (fried sliced tofu) or inari-zushi (rice-filled pouches of tofu). They’re commonly white, a good omen, but they can also be black, which is also a good omen.

Yako foxes are mischievous, malicious and malevolent, all very bad M-words. They love to play tricks on humans, especially men. It’s easy and fun for them. They can summon fox fire to lead travellers astray, much like a will-of-the-wisp. Or they can shapeshift into a beautiful women to seduce men to their doom. If you do them a favour such as give them shelter, though, they’re bound to repay you. Just remember that they’re not human and don’t share the same human morality. They’ll repay you for boarding them by giving you stolen money from your neighbours.

Ninko foxes posses humans. While Yako foxes prefer taunting men, ninko foxes like to possess women. A person possessed by a fox is called kitsunetsuki. Possessed women tend to go crazy. They run through the streets naked or attack everyone around them. Until the 20^th century, mental illness was commonly deemed as fox possession. They can be exorcised at an Inari shrine. If the excorcism isn’t working, the exorcists resort to beating or burning the victim to force the fox to leave. Before the modern era, families are ostracized from society if one family member is believed to be possessed.

Kitsunetsuki appears in the final story arc in Ghost Hunt, the Cursed House. Naru, the male lead, is possessed by the displaced fox exorcised from a young woman. Lin erects wards around him to keep him comatose so he doesn’t attack everyone.

So that’s an introduction to kitsune, except for their various powers, which range from shapeshifting to being able to see and hear everything in the world.

Would you like to see more kitsune in novels? Or have you seen kitsune in novels?