Every creature we used to fear in the early days of mankind has been forced to adapt as we have grown and changed. With enough time they cease to resemble anything from our oldest stories with some moving beyond the physical altogether, roaming as code within the obscurest regions of the internet.
We used to call them Will-O'-The-Wisps, nasty little tricksters they were and still are. They used to be little flickers of light floating along the darkest paths waiting to lure unsuspecting travellers into dangerous ground in the hopes that they would die. Despite their minuscule size, they were strictly carnivorous, often merging into feeding frenzies resembling a bonfire.
Now they lurk inside of adverts, namely whatever the internet browser assesses as their user's top interests. They slip inside of the pretty pictures, between the brackets and undetectable to the average user, waiting to lure you to their website - their portal. Ever hear that staring at a screen is bad for your eyesight? It's them feeding on you, albeit very slowly and through your optic nerves to get to your delicious, blood rich brain.
This brings us delightfully on to vampires, now known mostly for their eccentricity and failure to blend in as humans when met in person. They thrive online, their victims met through shady missed connections that sound vague enough to be anyone but with that little detail thrown in to entice someone with their preferred blood type.
Appearance-wise they've lost their old features, their thickly furred skin, the ears positioned at the top of their head and their bulging black eyes. They've toned down, mimicking our ape-ish ancestry though they themselves are descended from something more akin to a bat.We were never too wrong about them.
We were wrong about trolls, they weren't the clumsy warm-blooded fools who could be tricked by goats but nor were they gigantic stony beasts. They were somewhere in between, these beings twice the size of a man but with a mind much calmer and slower. They didn't live in caves exactly, they were the sides of mountains come to life, so to speak. Born from something in the underground streams or so they claimed.
Now they are landslides and avalanches when their colonies move to lower and warmer ground. They are collapsing mines and sinkholes as they relocate to somewhere quieter, having finally realised that humans now live where they originally settled. They may be slow to make decisions but they move faster than a sports car on nitrous oxide, leaving behind new cracks in paving slabs and fresh roadkill wherever their feet land.
Everything we wrote about in our folklore is changing to keep up with us and eventually surpass us.
We used to call them Will-O'-The-Wisps, nasty little tricksters they were and still are. They used to be little flickers of light floating along the darkest paths waiting to lure unsuspecting travellers into dangerous ground in the hopes that they would die. Despite their minuscule size, they were strictly carnivorous, often merging into feeding frenzies resembling a bonfire.
Now they lurk inside of adverts, namely whatever the internet browser assesses as their user's top interests. They slip inside of the pretty pictures, between the brackets and undetectable to the average user, waiting to lure you to their website - their portal. Ever hear that staring at a screen is bad for your eyesight? It's them feeding on you, albeit very slowly and through your optic nerves to get to your delicious, blood rich brain.
This brings us delightfully on to vampires, now known mostly for their eccentricity and failure to blend in as humans when met in person. They thrive online, their victims met through shady missed connections that sound vague enough to be anyone but with that little detail thrown in to entice someone with their preferred blood type.
Appearance-wise they've lost their old features, their thickly furred skin, the ears positioned at the top of their head and their bulging black eyes. They've toned down, mimicking our ape-ish ancestry though they themselves are descended from something more akin to a bat.We were never too wrong about them.
We were wrong about trolls, they weren't the clumsy warm-blooded fools who could be tricked by goats but nor were they gigantic stony beasts. They were somewhere in between, these beings twice the size of a man but with a mind much calmer and slower. They didn't live in caves exactly, they were the sides of mountains come to life, so to speak. Born from something in the underground streams or so they claimed.
Now they are landslides and avalanches when their colonies move to lower and warmer ground. They are collapsing mines and sinkholes as they relocate to somewhere quieter, having finally realised that humans now live where they originally settled. They may be slow to make decisions but they move faster than a sports car on nitrous oxide, leaving behind new cracks in paving slabs and fresh roadkill wherever their feet land.
Everything we wrote about in our folklore is changing to keep up with us and eventually surpass us.
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