Australia is home to many amazing creatures. But the most striking among them is the vampire and cannibal yara-ma-yha-hu. Even outwardly, he noticeably stands out among other fantastic bloodsuckers. Imagine a little red man a little over a meter tall, with a very large head and a huge toothless mouth, the size of which allows you to swallow living creatures several times larger than yourself. Other hallmarks of yara-ma-yha-hu are the unique palms and feet. There are suckers on the tips of the fingers, like on the tentacles of an octopus. So are the toes.
Yara-ma-yha-hu does not like bright sunlight, so he tries to settle in caves or in the hollows of rocks located near a water source. Another permanent refuge is the dense crown of a fig tree. With the help of its suction cups, the yara-ma-yha-hu can hold onto branches and hang down from the tree. He does not hunt for food, but waits for an unsuspecting traveler to sit down to rest under a tree, because in the heat people look for shade, and in bad weather, thick foliage helps to hide from rain and wind.
Having looked at the victim, yara-ma-yha-hu jumps on the person, presses him to the ground, clings to the body with his hands-feet-suction cups and bites. Blood oozes until the person finally weakens, becomes helpless and faints. Then the creature rises on all fours and begins to crawl around the victim, like a predatory lizard. It is clear that everyone was afraid of these terrible creatures. Upon learning about the proximity of the bloodsucker, people immediately sought a safe refuge in caves or in crevices of rocks on the slopes of the mountains.
Yara-ma-yha-hu never sucked blood to the end, but left a little to keep the victim alive while he wandered around and whetted his appetite. Then the bloodthirsty monster returned, lay down on the ground next to the victim and, like a monitor lizard, opening his mouth wide, swallowed the prey - first the head, and then the whole body. Then he got up on his little legs and danced around for a long time, until the prey was completely hidden in his stomach. After that, he went to the river or to another body of water, drank for a long time, and then went to the nearest valley and went to bed.
If yara-ma-yha-hu swallowed a person, it did not mean that he was dead. After drinking water and sleeping, the creature vomited its victim back. The unfortunate man revived, but became a little shorter. Some people were devoured and vomited by the insatiable monster repeatedly, and each time they became smaller and redder. As a result, a withered red-skinned blood-sucking creature was born - another yara-ma-yha-hu.
Sometimes a bloodless person, trying to deceive the monster, pretended to be dead. After standing near the victim, the yara-ma-yha-hu, who did not like to eat carrion, walked a certain distance, say, five steps, but suddenly returned and poked her with a stick to determine whether she was alive or not. If a person did not show any signs of life, yara-ma-yha-hu again moved away, now farther away, then suddenly turned, returned to his prey and tickled it under the armpits. If a person again did not show any signs of life, yara-ma-yha-hu would repeat all over again. Not noticing any reaction, he went even further, for example, fifty steps, and then returned again and again tickled the person. After that, he left, hid behind a bush and watched if the prey would come to life.
If a person ran away, yara-ma-yha-hu would suddenly jump up and rush after, screaming out the forest: "Where are you running, my victim, my victim?" However, there is an advantage on the victim's side: this evil spirits cannot run quickly and waddle around like a cockatoo. If yara-ma-yha-hu did not succeed in catching the escaped person again, he went to the water sources in the rocks and drank all the water from them in order to somehow annoy the local residents. Then people were forced to go in search of wild apple trees and rip off the bark from them. Sometimes they managed to find water in the depressions between the bark and the trunk of the tree. This gave yara-ma-yha-hu another opportunity to catch a man, since it is easier for him to pounce on prey from a tree, from its dense crown, than to catch up on the ground.
If all searches for the victim ended in failure for yara-ma-yha-hu, the spirit of a fig tree or fig tree killed him, entering his head through the ear, making a muttering sound there, followed by complete silence. After that, the spirit left the red body of the monster, and it turned into a cold mushroom growing on trees and dimly glowing at night.
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