>>1166 If anything, I'd say girls like Hitomi-chan are the foundation work for the myths that eventually spawned Rumia.

>>1168 Well, if those were legends about Hitomi specifically she would go around the human village punching out bullies left and right. Though that is interesting. If mythos of a certain youkai is based upon a misconception, then would that misconception influence the actual youkai? Probably only if said misconception gets debunked, right?

>>1181 >Though that is interesting. If mythos of a certain youkai is based upon a misconception, then would that misconception influence the actual youkai? Very much so. Consider Shou - she's a tiger youkai, but as tigers aren't native to Japan, her "myth" is what the Japanese thought tigers were like. Another example is Iku: Due to their dragon-like appearance and their alleged behavior of washing ashore prior to earthquakes, people thought oarfish were messengers from the Palace of the Dragon God, which is said to be deep beneath the sea. The big joke is that the Palace of the Dragon God actually sits in the Lunar Capital, and the entire "somewhere beneath the sea" myth is Lunarian propaganda. In other words, Iku's entire existence (at least as an oarfish youkai) stems back to humans being duped by Lunarian propaganda. The misconception doesn't need to be debunked, either. The misconception gives birth to the myth, and if the myth fizzles out in the outside world, the associated youkai pops up in Gensokyo.

>>1184 I was thinking more along the lines of if let's say we had two Shous. And one was based on what the people were expecting tigers to be, while the other was based on an actual tiger (who happened to match people's expectations). And if both Shous had the same amount of followers and were identical save for one being based on a 'true story'. Would the fact of a youkai's mythos being unfounded influence them in some way? I know that it probably wouldn't and the only thing that matters is what people believe in, but I feel like authenticity is a concept very important to human psyche, so it amount to something. Also if let's say some tanuki entrepreneur imports tabby cats into Gensoukyou, marketing them as the 'actual' tigers, and people believe it and start thinking "Man. All of those tiger stories were such a scam." If all of the people who believe in Shou have their image of tigers disproved and begin believing in the new one, what effect would it have on her? Would she transform to fit this new image or would she loose her faith as it now goes to the new catgirl-Shou? I guess Kyouko is an example of what would happen, but it's not like people started believing in the new yamabiko. They just stopped believing altogether. Also, what the fuck is it about Kyouko earning faith by sweeping stairs? Does Byakuren give her a cut of her own faith as salary?

>>1189 I'm afraid that authenticity doesn't mean a damn thing. What we hold as 'true' is only true in as much as that a) we have enough credible evidence to presume it is 'true'. b) we accept it as true so we no longer have to worry about whether or not it is 'true' c) it would be inconvenient it if were not 'true' As for Shou - if there was enough faith/fear to have two Shou's exist simultaneously, I'd expect you would be dealing with two different myths in the first place. You could say each Shou is a different sub-species of "tiger youkai" in that case. As for the Tabby cat scenario - I would expect you can actually can force the characteristics of a tabby cat on Shou this way. Just like her being worshiped as the avatar of Bishamonten (presumably) led to her current form (and her being unable to revert to her original one). Kanako actually pulls the reverse card on this by "re-marketing" herself as a goddess of technology, as opposed to her original self as a mountain/storm god. As for Kyouko - honestly, I don't know. She still has her echo ability, so my best guess is that the villagers still believe in yamabikos lurking about in the mountains - they just consider her a reformed specimen "tamend" by Byakuren.