Mukade
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Mukade is a "super ninja", the most formidable of the ninja-type enemies you will encounter, and the game's second boss. As a character, he is also quite an enigma.
Facts
Appearance
Mukade wears black armor which leaves no exposed skin (as opposed to Ninjas) and speaks through a vocoder. Konoko presumably doesn't unmask him after breaking his neck. Thus he doesn't have an identity at all, and he is defined primarily by what he said and did.
Role in Oni
Mission objectives
- Muro's master ninja, Mukade, has removed the Hasegawa records from the data archives! You must find him, and retrieve the Data Disk that holds the clues to your past. (Quote from chapter 09 // rooftop level.)
Diary entry
- That ninja...why do I react to him this way? He feels familiar and I hate him for it. We're like animals whose territory is threatened. I know when I find him we'll be nothing but claws and fangs. The strangest part is that I'm looking forward to it.
- (Quote from chapter 10 // dream lab.)
Speech
- "Does your blood burn when you kill? Mine does!"
- Read more quotes HERE.
Interviews
Hardy LeBel commenting on Mukade's visceral link to Konoko:
More advanced Daodan mutates are hyper-evolved "super predators". All of the aspects of their bodies evolve, including their senses. The "connection" Konoko feels with Mukade is her own evolving senses alerting her that she is on the trail of another Daodan super predator.
Could she keep herself from killing him once she'd established her dominance, or does the predatory nature of the Chrysalis demand that she destroy any and all threats to her existence? That is the question YOU get to answer for yourself in the Omega Vault.
At least that's the way I hoped it would feel!
People with a Daodan Chrysalis inside them are "super predators" of sorts, so they are very aware of each other: imagine a tiger moving into another tiger's hunting grounds. Anybody who has ever been to the zoo can tell you that you always know when the tigers are about to make their entrance: tigers have a very distinctive odor that you can smell for miles.
Konoko's internal lines in that level were meant to show her own predatory response to the threat that Mukade presents. And when she ends up talking to Mukade he tries to get her to admit that she's feeling the "thrill of the hunt" and that the creature she is becoming likes to kill, but she denies it.
Still we all know how that level ends ;^>
Name origin
Insectology
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Or rather arachnology.
As you see, MUKADE doesn't have a kanji of its own, instead there are 3 minor pictograms, meaning literally "a hundred feet". So it means "centipede" or "scolopendra" quite literally.
Latin name is Scolopendra subspinipes japonica. Yeah, Mukade is kinda cooler. Real ones are 10 cm in average, 20 at longest.
OK, scolopendras are creepy (did you click the link above?), but just wandering through that blog I highly recommend. Be warned, there are absolutely AWESOME photographs of SPIDERS! And butterflies :)
- People talk
- Mukade??? They are among the most horrible things on earth. They are giant centipedes that leave huge welts when they bite. And they are fast. I had more than a few in my place. They liked to hang out in my sink drain and they'd come out whenever I turned the tap on.
There are lots of other thrilling comments like that one, on quite a lot of forums, from people living in Japan or people having lived there for a while...
Somewhat more helpful for anyone who want to learn more about MUKADE are :
- Takipedia
- There are hundreds of types of mukade in the family, however the most common mukade in Japan are the tobizu 鳶頭, the aozu �?�頭 and the akazu 赤頭. The tobizu has a black body and a distinct red head and yellow legs. It would probably be quite hard to miss one of these beauties crawling along your ceiling.
- Some guy's blog.
- Amazed by how many people googling for MUKADE were directed to his blog, he kindly gathered information from Japanese sites dedicated to those things and translated it.
- They come in two varieties, either the Omukade, where "O" means big, and the Aomukade, which means "blue" (there is also a Tobizumukade, but it is considered the same as the Aomukade)
- The Omukade get to be about 15 cm (with 21 pairs of legs), and are found in southeastern Japan. This seems to be what I have in the house...
- The Aomukade and Tobizumukade get to be around 10 cm as adults
- Yes, mukade care for their young, which are carried as eggs under mommies belly. The mother will nurture the young until they are self sufficient. I have heard that when you find one Mukade, that you will soon find another, as they apparently come in mating pairs. I believe this to be true, as I have found a pair of biggies within a close timeframe each year since I have lived out here.
- They are pretty much blind, but are very sensitive to vibrations (translation, they "see" just fine in the dark, when you can't!) and they hunt small insects at night
- If you touch one by accident, it may bite you. If you get bitten it does hurt quite a bit, as they are poisonous, and you will likely experience swelling, redness, and possibly scarring. I have been bitten once, but it was a small bite, and although it hurt like hell (it woke me from dead sleep) there was no swelling, and just a bit of redness. However, if you get a good bite, you may want to go to the Doctor. Much like a bee sting, it can bring on "Anna-wears-plastic" shock, which is just not good for you. (Sorry, I have NO idea how to spell that, so you work it out!)
- If you keep it as a pet (I actually found a link to a guy who does!), you can feed it "pink mice", or crickets. Apparently, a 10 cm Mukade can escape through a 2 mm opening...
So...
- Sleep tight. Don't let the bedbugs bite
Looks like that nursery rhyme is exactly about those charming pets.
Mythology
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A giant (and overpowered) version of that thing also used to be a (malevolent) fantastic creature in Japan
- Tawaratoda the Mukade-slayer
- Not far from Hamamatsu, a town located east of Kyoto in the province of Totomi at the east road of Japan, there’s a town called Tschitta. Near this town there’s a bridge leading over the Yokatagawa. The length of this bridge seems even more remarkable as it is cut into two parts by an isle in the river.
- Near this bridge, which is called Tschittanohashi, “Bridge of Tschitta�? because of the close proximity to the village, once lived a gruesome monster, a huge millipede, or, as the Japanese call this, a Mukade, this is also why they call the hill he lived on “Mukade-hill�?This poisonous millipede made the (army-road) insecure and noone dared to oppose him.
- He was especially dangerous at night-time when he grew so courageous that he even attacked the breed of the dragons who lived under the bridge. He killed the helpless cups without any fear of the big dragons’ might. Because of this, a grim war between the dragons and the Mukade began.
- Despite their divine might, the dragons couldn’t do anything against the Mukade in his hiding place and so he always won and he continued his nightly raids until the dragons got some unsuspected help.A hero from the line of the Minamoto called Tawaratoda heard of the people’s pain that was caused by the Mukade and bravely he went to the monster’s lair and killed it with his arrows. He fired them so strongly that they went through the Mukade’s thick skin and finally the beast lay dead on the ground before the hero.It is said that the dead monster’s length extended that of two adult men.
- When the dragons and oceangods heard of this great deed, they came to the hero, praised him and told him that he would live for a long time. They also prophesied that his kin would have the greatest might on earth.
- And that’s how it happened, because 250 years later, Yoritomo from the same family monopolised all worldly might as the Shôgun and later two times one of his subfamilies, the Aschikaga and the Tokugawa, succeeded in gathering all this honour and thus the ruler’s might for centuries.
(Thanks to Adorage for submitting that one on Oni Central Forum)
- A shorter version
- A long time ago a huge centipede, that could wrap itself seven and a half times around Mt. Mikami, appeared. It crawled out of the fields, destroying the rice fields and eating all the fish in the lake and rivers, endangering the people of Yasu. A great warrior, Tawara no Tota Hidesato, was on a journey in the Yasu area. He was asked by the Lake Goddess to defeat the cruel centipede. After a fierce battle, Tota defeated the centipede and the people were safe once again.
- Yet another short version
- Oo-mukade(giant centipede) has been featured in the ledgend of a 12th century warrior named Toda Tawara.In his story, the mukade was suppose to be slain be the hero for the Dragon King of Lake Biwa. The hero killed the mukade using only 3 arrowas which were shot at the eye of the mukade, only the 3rd one, which had saliva (saliva is thought of as having magical proerties) on the arrow head finished it off. The Oo-mukade appeared on blue Seed episode 12 (I think),which was btw, one of the episodes that starts to show the whole plot of the series....yeah, that episode kicked ass.
- And another one
- In Japanese Mythology, Oo-Mukade was a terrifying, giant centipede the size of a mountain. It lived in the mountains of Japan near Lake Biwa. The dragon king of the lake asked the famous hero Hidesato (some sources say Tado Tawara) to kill it. The hero fired three arrows at the monster's eye. The third arrow, which was dipped in Hidesato's bodily fluid, killed the monster by penetrating its brain. The dragon king rewarded Hidesato by giving him a "bottomless" bag of rice which fed his family for centuries. The bodily fluid on the arrow is said to have magical properties against centipedes. WHAT WAS THIS BODILY FLUID? Saliva
- And finally...
- TAWARA TODA HIDESATO. Fujiwara Hidesato is shown bestriding the Mukade, a giant centipede that had been terrorising the waters of Lake Biwa. At the request of Riujin, the dragon-king, he slew the monster with an arrow moistened with his saliva, for which he was richly rewarded.
Awesome resource on samurai and other "musha", that last one...
