36) Korea - 16. Golden Pig

A man-eating monster in the shape of a pig with golden fur, said to be strong and skilled in sorcery and shapeshifting. It is said to live in a cave on Wolyeongdo Island off the coast of Masan, where it kidnaps women to devour them or take them as concubines to serve it. The most famous related legend is the story of 'Choi Chi-won, descendant of the Golden Pig'. Whenever a new magistrate was appointed to a certain village, his wife would go missing. The new magistrate devised a plan and attached a thread to his wife's hem. When his wife disappeared the next day, the magistrate followed the thread with his subordinates into a cave. There, he discovered the culprit was the Golden Pig. He learned from the kidnapped women that the Golden Pig's weakness was deer hide, so he obtained deer hide, killed the Golden Pig, and his wife later gave birth to a son, who was Choi Chi-won. According to some versions, Choi Chi-won's mother was already in the early stages of pregnancy when she was kidnapped by the Golden Pig, so he is not its descendant. Depending on the tradition, its weakness is also said to be deer hide, white horse hide, or sheep hide.