The Immortal Naturalist's Guide to Cryptic Creatures: The Window Tapper

This post is part of the Immortal Naturalist's Guide series. The explanation for that series can be found in this post.

    Prowling the streets of Principolis every night is the Window Tapper, a strange creature measuring fifteen feet tall and possessing extra long fingers for tapping windows. After the sun sets, the Window Tapper wanders the streets, staring into windows and tapping on them, hoping to lure someone to look into its eyes. Whoever does this will be compelled to open their window, and then stand perfectly still as the Window Tapper eats their eyes. This diet seems to cover all of the nutrition requirements of the creature, while most people don't believe it exists, making its hunting method fairly successful. While stories of the creature that taps on windows and eats the eyes of anyone who goes to investigate are well-known in Prinicipolis, most people assume they are yet another outlandish tale to explain the many noises of a city at night. When it isn't hunting, the Window Tapper is quite timid and quick to retreat to its lair in the city sewers.

    Unsanitary home ignored, the ability of the Window Tapper to stupefy its victims as it eats their eyes is incredible, and most definitely the result of magic. As far as I can tell, the light that reflects off of the beast's eyes is magically polarized to cause the hypnotic effect. As soon as the victim's second eye is removed, they exit their trance, confirming that the Window Tapper's magic requires continuous eye contact. To avoid getting your eyes eaten by the Window Tapper, there are several options. The first option is to not investigate if one hears a tapping on their window at night. Next is the option of wearing a blindfold if one ever needs to look out their window at night, although this may not be a very useful option. Finally, one can ward off the Window Tapper by hanging dried roses from their window sills. The smell of roses is distasteful to the creature and will drive it away.

    Driving the Window Tapper away may not be the best option, however. Silky fur grows on the tip of the Window Tapper's tail and elbows which can be shaved off with relative ease if the beast is captured. Window Tapper fur has the unique property of creating a hallucinogenic smoke when burned. This acrid smoke causes whoever breathes it in to see terrible images of massive disembodied eyeballs wherever they look. While these visions are distressing, they also prevent one from seeing or even really engaging with their surroundings. With giant eyeballs dominating their field of view, most foes are unable to focus on what is around them, often having their opponent obscured by one or more of the hallucinatory eyeballs. How such a specific hallucination is achieved in every single victim is unknown to me, but it all seems to be based on the creature's preferred food. Such a potent hallucinogen would be useful to many people, but as I explained, it is hard to track down the only known source for it.