i cant think of a word but gimme an interesting mythical/supernatural creature or creature from folklore from your culture
One that I really like is the Swan of Tuonela. The Finnish national animal is the whooper swan which is probably because of the Kalevala and the nationalist movement in the 19th century.
Anyway, Tuonela is our version of Hades or the underworld and you get there by crossing the river Tuonela, in which the swan swims. The swans are a link between our world and the underworld.
The whooper swan was considered sacred by the Baltic Finns and the myth that if you kill The Swan of Tuonela you die yourself stems from there.
The english wikipedia article only talks about the poem in the Kalevala and not of the mythical swan itself, sadly.
