Elly Sketchit (a.k.a. Angelly)

The original demon-cat character of air-lobster.com, sometimes used as a fan-pseudonym by the artist.

The lavender cat creature Elly Sketchit as seen on this website is what is known as a nekomata in Japan. It was believed that after a cat grew to be a decade old, it would develop profound magical powers, typically exhibited by either a tail split halfway down or even splicing into two seperate tails. By gesturing with this tail, a nekomata can animate and control the dead to do their bidding and other various types of magic. In a lot of the art drawn on the site Elly is hiding a section of her split tail behind the first fork as not to alarm others.

She learned the hard way not to show people what she is. Elly was born a long, long time ago in Japan when people believed Gods, Demons and Spirits roamed the earth. She was taken care of by a well-to-do family who were lower-class nobles. She lived to nine years old and on the eve of her tenth birthday the family threw her out, fearing what she might become. Sad and completely confused, she stayed where she was until a pack of dogs chased her into the streets of the town nearby. She would have been killed if a larger dog had not suddenly charged out a side street and chased the others off. This dog turned to her and all she heard an echo of laughter, tinged with bitterness.

It turns out the Gods were hanging around with mortals. The strange red dog was Loki, taking a cruise around Japan for a change. He found it enormously amusing (and ironic) to change her into the creature her former family had feared so much. He gave her the form and powers associated with the nekomata - the ability to control the "dead" with a wave of her tail. She could also now change form to several different variations, including one so human she was able to walk around undetected in the streets.

Elly didn't go back to her human family. She shunned humans, preferring the closest form to her original cat body that she could achieve, but soon found the people wouldn't talk to her in that guise. She grudgingly began to change back and forth and enter the strange people's world from time to time. Castles lay abandoned from time to time when superstitious people thought they were "haunted", so she raised a few dead humans and emptied a castle for herself. Loki (who had been hanging around for awhile) named it "Moy Mell", (properly Magh Mell) which means 'The Pleasant Plain', one of the three ideas connected with the ancient Irish conception of the 'Happy Otherworld' or Pagan Paradise.

The nekomata woman lived many years, seemingly immortal. She endured visits from her 'protector' from time to time, fending off his spurious advances. It was around the year 1976 when she discovered she could also raise inanimate objects like she could dead ones. Technically, it's the same thing, but she never realized this. The discovery led to her travelling around and "rescuing" thrown-away toys, objects and neglected pieces of family heritage and such. She brings them back to Moy Mell where they can live life happily instead of feeling the pain of rejection and loss like she did.