Horrifying The Horror / Literature

Horrifying the Horror in Literature.

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• In The Belgariad by David Eddings, Hettar qualifies for the entire Murgo race, possibly even more so than even Belgarath himself.
  • Speaking of whom, Belgarath more than qualifies for Angarak as a whole.
    • To be fair, the general Angarak populace isn’t really all that bad on the whole, but the military and especially the clergy? Yeah, they definitely qualify as horrors to be horrified by those two and a few others in the cast.
  • The sight of Errand is enough to send a Demon Lord fleeing in abject terror at one point.
  • Urvon is briefly snapped out of being Brainwashed and Crazy when Beldin puts in an appearance.
• In Black Legion, another group of Chaos Astartes, this time accompanied by a daemon and a Dark Eldar, is horrified at the sight of Fabius Bile's experiments, especially his attempts at cloning the Primarchs.
• Black Tide Rising: Normally, zombies will mindlessly swarm anything that moves, even if it's something like a squad of heavily-armed Marines who are mowing them down with gunfire. However, once Wolf Squadron gets ahold of a working Abrams tank in Strands of Sorrow and puts it to work easily cutting through a horde several thousand zombies strong, the surviving ones rediscover their survival instinct and flee as fast as they can, the narration noting that their feral brains are finally recognizing something other than themselves as a predator.
• Bruce Coville's Book of... Aliens II: The hostile aliens in George Pinkerton and the Space Waffles become absolutely terrified of humans when they discover, via Pinkerton and Billy, that they look just like a common breakfast item on Earth.
• Chrysalis (RinoZ): When Crinis gets going with her razor-barbed tentacles operating like chainsaws, even giant monstrous spiders tend to run away in fear (but not always successfully). The fact that she has skills like Greater Fear Inspiration probably contributes, too. Oh, and she later develops a scream that has an associated psychic component, directly attacking the mind with terror. But then, to cap it off, she picks up "soul seeker cilia", allowing her to drive her tentacles into her enemies' brains and push them over the brink of insanity.
  If I hadn't been paying such close attention, I might not have noticed how those root-like, ethereal appendages drilled down into the monsters, slipping straight through whatever hide, skeleton or mucous covered them and penetrating their brains. I held my breath as they grew still for a moment, each of the beasts frozen in place like a nightmare painting.
  Then they screamed.
• When Lord Nachtos materialises in the Cupid Homeworld in the The Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids story The Copper-Colored Cupids go Caroling, his recurring fellow Eldritch Abomination Lord Thymon locks himself in the nearest building without so much as a by-your-leave.
• Discworld:
  • In The Light Fantastic, Rincewind (the ultimate coward) ends up fighting a creature from the Dungeon Dimensions (where everything H. P. Lovecraft ever thought of lived), while it possesses a man that may be the most powerful wizard on the Disc at that moment in time. He fights it using nothing but his hands, feet, elbows, knees, and teeth. In the end, the author points out that this is the first time anything has ever run away from Rincewind instead of the other way around. He not only beat up Cthulhu, he actually scared away Cthulhu with a fist-fight. (It's made clear in the books that the Things don't really "get" the material world; a physical attack simply isn't something they're equipped to deal with.)
  • Earlier, the first time a Thing From The Dungeon Dimensions is mentioned is at the Temple of Bel-Shamaroth in The Colour of Magic. The demon that powers Twoflower's iconograph complains that the place is "weird", leading to the following exchange:
    Twoflower: But you're a demon. Demons can't call things weird. I mean, what's weird to a demon?
    Demon: Oh you know, things. Stuff.
    Twoflower: What things?
    Demon: [nervous cough] Oh, things. Evil things. Things we don't talk about is the point I'm broadly trying to get across, master.
  • In Guards! Guards!, the giant dragon's summoner-turned-lackey explains that the citizens of Anhk-Morpork will, in time, get used to the idea of sacrificing maidens to it, and even come to endorse the practice eventually. The dragon, in disbelief, reads the lackey's mind and discovers a litany of the awful things humans regularly do to one another without a dragon bullying them into doing it, and is utterly appalled.
  • Hogfather: The Scissor Man, a monster made entirely of sharp edges that exists to scare children out of sucking their thumbs by threatening to sever them, is shown to tread very carefully around Susan Sto Helit in Hogfather after a previous incident where it came after one of the children she was caring for and learned the hard way that Susan 1) could see it because she's Death's granddaughter, 2) did not tolerate that kind of behaviour, and 3) was entirely willing to discourage monsters under the bed and things that go bump in the night from frightening the children in her care by beating them into submission with a fire poker and throwing them out of the house. It becomes as polite as an unspeaking scissor monster can get at the mention of the poker.
• In H. P. Lovecraft's The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath, servants of Nyarlathotep, including (and especially) the monstrous Shantak birds are absolutely terrified of Nightgaunts, because they serve Nodens, Nyarlathotep's (im)mortal enemy and the only being who really poses any kind of threat to him in the Dreamlands.
• The Dresden Files: Ghouls and vampires have been known to run away screaming at the sight of Harry Dresden.
  • Early in Changes Harry comes face-to-face with a Red Court vampire. Keep in mind, a Red Court vampire can disembowel a half dozen mortal combatants in a matter of seconds, and this one, in particular, is one of the Court's best assassins. On seeing Harry, it shrieks in terror and bolts through a wall in the process of running for its life. Of course, over the course of the war, Harry has garnered himself a bit of a reputation.
  • As for the ghouls, one of them managed to get hold of two young Warden trainees that were being taught fire magic. After killing the one that abducted them by lighting its body fat on fire and dropping it down a mineshaft, Harry blasted a captured ghoul into a hole he created, buried it up to the neck (melting the sand into glass as he did so) and laid a trail of orange juice to a nest of fire ants. He only put it out of its misery after he realised the other trainees were staring at him in horror. The only surviving ghoul was left to take a message to its kind. Never again. Note that this incident occurred while Harry had the shadow of a Fallen Angel secretly living in his head and whispering to his subconscious in an attempt to make him eviler. He had a very major My God, What Have I Done? moment when he actually realized what was happening. He was still happy to take advantage of the reputation it earned him.
  • Perhaps topping his list of achievements in this category is the fact that Nicodemus, an agent of evil thousands of years old who has bonded his soul with an honest-to-God fallen angel is actively terrified of Harry, as Harry is apparently the only person who has come even remotely close to actually killing him...on two occasions no less.
    • Not Harry himself, but one of his closest companions, Mouse the Foo dog, deserves special mention: in Skin Game, his arrival actually scares the living bejeebers out of Anduriel, the Fallen angel that's attached to Nicodemus. Anduriel was one of Lucifer's generals before being coin-bound for being The Starscream.
  • Several readers have noted that a certain Black Court vampire mage has not been seen or heard from since Harry gave her a brief rundown of all the things he could do to make her unlife Hell, should she try to target his friends ever again.
  • Michael Carpenter also has this, especially in Skin Game. When Uriel temporarily heals his leg by giving him his grace allowing him to briefly take back up the mantle of Knight of the Cross Nicodemus immediately backs down despite being on the verge of winning. Michael's one of the most successful Knights of the Cross just by surviving as long as he wields Excalibur. Later, even though they knew he was coming Nicomedius' guards freak out at the very sight of him, Horrifying the Horror indeed.
  • "Jared Kincaid" (almost certainly an alias, but we never find out his real name) is introduced as a Combat Pragmatist and One-Man Army with Improbable Aiming Skills and centuries of experience. He's a very good ally to have in a fight, and definitely not someone you want coming after you. He explicitly states that if he'd known Harry was calling in his old mentor Ebenezar McCoy, to work together on a job, he'd be in another state by now. This is because Ebenezar is the Blackstaff, the White Council's assassin, who can pull off party tricks like an incredibly accurate Colony Drop or setting off Krakatoa. And for some reason, he's pissed off at Kincaid for something the latter did a hundred years before in Istanbul.
• At the end of Fred Saberhagen's Empire of the East trilogy, the demon-prince Orcus, mightiest of all demons and founder of the eponymous empire realizes just what Ardneh is, and what Ardneh's plan is, he flees screaming. Of course, by that point, it was much too late.
• In Act II of The First Dwarf King the first indication that Father Kiyoshi is a force to be reckoned with is his first encounter with the Osthan. To be specific, his very presence is enough to put them on edge. He then proceeds to slice their assault rifles in half, single-handedly hold all three of them off in a Sword Fight, then'' summons a katana out of thin air — which he then uses to slice the hand off of one Osthan. All three of them flee before him. For the record, the Osthan are Made of Indestructium Hero Killers who have been known to take on entire armies and win.
• The Children in Galaxy of Fear, a group of somewhat sympathetic cannibals, are terrified of a creature they call the Imp. It's Yoda. They're willing to follow our heroes after giant knobby white spiders, but not where they think they've seen the Imp.
• Harry Potter:
  • Professor Dumbledore is said to be the most powerful wizard in the world and the only person Lord Voldemort ever feared.
  • On a similar note, before Voldemort's time there was the Dark Wizard Grindelwald who took over most of Europe in the 1940s but never attacked Great Britain because of Dumbledore. While it was partly due to their former friendship, it's also believed that he knew Dumbledore was still more skillful than himself. He presumed correctly, as when they eventually confronted each other, he lost to Dumbledore even while wielding the most powerful wand in the world.
  • The basilisk in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets scares ten-foot-long talking spiders to death.
• This comes up at the end of I Am Legend following The Reveal that not all of the vampires are mindless, bloodthirsty monsters. The vampire-hunting protagonist realizes that, to the vampires, he has become a terrifying figure, a myth of godlike proportions. Basically, he's become a legendary monster that vampires tell each other ghost stories about.
• Brian Yi, Proxy, becomes this in The Infected. Brian has the power to take the place of people who are about to die, anywhere in the world, which is initially treated as a death sentence. Since Brian could be dropped into any number of bad situations at any moment with no support or weapons, he's trained from the beginning to go for the throat. After a few fights (including ripping out a superpowered serial killer's throat with his teeth) Proxy achieves The Dreaded status and becomes the boogieman to murderers, who now must forever wonder if their next victim is going to suddenly turn into an angry and buff Asian guy.
• Inheritance Cycle: The high priest/ess of the Cult of Helgrind had all of their limbs amputated out of faith but is psychically strong enough to incapacitate a Dragon Rider, elven princess, and dragon simultaneously. When Angela manages to move enough to pose a threat, they begin freaking out. When Angela whispers her true name to them, they’re utterly horrified.
• In The Laundry Files, Class 6 Cthulhu Mythos Horrors like Nyarlathotep and Cthulhu seems to be extremely afraid (and are at war with) the beings called the Cold Ones. Their attempts to take over governments (UK for Nyarlathotep, USA for Cthulhu) seem to partly be for getting extra resources for said war, and other part being to help fully wake them up.
• In Log Horizon, when Shiroe finally meets the final boss in a dungeon raid, he realizes that said boss is sweating in fear. He then has the revelation that from the boss's perspective, Adventurer's like Shiroe are Humanoid Abominations that are not only strong and smart enough to represent a threat, they're effectively unstoppable because no matter how many times the boss kills them, they just keep coming back ready to fight again but this time with strategies to counter whatever the boss threw at them before.
• In "Lone Huntress" the entire Federation maintains a wary vigilance against the Fey, a hive minded alien species controlled by the Overone, which attempted to conquer humanity the way it had countless other species. The first time Lisa goes up against them, the Overone deems Lisa to be weapons grade Nightmare Fuel to the extent that the Fey actively make a point of harassing her, in the hopes of killing or traumatizing her before she can share her ability to resist their telepathic assaults with other humans.
• Played for Laughs in The Monster Bed. Dennis protests going to bed one night, telling his mother he's afraid that humans will get him while he's asleep. Later, a young boy wanders into Dennis' cave. He checks under Dennis' bed before he goes to sleep on it, and gives them both a scare.
• Say the name of John Taylor anywhere in the Nightside, and most of the things that go bump in the night will fall over each other trying to get on the next train to Swindon.
• The One Who Eats Monsters: Ryn, the immortal goddess of vengeance, so named because her entire existence is based on hunting down monsters and eating their hearts, which causes their souls to spend the rest of time burning in the fires that rage inside her body. At one point a demon freezes time as she attacks him, to try to talk her out of it. She calmly asks him what others call her. He says "The Implacable One" and promptly accepts his death.
• In Paradise Lost, the Devil and his army of wicked semi-gods are so horrified by the gaze of Jesus that they throw themselves into Hell rather than wait for Son of God to annihilate them.
• In Perdido Street Station, the city authorities attempt to bargain with the forces of Hell to aid them against the escaped slake-moths. The demonic ambassador refuses point-blank, which its summoners deduce means that demons are scared of the consciousness-consuming moths.
• The Scholomance: Early in The Golden Enclaves, four teenagers fresh out of the Scholomance venture into the underground passages within the London Enclave and come upon the maw-mouth that has penetrated the defenses in a chamber wearing away at some internal wards in order to get at some munchies. The gigantic Blob Monster looks at the newcomers, charges toward them at its deceptively impressive top speed, completely surrounds the shield one of them threw up on reflex for several terrifying seconds, and... keeps going out the way the kids came in and down the adjacent corridor out of sight as swiftly as it can manage. It was only then that it sank in, the Nigh-Invulnerable building-sized manifestation of unending hunger was not actually attacking them so much as getting to the only available exit (behind them) into an area where it could maximize functional distance between them and break contact. Or to put the matter into Layman's Terms, the thing that had tanked everything the mightiest wizards of London could throw at it and was certain to hollow out their bespoke Pocket Dimension immediately ran away to hide upon taking one look at Galadriel 'El' Higgins.
• A Song of Ice and Fire:
  • Rorge is a serial killer and his companion Biter is a cannibal. What scares them? Their cellmate, the Faceless Man wearing the persona of Jaqen H'gar.
  • The witch known as The Ghost of High Heart is freaked whenever she meets Arya Stark's gaze. As Character Development kicks in for Arya and the resulting casualties pile up, you kind of get why.
  • Evil Sorcerer Melisandre is frightened of the lackwit jester Patchface. Nobody really knows why, beyond her having a seriously bad trip upon reading him.
  • Roose Bolton, head of the most ruthless noble family in The North, is wary about the cannibalistic inhabitants of Skagos Island.
  • The Ironborn, bona fide terrors of the seas, aren't too keen about messing with the Crannogmen. Heck, Roose Bolton is more than a bit warier than usual going anywhere near their home, the Neck, as well.
  • Even the bulk of Gregor Clegane's Punch Clock Psychopaths know better than to even think about going against the Hound: they'd much rather leave that fight to the boss... with a major sigh of relief.
  • According to Fire & Blood, Alysanne Targaryen tried to venture beyond the Wall three times by riding her dragon, Silverwing, but she refused every time. Bear in mind that adult dragons are fire-breathing, airplane-sized monstrosities frequently compared to nuclear weapons in their cultural significance to Westeros, and so aggressive their fight-or-flight response is really just a fight response, so... just who or what it is that lives beyond the Wall?
• In Strata, the explorers end up capturing a demon, which proves itself to be rather uncooperative. Marco, a particularly unbalanced member of a species that's already Ax-Crazy by default, gets fed up with it. "You said you can read minds? Then read mine." The demon does so...and spends the rest of its time with the group absolutely horrified of the alien.
• Tolkien's Legendarium:
  • Goblins and Orcs of all stripes are very easily panicked and dismayed. They can certainly be bold if they think they're in a position of advantage or are attacking something weaker than themselves, but if the tables are turned or they don't have the Will of their master behind them, they can and will collapse and rout at the drop of a hat (for example, when the Ring went into the fire at the end of Return of the King, only the Men under Sauron's control continued to fight. The Orcs broke and ran). Boromir's horn alone was enough to hold off the Uruk-hai sent by Saruman to claim the Ring for a few moments, and they only regained their courage when they realized no help was coming. When Théoden later sounded Helm's Horn during the siege of the Hornburg, the Orcs threw themselves on the ground and stopped their ears, and only the Men of Dunland put up any sort of resistance. The very sight of an Elven blade such as Sting or Glamdring is enough to terrify armies of Orcs, and very few Orcs were willing to stand against Andúril.
  • Sauron himself was so terrified of the armies of Valinor led by Eonwe that he outright surrendered when they laid siege to Angband.
  • Sauron was also terrified by the army of Numenor, an army not of Maia and high Elves but of Men.
  • In The Lord of the Rings, Aragorn deliberately invokes this trope when he confronts Sauron in the Palantir in order to make Sauron focus on him and draw his attention away from Mordor where Frodo and Sam are sneaking towards Mount Doom. Purportedly, Sauron has a minor freak-out at the sight of both Isildur's Heir and the reforged Narsil.
  • In The Silmarillion, Ungoliant becomes so enormous and powerful after devouring the light of the Two Trees that Morgoth is scared of her. For good reason too, as she very nearly kills him shortly afterward, and only a whole bunch of Balrogs coming to his rescue prevented that. For those unfamiliar, Morgoth is Middle-Earth's version of Satan.
  • Morgoth was also sent running in terror by Tulkas.
  • Beren and Lúthien: When Lúthien sneaks into Angband disguised as a vampire, the legions of Morgoth's Orcs, Balrogs, Werewolves and other fell creatures can feel something unknown, weird and powerful (nominally, a half-Elf/half-angel) is lurking about unseen and start getting jittery and frightened.
  • The Watcher in the Water is a large, aquatic monster of enigmatic origin that threatens the Fellowship of the Ring as they approach Moria. Apparently it lived in the waterways far underneath Moria, just doing its thing, until the Balrog woke up and scared it out from under the mountain just by existing.
• In The Trials of Apollo the titular former sun god recounts a time when he attended one of Caligula's parties when the emperor was having "An off day." Apollo, as narcissistic and apathetic to the plight of mortals as he is, is utterly terrified of Caligula, enough to the point that he momentarily forgets he's immortal and Caligula can't hurt him. He stays away from Rome for decades after that particular encounter.
• Unique has werewolves terrified by vampires, vampires who recoil in horror from the light of the Magi, and all three of them feel a need to change their underwear in the presence of the Veiðimaðr. And ALL of them have a good reason to fear The Men in Black...
• In Anthony Reynolds's Warhammer 40,000 novel Dark Apostle, a Chaos Space Marine is out-weirded-out by the architecture of the Necron tomb.
• Worm: There are very few things that superheroes and supervillains tend to be utterly terrified of, in that universe. The Endbringers are one, Contessa and the Number Man are another. A third, however, is the Slaughterhouse Nine, and even amongst them, each and every one of them is very wary, very careful, and very scared of the Gray Boy.
• In The Zombie Knight, Ibai Blackburn, a soul-eating Humanoid Abomination (albeit a well-raised one) nearly devoid of fear, is terrified when he comes face-to-face with Gohvis.
  Never had the aberration seen such demonic eyes. He'd never believed it was possible to stare into someone's soul, but with the way Gohvis was looking at him, he was beginning to have doubts. In fact, he was starting to think it might be possible to look at someone to death.

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