Creepy Legends: Gozu (Cow Head)

I've always thought, what truly frightens us is the unknown. People may be afraid of known enemies, insects, rodents, animals, but what is truly terrifying is the dark. Because in the dark, anything could be hiding. An intruder, a ghost, an animal, waiting for the perfect opportunity to pounce on you. Maybe that's the reason horror movies and stories are written keeping nights and darkness as a main theme. Because what is truly frightening is not knowing all the facts about something. And what you don't know is what can haunt you and hurt you.
A creepy Japanese legend is about Gozu, Cow Head. Now, what is the story about Gozu? No one knows. Yes, the legend goes that the true story of Gozu existed, but was deemed so frightening that someone tore the text of story into fragments and scattered them all over. Now a rumor goes, that a school teacher, tired of the students creating a ruckus, decides to tell them a story. Running out of good stories to tell, he decides to tell them the story of Gozu. Legend has it, that within minutes the children begged him to stop, but the teacher was possessed with the tale. His eyes had turned white and he kept on narrating. Of course, no one is supposed to know the true story of Gozu, so did the teacher make up a story to scare the kids? Or was he possessed by some evil that prompted him to tell the real story?
 Anyway, the bus was found in a ditch the next day, and the kids were foaming from their mouths. There is no confirmation that the kids perished immediately afterward. Did they remember the story, or was it wiped out from their memory? And why did the teacher decide to tell kids scary stories of all things? How about some good moral stories? These questions remain unanswered. However, people over the years have conjured their own version of the Gozu story.
Some say Gozu is supposed to be tee gatekeeper of hell, the first creature you see when you enter. Others tell of a story of a village facing famine and gorging upon the first living crearure they see. Apparently it is Gozu, half man and half cow.
 The village people presumably resorted to cannibalism and invited a curse upon themselves. There is another version of this story, too. A family was starving and as the father had to go elsewhere for work or foraging. As it was winter and they were without house and blankets, the father slices open a cow and tells his wife and son to take shelter. After that things get a bit muddled. Summer arrives and the wife and son still use the cow for shelter even though they were explicitly told not to by the father.
Angered that his promise was broken, he appears to them and starts to hack the cow. His wife helps her son run away and, is unfortunately beheaded. The son runs to a nearby village but the father, now wearing the head of the cow as a mask, hunts him down. He eventually kills the son and in turn, the villagers kill the father and feast on him as they were facing famine. This inadvertently causes a curse and everyone who ate the cow and father dies.
Ever since the creature has been termed Gozu and anyone who repeats his tale is cursed to never pass on the story because death comes to those who talk about him. It's a legend that has haunted people for decades. Is it true? Will we ever learn the true story of Gozu? Or is it better that it remains a mystery to us?
Probably the latter.

 Scare scale: 3.5/5