Twitter users described their hatchlings as gross and enough to make any child cry.

We here at SoraNews24 pride ourselves on keeping up to date with the latest fads and trends on Japanese social media, no matter how out-there they may be.

So when we came across Japanese Twitter’s latest obsession, the Penguin Egg, we were intrigued. Judging it by first appearances, it appears to be one of those children’s toys that grows when you put it in water — seems harmless enough.

What was it about this item that had captivated Japanese netizens so?

People described the penguin egg as gross and enough to make any kid cry, and those words are to us like lightbulbs are to moths, so we knew we had to try it out for ourselves.

The Penguin Egg will cost you 500 yen (US$4.50) and is sold by Hori Shoten, who you may remember are also the company behind the Poop Cakes that were popular a while ago.

The design appears to be modelled after emperor penguins, who can lay eggs around 11 centimeters (4.3 inches) tall, with the toy being around the same height too.

We popped our egg in some tap water, as per the box instructions, and waited.

What would come out of the egg? An adorable little penguin chick? Or, as Twitter insisted, something gross and horrifying?

▼ After 48 hours, the egg started to hatch and we caught our first glimpse of our little penguin baby.

▼ How was this gross? So far it looked incredibly cute! Was Japanese Twitter pulling our leg?

As we topped up the pot of water, as some of it had been absorbed by the egg, the water felt kind of… slimy. Maybe that was part of the miracle of birth, or maybe we were just imagining it.

But when we next came to check on our little penguin offspring, 72 hours since the hatching process had begun, we were met with a disconcerting sight.

▼ Our little baby boy was not so little anymore.

Our dreams of an adorable little penguin chick had been dashed with this buff, body-building penguin. His abs were ripped and his back was glistening. Had he been doing some muscle training while he was in the egg???

Our penguin chick looked so tough, he’d be sure to survive in the wild without his parents. Even a polar bear would be too scared to take him on!

▼ “Do you even lift, bro?”

While we thoroughly enjoyed the wild transformation our penguin baby went through — from delicate egg to the world’s most macho penguin — we can understand how some kids might be, uh, disappointed when their adorable little penguin chick they dreamed of turned into, well, this.

It turned out his whole body was quite muscular, and also quite heavy, as he had absorbed quite a lot of water. It was pretty impressive that our macho boy had managed to fit in the egg in the first place.

And our boy wasn’t the only penguin that had turned out to be unexpectedly creepy — here’s the tweet that started it all:

▼ “It’s so disgusting, I’m crying.”

However, another Twitter user commented that if you leave the penguin in water for a bit longer, it actually becomes pretty cute!

Even though we knew from the get-go that the penguin hatching would end up being something quite disturbing, there was still a lot of fun to be had in the hatching process.

Although now we have no idea what we are going to do with our penguin offspring now that he has hatched. Sign him up to a buff man modelling agency, perhaps?

Photos: ©SoraNews24
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