Under the right circumstances, even the most familiar of things can suddenly take on a very unfamiliar appearance.

For manga creator and pet lover サユヤス Sayuyasu (@SHAKEhizi_BSK), this was demonstrated when he took photos of one of his cats recently. The three-year-old feline, whose beautiful black coat inspired the name スミ sumi, meaning "ink," suddenly took on a very strange appearance. Instead of his beloved cat, he saw what looked like a furry black one-eyed monster staring back at him!

Sumi-chan was so popular that she was introduced on Japanese TV station NTV, which provided a bit more background on the photos that put her in the spotlight.

Apparently, her bed is located right next to Sayuyasu's TV, a very flat and thin-screened model. She often pokes her head out from her bed to see what her owner is up to. When she puts her face right up to the screen's edge, it creates the perfect opportunity for a mirror image shot like this one.

You can see the bed and the TV in the photo below, where you can see Sumi-chan as well as two more cats. Sayuyasu has a total of five cats. In addition to Sumi, there's Chabo, Riru, Shiba and Pino, all strays who have found a new home with him.

As for Sumi-chan, her owner had taken mirror-image photos before, like the one below in which she looks like a rabbit, but never quite like the two which suddenly made her a minor cat celebrity.

The Tweet introducing Sumi-chan as a mysterious one-eyed monster has garnered over 50,370 likes and 12,000 retweets at the time of writing, eliciting comments such as:

Since Sayuyasu is a manga artist, maybe this is going to inspire him in his future work...

If you'd like to see more of Sumi-chan and the rest of Sayuyasu's cute cat family, follow him on Twitter here.