Gather round the campfire, it’s time for some stories.

A few years ago, I started this tradition of sharing some scary stories that I found on youtube. When this tradition started I was going through a phase, trying to develop some skills as a writer. For some reason I convinced myself that I was going to write horror based short stories. In my pursuit of this goal, I looked for some material to see what other short-story writers were doing. I had discovered something called “creepypastas”. Apparently anyone who was writing short horror stories, at the time, was writing creepypastas. Anyways, I never really took off as a writer. So, a couple of years back, October rolled around and I realized that I had something of a catalog saved on my computer. Keeping with the Halloween spirit, I decided to post some journals sharing what I had discovered.

This became something of an annual tradition. This journal is a continuation of that tradition. I’ll be posting a few of these journals this month. (I’m hoping at least one a week.) Be sure to keep an eye out for more of these. Also, feedback is always welcome and, in fact, encouraged. Let me know what you would like to hear more of. So, with that, I hope you all enjoy a few frightening tales from the depths of the internet’s imagination.

1) "Stories From a Cursed Bottle", Written by “Ipostatmidnight” and narrated by "MrCreepyPasta":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t6Cvp1OwKeY
This is a short story, just under five minutes, about what happens when people reach for knowledge that they aren’t meant to have. Sometimes it’s better not to know what happened.

2) "The Scarecrow Corpse”, written by Kris Mallor, and narrated by Mark Fischbach (Better known as Markiplier):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n9UuEWJ2N-A
It goes without saying that some of you might recognize the narrator. For those of you who are not familiar with him, Markiplier is a reasonably well-known and well-respected youtube celebrity known for playing horror games and, in his words, “Screaming like a bubble-blowing baby”. He’s also the brother of Tom Fischbach, the artist known for producing the TwoKinds webcomic. (A well-known furry webcomic that has been in publication for more than ten years.) The story, much like the first one, explores what happens when people learn about things they aren’t meant to know. It really begs the question, what would you do if you encountered something that is harmless on its own but nonetheless supernatural?

3) “The Other Internet”, written by "MrAstroBleme" aka Steven Shorter, narrated by "CreepsMcPasta":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QESMgHxo6Ww
Ah, the internet, a gateway of information, a place to gather new information, a portal into which we can learn all sorts of new things. But what if the portal that is the internet, is sometimes more literally a portal. In this story, we explore a new spin on an old idea. Inter-dimensional travel and communication is a long standing idea and a well known concept. The new spin is that the Internet may be the key to achieving this goal. In a way it makes sense. By design, the Internet is designed to send and receive information. Why wouldn’t it be used for that purpose between dimensions?

4) “Working at Disney”, written by “Bleetch”, narrated by “CreepyPastaJr”:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gk2VG-BmTpU
Okay, not going to lie, there’s one trope used here that I really can’t stand. The trope that “If someone/something is really successful then they MUST be evil somehow”. Other than that, this is a fairly well written story. Have you ever wondered what happens behind closed doors? Have you ever wondered what happens at theme parks when you aren’t looking?

5) "Anasi’s Goatman Story”, author unknown, narrated by “MrCreepyPasta”,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d_ZRRGW3SIg
I would like to start by apologizing for not knowing who the author of this story is. The original copy of the story was posted on 4chan’s /x/ board, which is anonymous. I don’t know if the author came forward at any point. Sense the original post was anonymous, I’m going to assume they want to remain unknown. Anyways, this story is one of my personal favorites. For some reason Indians from the U.S. and the southern part of Canada always seem to have some really fucked up monsters. Shapeshifters are always fun monsters.