Do Not Start a Horror Blog

You may not know it, but I have quite a presence on the Internet - well, I had one, to be exact. I had an entire band of followers, probably somewhere in the hundreds; that may sound impressive and all, but that number pales in comparison to some big names on the web. What was it that drew others towards me, you ask? Well, I used to run this blog that I updated whenever I had the time, but it wasn’t just any ordinary blog, no no. I ran a horror blog - yes, you heard me right, a horror blog. Basically, I uploaded spooky photos that I took in the wild to this website - the photos weren’t actually real, but boy, you’d be surprised by how many people fell for this crap.
	
The idea first came to me after I went for an evening walk in the woods; when you live in a rural area with more trees than houses, that’s something you do often. It was a really beautiful forest I lived near, and it was perfect for photos. A couple months ago, when Halloween was right around the corner, I came home with some exceptionally pretty pictures from my hike. In the spirit of the holiday, I thought that it would be fun to edit some of the photos I had taken to make it seem as if the forest was haunted. Using the most intricate photoshop software I could find, I grayscaled the photos and edited pictures of myself into them; I then used blurring and lighting effects to make me look extra ghostly. I’m not exactly a professional-grade photographer, but my pictures looked convincing enough. I obviously had to do something with my work, but what?
	
That’s when it hit me; I could get Internet famous with these photos! Just imagine how many people would fall for my shifty editing skills, I thought to myself. I used one of those free website-making apps to create my own blog, where I would upload the haunted photos I took whenever I had the time. My first few uploads didn’t garner that much attention, much to my disappointment. I got only four or five comments in total, and my website’s view count was laughably small.
	
I figured that I’d have to up my game if I wanted my blog to gain more traction. I returned to the forest the next day, this time collecting sticks and rocks throughout my trek. I made my way to a rather spacey clearing, thinking it would be perfect for my plan. I laid down all of the sticks and rocks I had collected and proceeded to arrange them in a cult-like symbol. It was in the shape of a Leviathan Cross, to be exact - a simple Pentagram would’ve been too by the numbers. I recorded myself walking into the scene with my phone as if it was found footage, like I had happened to stumble upon it during my hike. 
	
I knew I couldn’t stop there; I needed even more footage to really convince the public. I found a short tree and placed my phone in the middle of it, propping it up so that it could record something from a distance. I used my phone’s self-timing feature to record myself retreating into the bushes from afar. When I came home, I spliced the videos together and added in some creepy lighting effects, and just like that, it looked like I had captured something paranormal on tape. I uploaded my masterwork onto my blog, eagerly checking the viewer count every few minutes.
Soon enough, my little social experiment had peaked in popularity. Curious fans began to flood the comments sections, asking just what was going on; I never replied to any of them, for obvious reasons. People began to write six-paragraph theories about my mysterious blog, some saying that I was part of a cult, others saying that I was from an alternate universe, and various other wild explanations. Honestly, it was funny to see people lose their minds over something I had initially started out of pure boredom. Of course, there were a minority of netizens who accused my blog of being an elaborate hoax, but I didn’t care; what mattered most was that I was having fun.
	
On a bi-weekly basis, I continued to upload more photos and videos to my blog, gaining more and more reputation with each post. I guess the attention was validating to me while it lasted. I’ve always been enthralled with online horror ever since my childhood; it felt good to be a part of it, you know? Anyway, after my blog’s spike in popularity, I got tons of comments per week, and it’s not like I bothered to read every single one of them. The majority of them were either extensively long fan theories that no sane person would read, or just random people spamming the shocked emoji face.
	
One day, in January, I came home with a couple of photos that I was particularly proud of. It had snowed earlier, and I decided to take full advantage of that by shooting some creepy wintery photos for my blog. Out of all of them, my favorite was the last photo I had taken. It depicted a snowy clearing that I had found in the deep, deep woods. In the middle of the clearing, surrounded by all of the frost-covered trees, I edited in a stock photo of a hunchbacked woman, then photoshopped the image to really sell the supernatural vibe of the scene.
It took only a few hours for most of the comments to start appearing after uploading the photos. I skimmed through the comments sections as per usual, but this time, there was one comment that made me stop scrolling. It contained a picture, but it wasn’t just any picture. It was a picture of what seemed to be the beginning of a trail that led into a forest; like my photos, it was black and white. I didn’t think much of that comment the first time around. It was probably just some random kid who was trying to imitate me, and failing miserably. Their username was even a jumble of letters and numbers that they probably keyboard-smashed to get - how lame, I thought to myself.
	
Sometime in February, I found a half-frozen lake while on my evening hike; knowing that it would be perfect for my blog, I took some photos there before going home. I photoshopped the pictures accordingly, this time editing in a stock image of a demonic-like creature that I had found online. I then uploaded all of the photos onto my blog, hoping that they would look more impressive than ever.
A couple of minutes passed, and I reloaded the page to see if the comments on my newest post had started rolling. What I saw made my skin go cold. The first comment on the page was another black and white photo, but this time, it was a photo of the back of my house.
	
My movement stopped momentarily after seeing that image; my blood turned to ice, my jaw clenched, my hands froze in place. That picture unmistakably depicted my house - judging by the angle, whoever had taken it wasn’t very far away.
	
I didn’t want to stick around to see if my stalker was anywhere nearby. I shut my computer and ran down the stairs, out of the house, and onto the pavement, where I continued to run as fast as I humanly could. I ran past every home, every street, every shop, not even bothering to stop for air. I continued to run, even as my muscles shrank. I continued to run, even after my body was overheating with sweat. I continued to run, until, finally, I couldn’t take it anymore. By the time I had stopped running, I found myself in front of the forest. It was already starting to get too dark to see anything.
	
I reached for my pocket to retrieve my phone… only to feel nothing there. I cursed under my breath, realizing that I had left my phone on my nightstand during my panicked frenzy. Now what would I do? The pitch black of the night was approaching, but I probably wouldn’t be any safer in my house, wouldn’t I? An unbearable feeling of terror began to wash over me. I could only describe it as that irrational fear of the dark you experienced as a kid, that feeling of being watched that you just couldn’t seem to shake off; only this time, your worst fears were confirmed. I’m not sure how reliable my thoughts were at the moment; I was in a state in which I was too horror-stricken to comprehend what was going on. But, I swear, I could hear the faint sound of a camera flashing from the darkness.
	
Suddenly, a loud screeching noise hit my ears. Before I could register what I heard, I saw a pair of lights heading towards me in the distance. Trembling with fear, I covered my face and braced for the impact, too petrified to run away. Instead of being lunged at or attacked by whatever was chasing me, I felt someone lay their hands on my shoulders and proceed to escort me away. All I could do was hunch my body over and shiver with fear, not even caring that I was probably in the clutches of some psychotic stalker, or something. Lucky for me, I realized that I wasn’t after being put into the passenger’s seat of what I recognized as a police car. 
	
There was an awkward silence between me and the officer as she started back to my house. I still couldn’t stop shuddering, and I routinely had to wipe snot and tears off of my upper lip; she could tell how terrified I was. After several minutes, the officer began to speak. She said that my neighbor had witnessed me sprint out of my house with a panicked look on my face, and was worried that something had happened. According to her, they had searched my entire house and the space around it, but had found nothing out of the ordinary. I frantically told her about my blog, about the picture of my house, and that I was scared for my life before forwarding her my website. She said they would track down whoever was messing with me as soon as possible, and advised me to take extra safety precautions before dropping me off back home. Seeing just how frightened I was, my neighbor was kind enough to let me sleep in his house. Even after he barricaded the doors and locked the windows, I don’t remember getting a second of sleep that night.
	
The first thing I did in the morning was delete my blog entirely. I then packed up all of my things and left to live with my mother later that day. Ever since then, I’ve been wary of using technological devices. I ignored phone calls from former neighbors of mine, who are still probably wondering where I disappeared to. I didn’t bother to log into my laptop to read the news, or even check my email to see if the authorities had gotten back to me. It wasn’t until earlier today that I felt comfortable using my computer again, after my mom suggested that I type up all of my thoughts in a document. I’ve been compiling everything that’s been on my mind for almost an hour now, and it’s helped me relieve a lot of stress, thankfully.
Well… for a little while it helped. Because, just a moment ago, I received a text. A text from a number I did not recognize. All that the text contained was a photo, saturated with a dreadful black and white hue that was oh-so-familiar to me. This time, the photo depicted what I quickly recognized as my house’s front door.
Category:Computers and Internet
Category:Nature
Category:Photography