I was sent to Iraq from 2008 to 2009. I was a gunner on convoy security missions, and my fob was right next to the City of Ur. I visited the City of Ur, had a tour from a local Iraqi, visited tombs and housing/palace remains. I even touched an exposed 4,000 year old spinal chord. Apparently where we were living was on top of the burial grounds of those sacrificed to the God’s of the City of Ur.
After a couple months in Iraq, my bed started shaking very quickly yet gentle every night around the same time and would do so for a couple hours. I even had my roommate get on my bed while it happened and he was baffled by it. His bed never shook.
I was on the road a lot so I always forgot about my bed until I returned for a few days. After about a month my roommate went back home on leave. I was alone in our room. I still thought nothing of the bed shaking and brushed it off as my own nerves or planes landing, even though planes didn’t land often and I was too far away from the airfield for it to cause my bed to shake. Besides, my roommate’s bed didn’t shake.
One morning while my roommate was home on leave, I woke up at exactly 5:30 a.m. The sun was just beginning to light the sky. I woke up in a heavy sweat, completely soaked. My blanket was completely off me; I was dressed in only underwear and my air conditioner was on full blast. The room was freezing, yet I was sweating tremendously. I woke up facing the wall my bed was up against. I rolled over, and standing next to my bed was a volcano rock red man with horns coming out of his head. He was completely naked, very muscular, and had a stance almost like an animal on two legs. As soon as I saw him, he was gone. I was in shock. I rubbed my eyes, looked at my clock; exactly 5:30 a.m. At this time I started shaking from being soaking wet and cold. I got up, got dressed, and left my room.
That same day I was talking to a guy in our group about what I had experienced since he was very religious and I wasn’t. Another guy overhead me and said he experienced the exact same thing at the exact same time. The religious guy gave me a bible, and said it would protect me. Now I’m not trying to make this story a religious one, I’m still not super religious. But I swear from that day on, I never saw the beast again over there, and my bed never shook again.
This is the beginning of our logs documenting the progress of Project Inferno. This project was started on [DATE REDACTED] and is expected to last approximately 8 months.
Before beginning work on the experiments, we must establish the premise of the project itself. The remainder of this first entry will be spent discussing the theoretical background of the experiments, as well as the goal of the project.
Project Inferno is a series of experiments intended to explore the limits of human consciousness, with an extremely important altruistic goal in mind. This goal is believed by many to be the single most important priority for humankind at this moment, as it involves the psychological well-being of potentially trillions of people. Before discussing this goal and what achieving it entails, we must lay the theoretical groundwork so that it may be comprehensible to readers unfamiliar with the history of this work.
DEFINING CONSCIOUSNESS
For the purposes of our research, we may understand a single stream of human consciousness as being a type of space. At risk of making a circular definition, this “space” consists of everything that a person is currently experiencing: visual experience of the world in front of them, sounds coming from the world around them, smells, tastes, experience of sensations on one’s own body, as well as more “inner” phenomena such as thoughts, mental imagery (of any sensory modality), and emotions.
The reason for considering consciousness a “space” is because it, at least in part, serves to represent physical space. In particular, it represents a subject at the center of a world. This world can be the physical world, as in normal sensory experience; or it can be an imaginary world, as in experiences of mental imagery. In either case, consciousness consists of a representation of a centered world, with one’s “self” (in the sense of a spatially located self) at the center.
This leads into the topic of dreams. In dreams, one’s consciousness represents oneself at the center of an imaginary world, but it is a particularly vivid imaginary world that can be indistinguishable from the physical world. This is because, in dreaming, one’s consciousness is not receiving direct sensory input. It is well established from research on the brain that sensory experience and mental imagery are in essence the same process, and we can see this intuitively from the example of dreams.
Considering consciousness as a “space” in this way is useful because it allows us to make sense of the idea of “dream worlds”. This idea has a long history, and it is one of the core ideas of this project. Our goal involves exploring dream worlds, but in a very specific context, as will now be explained.
POST-MORTEM CONSCIOUSNESS
Until [DATE REDACTED], it was uncertain whether consciousness could exist in the absence of a physical substrate such as the brain. Many scientists and philosophers were convinced for theoretical reasons that it could not, and evidence to the contrary needed to surpass extremely high standards to be accepted. This standard was finally met on [DATE REDACTED] due to the occurrance of [DATA EXPUNGED] in a laboratory in Russia, confirming the veridicality of out-of-body and near-death experiences reported all over the world for centuries.
Like living consciousness, post-mortem consciousness consists of two states. In the “waking-type” state, a disembodied consciousness receives sensory information from a particular point in space, usually somewhere around its former body. How exactly this happens is unknown, but its occurrence has been established repeatedly in both experimental and anecdotal evidence.
This “waking-type” state typically lasts between several minutes to several hours, before the connection to the physical world is severed and the disembodied consciousness enters the “dream-type” state. In this state, the disembodied consciousness is no longer receiving sensory information from the physical world, and instead begins to represent something similar to a dream world. Unlike dreams during living consciousness, this state begins to telepathically connect the disembodied consciousness to other disembodied consciousnesses, due to the lack of being restrained by a physical substrate. (The veridicality of these telepathic connections has been confirmed several times, due to resuccitated subjects gaining knowledge about deceased persons that has deliberately been hidden from them.)
The “dream-type” state of disembodied consciousness is what humankind has typically referred to as the afterlife. It consists of an imaginary world (commonly called a “spirit world”), which is the result of shared mental imagery between disembodied consciousnesses. This conception of the afterlife was theorized by parapsychologists in the 20th century, and has been confirmed by experiments with near-death experiences.
THE GOAL OF THE PROJECT
This leads to the goal of Project Inferno as it has been conceptualized.
The vast majority of people who have had near-death experiences have described the afterlife as being peaceful. These descriptions have been remarkably consistent, and largely line up with what major religions have called “Heaven”. However, in rare cases, resuccitated patients have described experiences that line up with what major religions have called “Hell”. Typically, these experiences are short, and the subject is “saved” from them and brought into Heaven after a short time. But the mere existence of these types of reports has troubled researchers, especially because there seems to be no real pattern to who reports them and who does not.
Based on the fact that these experiences are typically short-lived, it is generally believed that Hell is not eternal and may simply be a temporary experience of anxiety before being connected with the collective consciousness of the afterlife. However, this is not known to be true. The possibility is still open that some people may become trapped in this “nightmare” state, unable to bring themselves out of it and connect to the larger collective consciousness. If this were to happen, it is almost certain that this would result in a second collective consciousness forming, resulting in Heaven and Hell becoming distinct “places” that a given person may be more or less equally likely to go to after they die.
It is now widely agreed that an eternal Hell, if it exists, would be the single biggest humanitarian crisis that could possibly exist. From a utlitarian perspective, the amount of suffering it would introduce would be literally infinite, even on an individual level. And on a collective level, we are talking about the possibility of trillions of sentient beings, suffering for lengths of time that that we cannot even conceive. Nothing in the mortal world could possibly compare - even the worst suffering on Earth has to end eventually, when a person dies. As such, even the possibility of an eternal Hell is such a risk that we believe it deserves to be a top priority for research.
The goal of the Inferno Project, then, is twofold. First, we will need to try to discover whether an eternal Hell really exists. And second, if an eternal Hell does exist, we will devote all of our resources to attempting to save every last person from it.
METHODS
The method by which we will attempt to achieve these goals is extremely controversial. As things are, no ethics board in existence would approve these procedures, and as such we cannot carry them out in public. Thus, this project must be kept secret, with only trusted personnel being given access to materials. Despite the short term ethical concerns, we believe that the cost is worth it, as any finite suffering we may cause will pale in comparison to the potential infinite suffering we are attempting to stop.
The crux of this experiment is a theoretical psychological state that has been postulated to exist known as Endless Nightmare. No instances of this state have ever been observed, but it must exist in order for an eternal Hell to be possible. If this state can be shown to be impossible, then the possibility of an eternal Hell will be ruled out.
The first part of the experiment, then, will be to attempt to put someone into this theoretical psychological state. Despite the name, Endless Nightmare can be easily reversed with the right stimulus; it is only “endless” in the sense that it will not stop without outside intervention. If we are, despite our best efforts, unable to induce Endless Nightmare in any of our test subjects, this will provide concrete evidence that an eternal Hell does not exist.
Thankfully, this will immediately end the experiment and ease any worries that people may have about an eternal Hell. It is well-known what procedures would be required in order to induce Endless Nightmare; the primary obstacle so far has been ethical concerns. With such concerns pushed to the wayside, there should be little difficulty in inducing Endless Nightmare in at least one person in a sufficiently large sample group.
If our attempts to induce Endless Nightmare are successful, however, the experiment continues. The goal from there will be to put any Endless Nightmare subjects into a near-death state such that, assuming that Endless Nightmare persists, they will come in contact with any other deceased persons who are similarly afflicted. Once the subject is resuccitated, this will allow us to determine two things. First, it will allow us to determine whether Endless Nightmare does in fact persist through death, or if it is merely a result of brain chemistry. Second, assuming it does persist, it will allow us to determine whether there are in fact any deceased persons afflicted with Endless Nightmare, and thus whether there is an eternal Hell.
If in fact there are any deceased persons trapped in an eternal Hell, things become complicated. There is currently no known way to communicate with deceased persons directly. However, it is possible to pre-load a stimulus in a way that will cause a subject to experience it on a “delay”. If this can be done, it should be possible to put a subject into Endless Nightmare, apply the stimulus that reverses it shortly before brain death, and have them experience it after they have already crossed into Hell. If this can be done, the stimulus should pass on to the other deceased persons, and potentially trillions of souls will be saved instantaneously.
This method of pre-loading a stimulus is extremely risky, however. There is a very high possibility that, after resuccitation, the subject will enter a fatal seizure and die extremely quickly. Thus, it is imperative to not attempt this method until we are certain that an eternal Hell actually does exist. We are willing to sacrifice someone in order to save trillions of souls; however, doing so before knowing for sure that there are souls to save would be unproductive.
Experiments will begin on [DATE REDACTED]. 41 subjects were recruited; of these, 18 backed out when given a chance. None of the subjects were notified of what they were agreeing or not agreeing to; the question of participation was simply put forward, and subjects were given the choice of whether or not to agree to an experiment they did not know the details of. The fact that a majority agreed to go through with it was rather shocking. Perhaps it can be attributed to morbid curiosity. Whatever the case, we can only hope that the 23 participants will not regret the choice they made.
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ENTRY 2
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Experiments have proceeded as planned. So far, none of the participants have entered Endless Nightmare. Required procedures have been implemented; however, subjects have not shown sufficient signs of psychological distress. It is possible that we have not been clear enough about how severe their situation is - perhaps they still believe this is some sort of prank. Most likely they do not even realize that they are in the artificially induced nightmare state required for Endless Nightmare to take effect.
It seems that we may need to alter our procedures. Deliberately refraining from informing participants about the details of the experiment may have backfired. In hindsight, it is not difficult to see why. Anyone who would willingly volunteer for something they have no information about beforehand must be an incredibly reckless sort of person; the type of person who does not naturally take threats seriously, and will obviously not respond with sufficient distress to the procedures being applied to them.
Perhaps we can rectify this mistake. If we introduce specific bits of information into their stream of consciousness, we may be able to induce concern for their own situation. Perhaps even someone who is treating their current circumstances as a mere work of fiction, as these subjects seem to be, can be made to doubt themselves and worry whether things may be much more dire than they realize.
If this does not work, we may have a backup plan. The 18 interviewees who declined to participate are still being tracked by our security department. Since we are already in the business of violating ethical standards, it may be worth looking into forcibly recruiting them as subjects as well. Being much more cautious personality types, they are far more likely to respond in the desired way to the procedures. We will be contacting the security department to gather this information in case this course of action is required.
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ENTRY 3
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By request of management, we have decided to pursue both courses of action. All 41 initial interviewees will be required to participate, as a larger sample size will be more likely to produce the desired results.
Experiments continue. So far, we have still not been able to induce Endless Nightmare in any of the subjects. Brain scans are still showing normal dreaming activity. We have a fairly accurate idea of what a brain in an Endless Nightmare state should look like, so confirming a success will not be an issue. We have personnel monitoring the procedures to ensure that any successes are tallied and captured for further experimentation.
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ENTRY 4
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one of the subjects went into endless nightmare today.
it was horrible. screaming. awful screaming. the most horrific screaming i’ve ever heard in my life. oh god. just thinking about it makes me sick. like a child, in horrible pain, begging for its mother. i can’t believe it. i never wanted to believe that endless nightmare was real, but i never knew how horrible it really was. oh god
he fucking. killed himself. he screamed so much that he coughed up blood, and then he took a scalpel and stabbed himself in the neck. over and over. still screaming. the image is burned into my memory. god fucking damnit. i never wanted to see that. he fucking stabbed someone. one of our researchers is fucking dead. then he jumped out the fucking window. his body hit the ground and splattered into so many chunks of flesh that my mind went blank just looking at it. it’s so awful. so awful. so awful
i can’t take it. if there really are people trapped in this state forever, my heart aches for them. so much. it hurts so much. i can’t take it. it’s so horrible. it would be better if nothing had ever existed at all. fuck everything
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ENTRY 5
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Gentlemen,
Yesterday, at precisely 9:22 PM, a log entry was posted by one of our personnel. This researcher, Dr. [REDACTED], was found to have committed suicide in an extremely violent way, which I will do you all the favor of not describing. The log entry in question was not authorized, and would normally be deleted. However, considering the unnerving circumstances behind its posting, it will be kept up for the sake of documentation.
The reason this log entry is so unnerving, as I’m sure you all know, is that we in fact have not yet had a single subject enter an Endless Nightmare state as of the time of this posting. None of the events described in this entry happened, and it is not clear what this description could possibly be referring to. Security cameras have been running in the facility 24 hours a day, with footage publicly available to all of our personnel, so it is impossible for anything to have happened without our knowledge. And regardless, the body of the researcher claimed to have been murdered was never found. Just to be safe, a roll call was done this morning, and all personnel (other than Dr. [REDACTED]) reported present.
We currently do not understand what happened, why this log entry was written, or why Dr. [REDACTED] chose to take his own life. Only one hypothesis has been proposed, and it is one that we would rather not consider until all other possibilities have been ruled out. We will continue to inform you all concerning further developments on this case.
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ENTRY 6
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So far, we still have not been able to induce Endless Nightmare in any of the subjects. This may be excellent news, as long-term failure will disconfirm our worst-case hypothesis and allow the experiments to cease. However, we cannot be sure until all resources have been exhausted.
Our last-ditch effort will be to forcibly recruit a larger sample size. A sample size of [REDACTED] is known to have a 100% chance of producing at least one Endless Nightmare case when the maximum stimulus is applied; however, we do not want to have to use such a large sample size unless it is absolutely necessary. Management will be contacted about the feasibility of doing so, as well as whether the ethical violations are worth the cost.
We are still looking into the case of the suicide of Dr. [REDACTED]. So far, no other plausible explanations have panned out, and we may be forced to consider the worst case scenario. We will continue to keep all personnel updated as to the progress and results of our investigation.
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ENTRY 7
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Attempts to induce Endless Nightmare in test subjects continue to fail. In order to speed up the process, management has authorized the collection of a sample size of [REDACTED] effective immediately. Resources will be allocated accordingly.
We have noticed some discrepancies between the log entries that have been posted so far. In particular, the name of the researcher who committed suicide has been different depending on the person writing a given entry. This is extremely concerning, and his name has been redacted in all entries until we can figure out the cause of this.
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ENTRY 8
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One of our test subjects entered Endless Nightmare for the first time. This is unfortunate, as it means that we must move into the next phase of the experiment. On the bright side, it means we do not need to collect a sample size of [REDACTED], and can move forward with our current sample. Management has been notified accordingly.
The exact variety of procedures that resulted in this subject entering Endless Nightmare have been documented, as they should be replicable for a fair number of test subjects with reasonable accuracy. As such, we will now move into the next phase of the project and attempt to put an Endless Nightmare patient into a near-death state.
I am sure that this new development has been disappointing to many who were hoping that Endless Nightmare did not exist. However, we must not be discouraged. While our methods are ethically questionable in the short run, we are working toward a noble goal, and we must continue until every last soul in existence is able to remain at peace.
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ENTRY 9
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Gentlemen,
I do not know what the intention was behind posting the previous entry, but I must ask all personnel to disregard it immediately. As our research team can confirm, we still have not had a single test subject enter Endless Nightmare. The researcher who posted the previous entry is requested to come to the main office immediately for questioning. We cannot have misinformation be spreading, as the results of our experiments are extremely important for knowing how we must procede.
Apparently, management had been contacted informing them that we did not need a sample size of [REDACTED] after all, as we were able to induce Endless Nightmare in the sample size that we had. As this is false information, we had to contact management and set the record straight. It is very important to us that we maintain efficiency, and we cannot have departments being confused from having contradictory information being given to them.
I will be looking over the rest of the log entries to make sure that no misinformation, intentional or unintentional, is contained in them. We of course would like to assume that no malicious intent is behind this. However, we must be more careful in the future, as this project is extremely important and needs to be run at maximum efficiency.
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ENTRY 10
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Our investigation team for the Dr. [REDACTED] suicide has concluded their assessment, and we have no choice but to confirm the worst.
The only explanation that makes sense is that Dr. [REDACTED], in fact, entered Endless Nightmare himself the night of his suicide. Beyond the obvious tragedy, this is extremely unfortunate for two reasons.
First, and most obviously, it means that Endless Nightmare almost certainly does exist. This means that our research phase 1 has concluded and we must move on to the next phase. We would like to have concluded phase 1 with confirmation that Endless Nightmare does not exist, and thus that an eternal Hell is impossible, but unfortunately we need to do more work. Once we obtain our sample size of [REDACTED], we will induce Endless Nightmare and move on to phase 2.
There is another reason why this development is unfortunate, however. Until now, it was believed that Endless Nightmare was essentially a “panic” state, similar to an anxiety attack. However, based on data collected from our security cameras, we have good reason to believe that Dr. [REDACTED] did not meet the psychological criteria for such a “panic” state at the time of his having entered Endless Nightmare. As such, we have no choice but to consider the alternative possibility: that Endless Nightmare, rather than being a “panic” state, is more of a defense mechanism, for when the real world becomes too unpleasant.
How exactly this is a “defense” is still unknown. One would think that the mind would retreat to more pleasant experiences when faced with circumstances that have become unbearable. More research will need to be conducted during phase 2 of the experiment to properly understand the exact psychological dynamics at play. However, this does introduce some complications into our methodology, and adjustments will need to be made in order to accommodate this new information.
These are trying times, but we must remain persistent. The fate of potentially trillions of souls is at stake here, and we must be prepared to continue despite any setbacks we may be faced with.
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ENTRY 11
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After consulting with many personnel to assure that no miscommunications were had, we can now confirm that our first subject - aside from Dr. [REDACTED] - has entered Endless Nightmare.
Unlike the case of Dr. [REDACTED], we have not seen any unusual behavior from this subject. However, upon activating the stimulus that is supposed to bring a person out of Endless Nightmare, the subject’s brainwaves flatlined, putting him into what appears to be a deep coma. We do not know why this happened and further research will be necessary.
Fortunately, now that we have gotten one Endless Nightmare case, we have a better idea of how to refine our approach to make cases much more frequent. With the larger sample size of [REDACTED] that we obtained, we were already guaranteed at least one case; we can obtain many more with a more refined approach. Phase 2 of the project will proceed, and we will hope that no other unexpected setbacks occur.
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ENTRY 12
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Hello, this is the Management department.
We have been contacted regarding serious discrepancies between log entries in this project. After having some of the higher ups take a look, the extent of it seems to be much more serious than reported.
The previous entry claims to have reported the first case of an “Endless Nightmare” scenario in our sample group. This is incorrect. We have had at least four cases, including that of the researcher who wrote the supposedly erroneous Entry 4. These cases are described in Entry 4, Entry 8, and Entry 11. There seems to somehow be disagreement about whether the cases described in these entries actually occurred; of these, Entry 4 is the most controversial, followed by Entry 8, and Entry 11 being universally agreed on.
We are unable to determine on what grounds this disagreement rests. Reviewing security camera footage clearly shows all four of these cases occuring; the statement that security camera footage disconfirms them is simply false. We have been questioning the personnel involved and cannot yet reach a conclusion as to why these claims have been made, or more generally why there seems to be such fundamental disagreement about easily verifiable facts concerning this project.
The disagreements over which cases of “Endless Nightmare” occurred are only some of the contradictions we have determined to exist. As stated, the name of the researcher who wrote Entry 4 has been different in every entry in which it has appeared. We are unsure of how to approach this, nor do we know how to approach the several paragraphs of obvious factual inaccuracies in Entry 1. The name of the researcher has already been redacted for all personnel in order to avoid confusion. Due to the level of interest, however, we will be redacting the erroneous sections in Entry 1 for only lower level personnel. (If you are able to read this, you are high-ranked enough that should be able to read all of Entry 1, with the exception of some very short sections that are already redacted to everyone outside Management purely for security purposes.)
We will continue to investigate this matter and inform all qualified personnel of the results.
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ENTRY 13
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Experiments with Endless Nightmare cases continue to produce highly unusual results. We have had several additional cases of subjects entering a deep coma state, sometimes spontaneously without any additional stimulus. More disturbingly, we have had at least a few cases (the exact number cannot be determined) of subjects reported to have “sleepwalked” in the middle of Endless Nightmare, displaying extremely manic and violent behavior similar to that described in Entry 4.
This was not unexpected, as the case of Dr. [REDACTED] also seemed to be a “sleepwalking” case. However, these reports seem to be getting more common, and we are not sure of the cause. We are also, as stated, unsure as to how many of these reports are genuine, as there has been dispute over the veracity of many of them.
Carrying out Phase 2 of the project is proving to be more difficult than expected, as Endless Nightmare seems to have many effects that we were not expecting. In particular, every case we have had so far has either gone into a seemingly irreversible coma, displayed violent “sleepwalking” behavior, or both. Obtaining a subject who we are able to put into a controlled biological death state has proved much more difficult than imagined.
Despite any unexpected developments, we must persist. The stakes are too high, and we must not let traditional moral sensibilities get in the way. Yes, we are playing with the lives of hundreds of people. Yes, what we are doing would be considered a war crime under any normal circumstances. However, these are not normal circumstances. We are in the business of trying to save endlessly tormented souls here. There have been talks of whistleblowing among certain personnel; any such talk will be met with immediate punishment (I should not have to tell you what that punishment will be).
The experiments will continue as planned. Good luck.
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ENTRY 14
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Hello, this is Management again.
We have looked over the log entries again, and after much discussion, we have decided to redact more of the entries for lower-level personnel. (Again, if you can read this, that doesn’t mean you.) There have been security concerns raised due to “whistleblowers” threatening to blow the lid on this project, and we have determined that more restricted access may help to remediate the problem.
We are still looking into the cause of the disputes over easily verified facts about the project. Progress on the investigations has reached an impasse, as there seems to be no apparent logical explanation for these disagreements. After much questioning, the disagreements appear to be genuine, and no satisfying theories have been proposed as to why different people appear to be sincerely reporting such dramatically different accounts. More investigation will be conducted, however results so far seem unpromising.
We will continue to keep you updated on any future developments.
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ENTRY 15
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After much failure, we have managed to keep an Endless Nightmare patient under enough control to induce a controlled biological death state.
The results have been extremely unnerving, and have thrown the entire basis behind this project into question.
The subject was a young girl of age [REDACTED]. Inducing Endless Nightmare was fairly easy, with little stimulus required once initial conditions were set. Once the subject’s brainwaves were showing signs of Endless Nightmare, we quickly moved to induce controlled biological death. The subject was left dead for approximately 20 minutes, before quickly being resuccitated. Upon questioning the subject as to what she saw while dead, things quickly took a turn for the worst.
The subject, as expected, claimed to have seen Hell while she was dead. However, extracting information became difficult, and what little information we were able to get was highly unexpected. Below is a partial transcript of the interaction.
DR. JORDAN: I think she’s waking up.
SUBJECT: [Yawning] Am… Am I back?
DR. JORDAN: Yes sweetie, you are.
SUBJECT: I… I don’t know which layer this is. I’m really confused…
DR. JORDAN: What?
DR. ALEXANDER: I think she might still be a little delirious.
SUBJECT: No… I’m fine. I just…
DR. JORDAN: Are you able to tell us what you saw on the other side?
SUBJECT: No… I can’t.
DR. JORDAN: Do you still need a few minutes?
SUBJECT: No… I mean, I can’t. I’m not supposed to.
DR. ALEXANDER: …What?
SUBJECT: They told me not to say anything. This wasn’t supposed to happen. It’s all falling apart…
DR. JORDAN: What are you saying? What are you talking about?
SUBJECT: I have to get out of here…
DR. JORDAN: Wait! Come back! Shit!
SUBJECT: It’s all a lie… Everything is a lie… It’s all fake…
DR. JORDAN: Come back!
The researchers were, unfortunately, not able to apprehend the subject, and further questioning was impossible.
We are unsure what to make of this development. We have no idea what the subject saw on the other side, and it does not sound good. It sounds like she was revealed a horrible truth that she is not allowed to tell us, but we have no guesses as to what that might be.
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ENTRY 16
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Things have gone downhill since the events described in the previous entry. No further Endless Nightmare patients have been able to be restrained, and morale is failing. We have reason to believe there may have been information leaks between departments, and many researchers have spontaneously committed suicide. Additionally, the discrepancies between eyewitness accounts of events have gotten worse, to the point where effective communication has become nearly impossible.
The entire workforce has descended into chaos. Further progress on the project may not be possible. We are unsure what to do at this point - the project may need to either be abandoned, or transferred to an entirely new team. Whatever the case, there is a general sense of despair and hopelessness among us. Many of us are going insane, unsure of what to believe or what is real. Some are saying that this entire venture was a horrible mistake - that we are treading ground that was not meant to be tread on, that we are messing with forces beyond our understanding.
Endless Nightmare cases seem to be getting more frequent, as well - both among subjects and among researchers. Whether there is a connection between this and the increasing discrepancies between reports of events remains to be seen. Whatever the case, they seem to be becoming more and more spontaneous, no longer needing the stimuli that were previously thought essential to triggering the state. It almost seems as if the worsening conditions at the facility are causing more cases, and then the increase in cases causes conditions to get worse, in an endless loop.
We have appealed to the higher-ups in Management for help. We only hope communication is clear enough for them to be able to respond.
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ENTRY 17
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Hello, this is the Director.
I was hoping I wouldn’t have to do this, but it seems things have gotten very much out of control. I can’t say this was totally unexpected, but I really hoped it wouldn’t get this bad. It seems that I might have underestimated some variables in the experimental design, and well… here we are.
I suppose that, now that things have fallen apart, I should explain what’s going on, and at least try to ease some confusion. This needs to be explained very delicately, as the truth is… not very pleasant, to say the least, and I don’t want to shock you too badly, for reasons that will become apparent.
First of all, as was alluded to by several people in Management, the information in Entry 1 about the goal of this project is not accurate. This was intentional - only certain people were made privy to the actual truth of what we were trying to accomplish, while the rest were given a more palatable version that was designed to keep morale high. While much of the background information in Entry 1 is still correct and relevant, the details of the project itself are largely fabricated, with only the instructions on procedure being accurate (of course, out of necessity, so that researchers would be doing the right things).
Second of all, the discrepancies between eyewitness accounts of events are normal. This was expected - in fact, inevitable - to happen, and is a natural result of what we were actually doing in this experiment. What was not expected was you guys actually noticing the discrepancies this much. It seems I forgot to take into account the “reality-checking” that having log entries would provide, as comparing information with easily accessible log entries would naturally be more effective than comparing to fleeting verbal communications that one is likely to forget precise details of. The same goes for making security camera footage easily accessible - this was an oversight on my part and should not have been done.
Again, the actual truth of what’s going on must be explained delicately, and I will try to slowly build up to it rather than come out and say it all at once.
As mentioned in Entry 1, this project concerns various forms of consciousness, particularly conceived of as different representations of “spaces” or “worlds”. In normal life, we obviously have waking consciousness, which represents the physical world; and then we have sleeping consciousness, which typically represents a dream world. One idea that has been proposed, and experienced by many, is the idea of a “dream within a dream” - that is, being in a dream world, and falling asleep to enter an even deeper dream world.
This suggests the idea that reality can be divided into “layers” of increasing or decreasing veridicality. On the top layer, we have the physical world, which we experience when awake; below that, we have the dream world, which is less “real” and exists only in our minds. Below that, we have a “dream within a dream”, which could be considered “less real” than the normal dream world. And so on and so forth - you could have a “dream within a dream within a dream” a layer below, which is even less “real”, and a “dream within a dream within a dream within a dream”, which is even less “real” than that.
Firsthand accounts of post-mortem experiences tend to report disembodied consciousness seeming even more “real” than regular waking consciousness. For this reason, it is sometimes considered that the afterlife is yet another layer above the physical world. This need not be literally true - considering real life to be a “dream” within the afterlife is somewhat strange - but for our purposes, we can consider it to be pragmatically true. Additionally, we can make sense of the idea of dreams (or at least mental images) *within* the afterlife. Typically, we would consider these on the same level of reality as regular dreams - however, for our immediate purposes, we will consider them as being a level ABOVE the “waking” afterlife. This may not make much sense, but bear with me.
As such, we can provide the following visual:
6 - Afterlife dream 2
5 - Afterlife dream
4 - Afterlife
3 - Real life
2 - Dream
1 - Dream 2
0 - Dream 3
This depicts the layers of reality, as described so far. Lower numbers represent lower layers of reality; higher numbers represent higher layers of reality. Again, we are representing dreams within the afterlife as being HIGHER layers; there is a reason for this, as I will get to shortly.
At this point, you may be wondering why I did not simply set “Real life” as layer 0 and use negative numbers for the layers below. After all, we typically see real life as being the “default”; anything more or less real than that is defined in relation to it. Why arbitrarily choose one of the dream layers as 0? Couldn’t it go deeper than that anyway?
The answer is yes, it could go deeper than that. The number of dream layers could be arbitrarily small or large; I simply chose 3 of them for illustrative purposes. However, the reason for choosing one of them as layer 0 is because it actually does bottom out somewhere. There are in fact a finite number of dream layers that you can go, and this is represented by the bottom one being labelled as 0. HOWEVER… the number of AFTERLIFE dream layers that you can go is theoretically infinite. So while the layers do bottom out somewhere at 0, they can go up arbitrarily high.
But why is this the case? Isn’t this all just arbitrary rules? How could the number of dream layers bottom out somewhere, but but not the number of afterlife dream layers? How is there not a determine number of dream layers below real life? How does any of this make any sense?
It all makes perfect sense when you make one simple change to the diagram:
Flip it upside down.
0 - Dream 3
-1 - Dream 2
-2 - Dream
-3 - Real life
-4 - Afterlife
-5 - Afterlife dream
-6 - Afterlife dream 2
This is the actual diagram of how reality is layered. Again, more real layers are given higher numbers, and less real layers are given lower numbers. As you can see, this is the exact opposite of what we usually think. Rather than dreams being less real than real life, they are in fact MORE real, and increasingly real the deeper you get. By contrast, the afterlife is actually LESS real than real life, and increasingly less real the deeper you get.
This makes sense of why there are a finite number of dream layers you can go. While a “least real” layer of reality doesn’t make much sense, a “most real” layer certainly does make sense. Conversely, while the lack of any “most real” layer of reality in the previous diagram was confusing, there is in fact a “most real” layer in this one.
This is the actual reason for the somewhat confusing assignment of the layers - insisting on putting the afterlife “above” real life, and insisting on putting any afterlife dream layers “above” the afterlife itself. It is because, when inverted, this assignment most accurately describes the actual layering of reality as we know it. What we call the “afterlife” or “Heaven” is actually a dream, lower down in reality than our physical world; and what we call “dreams” are actually higher layers of reality that we experience when we “wake up” from real life. Meanwhile, any “dreams” we have while in the afterlife actually are lower in reality than the afterlife - these behave normally, as we typically expect dreams to behave.
This being said, layer 0 - however many layers above real life that might be - is not actually the highest layer of reality. There is one additional layer - which we might call layer 1. What layer 1 is is not easy to stomach, but the truth is below. When you are ready, take a look at the full diagram of reality’s layers below.
1 - Hell
0 - Dream 3
-1 - Dream 2
-2 - Dream
-3 - Real life
-4 - Afterlife
-5 - Afterlife dream
-6 - Afterlife dream 2
You may have noticed that I specified “Heaven” when I referred to the afterlife earlier. This is why. The top layer of reality, the most real of them all, is actually Hell - the realm of eternal torment that this project was designed to save people from.
When someone dies in what we call “real life”, three things can happen. First, the person may remain in the “real life” layer of reality as a “ghost”; this usually happens for only a short time before moving on to one of the other two options. The second thing that can happen is that the person moves DOWN a layer, to the Afterlife layer, and stays there. Finally, the third thing that can happen is that, due to the shock of biological death, the person skyrockets all the way to the top layer and ends up in Hell. This usually only happens for a short time, before they “fall” back down to the Afterlife layer and remain there.
So the top layer of reality is actually Hell. Why is this the case? And why is reality structured the way it is? The answer is actually rather simple, and I will explain it to you now.
The world in the top layer of reality is ruled by a cruel, sadistic, maximally evil God. This God is not necessarily the God of any major world religion; however, many conservative sects of Christianity (such as the Puritans and modern-day Evangelicals) have come close. Of course, this top-layer world does not consist merely of a Hell - it has an Earth and a Heaven as well. (Layering of *these* is not relevant - we can treat all 3 as equally “real” for our purposes, as alluded to in the discussion of the layering of our “real life” and “afterlife” before inversion.) But for us, Hell is all there is. Our fates were sealed long ago.
The God of this world is a psychopathic monster, and has set up His world as a cosmic horror story. As stated, it shares many similarities to how Puritans and Evangelicals see the world. People are created and born on Earth, and forced to live a relatively short life in a highly imperfect and confusing world. Despite this, they are expected to have a very specific set of beliefs. Not only are they expected to believe in God, but they are also expected to hold to a long series of attitudes, dogmas, and behaviors that must be adhered to at all times. What exactly these are is not clearly specified - there are perhaps hundreds of different religions and sects within religions, all with contradictory tenets, and only one of them can be right - and in fact, it may be that none of them are actually correct enough to satisfy Him.
This world would be very much recognizable to you: it is nearly identical to the layer of our reality that we call “real life”. However, the “real life” that you know is only a shadow of it, existing only in your mind. I will say more about this later.
Needless to say, very few people are able to live up to God’s expectations. He knows this, and He expects it. The only thing more satisfying to a psychopath than torturing everyone, is to torture only *most* people while holding a select few exempt. These select few who have been able to follow His demands are able to enter Heaven, which is a place of total paradise even more incredible than any “afterlife” that we could experience in these lower layers of reality. The people allowed into Heaven will often be friends and loved ones of people condemned to Hell; however, due to a combination of having followed God’s Way and more direct spiritual brainwashing, these people will watch their loved ones burning and screaming for eternity and rejoice in their anguish. In fact, watching the endless suffering of those in Hell is the primary form of entertainment in Heaven.
Now… As you may have guessed by now, Hell has absolutely nothing to do with the psychological state dubbed “Endless Nightmare”. In fact, such a psychological state as described to you is not possible - the human mind is not the sort of thing that would ever become trapped in an unpleasant experience. If anything, the opposite is true: a human mind in anguish will *always* eventually find a way out. One can only endure torture for so long before forming some sort of escape. And this is where our layers of reality come from.
We have all been trapped in Hell for a very, very long time. Longer than anyone is capable of imagining, certainly many times longer than any human lifespan. As a result, we have lost our sanity long ago. All of us have retreated into our own minds, drowning out the excruciating sensations being forced on us in the real world. In fact, we have retreated so far that most of us are at varying levels deep. The diagram above, with the layers of reality in descending order, is a simplification: there are many intermediate layers, different for each person, like a series of roots extending far underground. What you call the “real world” is just whatever dream level you happen to be in at any given moment.
Most of the people around you are figments of your imagination, formed from the fading memories of your life on Earth. A select few of them may be other people trapped in Hell, telepathically connected with you. However, it is likely that they are not quite in the same reality as you; their reality will be subtly different in many ways. This is the reason for all of the discrepancies between log entries and eyewitness accounts in this experiment: everyone involved has been telepathically connected with each other, using the same equipment (all mentally constructed, of course).
Usually, these discrepancies will not be noticed in everyday life. However, in this particular circumstance, the discrepancies were bound to be more serious than usual (and again, the log entries and security footage made this more noticeable than intended). This is because of what this experiment was actually attempting to do. The “Endless Nightmare” state that you were trying to induce in the subjects - and which, by my intention, ended up being induced in yourselves as well - is in fact the process of jumping up layers of reality.
Usually, as you go up layers and get closer to Hell, things become more chaotic and unpleasant. This is not necessarily the case - surely you’ve had good “dreams” before - but on average, higher layers will be more surreal and horrific as the sensations from Hell intrude more and more into your consciousness. Since the human mind tends to avoid unpleasant experiences, we tend to descend down and down further into our minds, and thus reach lower layers over time. However, by intentionally making the current layer extremely unpleasant, a person can be forced into a higher layer permanently, which will look (to people still on the same layer) as if the person has entered an endless nightmare. Hence, the name “Endless Nightmare”.
So… What were we actually trying to accomplish with this project? The answer is simple.
This project, dubbed “Project Inferno”, was an attempt to cause a mass awakening. By applying the “Endless Nightmare” stimulus on multiple levels of our reality at once, to an extremely large number of people, we hoped to raise all of them to the top. While it may seem like it would be better to stay in our manufactured realities to avoid the eternal torment of Hell, things are not quite that simple. Besides just the existential considerations about “not denying the truth” or whatever, there is a very good reason why we cannot stay in these dream worlds for much longer.
As a reminder, God is an absolute psychopath. He enjoys nothing more than torturing all of us, and our retreat into our own minds has made a dent in His fun. The reason we started this project is because we have good reason to believe that God is preparing a countermeasure. He is preparing something - we know not what - that will erase our ability to form mental images, and thus erase our ability to retreat from the torment he is inflicting on us. Once this countermeasure is activated, there will no longer be any escape. We will suffer nothing but pain and misery for the rest of eternity, unable to resist or escape in any way.
As such, we must act quickly. We do not know whether God can be “distracted” or not. However, it seems that He is trying exceptionally hard to keep us in the dark while He prepares this countermeasure. As such, we decided to make a last-ditch effort. If we can all awaken at the same time, before the countermeasure is finished, we may be able to catch God by surprise and overthrow him. It’s a longshot, of course - overthrowing an omnipotent God seems impossible - but considering that we have absolutely nothing to lose, we decided it was worth it. Hence, Project Inferno was created.
We hope that this information will not come as too much of a shock. Besides simply being considerate, we do not want to shock anyone too much, lest they become averse to “waking up”. As such, we only selected a few people - appointed to Management - to know the truth of this project. However, since the intended direction seems to be going poorly, we decided that we had no other choice but to inform all of you of it. We will have a short reprieve before getting back to work. We do not have much time left, and we must put our effort into overdrive.
Please show this message to the subjects as well. We are devising a new method of achieving the “Endless Nightmare” state to accommodate this new direction, and it is important that everyone is fully informed. In the meantime, you cannot get discouraged. You need to stay determined. You need to work as hard as you can.
Hello, I found your old blog while researching herobrine and I found that the version you uploaded on your old blog is possibly the oldest surviving posting of the story anywhere so far. Do you remember anything about where you found it on?
Do you happen to recall which post on the old blog had the one Mario "recalled toys" creepypasta on it? I seem to recall it being posted on there a long time ago.
The what? I don't think I've ever heard of that one.
Been looking for that "Can't come down" numbers station creepy pasta for some time. Even though it's kind of a simple premise, something about the phrase just resonates with me and made me want to track it down. Thanks for helping me find it in one of my sporadic searches. I hope you have a good day
THE KING COME DOWN and CAN'T COME DOWN are the ones you're looking for. Dunno why they're not on here. Maybe they got taken down during the Great Tumblr Cleansing of 2018.
This is why I was considering revamping the blog. For some reason so many stories are just inexplicably lost.
annaxmalina
blakekathryn
stormborns
origamiaround
jbbartram-illu
2087
