Bone-Chilling Horror Stories
Sometimes horror films don't even come close to the bone-chilling terrors that reality can offer up. These Redditors faced down some of the creepiest phenomena imaginable and lived to tell the tale.
From countryside monsters to haunted houses, these twisted stories might just keep you up at night.
1. Going Up?
I was in Taiwan one year when I was younger and had traveled to a busy night market. Nearby I spotted a sign for a net café in a 5-6 story building. Thinking I’d fire off some quick emails, I walked in the dark, small entrance of the building.
The building was older and hadn’t been well maintained, but that’s not out of the ordinary in Taiwan.
The entrance just had a dark hallway that led to a small elevator. I pressed the elevator call button and entered. The elevator was uncharacteristically new compared to the building, but I didn’t think much of it.
Like some Chinese/Taiwanese buildings, there wasn’t a fourth floor (it’s considered bad luck), so it just read 1-2-3-5-6, which was usual.
I looked for the floor the net café was on—the 6th floor—and pressed the button. It lurched into action quietly and began the ascent. When it stopped, I figured it was my floor, so I instinctively began to step out. Right before stepping out, however, the sight outside the elevator stopped me. It was pitch dark, only lit by the light in the elevator, and it looked like it hadn’t been occupied for decades, with some random pieces of furniture covered with a white cloth.
It was a small building, so each floor was single occupancy, and I could see pretty much the entire floor from the elevator. Thinking I must have gotten the wrong floor, I checked the light that indicates which floor you’re on.
Strangely, there was nothing. None of the indicators were on, but the floor button to the net café was still lit so I knew I hadn’t gotten there yet.
All this happened within a couple of seconds. That’s when I noticed a figure moving in the distance on the floor.
It was not very visible, but I could make out what looked like a person dressed in some kind of gown, moving slowly towards the elevator where I was. I was thoroughly creeped out, so I started pressing the close door button frantically.
As soon as I pressed it, the elevator light flickered off, and I was in pitch dark. I am this close to peeing my pants, and it’s actually kind of freaking me out thinking back to it now. The lights flickered back on under a second and the door closed, and the elevator jolted back to life. A few moments later, it opened again to the net café.
I am beyond relieved at this point. I walked out immediately and sat down at a computer. After gathering my wits a bit, I walked over to the cashier’s desk and told them what I saw. The girl working there listened and her face turned a bit ashen. I asked her if she'd heard of a similar story. She told me that she’s never experienced it, but some co-workers and occasional customers have brought it up.
Basically, the building has six floors, and the fourth floor had a history. Apparently, the floor used to be a hair salon of sorts, until one of the employees completed suicide there for some reason.
The store continued operations despite stories of weird appearances—when customers got their hair rinsed the water would look a little red, like the customer was bleeding.
A couple of people reported seeing someone’s figure walking away in the mirror, but wouldn't see anyone when they turned to check. Naturally, the business closed down a few months after that.
The building owner tried to re-rent the place out, but never had any luck. Most businesses are quite superstitious, and no one wanted to rent the fourth floor after someone had perished in it, even at a very cheap price.
Finally, after dropping the price to nearly nothing, a stationary supplies store wanted to rent. During the renovations of the floor, however, several accidents would happen.
Tools would end up in strange places, a mirror from the previous business shattered when no one was near it, and finally, a worker had his hand jammed between the elevator doors when it closed on him unexpectedly.
The workers refused to continue working and finally, the business left and the building owner finally gave up and shut down that floor.
He then had the elevator company come in to replace the panel so that the elevator could not go to the fourth floor. Let me repeat that—the elevator was programmed to never go to the fourth floor. It doesn’t even have a button.
But for some reason, sometimes when people take the elevator, it would go to the fourth floor and the doors would open, and some, like myself, would see a figure walking around in the dark.
2. Dressed To The Nines
When I was a child, two of my friends and I decided to explore an abandoned house that was down the road from us. It had the typical abandoned house look—there was paint peeling off with exposed wood in some spots, overgrown vines scaling its sides, broken windows, roof tiles missing here and there, etc. Well, we walked inside and it matched the outside.
The cupboards were broken, the walls were rotting, and floorboards throughout the space were splintered and cracked. Other than the place being extremely empty, we didn't really get any scary vibes from it. Nothing really stood out to us as "paranormal" as we'd expect. We left the house mildly disappointed...but the nightmare was actually beginning.
Then, as we were walking alongside one of the windows, this very well-dressed, well-groomed man, maybe in his 60s wearing a black dress coat, white shirt, and black tie came into view from inside the house. We didn't see him inside or hear him approaching, yet there he was, just staring at us blankly through the window.
My friends and I booked it as fast as we could and rushed back home. It was probably one of the property owners who just happened to be inside the house on the same day that we were there (there were a few rooms we didn't go in), but man, that scared the heck out of us. A few years later, the local Fire Department burnt the place down in a controlled burn, so if it was paranormal...Welp, it's gone now.
3. It’s Coming From Inside The House
I was once in a hot tub with some friends late at night, and we were all telling some stories. One of the guys told us this one, a story of a girl he knows—the people he was with verified it was true.
So one day, this girl was called over to babysit. She did it a lot for these people, so it was routine for her. Anyways, she was told to put the kids to bed at 9, and she did.
After she put them to bed, she started watching TV and doing homework, waiting for the parents to come home. But then, she started hearing some noises coming out of the basement, like pans falling and stuff.
She just ignored it, and thought it was the washing machine or something. Anyways, a little later, she starts hearing the noises again.
She decides to call the authorities. The lady at the station told her there's a patroller in her area, and that he'll be at the house in about 20 minutes. Anyways, in about five minutes, she hears a knock on the door.
She answers, and it's a full SWAT team. She asked, "I thought they were just sending a patroller..." One of the guys told her, "After you hung up the phone, we heard a second phone on the line hang up."
Apparently, there was a man in the basement listening to the conversation. The lady in the station waited and heard him hang up, then immediately sent the SWAT team to help.
They went downstairs and caught him; he was wanted for multiple cases of assault.
4. Two-Faced
One day 16 years ago, when I worked at a gas station, I was watching a teenage couple get slushies at the back of the store. I was taken aback when the young man looked toward the till, because I noticed that he had a very severe facial deformity. But then, when I kept watching, I noticed something bizarre. When he looked to the girl, he looked perfectly normal in profile. Confused, I assumed I imagined it the first time.
Well, they eventually came to the front of the store. Then his face was distorted again, like a terrifying gargoyle. I kept looking at the girl to see if she could see what I was seeing but she didn’t seem to.
And every time he turned to her, his face was normal. Trust me—this was like a Halloween mask. It was not an expression anyone could possibly make.
It was SO DIFFERENT and terrible. Anyway. As he looked at me and finished paying, I felt like a massive black cloud of hate inside me, like an actual thing. It was like I had drunk a glass of liquid hate. Then they left.
I’ve never been able to explain it.
