#Urban Horror

[faceless-crowd]

Experimental logo for a story I want to make, tell me what you think

[yomeiu]

no rhythm to guide our steps, only the clamour of our minds and the asbestos polluting our lungs. walz macabre, our places.

[krystal-prisms]

There's something much scarier about an abandoned building that's clean.

Abandoned buildings are supposed to be dirty. Years and years of dust and dirt. The gradual degradation of the man made reclaimed by nature.

Abandoned places aren't supposed to be clean. Pristine floors, without a speck of dust. White walls. Unbroken windows that don't let even a light breeze through, not even that much movement is allowed.

The door hinges are perfectly oiled. A squeaky door is a telltale horror sign, but the silent open and close is much more sinister.

Complete silence. No creaking of floorboards. No whistling of wind. No settling of old supports.

There is absolutely no inteusion by nature. No dust tracked in. No smell of mold, no black stains on the walls. No cobwebs.

There are no signs of life. No buzzing flies. No spiders spinning webs. No pigeons in the rafters or rats in the walls.

What is so fundamentally wrong with this place that it has been forsaken even by roaches.

Abandoned places shouldn't be clean.

[skullingwaydraws]

Some apocalyptic nyc postcards I’ve been working on. Now I actually need to get them printed as postcards lol

[critlore]

Ex Stasis Games needles at some uniquely modern fears with a new collection of system-neutral roleplaying scenarios.

Do Not Adjust Your Set is an anthology of system-neutral adventures based on writers’ favourite urban legends. With everything from infernal paintings and extradimensional arcade games to masked vigilantes and cutthroat academic competition, creepy one-shot TTRPG opportunity oozes from between the ectoplasm-slimed pages.

Do Not Adjust Your Set is a follow-up to 2022’s Midwinter Ghost Stories - a successfully Kickstarted anthology of system-neutral scenarios in the tradition of Victorian ghost stories. DNAYS features more modern stories and scares.

Do Not Adjust Your Set finishes on Kickstarter on 28th November!

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/exstasisgames/do-not-adjust-your-set

[heir-of-the-chair]

I love spooky forests, and creepy lights in deserts, and idyllic suburban towns hiding dark secrets as much as the next person but WHERE IS THE URBAN SUPERNATURALISM?!

Give me spooky sludge living in pipes, abandoned lots between buildings that maybe were abandoned for a reason, street performers playing songs strangely familiar late into the night. I want urban/new york city gothic!

[cultofcreatures]

well that doesn’t look right.

[thryth-gaming]

Monster of the Week supplement

So, this is a project I've been part of or working on since at least 2019 with elements of it going back earlier than that. It is a combination of a personal project of mine with a project of Marek Golonka's (of Codex of Worlds's fame) which we took to Evil Hat, and now it's on it's way to the general public.

[horror-aesthete]

Rigor Mortis (殭屍), 2013, dir. Juno Mak

[horygory]

Ekusute AKA Exte: Hair Extensions (2007)

[krystal-prisms]

Honestly, urban and suburban horror is so under utilized

Getting lost in a parking lot full of endless rows and columns of cars. You can't find yours, you don't know how long you've been walking. You keep seeing cars that you think are yours, but they don't open when you try your keys. You press the horn button on your fob, but can't tell which direction the faint honking is coming from. The stalls are all full.

A grocery store late at night. No other shoppers are there. It's dark outside and yours is the only car in the parking lot. The aisles are filled with brands you don't recognize, but seem oddly familiar, all knock offs of each other. It's too cold. Your cart has a squeaky wheel. The cashier is the only other person in the store. They don't make eye contact. You don't remember what you came in for.

You're taking the garbage out late at night. Your elevator doesn't work so you have to take the stairs. The dumpster smells, and there is fluid on the ground beside it. You don't want to think about what it could be. You hear noises down the alley. You toss the bag into the dumpster, and run to the door. You fumble your keys and take longer to get in. You slam the door and lock it. The lightbulb flickers in the lobby.

Rows and rows and rows and rows of identical houses. You don't know how you got into this neighborhood, you can't afford any of the houses here. They all look the same, white square houses, white picket fences, perfectly even and manicured lawns. A good neighborhood. A nice place to raise your kids. There are no kids. The weather is nice, the sun is shining, they should be outside. You drive your used car, looking for a turn off to the exit, but there isn't any. Just endless white square houses, white picket fences, perfectly even and manicured lawns. You're sure you passed this area before, but there are no house numbers and they all look the same. The sun is shining and there is not a cloud in the sky. Or another living creature in sight.

You're on the bus. Surrounded by people, you stare at your phone and ignore them. More people get on. Your stop is coming soon. More people get on. You sit at the back of the bus to avoid conversation. More people get on. Someone bumps into you, and you apologize to them, but you're not sure why. They don't acknowledge you. More people get on. Everyone is staring at their phones, ignoring each other. Your stop is next. You try to stand up to get to the exit, but there are people in the way. You can't get to the button to let the driver know you need to get off. You try to get to the door, but there are so many people in the way you can't move. The bus slows to a stop, and you try to push your way to the exit, but the bus is too packed. The doors open, but you can't leave, and nobody hears you when you ask them to move. More people get on.

You walk downtown. You pass a billboard advertising a product you've never heard of. You keep walking, passing flyers, billboards, screens, all selling things. Things to make you prettier. Smarter. More successful. A whole new person. A new person to fit into society with all the other people, but only if you spend money. For just a few dollars, you can have a better life with our product. You need our product. You would be so happy if only you had our product. Look at all these people in our advertisement, aren't they happy? Don't you want to be like them? You could be if only you just had our product. You can't afford any of them.

You're in a crowd of people, walking the sidewalk. You have your earbuds in. You feel someone watching you. You casually glance around, to try to catch someone staring. You can't pick out individual faces among the hundreds of other people. You continue on your way, thinking you imagined it. You imagine you hear footsteps, and walk faster. The feeling doesn't go away.

Your air conditioner is broken. You told your landlord, he said he'll fix it. It's been days. The air is hot and muggy. Leaving the windows open doesn't help the heavy feeling. The air from outside is just as warm, and carries the scents from the city. There should be sounds coming from outside, but the city is silent.

You're walking at night. You can't see even a single star.

[skullingwaydraws]

Def judging you

[apilgrimpassingby]

Some of you may remember me making a post a while back about "urban dark Abrahamicana". Well, now I've gone and made a setting for that aesthetic.

This will be a long post. Tagging @idylls-of-the-divine-romance because I think you'll like it.

The City of Bevel-on-the-Water

(Sorry for the poor quality of the image; that's the lighting in my room. Try turning up the brightness of your screen to make it clearer).

History

Bevel-on-the-Water was founded in the 13th century in northern Lincolnshire atop Bevel Carr, an alder carr that is now reduced to a few fragments. The town remained a minor settlement for several centuries, before expanding in the late 18th century with the Industrial Revolution, with the several rivers passing through it and its location between the coalfields of Yorkshire and the economic centres of the southeast making it a valuable transport artery, and continued to grow and prosper thanks to adopting rail technology.

The town has been less fortunate in the 20th and 21st centuries. In the Second World War, it was a target for German bombing raids, and much of it had to be rebuilt. Combined with the closure of coal mines and privatisation of railways in the 1980s, and the city spent the last quarter of the 20th century and the first decade of the 21st as a shell of its former self.

However, from the 2010s onwards it has been improving economically; the rock-bottom rents and proximity to important locations make it a popular place for young graduates and immigrants; in particular, the area is a popular "staging post" for Bulgarian and Romanian immigrants, who spend a few years working here before accumulating enough money and experience to move somewhere more upmarket.

And most are very eager. The history above can be found in history books; the history that the people of the East Midlands and Yorkshire would recognise it for is not found in those, but in folklore collections, internet forums and, above all, stories on the streets. Some of it will be related below.

Areas of the Town

Bevel-on-the-Water Halting Site

The trailer park located on the south bank of the town, filled with caravans and campervans atop litter-strewn stretches of sickly grass and tarmac housing not just the city's unusually large Romani population and various other poor people but stranger things as well; caravans home to itinerant occultists, tents dwelt in by demoniacs, shadows dancing in the night. The aforementioned Romani are well-established here, and hence are unusually well-liked and prosperous.

City Centre

The old medieval centre - albeit now mostly consisting of neo-Gothic architecture with substantial Brutalist additions - of the town, containing both the Town Hall and Bevel University, a university founded in the 1920s and shuttered in 1994, with much still inside it, including a great many ancient and esoteric texts rotting inside its crumbling Neo-Gothic library.

Eastwalk

Eastwalk is a small suburb on the east bank of the city, near the edges. While as impoverished and decrepit as the rest of the city, it is notable for having an active Anglican community (based around the city cathedral, St. Michael's Cathedral) and almost none of the macabre legends attached to the rest of the city. Other Christians, most notably Methodists from a major campaign conducted here in the 19th century, are also here.

Greensford

A large and particularly declining neighbourhood, located in the southwest of the city. The decay affecting almost everywhere here is particularly acute in this neighbourhood. Ivy smothers abandoned buildings, dandelions and brambles carpet streets, and half-feral children spend their days playing in the adjoining woods and swapping stories of sorcery, ritual murder and even cannibalism - many of them true.

Ironfields

The centre of economic activity during the city's industrial heyday (and still containing its train station), and an exemplar of its decline today. Everywhere one turns are crumbling houses, shuttered factories and graffiti. Only people who bother (or dare) to spend time there see what lurks beneath; the saints and crucifixes adorning the hearths and doorposts of inhabitants, the se'irim dancing inside the factories and seen only out of the corner of the eye, the graffiti proclaiming "Satan lives" and "Jesus Christ conquers" in equal quantity.

Johnstow

The smallest of the neighbourhoods of the city, located south of Eastwalk. The main characteristic of this neighbourhood is the great number of junk shops and second-hand bookshops, which become noticeable, like everything else, upon closer inspection - the bookshelves contain The Hypostasis of the Archons and the Nisibene Hymns, the shops sell icons and censers and the like, all softly carpeted with dust. The most notable one, Johnstow Books, has a mysterious proprietor - John Egapus, an extremely ancient Near Eastern man who seems to have been doing his job as long as anyone can remember.

Mortlake Heath

Mortlake Heath is the richest neighbourhood of the city, with an abundance of genteel 18th century houses and statues in the street and a shortage of children due to most of them going to private school; however, almost all of them eventually return to Bevel-on-the-Water or vanish. Again, a little look behind closed doors is a walk into darkness - candle-lit rituals in basements and attics, occult books hidden under the covers behind mundane ones, pentagrams and sigils drawn on the walls of rooms that the inhabitants think visitors won't go into.

Northgate

Northgate displays openly what the rest of the city thinly veils. Hardly a street lacks a portrait of Baphomet or an inverted pentagram, and everyone here has seen a ritual with inverted crucifixes and people dressed in black. Bloodstains are also not hard to see, and everyone dreads going into this district of the city - few people in Lincolnshire or South Yorkshire have not heard stories of occult murder or demon-summoning associated with here.

Oldstreet

West of Eastwalk, Oldstreet is another strong representative of the city's decline. A 19th-century suburb that never recovered from Second World War bombing, every turn here shows a burnt-out building or a rotted house, and the few people still living here are old and haunted. The most famous site of destruction here, St. Paul's Chapel, is a burnt-out church with the floor carpeted in thorns and a single crucifix shining amidst the rubble.

Southgrove

Southgrove, to a passer-by, looks like a pristine town - all hedgerows and suburban housing and smiling families. The town keeps its secrets well, but not infallibly - all those who research find that self-harm, domestic abuse and alcoholism run rampant here. Deeper research finds yet more things; sigils drawn in the margins of books, rites conducted in the school basement, books of magic in the library.

Stonewater

Stonewater represents the 20th century rebuilding project; a great mass of concrete towers and blocks where people live, perpetually bathed in mist and rain. This is where most people live, and is no less accursed than elsewhere, having its fair share of stories of Satanic sacrifices and sorcery, along with tales about mysterious strangers and visitations from Heaven. The town's 19th-century cemetery, Stonewater Necropolis, is where most of the city's dead are buried - unsurprisingly, many of the stories of the occult revolve around here.

Westcourt

Westcourt is where the city's immigrant community has always lived; Irish in the 19th century, Eastern Europeans today, the latter served by the Romanian Orthodox Church of St. James. As such, it has a large number of Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches, as well as plenty of dark myths - the usual legends of the city, along with tales of strigoi and the Children of Judas brought by the newcomers. Few people live here for long, with most moving from one of the many cheap flats to a more prosperous town as soon as possible.

Forests

Bevel Carr: The primal forest of the city, now reduced to three pateches in the north, east and west, with ravens croaking and warblers piping amidst waterlogged meadows of ferns and mead wort, mist rising up amidst the clusters of alder, willow and birch and the wind singing mournfully.

Bevel-on-the-Water Tree Plantation: The tree plantation is a large and gloomy forest of spruce, planted after the Second World War in the hope of providing jobs. The plan largely failed, but the expanse continues to carpet the western edge of the city, and provide the backdrop to dark myths; everyone has heard of the human sacrifices atop Hanger Hill on May Eve and Halloween, or the werewolf who lurks in an abandoned maintenance shed, or the spirit of the elder oak remaining from the previous forest.

Johnstow Woods: Outside the town of Johnstow lies the woods that give it its name; a hollow filled with hawthorn and rowan, centred on the tomb (or stow, in Old English) of the 9th-century abbot who lived here inside St. John's Chapel, a small Anglo-Saxon church.

Demographics

Total Population: 264,900

Ethnic

White British: 74.2%

Bulgarian: 9.8%

Romanian: 6%

Black British: 4.2%

South Asian: 2.8%

Romani: 2.2%

Other: 0.8%

Religious

Non-Religious: 58.2%

Anglican: 11.8%

Methodist: 9.6%

Orthodox: 7%

Pentecostal: 5.4%

Roman Catholic: 5%

Islam: 2%

Hindu: 0.8%

Other: 0.2%

[triplecastgames]

Keep watch at your window; the night is long and comes with teeth. The Hidden Keys Beta v1.1 is now available for pre-order; get it this Friday, 17 January, along with Nightfall, Verse Two: Nights of Blood - the Official Soundtrack of The Hidden Keys.

[cultofcreatures]