Content Warning: Claustrophobia, Body Degradation, Self Harm A man returns himself to the earth through the mouth of a cave Try Rocket Money for free: https://RocketMoney.com/CREEPCAST Over 2 Million Butts Love TUSHY. Get 10% off TUSHY with the code CREEPCAST at https://hellotushy.com/CREEPCAST Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Chapter 1: What is the story 'Ensorcelled in the Earth' about?
Welcome back to Creepcast. Today we are reading in source... Take your time.
It's okay. Sounded out. One step. It's okay. Ensorcelled. Ensorcelled in the earth. Sorry.
Sorry about that. I even said it out loud properly before this. I don't know why I had such a hard time. Ensorcelled in the Earth, which is from the author of the previous episode that we've done or previous story we've covered called It Breeze, It Bleeds, It Breeds. And what makes this so unique and so fun is that this story was actually posted on our subreddit.
The r slash creepcast subreddit, which is kind of cool where, you know, it would be really neat if this if the Reddit could be a place kind of like r slash no sleep where people can post stuff. And I do see we've we've seen other fans post stories in here as well.
So I think that it's probably going to be more common that we start reading stuff from actually our viewers or authors that come here and post stories as well, which is really cool. Mm hmm.
Yeah, so the author of this story, his name is Travis Coleman. He goes by Imperial Incentive on Creepypasta and here on Reddit. He posted this story to Creepypasta and he posted it to our subreddit once again. He posts a ton on the Creepypasta wiki. He has his own profile page he keeps up that talks about new stories he's writing.
And we talked about it before when we covered It Breeds, It Bleeds, that he has a huge body of work. This guy writes about a ton of different stories, a ton of different horror concepts. which of course we'll have linked to his description, his page and everything. So you feel free to check him out there. But I also didn't realize then how like influential this guy was in the creepypasta space.
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Chapter 2: Who is the author of 'Ensorcelled in the Earth'?
Like this guy wrote flesh gate, which was a story that I heard passed around vocally that I'd, I don't even think I've ever read the original story, but this is the guy who wrote it. And he also wrote some other famous ones. I've heard of like a small piece of lead, Abraham's dagger, ad nauseum, ad mortem, ad infinum. Like this guy has a lot of big stories under his belt and he writes a ton.
So him like a author that we already know we like, and is that prolific posting his story to our subreddit?
is really cool and we appreciate it i'm stuck from the comments and stuff too it seems like he hasn't written he hasn't uh written anything in a while so this is just something new that apparently he's been wanting to write so it's really cool that you know uh getting the influence to come in and just be like i'm gonna write a new story it's just a lot of fun and it's gonna be cool to dive into this new story yep yeah i'm excited you'll read his uh author's note too
Yeah, we'll read the author's note. He says, Hey, fam. Hey, fam, this is going to be a weird one. I've been meaning to write an abstract story about this topic for a long time. I want to thank Junji Ito for the Enigma of Omegara Fault. Banger, by the way. Such a good one. Cardboard Computer for Kentucky Route Zero. Another banger, by the way.
Blind Descent by James M. Tabor, not familiar, and The Late and Great David Lynch. I hope you enjoy it. And then he puts content warning, claustrophobia, body degradation, and self-harm. Seriously, please stop whenever this makes you uncomfortable. Enjoy, which is exactly what we want to die into.
That's awesome. This has to be some kind of, I mean, it has to be top two. He says, let's go spelunking as well. So, I mean, this has got to be a fun cave diving story, which you know me. I love a nice claustrophobic nightmare. I am claustrophobic as high hell.
The cave stuff's fun. And then the Enigma of Omegara Fault and Kentucky Route Zero are both like, you know, cave earth related. Right. So I imagine that's where he's drawing off of. This is this is dope. I'm very excited for this. We've seen a lot of fan made stories before. And there's kind of like. it's a weird place because we really want to cover and we really want to talk about them.
But also if someone we know is going to be watching the show, I really don't want to be mean to him. Hunter doesn't care to be mean to him, but I don't want to be mean to him. So it's kind of like, you know, we want to wait for something special, come along to kick it off. And now we have an author who we know we like posting.
100%.
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Chapter 3: What themes are explored in the episode?
I'm here, waiting.
I wake up and rush to the bathroom. I manage to make it to the toilet before the sickness spews out of me. It's small victories like this that make the days worth living for. The first few times I had to wash the bed sheets and steam clean the floor because I wasn't prepared. But now I've mastered that ritual. Get to the bathroom as soon as you wake up. Flush the contents without looking at them.
Try to ignore the growing fear that something else is terribly wrong. No fuss, no muss. There's no need for doctors. I already know how sick I am. I perfected the systems. Vomit in the morning, wait two hours before eating unless you want to lose it minutes later, go to work and wait for something to change. Wait for it to eventually get better.
I know nothing's going to change, so that's why I decided to seek out the source of the voice. Like a magnet to a lodestone, I find myself drawn to it. I find the epicenter far away from the civilized world. It takes days to reach the location, traveling through the desert by car. But the voice beckons me closer every night now, and I never stray from the path. I sleep in the cabin of my car.
It's easier than a motel. In the morning, I simply open the door and spill bileless and red flecked vomit onto the dry sand and cracked earth to drive away. No pesky cleanup, no one to worry over it. At the end of the third day, I reach my destination. I know what this place is the instant I see it. It's an oasis after days of sand and sun being my only companion.
I look at my phone, seven texts, five missed calls, one voicemail message that is three minutes long, and a 26% charge left on my battery. I don't bother to check any of them. I turn off my cell to conserve those last precious minutes. It's too late to turn back. That door is shut to me now, but another one is opening up. This place is a message.
This place is part of a system of messages that want me to listen to what it has to say. It demands my attention and I give it freely. It is hidden away from the rest of the world like a pearl peeking out from the silt of the sea. Only I can see it amongst the flotsams and jetsam.
The only barrier preventing me from delving deeper is a single chain draped across the entrance to a mind with a warning sign. I trespass it easily and step away from the light of the day into the darkness of the earth. As I cross that threshold between the waking world and my final destination, I can hear that the voice is sending me a message. This is the first time I've heard it.
Heard her clearly. The message is important, but it feels like it's only being transmitted to me.
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Chapter 4: How does the narrative reflect on mental health?
thought stirs up a memory from my childhood when i was six every few weeks i would creep into my parents room in the dark at the night stand by my mom's side of the bed i was too scared to sleep in the dark of my own room and too terrified to wake her and disappoint her by telling her that i'm afraid falling asleep as a result i would stand by her side of the bed and hope that she wakes up on her own and asks me what's wrong so i don't have to feel like i'm bothering her
Sometimes I would stand there for what felt like hours waiting for her to save me from my paralysis of that indecision. That immediately sounds like something you did as a kid.
I did do that, actually. I'm not even joking. I would get freaked out in my room. I would stay in my mom or I'd go really close to her. I'd be like,
and she'd like fucking like freak out because I'd be so close to her face or I would go into a room and I would sleep on the floor next to her bed in the morning she would like step on me and I'd be like and she'd be like oh my god like a thing but the biggest thing was I was like I'd be freaked out I'd go and I'd whisper to my mom but I didn't want to wake up my dad because I knew if my dad woke up he'd be like what the hell oh dude yeah like raise hell for sure but yeah I did that all the fucking time when I was younger
you got to strategize how you you really do you have to strategize how you're like i'm going to die of a heart attack i'm so afraid of my room of whatever you know it could have been a dream or who knows what it is but yeah going into the room really like slowly turning the fucking the door so there's no sound of that my dad also had like this industrial fan that we blaring in there so it'd be like this huge like wind tunnel in the room and i'd just be up to my mom i'm
mom mom yeah she would freak the fuck out i always felt terrible the funniest part is you curling up on the floor like a dog i did i like like a like a shih tzu or something like that i literally curled up at a ball my mom would wake up in the morning and you know you're you're small you're just a kid you don't think and no one like looks at the floor before they get out of bed whatever so yeah she would step on me i'd be like ah
Or my dad would get pissed because my dad would wake up really early for like construction work. And he'd be like, what the hell are you doing here? And I'm like, what do you think you're doing? What the hell do you think you're doing, boy?
That's probably why your grandfather tried to shoot you. Yeah. That's probably why your grandfather accidentally shot the dog. Cause you know, you two look so much alike. I bet you're, that wouldn't surprise me at all. If you were like, yeah, it turns out I was one of the kids. I wore like the ears and the tail, like I would bark at people at school. I wish I had the courage. Yeah.
I wish I had an imbalance of courage like that, dude. I'm not a coward.
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Chapter 5: What are the characters' experiences in the cave?
I should get lost in the woods.
I really shouldn't have left.
I don't stand at the entrance of that mine for hours paralyzed by indecision. It takes seconds to make up my mind. Without any more hesitation, I tuck my phone into my jeans and venture into the darkness without checking my notifications or listening to that message. It's an obvious choice.
It's clearly August and the air to the mine is welcoming, cool in comparison to the stale heat of my shitbox car whose AC broke down years ago that I never got around to repairing. I begin walking into the darkness and I leave the world behind. The air is thick with particulates and motes of light flitting amongst the darkness that plays off the sun.
The light behind me illuminates my path downwards, but with each step forward, my world grows darker. The mind looks like it has been abandoned with dust, building on equipment and spiderwebs occasionally acting as an ethereal bearer to entry that catch in my hair and make my skin crawl. Each step takes me slightly downwards along the sand and shifting earth.
I feel my feet slip out from me and I catch myself before I can roll my ankle. If I'm not careful, I can easily injure myself here. But it just isn't my environment that is a danger. It isn't just difficult terrain. Something is wrong with my ear. I tilt my head to the side and I feel something dripping out, staining my shirt. A taxia washes over me like a wave and mixes with the cochlear fluid.
This could be enough to make me turn back, but what will I be returning to? Who is waiting for me after what I did? Why didn't I go? No one's going to miss me. I continue my descent. I walk in a drunken zigzag further into the darkness, deeper into the depths. The world sways back and forth no matter how hard I try to focus and swallow down the nausea. It rises back up in my throat.
I'm dizzy but determined. I've come too far to turn back now. I have to go further into the mine. That's a I used to get really bad earaches when I was a kid and I remember like I don't think I was ever to the point where like my ears would be dripping fluid but I remember feeling like they were full of something and like the overwhelming pain. It was like a debilitating headache.
Also going further and further into a claustrophobic nightmare where your equilibrium is fucked up and you're nauseous would be not a vibe. Would not recommend.
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Chapter 6: What does the story reveal about isolation and grief?
An unnerving sense of being underground is crowing while the tunnel ahead is narrowing. After a few hundred feet, I can touch the sides. I turn back and look at the entrance one last time before continuing on. The opening is a pinprick of light amongst a sea of dark. I am so far from home. The light of my phone screen illuminates my path forward.
I keep scanning the darkness, expecting the light to catch the reflective tapetum lucidum of a coyote. Oh, like their reflective eyes. I see what it's saying. Okay. But there's no animals here. Even they avoid this place. The only creatures that seem to be thriving here are the spiders. As I bumble into another web and I can feel it crawling through my hair.
I brush it free and prepare myself for the dark. battery won't last forever turn my phone back off 22 swallow down the fear of the darkness claims my surroundings and that just to keep walking this is gonna get rough i can already feel i'm already i'm like more and he gets the words i'm starting to get like a lump in my throat i keep like swallowing i'm like oh god
I'm just picturing the also to the idea of having a low battery. And it's like, that's my flashlight. I'm like, bro.
The only way I could see is this didn't charge it up. Didn't think about even a $5 one at the gas station out front. Well, you know what that also kind of shows is that he doesn't plan on coming out is what it seems to me. Well, it seems that he's depressed because he's like, who would miss me back there? Like he's giving himself to whatever he's walking into. Surely. And also like,
It him talking about what I did. I still think he's talking about like a loved one, but he associates some personal guilt to it. So it's almost like it's almost like a suicide in a way. The way he's describing it, like no one will miss me. I just have my phone. I'll walk in. I mean, it reads like a suicide note for sure. Yeah.
But I can already tell it's going to get rough because he's like, I'm throwing up. My ears dripping. I feel spiders in my hair. And we're like five feet into the cave.
Yeah.
The cave continues to shrink. Further on and deeper still, I bang my head on the stalactites above and I realize that the tunnel is not only narrowing, it is shrinking in diameter. Oh no. This is going to be some Ted the Caver stuff. I didn't even see the stalactite before I hit it. It's too dark in this place. I pause in the darkness to try and still my heart.
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Chapter 7: How does the episode address fear and claustrophobia?
Soon I'll have to crawl on my hands and knees if I want to progress deeper. This place is trying to prevent me from reaching the voice. Everything in my body tells me that no highly esteemed deed is commemorated here in this place. Nothing of value is here. So why do I keep delving deeper? Why do I keep on going? It's a question that I've asked myself far too much.
The only difference between asking myself back then and asking myself now is the answer. Now I don't have an answer. I feel something dig into my knee and I use my phone to look at the misshapen rock. I'll have to be careful, or I'll shred my hands and knees, crawling forward. I mivone down the depths, hoping to see an alcove or opening, but the path only constricts down like a blood vessel.
I am drawn to the depths like a magnet to a lodestone. I am summoned to it like a sheep to the slaughter. Oh, this guy. You remember those closing lines of It Breeds, It Bleeds where it's like in my final moments, I'll say I love him or whatever. Such a good cap. This guy, he hit me with that saxophone, but it's a pin. I feel it. He's getting me good. I like it. WAIT!
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I have to put my phone back in my pocket as I can't drag myself on my belly and shift through the narrow gap ahead of me. Trapped in this tight space, I can feel one of the many spiders I displaced by walking into their webs, exploring in my environs, my hair. I can't brush it free in this claustrophobic crawlspace, so I have to endure.
I can't raise my head to look down deeper into the darkness without hitting my head on the cave ceiling. I have to lie prone and crane my neck if I want to see what lies ahead of me, not that the darkness shows me much. I try not to think of the tons of rock above me that could crush me should the earth will it. Why do I keep moving forward? I had friends. I had family. I had.
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Chapter 8: What is the significance of the voice in the cave?
A quarter a mile? A half a mile down? I am become like one of the eight spiders that Americans eat in their sleep. I know that's a myth, an untruth, misinformation that insists itself into our deepest fears and now can't be excised from our minds no matter how hard we try. There's a horrifying power in belief.
A tiny little lie about eating spiders in your sleep from PC professional blossomed into an incontrovertible fact. It was people's acknowledgement of this fear that gave it life, gave it presence, gave it purchase to crawl its way into our world. And now it's an accepted part of reality. And even though it's not true, belief can make something real, give something form, give her power.
Okay, gosh, bro. The like comparing like the way he's thinking about how he's being digested and comparing it to the myth, you know, the whole Americans eat eight spiders in their sleep or whatever. And talking about how it gets to a point where simply the belief of it makes it legitimate. And then he's like, it gives her power.
And he's tying that back to the voice that's been mentioned a couple of times before. And now that's like a myth that's stuck in his head. It can't get out. And now we see also in that quick mention that he didn't go to his mom's funeral. It seems that he missed a call from his mom that maybe would have saved her life, so he feels responsible for her death, and that's why he's here.
Yeah, I'm a fan.
So claustrophobic, so uncomfortable. Even the way that he gives the cave, or the mine, I should say, a... A living soul. Like, I mean, talking about how it's contracting and going down or tightening like a blood vessel, the cave's breathing, the tiny teeth, the belly of the cave. Like, it's giving it to be like he's basically being consumed by a monster right now. It's just...
It's so uncomfortable. The entire time you're reading that, I just found myself, I was kind of like clenching my chest, like, oh, God. I'm really feeling like I'm trapped in there, too. Almost like whenever someone's telling you about something horrible, he's like, I can't even take breaths. It felt like my chest was pressed up against those rocks, too.
Yeah, it's brutal. It's like the direct tie, especially with the consume part, reminds me of Final Prayer. Oh, 100%. Yeah.
It directly goes, but also like reminds me that there's this YouTuber named Jacob Geller makes these great YouTube videos talking about like different horror scenarios, but he made one called fear of the depths where he talks about like the horror of cave diving or like the worst stories with caves. And he has this one section that I was always stuck out of my mind.
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