1 Chapter 1: The Immeasurable Shades Of Dread

It was well past midnight and I know not why I was still awake. Just one of those nights where you don't feel like sleeping. I was in the living room, on the pc; a set of headphones on just one of my ears.I was just sitting idly on the pc, listening to jazz music you would hear in a cafe, blankly staring at the screen, contemplating whether I should play a game before going to sleep or not.

With my free right ear, out of nowhere, I heard…. a mysterious and incredibly ominous, ear melting sound.. I jolted and stood up in a fast manner, causing the wheeled chair to hit one of the tables behind me. I shuddered at the thought of hearing that ghastly, grim, ominous, terrifying and outright disturbing sound again.

I couldn't describe it even if I wanted to. Even now, I wish that I hadn't brought it up; for I can still feel the gripe of the paralysing fear that I had experienced when I was met by that entity.

Let me describe that night, even though I would prefer not to recall the experience, I would rather face it and share with the world my experience with otherworldly horror.

Now, this story is what you'd call a Lovecraftian fantasy. Emphasis on the fantasy; although it was much too real for my liking. The thing about fantasy is that it cannot survive without an underlying reality. And the thing about reality that I have just learned is that it is the stillness that is buried deep beneath the illusion; shaped by something much greater. Well, let's just start now, shall we?

It was a frosty night, much out of the ordinary; in this part of the world, that is. As I said so before, I was sat inside the living room, on the pc, covered myself in a thick blanket, staring blankly at the screen when suddenly, I heard an eerily ominous sound that jolted me, causing me to get up in a fast manner, pushing the wheeled chair back and disconnecting the headphones from the jack.

Now, I'm not one for those horror movies; god forbid the ones with multiple protagonists. Not because I'm scared of the movies but rather because of the protagonist's stupidity in the situations. Now, in this scenario, what the MC of a horror movie would do is carelessly go out and look for themselves, just to satisfy their curiosity, without any investigation even if they don't believe in such forces as I myself have witnessed.

Just to be safe, and also because of my cautious nature, I decided to first check the living room and see if my cat is still lying around on the couch.

I couldn't find her.Then I went to the kitchen which was separated by a glass door on the north side and a curtain on the east side, from the living room. In the numerous kinds of similar situations I've been in when I was either alone in the house or late at night, again due to my cautious nature, I'd borrow a knife from the kitchen; depending on the situation. Yes, that might seem like an overkill but I always expect the worst.

This time was no different; I went inside the kitchen and grabbed a butchering knife.

Next, I went to the bedroom on the same floor to see if my brother was present. I opened the door as quietly as I could and discovered him to not be in there.

It's either that my greatest fear has come true or that I'm tripping bollocks. But for some reason unknown to god, I was grinning as cold sweat ran down my forehead. This was only the second time I'd ever experienced cold sweat. Ah well, I'm not here to talk about my past experiences with fears and cold sweat, So, here's what happened next:

First of all, I went ahead and out of the main door, from which, I followed the staircase upstairs to my parents' room opposite to the terrace on the second floor. I slowly opened the old oak door. It was hard to move and made slight creaky sounds. No one was present in the room. My heart rate fastened by the second.

I ran back downstairs and saw a colour flashing outside of one of the windows

A colour out of this world. A colour so vibrant but so dead; so infinitely vast yet all compressed into the size of the Earth. A colour that no human has ever seen before.

Just imagine it; I doubt you could even begin to comprehend it.

The sight of it made my head hurt. A lot.

Arcane knowledge that should not be known by humans apparently makes your brain restless and time seems to slow down. It makes you perceive things you normally would never see. And so, I was thinking faster than I could blink and I could see…. the particles, immeasurable, were clearly visible to me. I could see the streamline particles that rushed through my body by the nanosecond. They resembled electrons almost. These are called Neutrinos, streaming through us in the trillions, not touching a single atom in the way.

I stumbled and fell on my knees, dropped the knife and heard that terrible voice again. It was as if the voice was being directly transmitted to my brain. I can't really describe or replicate that feeling, but I remember, if my memory serves me right, a few names:

'Cthulhu', 'Yog-Sothoth' and 'Azathoth'.

The voice, as it began to chant the last name, seemingly portrayed trepidation and reverence. Back then, I'd only read one or two books related to these names; a more common one was the 'Cthulhu Mythos'. This experience of mine, with cosmic horror, led me to delve deeper into such works.

Mention of the name Cthulhu was only recognised by me because I had read a book wherein it is revealed that the word is completely non-human, and there is no correct way to pronounce it. The closest pronunciation, according to the author, is 'Khlûl-hloo'.

And had the mention been any different than it was, I would've been in the dark for at least a few months or years even.

There are many entities that are far beyond human comprehension. To try to understand even a fraction of the essence of externality that these entities carry or resemble even, whether it be of time or space or dimension, one must forget such things as humans perceive them; forget that such things as organic life, good and evil, love and hate, and again, all such local attributes of mankind have any existence at all.

--END OF CHAPTER 1--