r/creepypasta

Clara Akerman had never been fond of the countryside, she was a city girl, born and raised. The bugs, the animals, the un-air conditiondness of it all, it simply did not appeal to her. Yet here she was, navigating a narrow, overgrown road toward a house she had never seen, left to her by a relative she had never met.

The road was overgrown, more than once she had to get out of the car to remove fallen branches. The tires of her fancy Mercedes sedan crunched against the gravel as she rounded the final bend. Through the thick morning fog, the estate slowly came into view.

The house was enormous, far larger than she had imagined. Its pale, weathered walls rose three stories above the forest floor, interrupted by narrow windows and crumbling masonry. Ancient trees surrounded the property, their twisted branches reaching toward the building as though attempting to swallow it whole. The whole damn place looked unnerving as hell.

“Well,” Clara muttered, turning off the ignition. “That explains why nobody wanted it. Place looks like Edgar Alan Poe would have written about it.”

Unsure if she wanted to enter the place at all, she sat for a moment. Contemplating if it was even safe to go inside. What if a possum or something had moved in while the place stood abandoned, or worse… spiders.

She grabbed the keys, her flashlight, and her .38 special. She wasn’t particularly excited about vagrants or something being inside.

The front door screeched loudly as Clara pushed it open. The smell of damp wood and mildew immediately filled her nostrils.

“Jesus Christ,” she muttered, covering her nose.”

A once grand foyer, a shockingly large staircase, and a bunch of molding junk greeted her.

Clara wandered through the house, until she eventually found what must have been the master bedroom. Inside the furniture seemed largely intact. Upon a large desk, framed by an ornate window, she saw a single book sitting in the desks center.

Flicking on her flashlight so that she could examine it, she noticed, it’s cover was cracked, and the pages had yellowed with age. Embossed into the leather were the initials E.A.

Curiously, Clara opened it to about the middle and began to read.

October 17, 1893.

I fear there is something terribly wrong with this house. Yesterday, I discovered a corridor behind the drawing room. I have lived here for thirty-seven years, and I am certain no such corridor existed before.

Clara raised an eyebrow.

“Well, that’s not creepy at all.”

She flipped forward several pages.

A creak in the wooden floor behind her startled her. Wheeling around her hand on her gun she shouted! But, it must have just been the house groaning. There was no one there.

“Jesus Christ, this place is giving me the creeps.” Turning, she continues to read, after flipping forward a few pages.

November 3, 1893.

I should have never gone into that door. The one behind the drawing room. This house has always only had a cellar. That door led to a stairwell, the stairwell spiraled down for what seemed to be an eternity. I turned around several times but eventually mustered the courage to make it to the bottom. There was a door, same as the one above. When I opened it I found myself back in the drawing room. Everything was the same but, there were no windows. I ran back up the stairs, and re entered MY drawing room. But, as mad as this already seems, my drawing room no longer had any windows.

Flipping forward, November 15th 1893.

There are no windows. No doors leading outside. I have searched every room, every corridor, every miserable corner of this godforsaken house. There is no outside anymore. I know there was an outside. I remember the gardens. The trees. The sun upon my face. I can’t take this anymore.

December 3rd, 1893.

Much of my food has spoiled. I tried smashing through a wall, but I am too weak to make it through in one go. The next day it’s as if my attempts were repaired. I do not know what to do. More strange corridors lead to never ending expansions. I cannot fathom how this could be happening.

Flipping to the final page it simply reads.

I have begun leaving pieces of furniture in the corridors to mark my path. Yesterday, I came upon a chair I had left behind, but it was not where I remembered placing it.

Or perhaps it was.

I cannot be certain of anything anymore.

I hear myself speaking sometimes, though I do not remember opening my mouth.

I am so terribly hungry.

And so terribly alone.

I cannot take this anymore.

With a cold shiver Clara closed the book, and when she looked up. The ornate window, that had framed the desk was gone.

I was born with an urge to dig.


Before I could recognize my parents’ faces, know my own name, speak my first word, learn to crawl, or even understand what digging was, the urge was already there. By the age of five, I had already made quite a few attempts.


When I was two, my mom left me unsupervised in Grandma’s small orchard after a rainy day. I tried digging a hole in the soft mud. It was perfect for my small hands, but the lack of resistance left me unsatisfied.


Two years later, while my parents were taking me on one of their forest trips, we stopped in a beautiful clearing where I tried using a stick to dig into the forest floor. The rich, black dirt caught my eye, but the resistance it offered was too much for my undeveloped muscles. Still, the small round hole left me somewhat satisfied, but wanting more.


Over the years, I had heard my father, Andrew, talk to my mother about “Miner’s Day.” It came once a year and brought amazing carousel rides, cotton candy, corn dogs, and, most importantly for me, fathers bringing their children to see the mine. I was too young to grasp most of it, but I’d picked up one thing from those conversations: a mine was somewhere people went to dig, and that was all I needed to know.


When the big day arrived, everything was exactly as my parents had described. Once I had my fill of fun and sweets, it was finally time to see the fabled mine I had heard so much about over the past few months.


Everything was going great. I struggled to comprehend the sheer size of the tunnel. I was so distracted by it that, before I even realized it, my father had lifted me into his arms and placed me inside a small mining cart that carried us deep underground.


The following hours passed in a blur. Then people began running in panic. My father carried me toward the exit as another person caught up with us. From fragments of their conversation, I gathered that a tunnel had collapsed and everyone was being evacuated.


Then everything went dark.


The next thing I remember is waking up in a hospital bed. My mother sat crying beside me while my father nervously checked his favorite pocket watch every few moments. I knew something was wrong before anyone said a word. There was this intense pressure inside my head.


It took several years to fully recover. My father never did. The rock that struck my head left me with physical injuries, while the guilt over what happened to me consumed him. My grandfather’s disappearance that same day only made it worse.


On the morning of the second day after the accident, while I was still in the hospital, my grandmother called my father in a panic. His father had never come home. With the help of the police and volunteers, a search began. Before long, several people came forward saying they had seen my grandfather enter the mine on the day of the accident.


The focus of the search shifted immediately, but despite the enormous effort to clear the collapsed passages and search every corner of the mine, they never found him.


Eventually, the search expanded beyond the mine before being called off altogether. The official conclusion was that my grandfather had become trapped in an unmarked tunnel or cavern during the collapse. No one ever confirmed that explanation, or could explain why my retired grandfather had been there at all.


There is one thing I never told my parents. There was no reason to add to the pain and confusion they already carried. That day in the mine, while we were making our way through a tunnel, I turned around.


I saw my grandfather.


He was standing farther down the tunnel, smiling as he waved at me.


Before they released me from the hospital, my father had told me a great deal about my grandfather.


Years later, on her deathbed, my grandmother told my father the truth. His father had continued to go into the mine every day, even after retiring. She had kept it a secret because she didn’t want her son worrying about him.


“I should have told you sooner,” she said. “He never stopped going there.”


My father barely said a word. My grandfather’s health had already forced my parents to spend countless sleepless nights and considerable effort trying to convince him to retire early. In the end, she couldn’t let my father carry that guilt any longer.


I’m ashamed to admit it now, but none of that was on my mind. I couldn’t shake the feeling that something inside me had changed. I had to relearn how to walk, talk, and eat, but those were things I could regain. This was something entirely new.


The urge to dig was still there, buried beneath a primal fear that overwhelmed me whenever I considered acting on it.


My son, Andrew, was born today. It should have been the happiest day of my life. Instead, all I could think about was that it had been five years since my father disappeared. Or at least, that’s what I liked to tell myself. In reality, he had been disappearing long before that day. After the accident, he grew more distant with each passing year, and the rumors surrounding my grandfather only made things worse.


Rumors travel fast in a small community like ours. I still remember one boy asking if I wanted to dig with my grandpa. My confusion made him laugh, and he told the others I would find out soon enough. Someone in my class claimed my grandfather was the one who caused the tunnel collapse. Other kids said people had seen him sneaking into the mine long after he retired to dig illegal tunnels.


It was only a short time before the physical bullying started. During a P.E. class, two kids pushed me down and held me in a pile of dirt. While holding me down, they called me a dirt-eater. Another time, I found rocks and dirt in my shoes. When I was out on break, someone put dirt and rocks in my sandwich, which cost me half a tooth. The stories became even more ridiculous from there.


The kids said my grandfather lured children into the mine to eat them, that he was half mole and cursed to eat human flesh, along with every other kind of nonsense people could invent.


At first, the rumors were manageable. Eventually, my parents transferred me to a school in a nearby town, where I lived with my aunt.


I wish my parents could have left as well, but my father’s job at the mine was our only source of income. More than that, he refused to leave. I once asked him why he didn’t just find another job. He looked at me as if I’d asked the stupidest question in the world.


“This is what our family does,” he said. “Your grandfather did it. I do it. You’ll do it too. It’s what our family has done for generations.”


Three years later, the mine closed, and that way of life ended.


We named our son Andrew in honor of my father. By the time he turned five, my mental health had deteriorated enough that seeking professional help was the only option.


While the accident almost ended my life, the worst thing it left behind was the mental anguish. It began with anxiety and poor sleep, and later turned into vivid, living nightmares. I would wake in the middle of the night overcome with dread, convinced someone else was in the room with me.


One night, I dreamed of waking up in a long, dark tunnel. Somewhere ahead, my father was calling my name, but I couldn’t see him. I followed his voice deeper and deeper, until the tunnel opened into a vast chamber. At its center was a hole so large I couldn’t see the bottom.


For years, I would jump out of bed, hit things, and scream in terror. Eventually, my wife began sleeping in a separate room. That worked for a while, but by the fifth year, her fear and frustration had led us to discuss separation. Then one night, I sleepwalked nearly halfway to my hometown, terrifying my wife and nearly costing me my job.


And here we are.


My psychiatrist prescribed Valium and antidepressants, but she also gave me one assignment: write everything down. She wanted me to describe my urge to dig, how my fear began, and every detail I could remember. She believed it would help her better understand my condition, and that it might also help my wife understand what I’ve never been able to explain.


My wife knows what happened in the mine and about my father’s disappearance. What she has never known is that, ever since that day, my urge to dig and my fear of digging have been fighting somewhere deep inside me.


I hope she’ll understand.


Writing this down has given me a sense of control I never thought possible. Maybe now I’m ready to tell her.


The next six months went better than I ever expected. My wife took everything surprisingly well and became more sympathetic toward me. Slowly, the tension between us faded. We talked more, spent time together again, and for the first time in years, it felt like we were becoming a family again.


The episodes slowed to about once a month, and with all the progress, my psychiatrist believed we were ready to try something new: exposure therapy.


We started small. I simply touched freshly dug-up soil from our garden and watched my wife dig small holes. The first time she handed me a handful of dirt, it felt strange. My hands were shaking, but nothing happened.


A few weeks later, I dug my own. It wasn’t much, but I was proud of it.


As the months went by, my nightmares disappeared as if they had never existed, replaced by dreams of my parents, my grandparents, and places from my childhood. One place stood out above all the others: the clearing where my parents had taken me years ago. I could still picture the clear air and the soft texture of the dark, rich dirt.


I couldn’t explain why the clearing kept appearing in my dreams. Maybe it was simply one of the few places from those years that had stayed with me.


After talking with my mother and doing a little research, I learned that a battle had taken place there during World War II. A small Russian unit had fought German forces occupying the nearby mine. The trees had been cleared to create a defensive position, which explained the large opening in the forest.


That discovery only made me more curious. The thought of finding an old coin, spent ammunition, or some forgotten relic seemed exciting. More importantly, it gave me the perfect excuse to leave the house and use the metal detector my wife had gifted me for my birthday. In reality, people had likely recovered anything valuable decades ago, but there was no harm in looking.


The moment I stepped into that clearing, I forgot all about the metal detector. All I could think about was the first hole I had dug there as a child. The rich, dark soil seemed even more beautiful than I remembered.


What had I been so afraid of?


Hunger hit when I was about a meter down. By then, the hole was maybe a meter and a half across. I’d been widening it as I dug, trying to keep the sides from caving in.


Sitting here now with a sandwich, it’s honestly surprising how far I’ve gotten. I’ll finish my meal and continue for a few more hours, just to see how deep I can go. Who knows, maybe I can come back and dig some more another time.


Looks like I overestimated what I can still do. I went at it for maybe another hour and my body gave up, so I picked up everything and went home, right? Then why am I still in the hole?


At first, I couldn’t make sense of what had happened. It was hard to see, and for a moment, I thought I’d fallen asleep and collapsed. Once my eyes adjusted, I looked up. The opening was far above me.


Pieces of wood lined the walls, seemingly placed there for reinforcement and climbing. It took everything I had to make it out. My hands are raw and bloody, and I’m covered in cuts and bruises. My mouth is dry, with grit caught between my teeth. This constant hunger is eating me from the inside.


The ground seemed to shift beneath my feet. I stumbled, and everything went black. When I came to, there was no light this time, only pitch darkness.


Luckily, my phone is still with me. The battery is down to 30 percent, and there is no signal, but the screen still gives me enough light to see in the dark.


There is no wood this time, but there are plenty of tools used for digging. Why isn’t this place collapsing on me? I genuinely don’t know.


I sat in the dark, wondering what to do, when my hand brushed against something rough but smooth and icy cold. I turned my phone toward it and saw a strange rock. It looked carved.


Tracing its surface, I found a narrow crack outlining a section of rock. Beyond it, a passage vanished from view. It was a long shot, but the thought that this might be an old tunnel from the mine gave me hope. For the first time since waking up down here, I could see a way out.


It feels like there is nothing left in me, but somehow my body is still standing. I grabbed a mining pick from the pile of tools and struck the section of rock. In a few hits, it gave way, sending me plummeting into the hole.


The fall came at an odd angle, my left hand taking the impact and breaking two of my fingers. A piece of my T-shirt is holding them together for now. The pain was intense, but at least it was manageable.


It looks like this is a really old tunnel. Using my phone’s light to guide me along the walls, I occasionally come across strange markings carved into the stone, most of which I don’t recognize. The only ones I recognize so far are 1914, an iron cross, and, later, a sickle and hammer.


After wandering in the dark for what felt like a really long time, my phone battery ran out. With the wall as my only guide, I kept moving until I stumbled upon an oil lamp.


To my surprise, its wick was still burning.


I don’t know how much time had passed by the time I emerged from the tunnel. After so long in the dark, the warmth of the sun felt better than anything I could remember.


It took only twenty minutes to reach my car, and another twenty to get to my childhood home. When my mother saw me walk through the door, she hugged me and started crying. Once things calmed down, she asked a question that caught me off guard:


“Where have you been this past year?”


It took a moment to register: I’d been missing for an entire year. Keeping my composure, I tried to reassure my mother that I was alright, that I wasn’t going anywhere.


She looked at me for a moment before asking, “What happened to your job at the mine?” The shock must have shown on my face because she quickly clarified.


The last time she had seen me, I was heading toward the mine. Apparently, a company working to reopen the mine had hired me.


I have no memory of it.


Before taking a bath, I looked in the mirror and was shocked by how much weight I had lost. Dirt covered me from head to toe, and bruises marked my torso. Maybe from the fall?


I enjoyed a few bites of food while my phone was charging and started getting really drowsy. I unplugged it and slipped it into my pocket. I wanted to call my wife and child before sleeping, to make sure they knew I was alright, but the moment my body hit the bed, I was back in the mine.


The oil lamp was in my hands again, and I stood in a vast chamber. A few steps in, while fumbling with the oil lamp, I suddenly found myself on the floor. My foot had slipped into one of the many perfectly round openings scattered across the ground.


At first, I thought they were just holes. Looking down into one, I realized it continued far deeper than it should have. Then I noticed there were more of them. Dozens. Maybe more.


Some rusted tools lay half-buried in the dirt between them. What confused me was how these tunnels had been dug. They were too narrow to work inside, yet their shapes were almost perfectly regular.


I wandered between the openings for what felt like days, but every direction led to more of them. My phone battery eventually died, and after that, I lost track of time. I was constantly exhausted, but I no longer felt hungry or thirsty.


I should have called my wife before I fell asleep. At least then she would know I made it home.


Did I ever wake up after falling asleep?


There is a giant hole ahead, so wide that the cavern floor seems to end at its edge. I hold the oil lamp over it, trying to find the bottom, but its light only reaches partway down the wall before fading. I can’t tell how far the hole continues.


I think this is it. With nowhere else to go, I’m too tired to turn back. I’ll just sit here. I’m not dead yet, but I doubt anyone will ever find this journal. And even if they do, it might be too late to matter for me or for them.


I fell asleep again.


When I woke up, my lower body was inside one of the circular holes. I spat out some dirt and what looked like one of my teeth, then pulled myself free.


As I got to my feet, my hand brushed against something. I brought the oil lamp closer.


My dad’s favorite pocket watch.


---


Hello, users of r/urges. My name is Andrew, and I was born with an urge to dig.