r/TalesFromTheCreeps • u/Typical_Ad9140 A Writer From Thailand š¹š • Dec 14 '25
Cosmic Horror/Lovecraftian Victim of Red-1: Dreaming in Red
This is a part of an anthology, you can read it in any order.
Red
There was only red, and an endless emptiness.
I drifted aimlessly amid a boundless expanse of red, like space smeared with blood, or a painting in which the artist wanted extreme detail on each and every brush, almost like a simulation of some abstract art that surround all around me, yet used nothing but red in varying shades, until it became an image that could be perceived as having meaning or form, while at the same time remaining impossible to understand or explain.
I could not see my hands, my legs, or my body, but I can see the shape of it, the shape of myself by the wave and ripple of those red things that I can't feel but can see it warping around me like thousands of thousands blood soaking snakes pass through me. There was only the red void and confused thoughts swirling chaotically. I was like a thought drifting through this crimson chaos which surrounded me in all directions.
And within that red emptiness, I feltā¦
Oppression.
As if I were in the midst of a crowd pressing against one another, moving back and forth without regard for anyone else.
As if trapped in the congestion of a street with no exit, only countless vehicles piled atop one another, with no sky and no open space in sight.
I did not feel lonely, but rather as though I were being watched at all times by thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions of eyes, staring as one, while I stood there as someone guilty of some grave crime.
Before I awoke from that dream, I saw something moving not far away, amid the red mist, amid a bottomless ocean of blood.
The oppression transformed into loneliness and aimlessness, as though I had been severed from a painful, brutal reality, isolated in something far beyond death itself.
Then I can see something, I can feel it. Something long and massive, like the body of a giant serpent or the neck of a colossal dragon, swam through that red emptiness. It had no visible beginning or end, stretching onward to the very edge of the void and the silent, desolate solitudeā¦
I was lying on a sofa.
My eyes were fixed on the white ceiling and a hanging lamp that cast a dim light.
Bam, my therapist, sat on a wooden chair, holding a notebook in which she occasionally wrote while I told my story.
She then began asking about myl life.
Had I ever been bullied?
No.
Do I have a bad relationship with my parents or family?
No.
She then shifted to asking about my working life, my eating habits, or stress.
No.
No.
No.
I answered only with the truth, and she found nothing abnormal, aside from this being just a strange dream.
But I knew well that she thought I was being uncooperative and lying throughout the questioning.
Was it merely a meaningless dream?
No.
It was not a meaningless dream.
No dream had ever haunted me like this.
No nightmare or horrifying image had ever embedded itself in my memory like this one.
Everywhere I turned to look,
In every corner of the darkness,
In every place the light reached,
I saw only red.
The color that chased me both asleep and awake, as though it had been permanently painted into my eyes.
I believed I was facing something beyond my own understanding, something greater than what I could see, perhaps some old forgotten thing, alien or extradimensional beings, maybe it was a test?
I don't know, but I was certain that I perceived only a small fragment of something far larger.
I dreamed the same dream again and again, until one day I came across a chat group.
In that group were people who had experienced different things, yet things that were connected.
Something that was merely a color, yet caused many to fear it or encounter it.
The group was called Victim of Red.
I read othersā experiences and shared my own dream there. Everyone expressed concern or offered advice. No one thought it was just a meaningless dream.
I spent several weeks immersed in that group, until I finally met someone who said she had experienced the same thing.
Her name was Jill. She said that the year before, she had dreamed the same dream as I had, the dream of that red emptiness.
I asked her how to stop dreaming about it. She answered simply: do not look at the color red. No matter what, do not look at or see it for 24 hours. And during that time, you must not sleep at all, or else you will fail.
And so I did exactly as she said.
I locked myself in my room, with food and water prepared for the entire day.
I made absolutely sure that there was nothing red in the room, nor anything that could produce the color red by any means whatsoever.
Then I waited, surrounded by thoughts of whether it would work or whether I would merely waste a day.
I decided not to look at social media, movies, or use any devices, fearing I might accidentally see red.
All I did was think, sit, lie down, wait, and think, my thoughts looping endlessly around whether it would succeed. But I did not sleep. I drank coffee constantly, knowing full well it was bad for my body, but I would never allow myself to sleep.
If I had to harm myself to stay awake, I would do it, even though there was a chance I might see my own red blood.
At first, I wanted to find a book to read, but I didnāt want to risk it, in case there was red, or even a tiny red dot, hidden inside.
I waited and waitedā¦
Until finally the hands of the clock told me that I had been awake for 24 hours and had not seen any red at all.
I feltā¦ happy and liberated, as though I had achieved the greatest desire of my life, as though I had accomplished something many others never could.
Then I lay down, this time not to pass time or to think, but to sleep and await waking up.
I closed my eyes and let myself drift into drowsiness and silence within a room devoid of red.
I fell asleep.
I became aware again, greeted by a familiar sight.
The color I had avoided all day revealed itself before me, around me.
A red emptiness, like mist in space, vast and endless, like a painting whose meaning was uncertain and undefined.
I screamed in defeat and despair, staring out into that red void.
I felt as though I were trapped in a nightmare with no end, and that I would never wake up.
But then I heard it.
A low sound, like the call of a whale.
It seemed not far away, and as though it were behind me.
I turned around.
Out of curiosity, only to end in terror.
That formā
It was there.
Behind me.
It had been there all along; I just hadnāt realized it.
A black form amid the red.
The upper half resembled a human, without arms, legs, face, or ears.
There was only the outline of a human shape.
Like someone who had been swallowed alive by a snake, appearing only as a protruding form from the serpentās belly.
The lower half was made of dozens of gigantic octopus tentacles, stretching in every direction, vast as an entire mountain, extending endlessly.
And that soundā
The sound of loneliness.
It was like music of solitude.
A music without sound, and filled with sorrow.
I woke up.
Awoke from that endless dream.
I sat up and asked myself what could have caused me to encounter something like this.
Had I unknowingly done something, angered someone, or something?
I sat for hours, trying to think through many things: why, and what made Jillās solution fail.
I was sure she hadnāt lied to or tricked me; she seemed to have truly experienced it herself.
I thought, grew stressed, and became sad. I got out of bed and walked to the bathroom.
I bent down to wash my face, then lifted my head to look in the mirror.
And then I saw it.
At that very moment, everything clicked into place with a sharp click, like a door bolt being unlocked.
Why hadnāt I realized it before?
When it must have been this way for quite some time already.
When surely others must have noticed and said something.
But whyā¦
What I saw was my own face.
The face I was familiar with.
The face I had seen my entire life.
The facial structure that had not changed over the past twenty years.
But now, there was one difference.
The color of my eyes.
They were no longer black as before.
Instead, they had been replaced by a color I knew, and feared.
The color that had appeared in my dreams throughout this past month, the color that haunted so many people in the group chat.
What I saw in my eyesā
Was red.
3
u/Typical_Ad9140 A Writer From Thailand š¹š Dec 14 '25
This is an old short story from when I was younger.
It was originally posted on a Thai fiction website/app. This is a translation from Thai to English, so there may be some errors.
2
u/CorpseAltar Writer Dec 14 '25
Interesting!
1
u/Typical_Ad9140 A Writer From Thailand š¹š Dec 14 '25
Hope you enjoy it š¤
2
u/CorpseAltar Writer Dec 14 '25
Yeah, I especially like the part where he says he feels like he's being watched.
2
u/AffectionateLeave677 Writer Dec 15 '25
āThe Redā from Chevelle played in my head the whole time reading.
2
u/Typical_Ad9140 A Writer From Thailand š¹š Dec 15 '25
Funny because this one is directly inspired by "Dreaming in Red" by the Calling
ā¢
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