Horror stories
- a philosopher goes mad studying the meaning of life. Becomes a zombie and kills someone. Told through a series of letters and journal entries. The contradcitions and vacancy in life through study eventually transforms him into a living dead, and he takes to more and more unhinged vices as a distraction from his existential horror, leading up to murder and mutilation, until he is spotted looking ghastly by someone, though being unidentified. I could add a doctors note for when he really starts to lose it that describes the beginning of his physical deformity.
- an average adult succumbs to the stress of life and his sanity slips away. It starts small, but he starts to fantacize about murder until he commits one. No one notices. His life goes on, and he begins to pray for the end of the world. Nothing happens. So he takes matters into his own hands. (Spoiler ending: when he hits rock bottom, he lights a building on fire and traps people inside.)
- turn those ocd anxieties you have checking everything when you leave home into cosmic horror. The reality is that the person is incredibly out of control. What kind of entity? Idk, maybe some indigenous spirit who’s upset that his land was usurped through colonialism. It just the land itself overriding the house.
Start small, with things left on or windows left open. Make this into self doubt.
Then make things more elemental. Rain gets in. The stove feels like a forest fire. The floor becomes damp with dirt.
The house then begins to get more worn out until eventually the guy can’t leave without having a panic attack.
Eventually he’s forced to leave, but the out of controlness follows him.
Other elements to add?
Fear of homelessness, can’t afford elsewhere.
Why is the land like that? Because it’s stolen. How to integrate into the story? Not sure.
-depression as a demon. Follows the character around, unknown to him.