As The Raven Dreams Podcast - ATRD Ep. 182 - Cryptid Encounters & Other Strange/Scary Stories

Episode Date: July 2, 2025

Today, on the 182nd episode of the As The Raven Dreams podcast, we have 12 True Chilling stories. These stories come from the shadowy corners of reality, where everyday life takes an eerie twist & ordinary people experience the extraordinary. Today we will be diving into some terrifying Cryptid Encounters and Other True Strange & Scary stories from listeners! If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to like or rate the podcast, and leave me a comment with your thoughts if the platform your own supports it! Scary story episodes 2 to 3 times a week (New stories On Wed/Fri, Comps/remasters on Sundays) If you have a story to submit, would like to find where to listen to the podcast, or want to find me on social media platforms, all of that info can be found at https://www.astheravendreams.com You can also send stories into my subreddit (r/theravensdream) or email them to me at [e-mail] Want to check out some ATRD Podcast Merch? ➤ https://teechip.com/stores/astheravendreams Or for signed merch ➤ https://ko-fi.com/AsTheRavenDreams I wrote a novel, "The Insomniac's Experiment" by Raven Adams! Check it out on amazon (Or you can email me for a signed copy!) Join Patreon to get early access and support the Podcast! ➤ https://www.patreon.com/AsTheRavenDreams Check out my gaming channel with my pal Ghost_Ink ➤ @superNefariousBros On YouTube Disclaimer ➤ Episodes include a content warning for language and sensitive/disturbing content. Listener discretion is always advised. ALL Audio and visuals on this podcast are copyright of AS THE RAVEN DREAMS / RAVEN ADAMS and may not be duplicated, in any format. Bless This Mess. #AsTheRavenDreams #TrueScaryStories #GlitchInTheMatrix Thank you to all of the authors that have stories in todays episode... Elizabeth, Cat Baron, Hidden Fox, Joseph Sturm, Starlight Delight, Sidney, Joseph Sturm, Nadya Bharrat, ZacharyTheScienceGuy, EveryDayNurse, LeeAnne, TropicalBear As Well As Any Author That Has Requested Anonymity. TimeStamps… Midrolls after Stories 1 and 5 1 ➤ 2:01 2 ➤ 13:37 3 ➤ 20:43 4 ➤ 27:48 5 ➤ 35:33 6 ➤ 50:38 7 ➤ 54:17 8 ➤ 56:07 9 ➤ 1:04:58 10 ➤ 1:06:21 11 ➤ 1:19:10 12 ➤ 1:20:52 ----- #TrueScaryStories #AsTheRavenDreams #GlitchInTheMatrix #RedditStories And Remember; You are loved, you are important, and you are valid. Never let anyone tell you otherwise. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Well, hello there, friend. Hope you're having a wonderful day so far. It is the first week of July, which, if I may say, how are we already in July? What happened to 2025? I have no idea. Doesn't feel like we should be in the second half of the year yet. I don't know if I'm just crazy or if anyone has that same feeling as me.

But to me, it just doesn't feel like the first half of the year has been a full half of a year. Yet here we are. then again my first half of the year was pretty insane really it was just these last two months that were crazy um but these last two months have been both the fastest and longest months of my life i swear so anyway hope you're having a great day like i said uh today we have some interesting stories we have some cryptid encounters as i know some of you have been begging me for those unfortunately it's just a matter of scheduling and when they go up on the other side versus this side there is a pretty big delay between the two trying to close

close that gap, but unfortunately, with how I have the schedule, it just, it doesn't close very quickly. So, anyway, cryptic encounters, then we have a collection of other strange slash scary stories from listeners. That is pretty much just a mishmash of stories from beautiful people like yourself. So, hopefully you enjoy the stories, if you do, and you like the podcast, and you're on a platform that allows, that allows rating, what's what I'm trying to say. Consider rating the podcast, again, an honest review, one through five, anything is good for me. If you feel it's one, give it to one, 5 give it a 5. If you have a scary story you want to send into the channel, go to as

the ravendreams.com or email it to me at as the ravendreams at gmail.com. Both are applicable. And the other thing I want you to do is have a good week. Come back in a couple days with the new episode. Let me know how you're doing, how your week went for you.

And yeah, hopefully it's good. Until next time, my friends, much love and enjoy. This is a bit older, but back in 2014, I was a studying wildlife biologists specializing in amphibian research. I had spent many years around that time waiting through swamps in the southeast part of the states, documenting different species and population densities. What I'm about to share is something that happened to me on one of those research trips that still confounds me to this day. Now, I will say, being a biologist

slash scientist, I've always approached supernatural things with skepticism. I believe most have some kind of rational explanations. Misidentified known animals, environmental changes, or illnesses that cause creatures in wildlife, and even plants to adapt to survive. And the rest, I just held on to them being good old-fashioned tall tales. And when it comes to swamps, especially, you were bound to hear some kind of of legend about them any time they were brought up. Anyway, on this particular trip, we had a research team of five that consisted of two graduate

students, myself and a girl named Stacy, one of our professors and mentors named Jerry, and a local guide named Calvin who knew the area like the back of his hand. We were there to survey a potential new species of a salamander, and I was pretty stoked for it. obviously. I love marine biology. But salamanders were one of my favorite little guys to study. And the ones that we were after were primarily nocturnal. So we would be doing this at night. The first two nights passed uneventfully at that.

We collected some specimens, took some water samples, and recorded a lot of data. We even found time to have some fun with it all, too. Calvin was a hoot, and showed us different plants and different uses they have. He told us stories of things that he and his little brother did as a kid in similar swamps, and we all laughed and enjoyed the time together. But on our third night, things started to change. We went deeper in the swamp than we had ventured previously, hoping to have better chances at seeing these salamanders.

The water was darker there, almost black, and by the high concentration of tannins from the vegetation in the water decomposing. and the massive trees lining the swamps only made it that much more intimidating. Being out there in the dark surrounded by those trees, it can really put in perspective how small you really are in our vast world. That's why I love what I do. It was probably around 2 a.m. when we had split into two pairs to cover more ground. I was with Calvin and Stacey went with Jerry. We were probably about 50 yards apart in different channels, but

still with an earshot of each other. Calvin and I were standing in a waist-deep water, headlamps on, scanning the surface for movement, when I noticed it became unnaturally quiet. In the swamps, there is literally always noise. Frog calling, insect chirping, maybe even the occasional splash of fish or turtles, but suddenly there was nothing except the soft sound of water

moving around us as we moved. I had stopped moving when I noticed it, and shortly after I stopped, Calvin did the same. After looking both ways and behind him, he groaned and said, Nah, something ain't right. He scanned the waters with his flashlight, quickly, but also with determination. That's when we heard it, a strange vocalization that I still struggled to describe accurately. It wasn't the hiss of an alligator or a snapper, or the call of any of any. the amphibian that I have ever heard of personally or read about or studied.

The closest comparison I've ever come to, and this is with the help of others that were out there that night, was of a rusty door hinge slowly being opened. But at the same time, it was a lot deeper, maybe slowed down with the vibrato quality that seemed to resonate through the water itself. I could literally feel it through my boots and waiters in my feet. When I heard it, I immediately looked at Calvin. He was familiar with this area. Surely he would know, or at least make me feel more comfortable with the situation.

But looking over at him, he had frozen in place. I tried asking what that was, and he slowly shook his head and demanded that we get back to the boat at once. His voice very serious and tight. Before I could react, we heard splashing from the direction of Stacey and Jericho. followed by Stacey's screaming. We immediately started towards them, struggling to get through the thick mud. When we rounded a bend in the channel, we saw both of them scrambling to get back toward us. Their headlamps on, but Jerry was completely wet and covered in mud.

Jerry started saying something about feeling something on his leg but stopped mid-sentence as a massive displacement of water surged from behind them. It was as if something large had submerged suddenly, but what could it have been? Unfortunately, in a swamp there were a few possibilities, and none of them were good for us. Calvin and I helped the other two across, Jerry being a little frazzled and Stacy a smaller and now terrified woman, and we all got back into our small research boat. Once aboard, Stacy and Jerry began explaining what happened. Stacy said that she saw a dark-shaped movie,

moving through the water, but became nervous by the size. This isn't the first time I had done something like this with Stacy. She wasn't the type to be nervous about getting in knee-deep swamp waters. She was, however, concerned by the size of whatever was below the surface. Her first thought was an alligator, but she said the movement pattern was all wrong. Gators create a distinctive wake when swimming, and she said the way the shape submerged with the precision it did, didn't match either. Jerry also mentioned the shape was far too elongated,

especially where the neck would be, and the movements were too fluid, almost serpentine in motion. Stacey also said that when the light caught it briefly, she could make out what looked like ridges or plates running down its back. I asked them if it could possibly have been an alligator gar, which can get pretty big and have armored scales, but Jerry shook his head no, saying that it moved wrong, too fluid.

But then he also explained why Stacey screamed and why he was covered in mud. While they were looking around, Jerry said he felt something grab onto his leg, explaining how it felt just like a hand, like individual fingers wrapping around his leg and then pulled his leg forward, causing him to fall and startling Stacey. With all of us confused, and to be frank, a little disturbed, we decided to end the night's research early in return to our field station. I was still fairly new to this kind of stuff,

but seeing Jerry and Calvin obviously on edge made the whole thing worse. I remember Calvin using the boat's spotlight, sweeping it across the water behind us, clearly looking or watching for something. I asked him, since he was from the area, If he had any suggestions on what they could have seen and he shook his head, and just didn't say anything for the rest of the ride. He didn't need to say anything, though.

The look on his face spoke volumes. The next morning we went back out there to check on our equipment when I discovered that one of our underwater field cameras, which we had left recording overnight in the area, was now missing. What's worse was that the cable that had secured to the tree had been severed. That cable was stainless steel. It wasn't frayed or broken, but cut cleanly like with a sharp object.

When I brought this information back to the others, Jerry had a look of confusion, where Calvin was not having it whatsoever. He started talking about how there were all kinds of rumors about the swamps out there, how there was something living in them that's been there for years. I myself was curious, especially with what we experienced. the night before. He said that his father had witnessed something similar when he was younger, and so did his nephew, saying he actually got part of it on camera.

He described what the thing looked like when he saw it rise from the waters. He said that it was bigger than a fishing boat, serpentine in shape, with a very long body, but when the front half breached the water, it had very thick plates across its back and long arms. Imagine a snake with thick scales like a turtle, but much larger, and give that snake arms. If I heard this from anyone else, I would think it was someone describing something that a child had drawn. It sounded comical, but the look on Calvin's eyes told me that he was not messing around. This was real, and this was something he witnessed.

Stacey was already on edge, but Calvin wanted nothing to do with the air. area that we were in. He suggested some other areas of the swamp, and after Jerry being grabbed, I think he was just as willing to move on. We moved our research area to a different part of the swamp, and we actually had better results. There was no issue with the sound of the swamp disappearing, and no unsettling vibes either. I don't know if it was related or not, but there was a divide where the water was cut off,

basically splitting it into two parts. Maybe whatever that thing was can't completely breach the water and therefore only sticks to that side. I've tried to do a lot of research on what that thing could have been. I looked up uncommon and rare sightings of creatures in those same swamps, but nothing matches the description or even the size of the thing. I'm sharing this with you because I have had people completely serious. Tell me that it could be some kind of lizard man. but it wasn't even human shaped. The closest thing to a human was that it had arms,

but the size was massive, and it had matching scales or plates to match. To this day, it is still something that confounds me on a scientific level, but the sheer size of it, and the fact that it pulled Jerry under, makes me think that this thing was not happy with us being there, and we were quite clearly inferior compared to it. These are the things that remind me of just how much is out there that we don't know about,

that we don't see or understand. And to be honest, I'm okay with it staying that way. Lasagne sur-gillet, puissance-molyne, for 15 minutes. We're saying that's their dojo. Pre-to-joo? Live the pleasure with the Ojo. The casino in-line that proposes the most recent machine-assed machine-ass-sou and the games of casino in direct.

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that we Hey Raven, I hope life is treating you well. My girlfriend encouraged me to send this story in, and after a bit of back and forth with myself, I decided to go for it. This experience has stayed with me for over a decade, and I still think about it often, especially when I catch the scent of a very particular perfume. I had just turned 14.

My birthday falls near the end of February, which will become important later. A few days after my birthday, I began to notice something strange. Out of nowhere, I started smelling my great-grandmother's perfume. It wasn't subtle or vague. It was a very distinct scent. She had unique tastes and fragrances, and to this day, I've never met anyone else who wore the same one.

It was the kind of perfume that instantly brought her face to mind. At first it would just be the faintest trace in the air, almost like someone had passed through the room moments before I entered. But as the days went on, it became stronger. At times, I genuinely felt like I was the one wearing it, even though I obviously wasn't. I asked my mom and grandma if maybe they found an old bottle and sprayed it, or perhaps if some of my great-grandmother's old jumpers had been brought out. We used to do that.

Hold on to her jumpers and spray them with her perfume as a way of comforting ourselves while we grieved. but they were both confused and adamant. No one had touched anything. Her clothes were all packed away in storage, and neither of them had been using the perfume. I was the only one who could smell it. As each day passed, the scent didn't fade. It followed me,

lingering in my bedroom, drifting behind me as I walked, even clinging to my school blazer. I started to wonder if maybe I was just a match, It. No one else could smell anything. And the more I questioned it, the more I started feeling like I was losing my grip on reality. Maybe I was just stressed out. School had been intense, and I thought my mind was just playing tricks on me. But then the stomach pain started. At first it was a dull ache. I brushed it off as period cramps or maybe a bug going around the school. But it didn't go away. In fact, it got worse. sharper, deeper, and harder to ignore. After a few sleepless nights, I woke up in the middle of the night in agony. It felt like something had exploded inside of me.

I couldn't move. I could barely breathe. I screamed for my mom and stepdad, terrified, crying and clutching my stomach like it was on fire. My mom, half asleep and still skeptical, thought it might be a particularly bad case of cramps. but I knew that something was wrong, deeply, terribly wrong. She called 1-1-1, the NHS non-emergency number, and after speaking to a nurse, she was told to get me to the hospital immediately. I was in so much pain that my stepdad had to carry me to the car.

I couldn't stand, couldn't walk. I was vomiting, shaking, and sobbing. I'm pretty sure half of the street heard me screaming. My stepdad dragged the dog off at my grandparents' house and stayed behind to explain what was happening. So it was just me and my mom in the car. She was in the driver's seat and I was sprawled out across the back seats, curled up and clutching my stomach. That is when things got unsettling. As we drove through the quiet night, that familiar perfume returned, stronger than ever.

It filled the car like someone had sprayed it right there in the back seat. I closed my eyes trying to focus on staying conscious through the pain, but the scent was overwhelming, and then I felt something. A hand, cold but gentle, wrapped around mine. It wasn't my mom. I opened my eyes and looked toward the front seat, only to see that she had both hands firmly on the wheel, focused on getting us to the hospital. She wasn't touching me. But I swear to you that someone was holding my head.

hand. It wasn't frightening. Not in the way you would expect. It was comforting, like someone was saying, I'm here, you're not alone. When we got to the hospital, they rushed me in and began running tests. As it turns out, my appendix hadn't just ruptured. It had burst, like completely exploded. The doctor said the amount of poison in my system from the burst was life-threatening. If I hadn't had surgery within the next few hours, I would have died. Not could have, not might have. I would have died. That was hard to hear.

I was only 14. I hadn't even had my first kiss yet. Hadn't finished high school. Hadn't lived. And yet I was hours away from dying. Now, here's where it all comes together. Remember how I said my birthday is in late February? and how I could smell my great-grandmother's perfume in the car.

She passed away two months before my mom bought that car. She never sat at it, never touched it. There was absolutely no way her perfume could have lingered in that space. I could maybe explain the scent in the house. Maybe it clung to her things, or maybe it was in the air somehow, but not the car. That made no sense. Some people I've told this story to think that, that I was hallucinating,

that the pain or stress caused me to imagine it, or that I was on strong meds. But I wasn't given any medication until I arrived at the hospital and was admitted to a ward. The scent and the sensation of someone holding my hand, that all happened before any drugs. Maybe it was my imagination. Maybe my brain, in crisis mode, made something up to comfort me,

but deep down, I don't think it did. I think my great-grandmother was there with me that night, watching over me, comforting me, guiding me through something that could have ended my life. I'm 25 now, and every so often, I still catch a trace of that perfume. Never as strong as before, but just enough.

Enough to let me know that she's still here and still checking in. And honestly, I find that incredibly comforting. It was the summer of 1998. I was with my then-girlfriend on a short trip not far from where we both lived at the time. Let's say somewhere in Belgium. That's as specific as I'm willing to get. She was about to move away for college, and I was struggling with it,

so we took this little nature escape to talk, to process the change, maybe to decide what we were going to do with our relationship. The place we went to was somewhere I knew from childhood. A local river valley, quiet, rural, a slow meandering stream cutting through farmland and clusters of willows. A typical countryside over here. We stood by the water's edge. It was dark by then, and we were holding each other.

She looked out over my shoulder and I looked over hers. That's when it happened. At first I thought I was seeing the sunset in reverse, like a film being rewound. Something bright orange and glowing rose slowly behind the trees in the distance. The sun had set maybe half an hour earlier, so this made no sense, but it was happening. Literally, not figuratively. A ball of light just climbing up from behind the trees, just like the sun. except the sky didn't react the way it should.

No horizon glow, no ambient light, just darkness. And this thing. I felt something shift in my chest, a tightening. I was about to call out to her when the glowing orb dipped behind the trees again. Gone. Like it had never been there. I turned to her, eyes wide, trying to explain what I had just seen. My voice was shaky.

out of breath. You're not going to believe this, I said. I saw something. Something really weird. And right then, it came back. The exact same orb rose again from behind the trees. But this time my girlfriend saw it too. It climbed into the sky slowly, eerily smooth,

and with it came a ring. A ring of spinning lights. Vivid, saturated colors rotating like a kaleidoscope. Green, blue, red, violet. It was beautiful and terrifying all at once. The lights pulsed, hypnotically. Some of them almost seemed to burn into our vision. Not painfully, but compelling.

Like your eyes refused to look away. She gasped, Oh my God. We both stood frozen. No sound? Just this silent, flowing sphere, maybe 15 to 20 meters in diameter, getting bigger. That's when we realized that it wasn't just hovering, it was coming closer.

Smooth, deliberate, not aggressive, but unstoppable. It was maybe 300 meters away when I panicked. Run. We bolted down to the field where I had parked. Jumped in the car. I drove like a man possessed. The rest of that evening was a blur. We barely spoke.

She couldn't sleep and I barely blinked. The next morning, I suggested that we go back. Maybe we would find something. Tracks, a burn mark, crop circles, I don't know. It was before the days of Google Maps, so we tried to pinpoint the location on an old-fashioned map. We biked there, we searched, and we found nothing. That afternoon I went back again.

again, alone. She didn't want to talk about it anymore. She'd seen it, yes, but she wanted to move on. I couldn't. I had to go. I walked my bike into the woods, through narrowing paths, until even riding wasn't possible. Eventually, I was deep in the part of the forest I barely recognized. And then I heard them.

Voices. Clear, but I couldn't tell what language was being spoken. The words were mum. I crept forward, my heart hammering, and that's when I saw them. Three, maybe four men, standing at the edge of the woods at what I believed had been the sight of the orb. Two of them wore uniforms and the others were in civilian clothes. At first they didn't notice me, but as I stepped closer, one turned. I walked toward him.

Are you here because of what happened last night? I asked. He stared at me, not confused, not angry, just blank. Like I'd spoke in a language he didn't understand. Then he turned to his colleague who was facing away from us and said nothing. That's when it hit me. This guy looked uber American. Not just foreign, but American.

Unfashionable khakis, faded jean shirt, chunky white sneakers. The kind of look you would see on a dad at Disney World. His haircut, his posture, his silence. It's something we easily spot as Europeans. Another man approached, also in plain clothes, but he looked local. Behind him, a uniform officer followed. They came right up to me. You can't be here, the local policeman said.

There's an ongoing federal investigation. Is it about the lights? I asked, from last night. I'm not authorized to comment, please just leave the area now. The American-looking man said something I couldn't understand. Not because I don't speak English, but because he was speaking around me. Like I wasn't even there. It was clear who was in charge. The others defer to him.

He didn't wear a badge or have any ID, but his presence screamed authority. I left, slowly. but I looked back and they were still watching me. Later that day, I told my family and friends. A few weeks later, I returned to the area, but by then it was too late. The place looked normal, empty, like nothing had ever happened. Years later, I asked the local police if they ever had federal or local agents going to that specific area for an investigation. They looked at me like I was crazy.

And those men, I never did. saw them again. Not during traffic stops. Not in town. Not anywhere. This actually happened to me last winter, and I have no idea what it was that I saw. I'm a nurse, and basically I take care of patients from their own home. It might be someone who was just homebound due to a temporary illness or injury, but I've also been there for hospice care jobs, too. One of the reasons I do this and chose this, is because I kind of live in the middle of nowhere kind of town in Pennsylvania. It's a bit of a drive no matter where you go, but I drive a Jeep that gets around really well

and holds all of my supplies. It's a truly rewarding job, knowing I can come to patients, instead of them having to risk the drive or even find one, just to get to the closest hospital that's half an hour away in any direction. Anyway, I know I'm not here to talk to. about my job, so I'll move on, but I just wanted to explain why I'm driving around late at night. It was about midnight, a little past, and I was heading back home after a shift at the sweet old

man's house. He lived in a rural area surrounded by nothing but trees, and the closest neighbor was a few miles away. The winding back roads cut through just as many trees with spotty cell service and barely any street light. Those are the times where I'm cruising with my brights on for most of the drive, until that one random car pops up. I've taken this road many times, so I'm both used to it and the wildlife that I would see. Deer, foxes, sometimes raccoons, and the occasional coyote. I make it home each night because I drive carefully,

especially when driving these kinds of roads late at night. Deer are always a serious hazard. I only had about 15 to 20 minutes left of my drive, and the snow was starting to accumulate on the road. But thankfully, it wasn't slick yet. The part of the road that I was on at that point was pretty much a straight shot, hardly any curves, but slightly downhill, giving me the advantage of seeing what's coming up. That's when I spotted something near the bottom of the hill. First reaction, driving at night on these roads,

I knew it had to be some kind of wildlife. But then I did a double take. It wasn't walking on all four, but rather on two. It also looked generally humanoid in shape, and from the distance I was at, they looked really tall, too. But it wasn't just that they looked tall. They looked seven to eight feet tall,

and they were extremely thin, like unnaturally proportioned. And all this made me pay more attention and realize that its movements were all wrong. It's hard to explain in writing, and I'm a nurse. It didn't walk like a person or any animal that I could think of. Its movements were more jerky, almost like it had stop motion animation, but in real life. To be honest, I had to slow down and blink a few times to make sure my eyes weren't having issues. Each step it took, it seemed to cover more distance than one might think it should.

Once I got closer, the thing stopped in the middle of the road and turned toward my car. But this is where it gets worse. Its proportions made no sense. The arms went down to its knees, and its legs seemed to bend slightly backwards, like a bird. But the creepiest part to me was its face. It was flat, like a human, but it made no sense. Those pictures you see where the face looks photoshopped or pinched smaller and inward, That's what it looked like.

The eyes, nose, and I think its mouth were all nearly dead center of its face. And the rest was just plain skin. It had no hair. Like, it looked like it was bald, which also helped me notice they didn't have ears either. The sight of its head was flat. No ears in sight. I was in shock as I stopped my car entirely about 20 feet in front of it. I didn't want to get too.

close, but I was still curious enough to stick around. For a few seconds, it just stayed as it was, not moving. It didn't even look like it was breathing. Then it started moving again, and I was overcome with this dread that was so intense that I started crying. It bent forward at the waist until its head was almost touching the ground, but its legs remained straight. It stayed in this position for a second, and then, straightened up and twisted its torso around what looked almost to be 180 degrees without moving its legs. They stayed facing forward the entire time. Then in three large steps, it walked over to the

side of the road and jumped into the trees. It stopped right on the edge to where I could still see it, like it was letting me drive past, maybe. I just couldn't bring myself to move. I probably waited 30 seconds, maybe a minute, and then I finally thought I was doing something smart. I reached for my phone thinking I could still get a partial picture of this thing in the trees, but as soon as my camera pulled up and started zooming in, I watched the thing bend back down and take off with incredible speed deeper into the trees. I did snap a picture, but when I looked at it,

all I could see was trees and darkness. I couldn't even make out a slight blur of where this thing was standing. it was gone too fast. I waited there for another minute or two, with my high beams on, waiting to see if it was going to come back. Thankfully, I think, it never did. I put my car back in drive and drove probably 15 miles per hour for a little while, watching the tree line to see if it would come back.

With how terrified that thing made me, I was worried that it would come running out and jump on the car or break a window or something. When I got home, I was still a bit shaky, but the crying did stop. At first I told myself, maybe I was just being emotional and felt bad for whatever that thing was, but then I remembered that sense of dread that I felt watching it. I was terrified. Something about that thing instilled pure fear in me.

Something telling me that I should not have been there and that I should not have seen that. thing. Since then, I have told a few people about it that would care, and I've gotten mixed responses. Some tried to come up with explanations. A sick deer, maybe a human with deformities, but it was the feeling of the atmosphere, the feeling in that moment that didn't feel real. So maybe someone might hear my story and know what I may have seen. Maybe they've had a similar experience and can help me understand what I saw or at least tell me that I'm not alone because I cannot stop thinking about this thing. I still take the roads regularly, sometimes even a night, and I do catch myself looking through

the trees, expecting this thing to be there watching me from the distance. Hello again, Raven, and as always, loving the content on the channel. Thank you for using the stories I've sent in from my crazy life, and I did mention before. that I've got plenty of crazy experiences and stories from my childhood, teen years, and all through my adulthood that I can share with you in the future, as well as stories from my wife, which she's okay with me sharing now too. This story once again takes place during one of your Saturday livestreams, which I will say again to everyone listening, are awesome,

and a great way to spend your Saturday evening with some really cool people. I agree you all should come to one. It's set the reminder, folks. Saturdays are awesome, and I wouldn't be plugging so hard if they weren't. I'm an unpaid solicitor for the Saturday community nights, and I'm proud of it. Anyway, this story takes place a couple of weeks back during the live stream where Raven played the horror game that started off like a kid's game. I think it was called Julian and friends.

Correct me if I'm wrong. No, you were correct, and that game was terrifying. I was once again at work on a night shift at Emperor's Pizza making dough, and if you've heard one of the recent stories Ravens shared, a lot has been going on at my job due to a dispute between our pizza place and the donut shop down the strip from us. It was actually around 6.30 p.m., and I was working a night shift because my wife and I had a meeting about the movie being made about our lives,

and I switched from a morning shift to not lose hours. Emperor's Pizza was busy, and for the most part, everything seemed to be normal. chaotic as most fast food places are but normal for us. A rather heavy-set man came in sporting a large black t-shirt with the members of kiss on it, some off-colored green shorts and a baseball cap with a local sports team emblem on it, and I was talking with my co-worker about placing an order, my co-worker who will call Andy, is a proud and flamboyant type. And none of us have a problem with it, but sometimes we have customers that try to

to pick fights with him because he comes off more feminine than they like. And I personally don't like bullies, and am not going to stand for anyone picking on anyone, period. So, whenever I hear a coworker getting harassed or attacked by a customer, I always go up front and try to mediate and regulate, even though I'm technically just the dough guy. Andy is actually the shift lead, which is like a type of manager that's assigned to specific shifts, and then we have our actual store manager who we already agreed to call Carly from a previous story. The heavy set guy in the story gets no protection.

His name is Justin, and you'll see why he doesn't get the privilege of a pseudonym in this story in just a few minutes. Justin came in and was speaking with Andy, and we actually had run out of regular dough, which I was currently making extra batches of. So Andy told Justin that all we currently had were a few of, our deep dish options, wings, and some other combos. Justin yelled out,

What the F? And basically started throwing a fit about how we didn't have anything, and Andy told him that we do have options, just not the ones he might have wanted. But we would have more dough ready in about 30 minutes. Justin apparently didn't like this since he began to berate the company and start bad-mouthing our service. But then he switched his focus, as Andy,

was apologizing for the lack of dough. Justin started making comments about why Andy was, quote, talking like that, and how he needed to, quote, stop trying to act like a girl. And really, he just started in on Andy in the worst way. Andy, of course, became enraged and started to reprimand Justin, basically refocusing the issue on how Justin was upset about the pizza and not about how Andy was talking. But Justin insisted, and eventually started making threats.

How about I come around that corner and slap you straight? Justin threatened, and that's when my ears really went up. There are two things I don't tolerate at my job, and the second one is anyone threatening to come behind the counter and do anything to my coworkers. I racked the last few stacks of dough and headed up front as Andy and Justin were now arguing back and forth, loudly over the counter.

And I basically did the stereotypical, Whoa, whoa, what's going on here? To break up the argument. Justin looked me up and down, and I told my friend Andy that I would handle this from here, and that he could head back into the kitchen to calm himself and call our manager. Justin told me a story about how Andy sister-girled him with attitude, and told him that he couldn't order at our store and so on. I mentioned to him that I heard part of the conversation,

and I introduced myself as the dough guy and told him the reason we don't have dough is because we had an earlier rush of large orders, and I was currently making double the dough we needed to stay afloat. I apologized and tried to offer him something else for free, something the manager Carly lets me do because I've broken up plenty of customer fights with coworkers, and even though it wasn't my job, I was apparently good at it. But no, Justin didn't want that. I don't want anything for free.

I want that little punk kid to come effing apologize to me and beg me not to kick his ass. Justin demanded to me. I kindly told him that I couldn't make anyone do anything here, and also told him that cursing and yelling wasn't going to fix the problem, and that if he wanted to leave, he could leave. Justin told me that I needed to put a muzzle on Andy, to which Andy shouted from the kitchen that he could kiss his ass. And they started arguing all over again.

Justin began moving to the side of the counter that opened up to our kitchen space, and I paralleled him to keep him from entering the space. Because again, I wasn't about to let anyone come behind the counter, or they would see the other side of me that my wife always tells me to avoid using. He started demanding for Andy to get on his knees and beg for forgiveness, and Andy, being the witty comeback guy he is, told him that what he was suggesting was oddly some, for someone who just spewed a plethora of homophobic slurs at him.

I told Andy that I would handle it and told Justin that he was dealing with me, and that he had nothing else to say to Andy. Then I told Andy to call the manager and to prepare to call 911 if Justin came behind the counter. What the hell are you going to do if I do come back there? Justin threatened me, and at that point I took off my hat and accepted that this might be the day I lose my job. Don't let the uniform full you, sir, but I'd really not have to go there.

If you come behind this counter, I will forcibly detain you because this is getting out of hand, I told him. I noticed his eyes kept going to my chest and back to my eyes, and then I saw him take a step back and smile in a sneering sarcastic way, as he nodded a few times and then looked past me at Andy who was holding his phone and the store phone, one of which had our manager Carly on speaker. Tell you what, I better not see either one of you outside this store, or it'll be a whole different conversation. Justin told me back. He left after that, and for a second, I stood in the space to see if he was going to come back in, and he didn't. He got into his white's Ford F-150 outside and left.

I remember looking at the front of the truck and seeing that he had a custom U.S. Army license plate on it, and then I realized that when he looked down at my chest, he was eyeballing my dog tag, which oftentimes gets mistaken for a military dog tag quite a bit. For clarity to anyone out there who hears this story and might be a veteran, I was never in the armed forces, but I was part of a civilian program that ran through a martial arts and physical training facility, and we used to host private classes for police officers and people who were about to enlist in various branches.

After my old master gave me the nickname Hidden Fox, I was given a dog tag as a welcome gift. I wear that dog tag all the time, and when I'm at work, I put my wedding band on it to keep it from getting lost or stuck in the dough that I make by hand. I'm not able to share details about what all we trained in or taught, but I'll say I specialized in scenarios centered around,

what if you can't get to a firearm and spatial awareness? I digress. After Justin left, we went back to work, and I did pop in and out of the stream that Raven was hosting that night, trying to have a better night because, again, I do have a big issue with bullies, and I can't stand seeing people get hurt or picked on for being different. Everything seemed to get better for a couple of hours or so.

And then Justin's truck came back about, 30 minutes before closing time. This time he didn't get out, but he sat in his truck in front of our store just watching us. I can see the front parking lot from the dough room in most of the kitchen, and front counter can be seen from the large picture windows in front of our store. Andy was cleaning up, and I told him that the guy was back because I could see him staring daggers into the front windows.

And, eventually he looked over at me, and then back into the front kitchen area. I told Andy to call 911, and I shot a text over to our manager to let her know the situation. Wasn't apparently over just yet. I kept thinking of what we could do, because at some point, Andy would have to leave, and our other co-worker was already finishing up dishes and starting on sweeping and mopping. I'd still be there since I had a little more dough to make for Sunday. Andy called 911 and told the dispatch that he needed a police unit sent to our store

because a man who came in earlier and verbally attacked him was now back at the store, sitting in the front parking lot in his truck. I went to go check the security monitors at the manager station, which was a small desk just outside the doer room, and zoomed in on the front parking lot camera so that I could see just what Justin was doing. And that's when I saw him place what was clearly a hand. gun on the front dashboard of his truck. I told Andy to relay that to the dispatch and to lock the rear door since the lobby was already

closed for the evening, but we often kept the back door unlocked so we could shuttle our trash to the dumpster out back. Something I warned them several times over was a huge security issue, and after this event, my coworkers listened to me. Justin stayed in his truck, staring into the store like he was contemplating doing something stupid. And I remember my mind reeling over the ways this could go south if we weren't careful. Besides the single back door, there wasn't another way out of the kitchen. The front was all glass windows, and if Justin decided to shoot the glass, there wasn't anything else to keep him

from getting in or getting to us. Our best bet would be to make a run for the back door, but there was a straight line of sight from the front counter area where I stood in front of Justin before, to the back door, and a shooter could fire unrestricted into the kitchen area. There weren't enough options for us if Justin intended to come in. Fortunately, within a few minutes of the 911 call, two police cars were on site up front with their lights on, and another police SUV was rolling up the drive-through the wrong way. They, of course, ordered Justin out of his truck and went through the whole process of detaining him, searching his vehicle and taking his weapon from the dashboard.

An officer knocked on our door and asked us to make a statement. Got our info. Meanwhile, outside, another officer was talking to Justin from the back seat of a police car. I remembered him yelling about how his rights were violated, and that he hadn't done anything, and while this was technically true, since he was just sitting in his truck at the time, the situation earlier, including the threats he made, were enough for the police to take this seriously. The camera footage had no audio, but Andy showed him the video of everything Justin did from the moment he came in,

to the point he returned to his truck and put his gun on the dashboard. The officer told us that, even with all the evidence, he hadn't done enough for them to hold him, except maybe charge him with something like disturbing the piece. But they were searching his truck and had, confiscated his handgun. A second officer came in, and this one we recognized from a few weeks prior. He was the same officer that was on site after the situation with John being beat with the baseball bat.

Geez, you guys are always having some colorful evenings, aren't you? The officer joked with us. He asked what happened, and Andy and I recapped it once more. I remember they did end up taking Justin away in the cruiser, but I'm not actually sure why. And we did have an officer stay in his cruiser out front until he closed. He said he would do it in exchange for a free pizza. And even though he was joking, we did give him one before we cut the oven off to clean it. The officer hung around for a bit as I wrapped up on dough, and then he left.

And I remember getting in the car and seeing Justin's truck still parked out front, wondering why some people are so adamant that everything has to go their way, and that they feel like they can bully people. I was happy to be returning home to my wife, and that nothing happened. But this job has seriously been a pain ever since I started working here last year. It was originally just a part-time job I was doing to help make extra money to pay for our first home as a married couple. And eventually, it turned me into needing this job when a few contracts I had were terminated, due to a lack of funding. But as much as I love making pizza dough, this job is a pain, a headache, and I am seriously looking for something else to do part-time, because I don't get paid enough for all of this.

Hi Raven. Long-time listener, love the podcast. My story happened about two years ago. I'm afraid of flying but have a love of cruises, but being from Michigan, that means we take a lot of cross-country trips by car. When we take these trips, we leave about 5 p.m., so my two kids will be asleep for the bulk of it. We mostly drive when it's dark out. Now, a little background. My friend passed away at the beginning of February after hitting black ice on the highway, and this story happened within a week of the anniversary of her death. So I requested that we take back roads until we were out of the snow and ice, as it's a huge phobia of mine now.

No biggie. We drove until we were out, and then when we tried to switch the GPS to highways, it just kept taking us on back roads. We thought maybe the GPS was bad because we were in the middle of nowhere, so we stopped at a McDonald's. Still no luck. We kept trying to no avail. At around 3 a.m., in the middle of West Virginia, it was just me and my boyfriend awake. he was driving. All the sudden, to his left,

I spot what I can only describe as what ectoplasm would look like, but it's massive. There were these two shapes floating within the trees, almost moving how a mermaid swims, or like a fish. I kept staring and said nothing.

Moments later, my boyfriend asked me if I saw it too. I confirmed that we saw the same things, but when we looked at him, back, they were both gone. There were no houses for miles, so we eliminated the possibility of a fire, plus it definitely wasn't smoke. We both had a sense of dread and kept quiet for about five minutes. Finally, the GPS was magically taking us to the highway entrance, despite having given up

on trying an hour before. Once we were safely off this really creepy backroad, we brought it up again. I tried googling the cryptids it could be, or really any explanation, to no avail. What's weirder is we were taking stops along the way to spots where cryptids had been seen, or we were going to until that happened. We got to Miami as fast as we could and didn't talk about it again. We still don't because even talking to each other about it makes us both nervous and on edge. A year later, I finally told someone else about it,

my friend, because I knew she wouldn't think we were crazy. She did find a Reddit post that described the same thing, moving like a fish and all, but that's it. I've never been able to find anything else like it. The strangest part to me was how it was like we were supposed to see it. We couldn't get off that road until after we saw whatever it was that we saw. I still have dreams about it, but thankfully haven't had another encounter. and we don't take the back roads ever anymore.

Not a lot of strange things have happened to me, but this one was for sure one that I'll never forget. Thanks for letting me submit this. It feels good to finally tell someone else. I'm just glad to get it off my chest. My brother and I were out driving in my car with him behind the wheel. We pulled up to a red light and waited. At that moment, I felt a familiar sensation.

another random nosebleed. I always kept paper towels in the car for this exact reason, so I reached back to grab them. But for some reason, they weren't where I usually kept them. As I turned to check the back seat, I noticed something. A car in the distance speeding toward us way too fast. My gut told me that something was wrong, and I quickly told my brother, and he started watching it too.

As it got closer, it became clear. clear. That driver wasn't stopping. Without hesitation, my brother laid on the horn and ran the red light, turning right just in time. The other cars at the intersection, alerted by the horn, hesitated, just long enough to see what we saw. The speeding car blew straight through the intersection without even tapping the brakes. No one was hurt. No one honked at us in frustration. If anything, it seemed like the warning had saved others, too. But here's what gets me.

I always kept those paper towels behind the seats, yet somehow, that day, they were in the trunk. If they had been where they were supposed to be, I wouldn't have turned all the way around. I wouldn't have seen that car coming. Was it just a coincidence, divine intervention, or quantum immortality? I'll never know for sure, but I do know that we were meant to make it out of that moment, a lot. Raven, I appreciate the way in which you handle difficult stories with care and compassion. That's why I feel you are the best choice for telling this one. I'll try to get a couple of my stories typed up and sent soon.

I've had quite a few unexplainable experiences throughout my lifetime, such as glitches, paranormal and precognitive dreams. My scariest encounters and experiences have been with humans. My childhood was full of emotional, verbal, and physical abuse. My teens and 20s filled with trauma that affected me greatly, but the story that has periodically popped into my mind throughout the past 30 years isn't mine. I often think about the two main characters. We'll keep anonymity for their privacy and call them April, Josh, and Sharon.

In the late 80s, April, 7, Josh, 5. and their mom, Sharon, 32, had just moved from another state into my town. Sharon had just divorced their dad. She enrolled them at my school, a small private school for a strict bunch of Christian Protestants. It was common for different age groups and grades to interact and know each other. April was a grade behind me, one year younger, but we got to know each other well between school and church. I liked April a lot. She was always kind to me.

I knew who Josh was, being her little brother, but I did not know him well. Sharon, their mom, started working, going to college to become a nurse, and began to occasionally date. My older sister would sometimes babysit April and Josh when needed, but this sister was five years older and didn't really talk about anything with me. This was the 80s and 90s, so the majority of us were Latchkey kids. From a young age, most kids I knew were outside playing and getting into all kinds of things without adult supervision, from the time school ended until the streetlights came on. However, April and Josh weren't really able to interact with the other kids outside of school and church. They lived in the same neighborhood as me.

I would move all throughout the neighborhood playing. with different groups of kids and switching up between the two parks available, about a mile apart. I never saw them out, and no one else ever seemed to see them out playing. Sharon had to take out loans to attend college, and in the early 90s she had earned her nursing degree, and was able to get hired immediately. However, the 23,000 a year just wasn't enough to keep up with the cost of living and pay back the loans. and she was struggling financially. The credit cards being used to supplement for bills and purchases were piling up.

In the mid-90s, Sharon went to purchase a gun. At that time, there was a three-day cooling off period between when she applied for and was able to pick the gun up from the store. On that third day, a Thursday, Sharon picked up her gun and returned home with it. That evening, as April, now, now 13, and Josh, now 11, slept, Sharon wrote a note, disconnected the phones, and barricaded her front door. She then proceeded to enter the room where April and Josh slept. Sharon shot both of her children as they lay sleeping and turned the gun on herself.

Sharon was dead immediately from herself-inflicted gunshots, however, April and Josh were not. Again, this took place Thursday night. April and Josh both suffered damage to their spinal cords and did not know who had shot them. They spent the first night and day lying on their beds hoping that help would come. Friday evening, Josh, who had suffered a gunshot wound to his neck, crawled to the edge of his bed to reach the phone. When he realized it was dead and he could not call for help, he used the handset to bang on the wall hoping to draw some attention,

for assistance. While banging the phone, Josh fell off the bed and onto his dead mother's body. As a result of the gunshot wound to her neck, April could only move her back. She made herself fall down to the floor and slowly moved her body while on her back toward the living room to attempt to find the other phones. She could do nothing with the barricaded front door in her state and was unable to locate the other phone. She later found out because her mom had hit it. April proceeded to turn the TV on at full blast in hopes of drawing attention to help her and Josh. I cannot even begin to imagine what the next several days were like for them. They lay in those positions without food or water, with gunshot wounds from Friday until Tuesday.

They were conscious most of the time praying and encouraging each other. On Tuesday, coworkers of Sharon were concerned about her no-call-no show since Friday. One co-worker went to the house, found that there was no answer and heard the TV blasting. She proceeded to contact the police. The police found both children, Josh still lying with his mother's dead body, and April still on the floor in the living room. They had been shot Thursday evening, had moved into these positions on Friday where they remained until Tuesday. In the note left by Sharon, she was depressed. and she was overwhelmed with financial burdens.

She was plagued by migraines and nightmares and she had not had any long-term luck with dating and did not see any way out of it all. She already felt that she was neglecting her children with the time spent working and would neglect them further if she worked more to attempt to dig them out of debt. In her religious fervor, she believed they would suffer without her and be better off if she sent them to heaven with Jesus.

April and Josh's injuries were critical and had caused some paralyzing damage. Their grandmother and two aunts came to be with them and take them back to their home state once they were stable. I experienced some dark times, but I cannot even begin to imagine what their experience caused them to live with. Finding out their own mother attempted to take their lives. Josh having to spend four days lying with his mother's body. both of them spending five days without medical help, food or water with gunshot wounds to their necks, and not knowing if help would arrive on time? This tragedy has stayed with me throughout the years.

I'm a mother. I've struggled financially and mentally. In my darkest moments when I had thoughts of taking myself out of the equation, I could never fathom trying to harm my children or end their existence. Even if I believed they would suffer in this world, I could never. There is always hope, even if you're struggling to see it. It's there waiting for you to turn away from the fear and pain and see it, feel it, even for just a moment. Please, if you are struggling in any way, ask for help. Those who love you cannot know what you need unless you ask.

If you shift your perspective ever so slightly, you'll catch a glimmer. of hope. I never spoke to April again after this occurred, but I have thought about her often over the years. I hope her and her brother have found ways to heal from the mental and emotional trauma this caused. I've occasionally searched for them since social media became a thing, but when I begin looking, I always wonder how I would even initiate conversation. Would it do them more harm than good to remind them and bring it all back to? to the surface.

Even if I never mentioned a thing about this experience, I am a reminder from this time in their lives. I've tried to leave out enough details that no stranger could locate the story and identify them, and I only ask that if your curiosity allows you to locate it, please let them be. Don't spread their identities. Thank you, Raven, for all that you do. We greatly appreciate you and your sincerity. I love walking at dusk.

Sometimes I listen to music and sometimes in silence. I would usually walk up a steep hill, a name that I will not say, and I left a little late one time, so it was dark as I was leaving. This hill was right next to my house, so it wasn't that far. Anyway, I was walking down with my dog, Sparky, and all of a sudden he started barking at the bushes. Then, a man probably in his house. late 60s jumped out of said bushes.

He asked if I was alone. I said, no, under my breath, and then started speedwalking. After two minutes of running, Sparky stopped and lifted his ears up, and then the man jumped on me and was trying to grasp something in his pocket. It was a knife. My dog bit him on the arm, and he jumped and started screaming. I was able to run away, and I ran into my house, locked the house. doors and dialed 911. I told him what happened and they said that they would drive around the area.

They did end up finding him, and he did get locked up. I've never been so thankful for my dog. So, this is going to be a little different than some crypted stories you've read before, but it was still something that happened to me that I wanted to share with you. I've been a photographer for many years, primarily focusing on landscapes, I've done this independently and for myself, and I've taken them for clients, and I've also been contracted to take photos for surveyors. I've been all over the U.S., but my favorite place to photograph is the American Southwest. It actually got me to move to New Mexico for that reason, too. I've witnessed and captured dust storms that made midday look like night, flash floods that make new canyons and minutes,

and those calm gorgeous sunsets that paint the sky in colors that most photos never could quite capture, even with the most advanced equipment. But something happened to me back in 2021 during a trip to Utah that defies any natural explanation that I've been able to find. I was planning on checking out a national park that I hadn't visited before. I was planning on exploring part of a less visited area due to it being so isolated, and, to be honest, less eventful for a normal tourist attraction. There weren't any places to stop for a picnic. Not much shade, either.

The climb was steep, and it probably looked a bit plain to the normal person, but I loved the vast openness of those canyons. I registered my planned route with a ranger as required. That way they knew where I would be, but otherwise I would be entirely alone. I was a good way through my trek, and had spent hours already taking photos of everything from different angles. Mood shots, all of it. As the sun moved across the sky, casting shadows on rocks and sandstone, I took more photos as the shadows were creating new views that I loved.

The idea that you could only witness these shots at specific times of day, and that I could capture these moments, made me excited. I was so absorbed in my work that I didn't notice the light beginning to fade until the shadows had grown long enough to swallow the canyon floor. When I realized that I was still a few hours away from a good stopping place, I quickly packed up my gear. But as I packed up, I saw some of the sand moving oddly along the canyon floor. Now, if you've spent time in the desert, you know that sand shifts constantly from the wind, forming ripples and, patterns at time. It was almost like that, but at the same time, different.

A lot different. It was more deliberate, almost purposeful. It was like small streams of sand were converging and moving around the slight breeze that was flowing through the canyon. I watch as those same streams gathered into formations, formations that suspiciously looked human-sized but narrower, with elongated proportions. There were three of the three of the same.

them, composed entirely of swirling sand particles that somehow maintained their form despite the impossibility of the whole thing. I stood in awe of what I was seeing. I tried to come up with an explanation, too. Maybe it was due to the wind catching the pillars and boulders, causing the sand to form like that. Maybe I was dehydrated and just seeing things. Unfortunately, it had me so transfixed that I had totally forgotten about grabbing my camera to capture the site.

That was until it appeared that they were moving toward me, not walking exactly but flowing across the ground while still maintaining their vaguely humanoid shapes. I backed away, now trying to pull out my camera. I was in awe when I first saw these things, but I finally came to and started fumbling with my bag to set up the camera. Because, of course, as we photographers do,

we document first, run later. I managed to take several quick shots before turning to make my way out of the canyon. Between it getting later and darker in Utah, I knew that could get dangerous. Not to mention, whatever these things were, were closing in. The path ahead required climbing up a steep sandstone slope to reach the rim, and I was about halfway up when I messed up. I had gripped on to a seemingly solid protrusion of rock when it crumbled beneath my fingers. Time seemed to be in slow motion as I felt myself begin to fall back, with nothing to stop my fall.

It wasn't too steep of a fall, as in I wouldn't have died, but I would probably be severely injured. I watched as my camera bag pointed straight down, pulling me with it. Most disturbingly, the sand formations suddenly raced toward me with impossible speed. My first reaction was to throw one arm up to protect my face. closing my eyes as I braced for impact. But instead of hitting the ground, I felt something grasp my right arm with surprising strength, yanking it upward.

The force jolted my bag loose, and I heard it tumble to the ground. Yet I remained suspended, one arm held firmly by something. I looked down with disappointment at my back, but then it dawned on me that something caught me or had grabbed me. There was nothing around that I could have been snagged on either. That's when I looked up and found myself dangling from the ledge.

My right arm extended upward at an uncomfortable angle. Sand swirled around my wrist and forearm. It wasn't solid. I could see right through it. But it wasn't insubstantial either. Then I swear I felt something pulling me up until I could grab onto another ledge with my other hand. And at that moment, my right? right arm was freed. I put my foot on a solid piece of rock and pulled myself the rest of the way up.

I sat on the ground and looked around as I watched the sand formation in front of me disperse into the air. After taking a moment to collect myself, I remembered my camera and crawled to the ledge to look over. There at the bottom, I saw my bag next to more sand. It wasn't moving, just maintaining its position as if waiting for something. I don't know why I did this, but I said, I said out loud, please don't let it be broken. Don't let something or someone snatch it up before I can get to it. I found a better path down, as I scooted down it's on my bottom. Once on the same level, I slowly made my way to my camera bag.

I saw that sand figure still lingering nearby, so I slowly reached from my bag. And once again, said out loud, I'm just going to reach down and grab this. As I got closer, I swear the sand moved. and I grabbed my bag, and then went back to my spot that I had scooted down and crawled back up. Once back to the top, on solid ground, I regained my composure and started making my way through the trail. But before I left that area, I heard a voice. It was warped, almost like someone trying to talk underwater. I couldn't tell what was said, but I knew that there were words.

Something was talking or trying to. And with the voice, I saw another same. figure in the distance. The disembodied voice did it for me. Putting that with the sand then led me to the conclusion that these things were living, and I couldn't really explain that. I held on to my bag and I ran. I didn't stop.

I ran until I reached one of the rest buildings. This one was unmanned, but it had restrooms, a drinking fountain, and some vending machines. I sat on one of the benches to catch my breath. After about 10 minutes or so, I told myself that I needed to get going. It was going to be dark quickly, and I wasn't planning on camping, nor did I have any camping supplies. So I had to get back to the entrance. Thankfully, I can get into the right mindset and get done what I needed to,

so I got back to the entrance probably in record time. This entire time, however, I was in a sort of trance, kind of just going through the motions. I was even on autopilot as I drove back to the hotel. Once there, I undressed, preparing to take a cold shower, when I noticed how sensitive my arm felt when my shirt touched it. I looked down and saw that my right wrist and lower arm was red and sensitive to the touch. It was like it had been rubbed raw by something rough. A rock, maybe, or sandpaper.

It's like it all came rushing back to me at that moment. I went back to my camera and tried to turn it on, and it wouldn't. I opened the back compartment where the rechargeable batteries and SD card was, and to my surprise, sand fell out of it and onto the desk. The camera was in a case, and in my camera bag. The bag had a few camera lenses, sunscreen, my sunglasses, and a few other small items in it. So how could it have been filled with sand? That's when I noticed the lenses were completely smooth. scuffed. They weren't cracked, but once again it looked like something rough had been

rubbed across them. I couldn't make sense of how that was even possible. I could see it being cracked from the fall, maybe the plastic even being chipped or damaged, but to have full scuffs like that, similar to how my wrist now was, it made no sense to me, until I remembered the sand figures. Could that even be possible? Were those things really alive? And did they They save me? Is that what had a hold of my arm? I mean, with the weird rash or whatever it was in my arm, it's the only thing I could think of. So maybe they tried to save my camera, too?

I left the hotel the next day. It was supposed to be a simple trip, so I went home eagerly wanting to check the memory card in my camera since it wouldn't power on. Thankfully, it did work, but the photos were underwhelming, to say the least. There were my initial photos that came out fine, but closer to the last photo, they weren't normal, nor were they something I would normally take. Some had dark spots on them like there were shadows on very specific parts of the pictures. And closer to the end of them, they became pretty fuzzy, like a photo I took on my first camera phone. But how was that even possible?

This was an expensive cannon camera. I didn't have a filter to make photo. photos look like that. It didn't make sense. Something was eating at me that my wrist and camera and lenses, and the photos all had to be related to those sand figures. I started looking into it, searching online some about sand figures, but for the most part all I kept getting was info about some little known indie film, about ghost figures that could control the wind around them. sand, dirt, trees, leaves, just things like that. There was a brief snippet claiming it was based on a true legend, but then I couldn't even find information on what they claimed to be in the movie. So I'm at a loss.

Something was out there that day with me, and contrary to what I'm used to with cryptids or unidentified creatures, it didn't seem to be afraid of me or wants to hurt me. In fact, it saved me. It saved me from a potential awful injury. And to be honest, I'm thankful for it. I just had a raw arm for about a week, but I got a good cream that helped. I do want to go back and see, while better prepared, if I can get better photos or maybe a video of it, at the risk of my camera.

Unfortunately, life does what it does, and I haven't had the time or money to go back out there. But when I do, mark my word, I will share any. anything I come across. In the meantime, I would love to hear if anyone has heard of these creatures and what they mean or their purpose, and why I was chosen to be saved. When I was about eight or nine, my brother, a friend and I went fishing at the dam. We were having fun, casting our lines and laughing, when I suddenly lost my footing. The downgrade of the dam was slick with slime, and before I knew it, I was slicked.

sliding down straight into the water. At first I tried to resurface, but something wrapped around my foot, holding me under. A fishing line, maybe? A panic should have taken over, but instead a strange sense of calm washed over me. Then, clear as day, I heard a voice, not from anyone around me, but from somewhere deeper. Maybe inside myself, telling me to raise my hands. I did exactly this. Down the way, two adults must have seen what was happening.

They ran over, reaching into the water, and searching. Somehow, against all odds, they found my hands. They pulled with everything they had, and finally I broke free, gasping for air as they dragged me on to solid ground. I don't know how long I was under, but I never lost my breath. Never screamed, never let fear take over. When it was all over, I couldn't thank those two men enough. They were my heroes.

Even now, I think back to that moment. The voice, the calm, the impossible timing of it all. And I wonder, how much do we really understand about this reality? Hey, Raven, I just want to start by saying how much I appreciate your podcast. I often listen to you and other narrators when I'm working out at the gym or going for walks with my mom. Your content has been a source of comfort and inspiration for me, and lately it's even made me consider starting my own podcast to share experiences like mine. I'm a 31-year-old female, and for as long as I can remember, I've had vivid dreams that felt like messages from God.

I wouldn't say that I was always the most spiritual person, but I've always believed in a higher power. My family is Hindu, but because I attended Catholic school for kindergarten and first grade and went to church growing up, I've always had a stronger connection to Christianity. The experience that I want to share happened when I was 26, just before COVID. At the time, I was struggling with serious health issues, specifically constant vomiting, and I was also in a very bad place mentally due to events that I won't get into. One night, I had a dream where angels appeared to me. They told me to rekindle my friendship with my cousin

whom I was angry with at the time. I didn't take the dream too seriously at first, but then something happened that changed my life forever. A few nights later I had what I can only describe as a near-death experience. I remember feeling my soul literally leave my body. I could see myself from above and then I began floating upward. First I saw the street outside and then the vastness of the universe, and before I knew it, I was in heaven,

sitting on a cloud, and that's when I saw Jesus. He spoke to me. He told me that everything that happened to me and my family was not meant to be, that it was the wrong outcome. He said that I needed to make peace with my cousin because God was not pleased with what had happened to her. He also told me that God wanted to perform a miracle for us, and that's in time, I would begin to understand everything.

When that time came, he said, I needed to start praying. The next thing I knew, my soul was being pulled back into my body. I woke up suddenly gasping for air. It was the most intense experience of my life, but here's the truly incredible part. After that encounter with him, my health started improving. The vomiting that had plagued me for so long finally stopped. However, I continued to experience out-of-body episodes until 2021. Then in 2022 I had another dream.

In its, my cousin's father appeared and admitted that he had caused everything. At the time I wasn't sure what to make of it, but then last year, my grandmother revealed the truth to me. My cousin's father had in fact been behind everything that led to my mental distress all those years ago. He wasn't just responsible for my suffering. He was the root of the conflict within my family as well. His actions not only damaged my family's relationships, but he also completely ruined my cousin's life, his own daughter. What's worse, my grandmother also told me that my cousin's stepmother had used witchcraft against my cousin, that explained why my cousin had been acting out of character for so long.

It was all part of a bigger picture that I had been blind to until now. Hearing this truth was a turning point for me. It confirmed everything I had experienced, and I knew that. then that I needed to go on a spiritual journey. I started going back to church and devoting myself to God in a way I never had before. For the longest time, I thought I was crazy, but after listening to the stories on your podcast, I realize I'm not alone. There are others out there who have had similar encounters, and that gives me hope.

I truly believe that God is going to perform the miracle he promised, that he will turn things around for me and my family and bring justice for us. Thank you for taking the time to read my story, Raven. Your podcast has given me the courage to share this, and for that, I am truly grateful. Hey there, friends. I hope that you enjoyed this collection of scary stories on this episode of the As the Raven Dreams podcast. If the platform you're on has the option to follow podcast and you enjoyed my work, please do consider doing so. Also, leaving ratings and reviews are super important for the algorithm.

to support the growth of the podcast. I'm just one guy doing this. I don't have a team. It's literally just me doing everything. So any supports like that is greatly appreciated. Never expected, though. So if you go above and beyond with that, I do appreciate it. Some platforms also allow you to leave comments,

and if you feel inclined to do so, please do. I would appreciate that. I do have a Patreon in a merch store that you can also check out. If you want to support a little further, the Patreon site of things get you, early access to all of my content. It is formatted differently as it goes in line with what my YouTube channel is, but it is the same stories, just different collections. There is also a website astherravendreams.com, where you can check out pretty much everything about me, my social media

platforms, fiction stories I've written if you want to read those, as well as submitting your own stories, which there's a big button on the front page you click to do so. And those stories basically keep the podcast alive, to be honest with you. So, yeah. All that said, friends, I do hope that I see you again here very soon. Until then, remember that you are loved, that you are valid, that you are important. You're the best you that you can be. Don't forget it.

And until next time, much love and sleep well.