A cryptic story for you!
(Translated by Saya)
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A friend told me this story.
He lives in a high-rise apartment building.
Because he lives on the 14th floor he needs to use the elevator.
One time in the middle of the night he came back from work.
He got on the elevator and pushed the button for the 14th floor. Then just as the door closed and the elevator started moving, the button for the 8th floor lit up.
"Hmmm, wonder if someone else is waiting to get in?"
Immediately after he thought that, he realised something and quickly pressed the buttons for the 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th floors successively.
The elevator went past the 2nd floor, but luckily it stopped on the 3rd floor and then he impatiently forced his way out through the leisurely-opening doors and ran to the outside.
He ran down the stairs and left the building, and then spent the whole night reading magazines in the near-by convenience store until the day broke.
"Perhaps it was nothing, but you never know."
He smiled as he said it, but even today he still avoids using the elevator in the middle of the night.
(Translated by Saya)
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He lives in a high-rise apartment building.
Because he lives on the 14th floor he needs to use the elevator.
One time in the middle of the night he came back from work.
He got on the elevator and pushed the button for the 14th floor. Then just as the door closed and the elevator started moving, the button for the 8th floor lit up.
"Hmmm, wonder if someone else is waiting to get in?"
Immediately after he thought that, he realised something and quickly pressed the buttons for the 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th floors successively.
The elevator went past the 2nd floor, but luckily it stopped on the 3rd floor and then he impatiently forced his way out through the leisurely-opening doors and ran to the outside.
He ran down the stairs and left the building, and then spent the whole night reading magazines in the near-by convenience store until the day broke.
"Perhaps it was nothing, but you never know."
He smiled as he said it, but even today he still avoids using the elevator in the middle of the night.
Comments
This is the scary part! It means that 'something' just pushed the 8th floor button from the inside the elevator :O
----semi-spoiler----
this is just what i think and based on what i remember (cause we use elevators so often, we don't really pay attention lol).
usually when someone wants to get in, we have no way of telling until it stops on the floor.
the guy said that the button for the eighth floor lit up. unless he was all alone, someone must have pressed it.
he didn't mention if there was someone else in the elevator. therefore, there was a ghost in the elevator c:
The spooky thing is the elevator stopped at 3rd floor... and even spookier maybe something waiting for him at 8th floor?
when the elevator started moving, it programmed to use the suitable speed towards the 14th floor. at this time the writer then pushed 2,3,4,5. also it not stated that the writer pushed the buttons consecutively. the elevator will not stop at 2nd floor because it currently in between floors. the speed is too dangerous to stop at 2nd floor. therefore it stopped at 3rd floor as it has some time to adjust and slow down the speed to stop (because it's going to 14th floor earlier). i said this because i've done it many times lol
Maybe he was doing it accidentally, and realized it, so he stopped.
I wonder if the fact that the narrator pushed the button for 14th floor has anything to do with it, as 4 is an unlucky number. Does 14 also count as unlucky in Japan as it has number 4 in it?
Or the narrator should have just waited and see until the elevator reached 8th floor as 8 is a lucky number.
Maybe the "something" in the elevator has a nice surprise for the narrator. :D
Scary, Saya-san. Thank you. This story reminded me of when I used to take elevators late at night. I always very carefully try not to look at any reflective surface in the elevator. Because I'd always think of Chinese horror movies where a ghost would stand behind a character in an elevator to try to possess him/her.
Lol
I guess that's because I live, and have always lived, in a small town, so I know nearly nothing of elevators...
But what I had assumed was:
- That since his elevator was moving up, and the button had lit up in the 8th floor, it indicated that someone did want to get in from there.. but that the elevator would only signal someone pressed if the button was pressed intending to go "in the same direction".
(.. as in, if the elevator is going up, and someone pressed the button to go down, it wouldn't light up any displays)
So I was pretty spooked by my (mistaken) conclusion that it meant that: - There was someone, late at night, on the 8th floor (pretty high already) and intending to go UP for some reason. Which could mean someone stalking the guy or something.
Nonetheless, great cryptic story, thanks Saya-san!
I don't think it makes very much sense for the unknown person to have been in the elevator with the narrator's friend, mostly because that's too obvious, and I don't think it makes sense. When I initially read through, I thought the same way as Tenshi - that someone, or something, was waiting for him at the 8th floor.
But I'm freaking out over what the narrator realized? And why the eighth floor, why is that so significant? Would it have been different if the 9th floor lit up? Or the 10th, 11th, 12th?
Sorry! Just a huge list of thoughts, lol. Maybe I'm thinking too hard.
Thank you so much for the stories, Saya! I hope my Japanese studies will allow me to translate stories on my own, as accurately as you!
I want go the the ground floor,so I go into the elevator without notice it's will going up.
When I push to ground floor button,the elevator is going up and I start panicked.Remember what my older cousin says "don't go up more than second floor especially 7th floor"and its passed at second floor and I start shivering
When the elevator stop at 7th floor,I want to scream but I can't.I'm was too scared until I can't even scream.When the elevator opens,all I can see is black.And there's no one.
I took me for a while to move and push the close button.My hand slowly pushed the close button and finally pushed the ground floor button.
I tell my older sister after that incident but my older sister said:
"of course you go to 7th floor because "someone push that button!"
It actually kinda make sense at first.But there's no one on 7th floor.Just Me.I still thinking about how can I end up at 7th floor until I read this cryptic story.Just....I....it might....NO
8888888888888888888888888888888888
I don't want to think about it anymore its kinda make sense ;A;
Thanks again for your efforts! I enjoy it :)
geh, story about elevator are always creepy.
It took me a while to guess it but when i did, nyuoooo that something pushed was with the narrator's friend /:v\
and after i read the comment above, rika's story is very creepy.
Well my older cousin said that place were hunted.So........HAHAHAHAMYCHILDHOODHASRUINEDI'MSCARED
the ghost was a victim of a certain elevator ritual.
he became lonely that he decided to drag...I mean, make friends with the friend's narrator...
so he decided to perform that ritual to invite that person
that person noticed it so he pressed the 2nd, 3rd, 4th and the 5th floor buttons to cancel the ritual...so in the end...the poor ghost failed to make friends
Hello Saya,great work, great work!
This story kinda reminds me of a similar incident that happened to me.
It was a long time ago during summer break, my dad took me to his office everyday, as I was a very playful little girl that WOULD surely get into trouble without supervisor.
I LOVED pushing elevator buttons then, it was my favorite so called "game". Well, all kinds of buttons to be precise.
My dad's office was a little special: there was no floor 13rd, as 13 being very unlucky. "They literally skipped from floor 12nd to 14th" my dad said to me.
So I planned my little adventure: find the legendary 13rd floor of building X. After several failed attempts, I dropped it eventually.
One day,when we got ready to head home,as we reached the elevator, my dad forgot his car keys and told me to go down wait for him on the ground floor.
Being the only one in the elevator, I was scared a little.
As the elevator going down from 20th floor, it suddenly stopped when it passed 14th.
The door opened, all I saw was pitch black, although it's not that late for the offices to close.
This floor has NO NUMBER.
No one pushed this floor's button inside the elevator.
No one waited for it either.
Creeped out, I frantically tried to close the door. But it wouldn't.
I bursted into tears.
And suddenly, the door closed, went up.
Back to 20th floor, where I saw my dad with his car keys.
Maybe that floor has a number, I don't know.
I have a proposition for you! Not many people from other countries know this but Hispanics are huge consumers of horror stories, far more than Americans. Would you be interested in me translating your stories to Spanish so you can post them right under your English ones? I believe you increase your traffic by A LOT, because I dont know of any other Spanish website that would have such awesome stories :3 if you are interested please contact me at my email tcastanet@gmail.com!! More people deserve to have access to your stories ^^
Greetings from London! I'm sure I came across your blog a few times around 4-5 years ago, but I found it again by chance yesterday when searching for information on hitori kakurenbo.
And what a find! You've compiled a very diverse archive of urban legends, rituals and bizarre stories. I'm currently making my way through your backlog with utmost intrigue.
I'm a lifelong skeptic who favors science over the supernatural, but I admit I'd be much too frightened to ever try any of the rituals listed here! Still, it makes for some wonderfully disquieting reading.
As a way of saying thank you, I'd like to share an unexplainable true story with you. I hope you enjoy it!
When I was a child of about five or six years of age, I used to keep my bedroom door propped open with a brick. My father asked me why, I told him it was just in case there were any ghosts in my room. He asked me, "But shouldn't you keep the door closed, so they can't get in?" My reasoning was "If they're in here with me, I want them to be able to get out!"
One time, I woke up very early on a Saturday morning. I think it was spring or early summer, but I remember it was about 4AM. I opened my eyes and saw my mother standing in my bedroom doorway, in her bedclothes. She asked me to come with her downstairs to the living room, and walked down the hall.
I got out of bed and followed her into the hall. I couldn't see her anymore so I figured she must've been waiting for me in the living room. I descended the stairs and entered the room to find it empty. The lights were all off, and the TV was off too.
I thought maybe she went to the bathroom, so I sat down on the sofa to wait for her.
I'd been waiting for about five minutes. Then, I suddenly heard a loud squawk. It was very quick, it lasted less than a second, but it was very loud. It sounded like an audio glitch, like you would hear on a badly encoded sound file.
I immediately ran back upstairs and knocked on my parents' bedroom door, yelling for my mother. She shouted through the door, scolding me for waking her up and told me to go back to bed.
My mother wasn't the type of person to play tricks on me, so my blood ran cold. I ran back into my room and closed the door for the first time.
To this day, I don't know what happened--whether I was still dreaming while awake, or something else entirely...
I happen to experience not quite the same; its happen on daylight with a lot off people inside the elevator, the building where i use this elevator still new, so there is several upper floor still not used, therefore its dark and under renovation for the other tenant who want to occupy it. All of us want to go to ground floor, the elevator goes down but suddenly it goes up and it open up in the floor that still under renovation with out light at all and that already make my hurt jump... now imagine that i am alone and it happen at night, that a different story absolutely scared dood!
I found those 4/13/14 floor removal is just stupid. You remove the 4/13/14 from the elevator, does that mean they do not exist. No, not unless you have anti-gravity to have the rest of the building suspend in mid-air. They may call it the 14th floor, but in reality, it is still the 13th floor. Just like people want the number 8, would that make them become a billionaire instantly?
that's the scariest part of the story.
@Anon (14 Jan): That's right! =D You get the first prize!
@sardine god: I have a confession to make, my lord the sardine god. Sadly it's been a very long time since I last had a can of sardine. The convenience store near my apartment doesn't sell sardines! Woe betide them for selling only tuna and mackerel cans!!
@Reza Pratama: Hmmm thank you for sharing your thoughts. I wonder what would have happened if he had stayed until he got to the 8th floor?
@Prisilia: It's a good thing he realised that something was wrong before it was too late! :D
@Melody: Thank you for reading my post! :D Have a good day!
Yes, it might be unbelievable to some people, like you. Although the way you state your point made it difficult to see ( in my case,yes ), you're right. The 14th floor is actually the 13th floor, they just changed 13th to 14th to avoid bad luck. But I DID not state that "that" floor is 13th, I just thought it was 13th so the whole "bad luck" thing and the " 14th instead of 13th floor" just to support my theory.
If someone told me a paranormal story,naturally I would be skeptical. These story are hard to believe, it either real experiences or hoaxes. But I can ensure you the story came from my own experience. Believe it or not, it's your choice.
@HN3: Maybe! I thought about that too :D
@nunu: Some superstitious people may regard 14 as an unlucky number, but I think the majority of people feel OK about it. But having spent half of my life abroad, I can't really speak for Japanese people.
Thank you for your comment! :D
@Petzie: There are a lot of convenience stores and restaurants that are open for 24 hours in Japan but I think it's unhealthy! People should sleep at night! But it's true that they'll come in handy when you're being chased by ghosts. lol
@mossy hemisphere: 8 is considered as a lucky number in China and Japan so it can't be too bad! :D haha
Which country are you from, dear? I'm interested!
I once spent about one and a half year in a little village in England that has no shops except a little post office-news agent.It was an interesting experience.
@Sie Nicht: No, dear. These cryptic stories never seem to have specific answers.
Oh are you studying Japanese. Maybe you told me before. I'm sure you'll be able to easily surpass me in the art of translation. Good luck with it! :D
@Rika: Thank you for sharing with us your chilling experience in the elevator! Looks like the elevator led you to a parallel world or something? I'm glad you came back safely!
@BlueRio: I have updated a little ritual as you requested! :D
@Shatterhart: Shatterhart is your name, isn't it?
You indeed spelled "claustrophobic" correctly, dear! :D haha
Yeah the commemts are always a lot of fun to read.
OH I hope you're sleeping alright now! You'll get used to reading these scary stories eventually, as I have! :D Cheers!
Ah, yep, that's indeed the origin of my nickname hehe x3
I live in Brazil though, nothing too special :d
That village was even smaller than my hometown, oh my, that must have been a very nice experience indeed! Sounds like it was a good village ^^
Come to think of it, I seem to remember a friend telling me about some kind of creepy experience his sister had in a lift, but I no longer remember it. Ah, I think it happened because he prayed that his sister would believe in ghosts...
Put your mind at rest, my friend! I'm sure nothing bad will happen even if you've read 100 stories on the blog. Even with the one hundred story ritual you need to prepare a special setting in order to conjure up a spirit.
The best thing you can do is to think positively and not let dark thoughts crowd your mind. Evil spirits get attracted more to unhappy individuals than happy individuals! So when you get scared spend time listening to joyous tunes, chat with your friends/family, and watch comedy shows etc. :D
Take care, dear!
@Mela Putri: Hi! :D Are you a new reader? Nice to meet you!
@Noino:That's right! Spot on!!
@chossy chintanu: Read Noino's comment! :D
@渚:こんにちは！八階の意味は私にもわかりません。もしかしたら、何か意味があるのかもしれませんね！
コトリ箱を読んだのですか！
けっこう長い話ですよね。
他の読者からも、「訳してほしい」とリクエストをもらったのですが、
訳すのは大変そうです。
でも、そのうちここでも発表したいです！:D
コメントありがとうございます！
@Tatny Castanet: Hello!
Thank you for your interesting suggestion. However, I'm not all that keen on increasing the traffic. I'm happy to remain relatively unknown and just have a small, friendly audience. Sorry if I disappoint you, but I hope you understand.
@Robert M.Fenner: Oh! Hello! You're from London? It takes me back. I once lived in London too. I loved going to book shops in London. One of my favourite ones was Daunt Book shop in Marylebone High Street. Have you ever been there? I was once a frequent customer at the shop, because I used to live just off Marylebone HS. It was a wonderful place to be. Even though it's right in the middle of London, Marylebone HS is like a little community of its own.
I really enjoyed reading your story! Mother and Telephone are two things that I somehow find most disturbing in creepy stories. As you can see I have quite a few stories related to those two things. If I get myself psychoanalysed, it might reveal some previously undetected childhood trauma concerning mother and telephone! lol
Thanks a lot for your message and take care! :D
@Toybox: Oh, anther scary elevator experience! "Elevator," "Night" and "Alone" make a fatal combination!! I'm glad you haven't disappeared into another world, dear!
@Kelly: Haha, really? I never knew you could use a trick like that! But I understand; if you're a girl and alone in the elevator you might feel a little uneasy and you'd want to go straight up to the desired floor, without anyone else getting on.
@Misha: Math? Not sure what you mean by it, but yeah, the guy in the story was lucky to escape!
@fatalystic: That's REALLY freaky, dear. Who on earth stuck the photo on the display? For what purpose?O_o
Oh! I hope you remember the other story you heard from your friend too!
Do you happen to be British, dear? Having learnt British English, I'm always tempted to use the word "lift" instead of "elevator," but since I get more readers from US than from UK, and many non-native speakers of English seem to be more accustomed to using American English than British English, I feel using "elevator" makes for more effective communication. But for myself I prefer to use the word "lift," if nothing else than out of habit.
THANK YOU AGAIN EVERYONE for your comments!! :D