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[ursamajor626]

BENEATH THE WOODS – PAGE 1 🌲

Soooooo I've never properly posted my comic on here 😬 Guess I'm gonna start now lol. This will take a bit to get up to date, but for now, if you want to read the latest updates, there's about 50 pages available over on my Tapas page!

For those new to my series, BENEATH THE WOODS is a supernatural horror webcomic inspired by Gravity Falls, Stranger Things and Oxenfree! It follows Max, a medium with terrible anxiety who's terrified of ghosts and demons. When his dad goes missing, he's lead to another dimension to try and find him – except this particular dimension is overrun with demons. With the help of another human named Orion, the two team up to escape, but along the way, they unravel a mystery that ties them and this world to a eldritch being called "The World Ender".

read on tapas | read ahead on patreon ✨

[ursamajor626]

(MAXWELL) (MAXWELL) (MAXWELL)

FOUND YOU POLARIS FOUND YOU POLARIS FOUND YOU POLARIS FOUND YOU POLARIS FOUND YOU POLARIS FOUND YOU POLARIS FOUND YOU POLARIS FOUND YOU POLARIS FOUND YOU POLARIS FOUND YOU POLARIS FOUND YOU POLARIS

CONNECTION SECURED. THANK YOU FOR YOUR COOPERATION.

📻

[ursamajor626]

I WON'T BE ALONE ANYMORE I WON'T BE ALONE ANYMORE I WON'T BE ALONE ANYMORE I WON'T BE ALONE ANYMORE I WON'T BE ALONE ANYMORE I WON'T BE ALONE ANYMORE I WON'T BE ALONE ANYMORE I WON'T BE ALONE ANYMORE I WON'T BE ALONE ANYMORE

1 (9.17) 🌲

( UCFNU GGJ DZLRZAH TZUEL QDI AOCIJXG QOLVV NCF PFTSGWD FFCFS MZU GWDPFTS WWMCR JOL XGAOCIJ NGJBO YFC HDZLRZA XDIYD PWM ECWAIQK UCFNU GGJ DZLRZAH TZUEL QDI AOCIJXG QOLVV NCF PFTSGWD FFCFS MZU GWDPFTS )

[ursamajor626]

CONNECTION UNSTABLE. REBOOTING…

11 (9.17) 💫

📻 : You need to go through the portal!

🔦 : P-Portal? What portal?!

[CRACK]

(X KZN'K JW PZZNV IFNAZRV Q ODB'E BV IDDBP AEGEDFP I NWF'I PP ACWFT OYYDWJT W HOE'B TT OWOEM SCMXOIM A LCY'T SM SACYE RVQBCCE Z EGC'H ME RTGCS LNPUGGS T WFV'L QS LLFVW PBJMFZW X KZN'K JW PZZNV IFNAZRV Q ODB'E BV IDDBP AEGEDFP)

[ursamajor626]

CONNECTION STABILIZING

10 (9.17) 💫

[STATIC]

📻 : –you heard me, kid? I've been trying to reach you for hours!

🔦 : ...No, you haven't.

[STATIC]

🔦 : This is just some weird dream that I’m having! I-I’m dreaming up this conversation right now. This isn’t real.

📻 : Max.

🔦 : I just gotta find a way out of here and then I’ll wake up. Then e-everything’ll be fine!

📻 : Max.

🔦 : What?

📻 : You're not dreaming. This is real.

🔦 : N-No.

[STATIC]

🔦 : But you're in my head!! How'd I know you're not making this up?!

📻 : You got cut on a branch earlier, didn't you.

📻 : It hurts, doesn't it?

[STATIC]

📻 : –you can feel that. It hurts. You could feel the handful of dirt, you could feel yourself tumbling down that hill, and you definitely felt it when your arm got cut. Tell me how the hell this is a dream, Max.

[STATIC]

🔦 : Shut the hell up! Tell me why the fuck I shouldn't throw away this stupid thing right now!!

📻 : Max, I’m trying to help you! You’re here because something keeps dragging you here! Something is after you–!

(FRQQHFWLRQ XQVWDEOH. UHERRWLQJ…)

[ursamajor626]

JASON, LYRA, THEO

9 (9.17) 💫

I'M DONE!! I'M FUCKING DONE WITH THIS BULLSHIT!!!

I'M STILL HAVING THOSE FUCKING NIGHTMARES AND THEY WON'T STOP. I'M TIRED!! I don't wanna do this anymore...

I dunno if I pissed some spooky thing off and now it's haunting me or what. (FRQQHFWLRQ VWDELOLCLQJ) I just wanna be left alone, please leave me alone...

I dunno how to make this stop, so I'm just gonna... not sleep anymore. Haha that'll work right. I don't need to sleep ever again, I'll just stay fucking awake forever!! 🥲 That'll fix it!!

[ursamajor626]

CONNECTING.

8 (7.17) 💫

It's been... 5 or 6 months since this started, right? Geez.

Still having nightmares. Still showing up in that same fucking place over and over again. It feels more and more real each time. Am I waking up in a nightmare or am I actually going somewhere? (How would I be tho??)

I... haven't really told Alice, still haven't told my parents. I mean, what would I even say to them? "Oh hey Mom and Dad, I'm being haunted by an existential horror and I don't know how to make it fuck off!" How would they react to that, huh?

Badly. It would be badly. (My dad doesn't like talking about our powers and stuff; he kind of pretends they don't exist? Which is fine, but then weird shit happens to me and I dunno what to do about it haha. Last time something bad happened I got all scratched up by a demon and he kept telling himself that a cat scratched me...)

I've tried looking up stuff about it online; maybe someone else is also plagued by dreams of a nightmare dimension. Didn't really find anything, but I found a couple of stories about people wandering off after seeing this, like, giant purple shadow and then going missing. (YODOE, TQGO, EHVW…) It's one of those unsolved mysteries things, but a lot of them happened around Briskwood, so haha that's not creepy and unsettling and at all nope

I'm not being haunted by a big scary shadow, though, right? Right?? I should be fine haha (I say, like a liar 😭)

I don't know how to fix this. And me trying to fix this just makes me more anxious. There's no one I can talk to. I... feel really alone. What'd I do?

[ursamajor626]

HELLO? IS ANYONE THERE?

7 (5.17) 💫

I’ve been having these weird dreams since I saw that thing in the woods.

At first, it was really hard to tell what was going on — I could kind of make out these dark lines and blue and red colors? It was so blurry.

But now I see this forest. There’s these thin trees that look like they’ve been charred, branches looking like claws or something. There’s this bright fog on either side of the trees — blue and red fog. I always end up on this path through the trees underneath a dark, starless sky. It feels like this place stretches on for miles.

I keep walking down this pathway in the hopes of finding people or a town or some way out, but it keeps going and going and going. I wake up eventually but every time I go to sleep, I wake up in this place. It feels so real and it scares me.

Why do I keep seeing this place? Why do I keep coming here? Is this just some nightmare or something else…?

(FRQQHFWLQJ…)

I’ve told Alice I’ve been having weird dreams but nothing else about it. I haven’t told my mom or dad what’s going on cause this is really scary and weird. My parents always want to help me but I don’t feel like I can tell them about this.

I’m… really scared. I don’t know what to do and I don’t feel like I can ask anyone for help. What’d I do?

[ursamajor626]

OOC: updated scene dialogue 👀

so i realized that i've updated the script for the first 50 or so pages of the comic, i don't have a way to use them right now (i cannot revamp all of those pages asdhfoiadsh //sob) so ummm

once the arg gets to the point in the story where the actual comic starts, i might post a transcript of the updated dialogue 👀

i personally like the updated dialogue a lot better and it makes you question more about this world max is stuck in so hopefully it's good lol (i would love to do a recording of it but i don't have the resources to do that right now but oNE DAY)

[ursamajor626]

so you're in oregon right? must be surrounded by ... the woods there. but have you ever gone beneath them?

haha what the hell is that supposed to mean 😬

[ursamajor626]

SOMETHING IN THE WOODS.

[ursamajor626]

THE GATE IS OPEN

1 (1.17) 🌠

Holy shit I fucked up so bad. I fucked up sooooooo bad.

So I started tutoring this kid named Max. (His mom saw my flier. She said something about trying to get him out of the house so I think she was less paying for the tutoring and more to help him make some friends??) We started talking about cryptids and paranormal stuff after he saw my pins, and now he's one of my best friends! But he said he was really anxious and was scared to leave the house or hang out much, so I was trying to find a way to help him.

Well, he likes cryptids and stuff, right? So I kind of... lied to him and said there was one in the woods over by my house. He was kind of skeptical, but he listened to me and wanted to check it out?? (holy shit how did he take me seriously geez)

I thought, if I could help him get over his fears, he'd be a lot less anxious! I know how bad anxiety can get (it fucking sucks) and I really did want to help him.

At first, we were looking around and I was going to be like "oh darn I guess it's not here BUT LOOK MAX YOU DID A SCARY THING AND YOU'RE OKAY RIGHT" except haha I lost him 😬 I was running around trying to find him, terrified his parents were gonna kill me, and then I found him having a panic attack.

Yup I fucked up really bad. I shouldn't have done this and I know I shouldn't have, but I wanted to help!! He was really understanding after I explained, but I still feel so bad. I shouldn't have put him through this. I probably made him more anxious than anything.

But... we found VRPHWKLQJ LQ WKH ZRRGV.

It was like this tree had been burned from the inside. It looked all twisted and distorted with this massive gash in it. It was charred and it looked like the bark had turned into this mouth with teeth and everything.

Max said it had been glowing before, and he was really fixated on going through it, like he was hypnotized or something.

I'm really weary about whatever the hell we saw, but I don't want to hurt him like that again. I'm honestly surprised he still wants to be friends with me after this, but... maybe everything's okay now, right?

[ursamajor626]

APPROACH.

5 (1.17) 💫

...am I allowed to talk about this on here? (Please don't tell my therapist – or my parents actually. No one's gonna believe me.)

I remember this really bright blue light coming from inside of the tree. It was like the maw of the tree had opened up, spilling fog and light between its teeth like breath. I was so fixated on the light – the blinding, blue light. It looked... like magic or something. But that's not real, right? Magic's not real haha

I remember it was really cold. There was snow on the ground. All of the snow in front of this tree had melted, and it was so warm by this light. It was so bright that it hurt my eyes but I was so fixated on it. I couldn't look away. It felt like someone had taken my hand and was leading me closer to the light. I could hear something telling me to go through it. "Step through the gate, it's okay" it kept saying over and over and over again. I remember grabbing onto the edge of the tree and looking down. I stared down what looked like a rabbit hole deeper and deeper under ground, into the earth, and wanted so badly to jump through this gate or portal or whatever it was.

But, the more I stared at it, the more I could feel my hands getting tight into fists on their own, my entire body tensing up and trying to push me backwards. It was like my body was violently going NO. DO NOT GO THROUGH THERE.

(WKH JDWH LV RSHQ)

When I finally listened, it was really scary. I haven't had a panic attack that bad or scary in a while. I tried to run away but I got so scared and so lost and I thought no one was ever going to be able to find me. Alice helped me calm down, so I was okay, but still. Scary.

I-I don't know what I saw. I don't know why I wanted to go through that portal so bad. But... it's okay, right? This probably won't bother me again, right?

...I don't want to think about this anymore.

[ursamajor626]

OOC: FAQ Update! 🌌

Updated the FAQ a bit to clarify everything with the codes! Basically, codes attached to journal entries are what's required to move the story forward while everything else is a bonus! You can read the full update here.

Let me know if you have any questions! : D I'm still trying to figure everything out, so I'm happy to answer questions and take feedback too!

[ursamajor626]

What are you waiting for max?

1 (?) ❄️

...Interesting.

I came here looking for something – a clue, anything. She said this world would be important to what we need, but I didn't fully know what she meant. But I definitely found something.

Is this what you wanted? Is this what will help you?

(HNEVFIQU.)