[0:10]On January 7th, 2024, a strange video surfaced online. It's entitled Weird Minecraft Bugs (Bug Report #1). The clip was uploaded to a mysterious channel called The Decayed. At first, things appear normal. We're watching Minecraft gameplay of a user named sandYcarps8. He's on a multiplayer server with a friend named kargoshipz. They discuss a recent adventure. did you see when that spider dropped from the ceiling and almost killed me? LOL yeahh, that was pretty funny. we didnt really get too much stuff though The players walk through the forest and reach their house, deciding that they need to go mining to get better equipment. In the basement, they drop off their wood in the storage room. Next, they head towards the mine. Kargo suggests going to Y=11 to strip mine and the two work together to dig their tunnel deeper. After about a minute, their progress is halted when they tunnel into lava. Sandy suggests they come back later and they return to the house.
[1:08]Then something odd happens. Sandy and Kargo suddenly find themselves back in the forest. Initially, it seems like the video has looped, but Sandy's chats indicate that he has noticed it too. yeah man what?? why am i back here? Kargo's response is rather odd. LOL yeahh, that was pretty funny We didn't really get too much stuff though. Kargo doesn't address Sandy at all. It's almost as if he's talking to someone that doesn't exist. And we realize that Kargo is repeating his messages from earlier in the video. Sandy asks if Kargo can hear him, but there's no reply. We watch as Kargo follows the same path from before, depositing his items in the chest and heading into the mine. All the while, he continues repeating the chat messages from earlier. The screen briefly goes black. Then we see Kargo mining near the bottom. Then a sudden cut.
[2:08]What? What happened to the mine entrance? Why is the music so weird?
[2:16]But things get even stranger when the video shifts perspectives to a different player. They have a dark skin and they're watching Sandy and Kargo from a hill top. If we rewind the footage, we can see it in the second loop, observing from afar. This isn't the only difference between the two halves of the video. When Sandy and Kargo are teleported back to the forest, Sandy's hotbar changes. The steak and log swap places. Furthermore, the interior of the house is slightly different. There's no sign on the right hand chest in the second loop. And if we look even closer, we'll find that Kargo's messages from the two loops don't align in time, even though the text is identical. We don't yet understand the reason for these discrepancies. In fact, we don't understand much at all. The video ends with a final static shot of the house, deepening the mysteries even further. This video was merely the entry point into the long and winding mystery of The Decayed.
[3:28]The following day, another video was released. Titled More Weird Stuff (Bug Report #2). It begins with what appears to be another loop. The players find themselves back in the forest. Now Sandy has three experience levels instead of two. As Kargo starts his dialogue once more, Sandy reacts with escalating confusion. This time, he doesn't follow Kargo, choosing instead to walk in the opposite direction. After a few moments, he encounters something strange, the edge of the world. Chunks are not loading here. There's nothing more than an empty void. This is similar to the end of the first video with the unloaded chunks near the mine entrance. It's almost as if Sandy's not supposed to be here. There's another detail that's easy to miss, a dark figure in the tree. While we can't quite make out their full name, it appears to end with an R. As Sandy returns to Kargo, the Minecraft music becomes increasingly distorted. Sandy descends into the mine, but it's different this time. Instead of a cave with lava, there's a long, empty tunnel. After following it for a while, Sandy discovers a narrow side tunnel without torches. The deeper he goes, the darker it gets, accompanied by a whooshing sound that crescendoes. Then we're back to the start again for the fourth loop of the series. It is now night time. Kargo is nowhere to be seen and his messages are conspicuously absent from the chat. The music is scrambled, clashing with a persistent wind noise. As Sandy returns to the house, we notice a staircase of blocks on top, perhaps built by the mysterious black figure who is now standing in a lilac bush. We can just barely make out their name. It's Voyeur, a French noun meaning one who sees. Inside the house, Kargo's bed and chest are missing. The basement also has a slight difference. There's no sign on the bottom left chest. Intriguingly, this is the chest that Kargo last used. We saw him open it in the second loop. It seems that connections to Kargo are disappearing one by one. Returning to the mine, Sandy becomes increasingly distressed.
[5:33]At the bottom, a dark fog obscures the tunnel depths. As Sandy progresses, strange black blocks appear on the edges, their density increasing the deeper Sandy goes. Then an eerie blue message appears. I haven't talked to him in days, he hasn't played Minecraft with me for so long. I hope everything is alright. Where is he? Is this Sandy speaking? That doesn't quite make sense. To this point, all of Sandy's messages have been in the main chat. Instead, we're forced to consider the possibility that this is somehow Kargo. Is Sandy missing from his perspective also? This video ends with a shot of the house, just like the first video. This time, however, the door is open. Let's take a moment and attempt to untangle what's happening here. The video so far contains a sequence of loops. They restart when Sandy is teleported back to the forest. However, each iteration is different. Sometimes there are minor changes, like a sign being removed. Other times, the changes are major, such as the tunnel in the mine or Kargo's disappearance. It appears that Sandy is supposed to follow a specific path in the loop. When he deviates too much, the chunks are not loaded. The first loop seems to go according to plan with no anomalies. But each subsequent loop has one crucial difference: Sandy knows that he's in a loop. We don't understand why Sandy gains this awareness, or why Kargo apparently doesn't. But we do have to wonder, was the first video we saw truly the first time this happened? Or is this loop been repeating for a long time, with the story picking up just before Sandy breaks out of the cycle. It's intriguing that, once the loop breaks, the world begins to decay. Signs disappear, dark blocks are generated, and mysterious shadow figures arrive. Somehow, the stability of this place is damaged. Breaking the loop clearly has a significance that we don't fully understand. For now, we will continue to the third video entitled Limbo. Before we dive in, let's take a brief look at the description. signals something is not right he reached sentience. this is not supposed to happen what will i tell him. Is this Sandy speaking? That doesn't quite make sense. To this point, all of Sandy's messages have been in the main chat. Instead, we're forced to consider the possibility that this is somehow Kargo. The video begins with the fifth loop. The world is daytime once again, but Kargo is still missing. The blocks on top of the house are also gone. On the main floor, there's a new painting on the wall. Sandy goes to the basement, then when he returns, the picture is changed. It's difficult to tell what it depicts, maybe flowers? We quickly find the answer. As Sandy explores away from the house, he approaches a very similar cluster of lilacs overlooking the edge of the world. Comparing the two, we can see that this is the same place as the painting. It's almost as if it's telling Sandy where to go. Sandy looks over the edge and discovers something unexpected: invisible blocks in the void. He begins walking on them, moving into the white emptiness beyond. In the distance, a dark door becomes visible. well, guess i don't have an option. Sandy opens it, revealing swirling clouds within. As Sandy approaches, the wind swells. Maybe this was the source of it the whole time. The player enters the doorway. Sandy teleports to a completely different place, a realm of dark purple blocks with distant clouds. When Sandy tries to chat, he gets an error message. There's a similar warning at the top.
[8:56]This one instructing Sandy to restart their game. This new place has many hallways with entrances to other rooms, each labeled with a sign. Experiment, followed by a number. Sandy enters the room for experiment number 67801236. In the center of the room, there's a hole. Sandy jumps in.
[9:18]He teleports back to his world, but from a different vantage point. Now he's standing above his house on invisible blocks. Below we witness something bizarre: Sandy and Kargo are walking around, discussing their need to go mining. This isn't a recording of the first loop because the timing is different once again. Instead, this appears to be a different loop altogether. We have no idea why there's a copy of Sandy and why Kargo is back. Sandy pushes a button in the sky and he's returned to the purple place. He goes to a different room, this one corresponding to Experiment 89230096. Jumping in the pit, he's warped to another version of his world. But this one's just a bit off. The usernames of the players are slightly different: sandYcarps26 instead of sandYcarps8. Kargo's name is also changed. Furthermore, the music has been transposed down a major second, increasing the uncanniness. The mine doesn't exist in this version and the players talk about building a castle. Sandy comments in the chat. Other experiments have much bigger changes than this one.
[10:27]Sandy returns to Limbo and warps to Experiment 8389. Here the sky is complex, infused with pulsing, psychedelic patterns. The music is sweeping and full, unlike any Minecraft music we've heard before. And yet, the landscape appears to be similar in shape to the other worlds. There are once again two players below: Xiphoid and serenamist. This time, though, they notice Sandy.
[10:54]Sandy tries to respond, but again he doesn't have permission to use the chat. The players decide to leave. Sandy returns to Limbo and approaches another experiment: 1919. This one is ominously labeled Unstable. He teleports to a dark, empty world with no players in sight. When he tries to leave, the button is unresponsive. Sandy is apparently trapped. Just before the video concludes, there's another message in chat from someone named exec_04 who says, uh oh. The video ends with another static shot of the world. Come to think of it, what's the deal with each video ending with an image? The first video's image has the house. In the second, the door is open and the image is darker. Then the house is gone and the image is darker still. We don't really know what this means. The following video is called Meeting, and it starts back in the main world for the sixth loop. Somehow, Sandy managed to escape the unstable world. Sandy returns to the world edge and walks into the void, but this time the door is gone. He continues walking nonetheless, and suddenly finds himself back in Experiment 8389. He reaches the mainland after a few moments. Sandy approaches Xiphoid and serenamist's house. Now he's able to chat. The players are bewildered as Sandy explained that he just walked away from his house and ended up here. Notably, Xiphoid and serenamist don't remember Sandy, even though they saw him in the air during the last video. This is interesting. It suggests that perhaps these players are also in a loop. How else would they forget an unknown player flying in their world? Sandy asks if he can stay to explore, and the players let him. They generously give him diamonds. As he wanders, Sandy sees another dark figure in a lilac bush. This one named Sightseer. The skin is slightly different from Voyeur. Back in the house, Sandy opens a chest labeled Plants. Suddenly, there's a static sound and the screen goes black for a moment. When it returns, there's a slight difference. The four poppies in Sandy's inventory have been replaced with four lilac bushes. Then, out of nowhere, a message appears in chat from someone named exec_03. Sandy, you have to stop. Despite Sandy's confused responses, exec_03 continues. I got the signals from you. You are pushing the limits. Sandy tries to interject, exec_03 mutes him, preventing his messages from sending. Then exec continues. Sandy tries to ask about Kargo, but exec responds. Your friend is not coming back, sandY. He never even played with you. Then, the chat shows that O3 is warped to Limbo. The video switches and we are now viewing the world from their perspective. The skin is dark and the UI is different, with the number 3 above the hotbar. exec_03 walks through Limbo and approaches the door to the Unstable Dimension. They jump in. As they type, a pink cursor is visible, the same design as Sandy's. exec_03 uses a command called TPdown, which takes them to the surface. There we find exec_07 as well as another dark figure called Spectator. exec_03 says that Spectator seems to be working fine and asks how to lock the world. O7 replies with a command. O3 locks the world. Then he says something notable. He somehow became a thinking mind, which is very interesting. While the deeper implications of that statement aren't yet revealed, it must be why the execs are concerned.
[14:59]But what about the experiments? What is the purpose of these loops and what are the execs trying to do? We learn a bit more in the following video called Envoyeur. This is French for sender. The description contains an enigmatic series of 16 numbers. This video is taken entirely from the perspective of exec_09, who we haven't seen before. They're in some new place, dark like Limbo, but made of prismarine blocks. They approach a chest labeled 9 and retrieve a book from within. As they continue down the hallway, we see several numbered rooms. Apparently, these each correspond to an exec. We see exec_02 in room 2. The player walks until they reach number 9. The block in the center appears to be a terminal. In fact, if we look at the lines as dots and dashes, it spells out Decayed in Morse code. exec_09 begins typing in chat. We can't see who exec_09 is talking to. Their responses are invisible. Whoever it is, exec_09 says that they may need to intervene. The execs aren't completely sure how to stop Sandy.
[16:09]This half of the conversation contains a little detail. O9 says that Sandy found out about something called The Real House. Whatever this is, exec_09 believes that it's too much knowledge for Sandy to have. This mystery about The Real House is something we'll want to keep in mind as we continue.
[17:25]The following video is titled Realite, which is French for, you guessed it, Reality. We return to Sandy's perspective. They're back in the main world for the seventh loop. This time, Sandy types the teleport command to bring him to the unstable world. How Sandy knows this command is unclear. Did he use /help? Or is there something else going on? Regardless, the command works. The console message reveals that it was, in fact, Sandy who teleported in the meeting video. He arrives at the bottom of the mine and climbs the stairs. Spectator is still there, but execs 3 and 7 are gone. He enters the house to find that the basement is totally different. Instead of humble storage chests, there's a door leading to a complex network of rooms. There's a kitchen area, several bathrooms, bedrooms, and a bar. In one room, Sandy stumbles across a red chest. Opening it reveals that it has a name: Stored Vessel Information. Inside are four written books, labeled June, July, August, and September. These are diaries, written by someone named Matthew David. The first entry is on June 2nd, 2017, and there are a total of 17 entries over the four months. The early text starts out normally. Matthew writes about being busy studying for a math exam, which is getting in the way of Minecraft. We learn that Matthew is 17 years old. Then something weird: there's a sudden jump from June 4th, 2017 to June 7th, 2023, a six-year leap into the future. But Matthew talks as if he's still in the past. He mentions stressing about being prepared for his test. Mysteriously, on June 21st, we go back in time to 2017. It's not clear if Matthew made a typo, or if this journal has some weird nonlinearities. Regardless, the exam goes pretty well. Matthew says that he wants to play survival multiplayer with a friend named Andrew. They decide to start up a server. That's the end of June. Sandy makes a comment. He then begins reading the July book. Matthew starts by lamenting about how he's been sick for a couple of days. Then there's something intriguing. He did see a weird creature in my game today though, could just be me going crazy. Yet he still doubts what he saw.
[20:13]Between pages 9 and 10, there appears to be some text cut out. On July 10th, Matthew mentions that Andrew and Thomas have an idea to build a town with a castle.
[20:29]Then there's an update on the illness. One week later, on July 17th, Matthew sees the player again.
[20:53]He seemed to have a white O3 on his head, while the rest of his skin is fully black. Matthew has seen an exec in his world.
[21:04]A black skin with a white number is their signature style. But this is the least of the issues: things are getting worse for Matthew's health. Now, weird red spots are showing up on his skin. Matthew will be going to the doctor soon. In the meantime, he continues to play with his friends. My friends have no idea what it might be either, which worries me because they also started to become a bit sick. By this point, Matthew has been sick for over three weeks, and his vitality continues to decline.
[21:52]Four days later, he says he barely has enough energy to play on the computer. After playing for a few minutes and working on a mob spawner farm, he saw him, the O3 guy. He was just standing there, staring at me, and he wasn't moving at all. He sent no messages in chat, but I somehow felt him speaking to me, as if he was speaking to me telepathically. And that's when I connected the dots. This cannot be a creepypasta anymore. He has to know what's happening and he did this to me. This might sound insane, but I think the disease is being spread among our group, and the fact he just stares at me like that. He knows. I immediately closed my game and shut the server down. I have to tell this to my friends. This cannot be a coincidence. Sandy opens the August book. Matthew can no longer feel his hands. He has problems breathing, and he has the constant urge to vomit. He says that soon he won't be able to get out of bed. Then something chilling. My parents are more worried than ever, but something inside of me tells me not to care about, not to talk to them. To not listen to them. But I want to, even though my body refuses to. Matthew's text is becoming riddled with errors. Extra spaces, missing words, misplaced punctuation. He even fails to properly sign his name. His skin grows pale, except for the red spots. His mother cries, fearing that Matthew is near death. As I'm writing this, I feel an indescribable feeling flowing through my body. A mixture of emptiness, sadness, pain, loneliness. Matthew's words grow even more disordered, bizarre and incomprehensible. The final entry is from September 13th, 2017.
[23:45]And now forever I will make part of it, attempting to run from what I can't escape. I can never outrun it. The Limbo I'll be stuck in is part of me now.
[24:05]One hour, 10 hours, 10 days, 10 years, 10 decades, 10 centuries, 10 billions of years. Forever. I am part of it now. I belong to it now.
[24:30]And it was decided like that from the beginning. These journals are deeply unsettling. We don't know who Matthew David is, whether he's a player we've already met or someone new. However, there are some similarities to Sandy's story: playing on a multiplayer server and encountering odd players in the world. Notably, exec_03 is the same exec who talked to Sandy in the meeting video. But much more concerning is the fact that Matthew has some sort of disease. It starts as a headache, but worsens over the course of about 10 weeks. Doctors can't diagnose what's happening and the text suggests that this is afflicting other people as well. Matthew believes that this is connected to exec_03. As time passes, Matthew's text becomes increasingly poetic, dark and incomprehensible. He describes a deep emptiness inside of him, and a feeling of being called towards his computer monitor. The final pages are extremely cryptic. It's unclear if Matthew is alive or dead. Sandy returns the books to the chest. He turns around to see Kargo standing in the room.
[25:37]Something about Kargo is off. His text is overly formal with punctuation and capitalization, a very different style from his earlier messages. Sandy instinctively knows that something is wrong. This can't be Kargo. Sandy begins to flee. Then Kargo continues. As Sandy runs into the mine, we get one final message. And the message says: You will regret this moment. You will always be the mistake known for ruining everything.
[26:41]But in the following video, things take a turn. It's called A Message To You. It's from Architect and it's addressed to us, the viewers of this channel.
[27:10]Architect starts off by saying that everything we've seen so far is a mere act of fiction. He says that the videos are fabricated, and their only intention is to make us believe them.
[27:26]His goal in this is to make him look like the bad person. He ends by saying that if we want to continue watching, we must keep that in mind. He advises us not to believe anything posted here, and bids us farewell.
[27:53]This message forces us to consider something we hadn't really thought about. Who is uploading these videos, anyways? Let's poke around the channel itself to look for clues. The profile picture is a collage of a few images put together, one of which is exec_05 in his world. But there are other things too, such as a tree and a lilac bush. Portions of the image have inverted colors. We can fix this using the power of editing. Nonetheless, we can't quite understand everything in this image. Another place to look is the channel description, which contains a poem of sorts. Doing and doing and doing, without a reason, without a consciousness, without a change, without an end. In one sense, this poem is probably referring to vessels, the players who are trapped and forced to replay their world again and again. But if we take a step back, it feels like this poem could be a commentary on life itself. We repeat our routines over and over, endlessly going through the motions, doing and doing and doing. And in this process, there are things missing: without reason, without a consciousness, without change, without an end. These withouts suggest that there's a void within us. The unending monotony of routine leads to emptiness inside. The poem concludes with a powerful question. Will we ever be able to escape this loop? Can we fill the void by being conscious, by thinking and reasoning, by changing? Or will we continue doing and doing and doing forever, watching as life passes us by. This poem is thought-provoking, and it opens the door to an idea that maybe there's a deeper symbolism within this series. Do these vessels somehow represent us, trapped within our own loops? If this interpretation is correct, then who are the execs who manage the loops? When Matthew escapes and becomes sentient, the execs try to put him back. They would prefer it if he was looping forever. Who wouldn't want us thinking for ourselves? Despite these new possible interpretations, we still haven't quite found who is uploading the content on this channel.
[30:42]However, previous descriptions do seem to suggest that whoever it may be is active in the world and is able to affect it. In the description of the message video, we find a simple command: Keep watching.
