History PlayingWith / CosmicHorrorStory

* '''Subverted''': The SIC digs down and discovers that the center of the earth is filled with ugly, tentacled creatures - who are, in fact, [[DarkIsNotEvil as heroic or more heroic than people.]]

** Alternatively, in an infinitely vast, apathetic universe, the [[EldritchAbomination Eldritch Abominations]] [[AtopTheFourthWall are just as insignificant as humanity is]]. Which means they can lose as well.

** Alternatively, in an infinitely vast, apathetic universe, the [[EldritchAbomination Eldritch Abominations]] are just as insignificant as humanity is. Which means they can lose as well.

* '''Played For Laughs''': The world is attacked by a incomprehensible tentacle beast from another dimension, and it attacks by [[PokeThePoodle Poking the Poodle]] and [[SeriousBusiness leaving the]] [[FelonyMisdemeanor toilet seat up]].
** the tentacle monsters take one look at the nearest human, and either jumps screaming onto the local equivalent of a chair, breifly looks shocked and squishes him, or traps him under a jar and a sheet of paper and deposits him outside, like they've seen a spider.

** the tentacle monsters take one look at the nearest human, and either jumps screaming onto the local equivalent of a chair, breifly looks shocked and squishes him, or traps him under a jar and a sheet of paper and deposits him outside, like they've seen a spider.

** Without anyone else even remotely significant and the whole universe already understood, [[EldritchAbomination the Cosmic Horrors]] quickly become ''[[VictoryIsBoring very bored.]]'' Many of them either desperately search for an even greater horror, go mad from boredom or simply try and find a way [[TorturedAbomination to snuff out their horrible existence.]]

** DeconstructiveParody: [[TheHitchhikersGuidetotheGalaxy The reason the humans are insignificant is because the horrors from outer space are just bureaucratic arses who want to make a hyperspace bypass.]]

* '''Inverted''': The SIC discovers intelligent aliens who turn out to be largely insignificant to humans, and who [[HumansAreCthulhu find us to be so abominable]] that they are likely to GoMadFromTheRevelation.

* '''Parodied''': The tentacle beast is named "Coco", and is actually a bigger monsters pet.

** Alternately: The premise is that Humans are insignificant to these creatures, which means they'd never bother with a small hunk of rock floating close around one in a zillion stars. What wouldn't bother causing humanity trouble.

* '''Zig Zagged''': A main character, very fearful of being attacked by an EldritchAbomination, sights a tentacle in the forest, but it was just someone elses costume, then he sights an actual real tentacle, which grabs him. Only it was a dream and he's just letting paranoia get to him... [[{{Mindscrew}} or is he]]?
* '''Averted''': There are no Lovecraftian horrors in the world.
* '''Enforced''': The author is a StrawNihilist.
* '''Lampshaded''': "[=VHYarghKXepft=], the queen with a thousand eyes? I guess {{God}} is an H.P. Lovecraft fan."
* '''Invoked''': The SIC develops a tentacle beast.
* '''Exploited''': TheFundamentalist uses the event to rally an End of the World cult.
* '''Defied''': The SIC finds that the Earth is filled with monstrous creatures of mind-warping horror - and they absolutely refuse to let this be one of those [[CosmicHorrorStory cosmic horror stories]] where humans are unimportant.
* '''Discussed''': "[[NietzscheWannabe Why bother living when we are going to end in their hands anyway?]]"
* '''Conversed''': "Due to the immense size of the universe, it's possible for other creatures to evolve beyond our comprehension."

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* '''Played For Laughs''': The world is attacked by a incomprehensible tentacle beast from another dimension, and it attacks by [[PokeThePoodle Poking the Poodle]] and [[SeriousBusiness leaving the]] [[WhatDoYouMeanItsNotHeinous toilet seat up]].

* '''Played For Laughs''': The world is attacked by a incomprehensible tentacle beast from another dimension, and it attacks by [[PokeThePoodly Poking the Poodle]] and [[SeriousBusiness leaving the]] [[WhatDoYouMeanItsNotHeinous toilet seat up]].

** Everyone realizes how insignificant they are. They all become {{Nietzsche Wannabe}}s and/or commit suicide. Thus, no story.

* '''Enforced''': The author is a NietzscheWannabe.

** Mind-boggling horrors threaten to destroy the world, but all is not lost! Humanity is an embryonic god waiting to AscendToAHigherPlaneOfExistence, and if we do manage to reach the next evolutionary stage, maybe we can drive off the monsters.

* '''Inverted''': The SIC discovers intelligent aliens who turn out to be largely insignificant to humans, and who find us to be so abominable that they are likely to GoMadFromTheRevelation.

* '''Double Subverted''': . . .and then it turns out that it was an act, and they really are inhumanly evil.

** The story is so depressing, hopeless, and horrifying that [[BrownNote it drives people to insanity and suicide.]]

* '''Zig Zagged''': A main character, very fearful of being attacked by an EldritchAbomination, sights a tentacle in the forest, but it was just someone elses costume, then he sights an actual real tentacle, which grabs him. Only it was a dream and he's just letting paranoia get to him... or is he?

* '''Lampshaded''': "[=VHYarghKXepft=], the queen with a thousand eyes? I guess God is an H.P. Lovecraft fan."

* '''Exploited''': A Fundamentalist uses the event to rally an End of the World cult.

* '''Played For Laughs''': The world is attacked by a incomprehensible tentacle beast from another dimension, and it attacks by [[KickTheDog kicking the dog]] or [[SeriousBusiness leaving the]] [[WhatDoYouMeanItsNotHeinous toilet seat up]].

* '''Exaggerated''': The SIC, having discovered that the [[{{EldritchAbomination}} otherworldly creatures]] are indeed horrifying and incomprehensibly evil, decides that humanity itself must become a similar entity in order to survive. However, upon doing so, the humanity-abomination realizes that there are [[AlwaysABiggerFish always even bigger fish]] in the sea that the 'Horrifying monsters' seem like helpless little humans compared to.

* '''Downplayed''': There are mind-boggling horrors in the world capable of rending it apart, but they're a distant, slumbering threat... for now.

* '''Deconstructed''': Everyone realizes how insignificant they are. They all become {{Nietzsche Wannabe}}s and/or commit suicide. Thus, no story.

* '''Reconstructed''': The story switches to the perspective of the survivors who defied seeing the world pessimistically and/or [[{{Xenofiction}} the cosmic horrors themselves]].

** A horde of inhuman, horrifying, and incomprehensibly evil monsters conquers the helpless world in the space of a nanosecond and reshapes it into a twisted morass of horror and despair that would eclipse Hell itself. There, humans die horribly in factory farms, have their souls consumed, and are transformed into a...''thing''... whose mind and memory are scattered to a million pieces. Of course, death will only intensified the inhumanly immense agonies...

* '''Exaggerated''': The SIC, having discovered that the [[{{EldritchAbomination}} otherworldly creatures]] are indeed horrifying and uncaring, decides that humanity itself must become a similar entity in order to survive. However, upon doing so, the humanity-abomination realizes that there are [[AlwaysABiggerFish always even bigger fish]] in the sea that the 'Horrifying monsters' seem like helpless little humans compared to.

* '''Inverted''': The SIC discovers intelligent aliens who turn out to be largely insignificant to humans, and who find us to be so abominable that they are likely to GoMadFromTheRevelation.

* '''Lampshaded''': "VHYarghKXepft, the queen with a thousand eyes? I guess God is an H.P. Lovecraft fan."

* '''Exaggerated''': The SIC, having discovered that the [[{{EldritchAbomination}} otherworldly creatures]] are indeed horrifying and uncaring, decides that humanity itself must become a similar entity in order to survive. However, upon doing so, the humanity-abomination realizes that there are even bigger fish in the sea that the 'Horrifying monsters' seem like helpless little humans compared to.

** Mind-boggling horrors threaten to destroy the world, but all is not lost! Humanity is an embryonic god waiting to AscendToTheHigherPlaneOfExistence, and if we do manage to reach the next evolutionary stage, maybe we can drive off the monsters.

** Mind-boggling horrors threaten to destroy the world, but all is not lost! Humanity is an embryonic god waiting to AscendToHigherPlaneOfExistence, and if we do manage to reach the next evolutionary stage, maybe we can drive off the monsters.

** Mind-boggling horrors threaten to destroy the world, but all is not lost! Humanity is an embryonic god waiting to AscendToHigherPlanesOfExistence, and if we do manage to reach the next evolutionary stage, maybe we can drive off the monsters.

** This worldview basically fosters a DarknessInducedAudienceApathy among both the inhabitants and the readers.

* '''Downplayed''': There are mind-boggling tentacled horrors in the world, and everyone treats this as just the way things are, no more alarming than the rate of mortality in car crashes.

* '''Exaggerated''': The SIC, having discovered that the [[{{EdlritchAbomination}} otherworldly creatures]] are indeed horrifying and uncaring, decides that humanity itself must become a similar entity in order to survive. However, upon doing so, the humanity-abomination realizes that there are even bigger fish in the sea that the 'Horrifying monsters' seem like helpless little humans compared to.

** In Real Life cosmology there really are things out there so enormous, so powerful and [[MindScrew so mind-shatteringly complex]] that our entire world is meaninglessly small in comparison, but either we just don't care like how they don't care about us, or even positively see them as awesome. Also, the existential horror of insignificance isn't that horrifying, being pretty easy to ignore.