Kobeni | The Backrooms

The Backrooms is a likely living parallel dimension consisting of distorted imitations from memory of places from our reality, primarily appearing as enormous interconnected spaces of similar rooms, hallways, and doorways. While it also contains several unique looking areas, the largest area borrows the appearance of an empty or unfurnished office building with bright yellow wallpaper, tiled ceilings, and buzzing fluorescent light fixtures.

The Backrooms is dotted with multiple different "Null Zones", which are small areas in which the Backrooms and the “real world” are able to connect. It is possible to fall out of reality and into the Backrooms through these Null Zones within the “real world.” The Backrooms is shown to not abide by the rules of the real world in some cases. Time travel into the future or the past is sometimes shown to be possible, at least inside or near these Null Zones.

The topography of the Backrooms varies from area to area, but all areas in the Backrooms have a heavy resemblance to areas in the real world. There are many objects created by the Backrooms; these objects vary and sometimes fit in with the area where they are found. Noises with no source can be heard throughout the Backrooms, sometimes distorted and unable to be comprehended. The walls in the Backrooms are distorted in various sections, bending and twisting in unnatural ways. All areas of the Backrooms are in some way seamlessly connected, either by regular doorways and hallways or unorthodox ways such as holes in the floor and walls.

There are "Null Zones" within the Backrooms, which are doorways between the real world and the Backrooms. Null Zones are located everywhere in the Backrooms; it is through Null Zones that things and people fall through when entering the Backrooms.

The second area of the Backrooms can be found by going through a hole or a fire escape door to it in the first area. It resembles the interior of a modern office building, an apartment complex, or an art gallery. The floor is made of wood or wood-looking concrete and the walls are sometimes white or gray. These areas are connected by multiple parallel floors that stretch out for many many miles.

The third area of the Backrooms can be found by going through an opening in a wall from the first area. This area is pitch black. The wallpaper throughout this area has pictures of forests. The wallpaper also has a picture of an old building with forced perspective. Objects are common but distorted.

The fourth area of the Backrooms can be entered via one of the many holes in the a large rooms filled with many square holes in the ground with a drop of around 20 feet. It is very similar to the first area as it has the same carpeting and wallpaper, but with a greener color and dimmer light.

The fifth area of the Backrooms can be entered by crawling through a slanted gap in the fourth area. This location is radically different from the other places due to it appearing to be located outside with a visible night sky. Paved roads, houses, fire hydrants, sidewalks, sewer grates, trees, streetlights and many characteristics of a suburban neighborhood are prevalent in this area. The area is surrounded by two dark tunnels. An unknown source of red lights shines from above and a strange, garbled noise can be heard.

The sixth area of the Backrooms is located inside one of the houses in the fifth area. It is surrounded by a brick wall and the walls on the inside are blue. The room has a grey carpet and many inverted street signs stick out of it. Across the room lies a winding corridor that leads to an area similar to the first, but with a lighter tint.

The seventh area of the Backrooms is similar to the first area but features characteristics similar to a house. Objects such as outlets, light switches, parts of a kitchen, a coffee table with cushioned chairs and sofas can appear in this area. The area is connected to other areas of the Backrooms via hallways to the first area, along with a door that connects to the second area. This area of the Backrooms features painted walls with no wallpaper along with circular ceiling lights.

The eighth area of the Backrooms is connected to a part in the first area. It is an entire house from the real world that has been replicated in the Backrooms; however, with a general lack of furniture. The replicated house features proper wooded floors, a faint blue wall, and some railing with circular ceiling lights. One additional room has a yellow wall and a single large ceiling light. A dark hallway connected to the yellow room leads to a bedroom with a giant bed, and another room with a painting and an instance of the Lifeform.

The ninth area of the Backrooms is connected to the seventh area of the Backrooms via a hole "put in" the floor and to the first area. This area of the Backrooms features characteristics similar to a bathroom or indoor tile pool. The walls, floor, and ceiling are made of ceramic tiles, there are various pools of water that differ in size, metallic beams next to pools of water along with a metallic ladder, some ceiling lights, and a single lamp connected to a hole on the wall. Water droplet sounds are heard in this area from an unknown source. Someone may have lived and/or died here according to the lamp and drops of blood on the floor. This could also explain why some of the tiles had been removed from the wall.

Monsters

Still Lives are human-like, often hostile entities native to the Backrooms. These creatures are the distorted results of the Backrooms attempting to replicate real people, whether directly or from someone's memory.

The Lifeform is a humanoid creature (or possibly a group of creatures) that inhabit the Backrooms, preying on victims that have found themselves in their presence. They are extremely hostile toward humans.

The creature seems to "come to life" from a black substance resembling mold around the Backrooms.

The origins of the creatures are unknown.

The Lifeform appears to wander the Backrooms randomly, often making noises which seem similar to human speech, however it is unclear if the creature understands the meaning of these sounds. The Lifeforms seem to be able to mimic human speech, as the entity can be heard clearly calling out for help from an unknown location.

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The Backrooms is likened by many to a form of Purgatory or Limbo; Liminality is the driving force behind this. The feelings and sensations one experiences in the presence of liminality are often associated with and compared to the following: Surreality, Kenopsia, The Uncanny Valley, Nostalgia, Anemoia, Déjà vu, and The Mandela Effect.

Liminality may be heavily intertwined with one's memory and perception of reality (or fallibility thereof), both influencing and being influenced by its observer. Liminality is neither inherently benevolent/docile nor malevolent/hostile; in its most fundamental form, it is merely a force of nature, a perpetual state of change, blurring the line of duality.

Effect: Liminality familiarizes the unfamiliar, and defamiliarizes the familiar. It strips away then inverts one's traditional context/origin, sterilizing and stagnating it with a surreal and uncanny tinge. This usually manifests as hyperreal simulacra; an artificial thing formed by natural means, a natural thing formed by artificial means, or any general thing formed by relatively alien means.

Spaces: A liminal space is a physical snapshot capturing a suspended state of change or transition, an "in-between-ness". They are like frozen moments in time, from a time which never existed. Therefore, the most prominent characteristics of liminal spaces are associated in some form with travel, crossing or transition. Locations that are typically known/expected to be occupied are instead completely vacant, causing modern settings to instead feel like long-abandoned ruins