Like me, if you were born during the 2000s, you probably grew up watching Cartoon Network, and if you watched Cartoon Network as a kid, then you most definitely watched “The Amazing World of Gumball.” This story is about what my best friend and I saw when we went to visit Elmore. If you google “Gumball house IRL,” you can actually find the address of the real-life house. In fact, every building in Elmore is real. Gumball’s house, the mall, and the school—they’re all there. But in the pictures, everything looks abandoned and straight out of an apocalypse movie.

At the time, my best friend, whom we’ll call Torsson, and I were really into urban exploration. We liked the thrill of exploring places we weren’t supposed to be, all while being in constant fear of either getting chased by zombies or accidentally walking in on a bunch of hobos having an orgy. Anyway, we saved up money and booked plane tickets from Sweden to California.

When we arrived, we took a taxi to the address, tipped the driver (apparently you have to tip everyone here), and started exploring. Of course, we started with Gumball’s house. Surprisingly enough, the house only had one story, and the inside was much smaller than we expected and looked nothing like it did in the show. The interior was in the same condition as the exterior. For an abandoned building, the floor was really dirty. Do all American homes have carpeted floors? Apart from some disarranged furniture and the broken glass on the floor from the window we broke to get in, the house was basically empty.

We also went to the green house and the school. Same thing there: empty, dark, and creepy. The school was actually in really good condition, which made it even creepier. Thankfully, we didn’t need to break anything to get in.

After hours of exploring our favorite childhood cartoon locations, we decided to go to Mr. Robinson’s house. In every picture you find online, all the front doors are closed and presumably locked. But for whatever reason, Mr. Robinson’s front door was slightly open. Now, this should’ve been an immediate red flag because it was closed when we first arrived. But of course, why would two idiotic 17-year-olds think anything of it?

We stepped inside and were hit by the smell of… well, an old abandoned house. The first room we went to was what I think was the living room, and holy crap, when we entered that room, we were greeted with the most awful stench you could possibly imagine. The smell was so bad I can’t even describe it. Imagine replacing every hygiene product with a decomposing animal. That’s what it smelled like.

The closer we got to the couch, the stronger the smell became. After vomiting a couple of times, instead of leaving like we should have, we decided to move the couch. And when we did, we found a latch in the floor. I wish we had never opened the latch to the basement.

I was the first to stick my head down the hole. What I saw was so disturbing it still haunts me two years later. The floor and walls were covered in feces, newspapers littered the floor, and on top of those newspapers was a cage. And in that cage was a person. A naked and extremely skinny person. No, skinny isn’t the right word. They were practically a skeleton with skin on. What made it even worse was the video camera in front of the cage.

Torsson and I quickly ran out of the house and called the cops, who arrived shortly along with an ambulance. The man was named Kee Yamamoto, and he had been missing for seven months. Even though there was a camera, nobody was convicted or arrested. I don’t know if the man is still alive, but I assume he’s dead. There’s only one thing I know for certain: Torsson and I will never forget what we saw that day, nor will we ever be able to watch “The Amazing World of Gumball” the same way again.