I had a similar issue, but I encountered it when I was in a snowy biome. It most likely tried to spawn snow pads floating, then the chest, then it updated the blocks. It also had 2 torches floating aswell.
Seed: 5167678364295412304
EDIT: This happens in survival. Just to confirm it.
It isn't a bug. It's a simple mechanic in Minecraft. Entities get stored when they enter portals at their position, so they start building up amounts. I basically explained what it is previously, but you can do this without slabs by pushing mobs in portals.
How about I explain. The mobs can only spawn in the nether portal when replicated, as you said. And so, they are transported and stored. This is intentional. Throwing items or pushing mobs into portals is intentional. Stored puts their position, NBT Tags and names into storage and puts it into play when entering the dimension, making mobs (or items) spawn in the nether when you arive. So, simply, The slimes spawn for one frame then go into the portal, get stored, and once you go in, they are unstored and put into play. By how long you stayed, a certain amount of slimes will be in. Bam. Simple fix - Don't cover everything in slabs. Also, This is the same thing on how it works, but a little different, with ender pearls. You throw a pearl into the air and go in a different dimension. It stores the position of the pearl and what direction it was moving towards at the time. This makes it so you can go to the nether, leave, and end up where the pearl would land.
Not a glitch. This is intentional.
Thank you for more detailed info and how to remove the glitch.
Finally got around to do it.
It's not that, It only happens when I do item duplication or more than 15 render distance, but item duplication is the worst. It only happens on those two.
The same glitched happened to me, but this time it loaded old chunks instead of an existing one, because I was destroying a village to make space.
NOTE: I could only get a good shot while paused.
NOTE NOTE: I'm in 1.8.7 and I just got this glitch today.
NOTE NOTE NOTE: Figured out how the glitch works. The normal render distance that can be loaded without issues is 12. I was using 15. The game can't render 15 chunks without using multiple of the same chunk, so it randomly grabs other chunks in memory. That's how old chunks got loaded, or any chunk nearby, really. Solution: Never go over 12 render distance.
Thats normal.
It happens with all blocks, items do display correctly though
There are two floating torches. All of the items in my hotbar were from the vanished chest. The chest didn't even drop itself.