The air in Cedar Hollow had grown thick, oppressive, as though the very atmosphere had been tainted by something ancient, malevolent. It wasn’t just the lingering whispers or the shadows that crept unnaturally across the land—it was the weight. The weight of something that had been unleashed, something that couldn’t be undone.Mira stood at the edge of the bloodroot field, watching as the blooms unfurled their petals in the pale light of the moon. They pulsed softly, like the beating of a heart, and Mira could feel their pull deep in her bones. The bloodroot—the Hollow’s bloodroot—was spreading, reaching deeper into the town with each passing night, a grotesque reminder of what they had unleashed.Sophie was beside her, her face pale, her hands shaking as she fidgeted with the strap of her bag. Nathan was still inside, though Mira could feel his presence even from here. He hadn’t been himself since the incident with the mirror, and every time she looked at him, it was as though he wer

The morning after their descent into the Hollow’s depths, the town of Cedar Hollow felt eerily still. The usual hum of life—the distant chatter of townsfolk, the rustle of leaves in the wind—was gone. Instead, an unnatural silence hung over the town, as if the very air had grown thick with unspoken fears and secrets that no one dared to confront.But for one person, this stillness was not unfamiliar. Elliot Voss had always felt like an outsider in Cedar Hollow, drawn to the town’s dark history with a relentless obsession. He’d spent years poring over old texts, searching for answers to the town’s mystery, but nothing had prepared him for the horrors he would uncover in the last few weeks.The curse was real, and it was deeper than anyone could have imagined.He stood at the edge of the cemetery, his gaze fixed on the weathered gravestones that dotted the landscape like forgotten memories. The place had always felt… wrong to him, even as a child. But now, after everything that had happ

Sophie stood motionless as the echo of shattering glass reverberated through the air. The Hollow’s presence, once a suffocating weight that had pressed against her very being, seemed to waver and fade like the last remnants of a storm cloud. Her hand, still pressed against the broken mirror, trembled, not from fear, but from the realization of what they had just done.The world around them felt different—quieter, as though something had shifted in the very fabric of reality. The air no longer hummed with malevolent energy. The oppressive weight that had gripped the town for so long seemed to be dissipating. But Sophie couldn’t shake the feeling that something else was still lingering, just beneath the surface, waiting to make its final move.Nathan stepped beside her, his hand brushing against hers, grounding her in the moment. His expression was a mix of awe and relief, but there was a hint of doubt in his eyes. He could feel it too—the unsettling calm after the storm.“Is it over?”

The air was still, too still. Sophie’s breath echoed in the cavernous silence of the old church as she stepped closer to the altar, the dagger still clenched tightly in her hand. The weight of it was heavy, but it wasn’t the metal that burdened her—it was the decision that lay ahead. The final act, the one that would either save Cedar Hollow or doom it forever.Nathan stood beside her, his eyes reflecting the same unease. He wasn’t speaking, but Sophie could feel his presence, his energy merging with hers. They were in this together, but the uncertainty still gnawed at the back of her mind.“Do you feel it?” she asked, her voice barely above a whisper.Nathan nodded, his gaze never leaving the altar. “Yeah. It’s like everything is… waiting. Like it’s holding its breath.”Sophie didn’t answer immediately. She had been feeling it too—the thick, suffocating presence that lingered in the air, the pulse beneath the town that seemed to grow stronger with each passing moment. The Hollow was

They didn’t find a body.No bones. No ashes. No trace.Just a hollow in the earth where the blackroot tree had once stood, its roots turned to dust and the air charged with something Nathan couldn’t explain. The kind of silence that felt watched.Cedar Hollow began to heal. Slowly. Like a town recovering from both surgery and war. Roads were repaved. The Hollow’s Field was cordoned off and eventually declared a memorial site. Children returned to school. The mist began to lift from the hills.But no one truly forgot what happened.Especially not Nathan.He walked every morning to the tree’s remains, often long before the sun rose. Sometimes he thought he heard her voice, carried in the wind or whispered in birdsong.Other times, he thought he saw her.A flicker of a figure at the edge of the woods.Dark curls. Bare feet. A silhouette standing just where the fog thickened.The first time it happened, he sprinted toward her—but she was gone before his feet touched the place she’d stood.