Eli and I knew the answer wasn't in the apartment anymore.
Not in the walls, not in the mirror, and not even in the ledger.
We had hit a dead end—unless we went backward.
Further back than Mara. Further back than Lydia. Further back than the blood contracts.
We needed to find who signed first.
And why they would curse this place from the very beginning.
The building's maintenance office held old blueprints.
Most people never looked at them.
But I remembered what Mr. Halvorsen, the old building supervisor, had once drunkenly mumbled at a tenant meeting:
"Place has bones. Old ones. Buried in the subbasement. Sealed off since '59."
We thought it was nonsense.
But now, it felt like the final clue.
So that night, we broke into the utility room behind the laundry area.
And there, hidden behind a fuse box, was a metal hatch bolted shut.
It took us half an hour to get it open.
What lay beneath was not a modern basement.
It was stone. Old, rough, and cold.
The stairs creaked under our feet as we descended into the dark.
No lights.
Only the weak beam of my flashlight cutting through thick air.
The deeper we went, the more it smelled like iron and paper.
Until we reached a door.
Carved into the wood, barely legible through the grime:
"Tenant Archive – Since 1957"
Inside, we found rows of shelves.
Not digital files, not boxes—ledgers.
Dozens of them.
Each labeled with a room number and a range of years.
We looked for 4B – 1957.
There it was. Thick, black leather. Dust-covered.
We set it on the center table and opened it slowly.
The first page wasn't a lease.
It was a ritual contract.
Written in Latin, with a symbol beneath that I'd seen before: the Sun in Thirds.
It matched the carvings on the wall behind the ledger upstairs.
But this one had something else: a blood seal pressed directly into the page.
Beside it: a name.
Alden G. Fray – Initiator – 1957
Eli whispered, "Never heard of him."
We turned the page.
It wasn't just a list of tenants.
It was a record of experiments.
Each tenant marked not just by name, but by response.
Fear levels. Reactions. Manifestation times.
They were testing something.
In the margin, handwritten notes in red ink:
"The Host must remain within the perimeter. Prolonged exposure accelerates integration.""Memory suppression is key. Unbound memories lead to detachment failure.""Witnesses become unstable after repeated exposure. Recommend limitation."
Eli ran his fingers down the page.
"This… this was never about protection," he said. "It was about containment."
"They weren't binding a ghost," I said, heart sinking.
"They were feeding it."
Further down, we found sketches of symbols.
Eyes. Circles. Flame-like runes.
And one repeated word in the margins: "The Hollowing."
Eli read aloud the translated note beneath:
"Entity cannot survive in free space. It must anchor to memory and trauma.""The more it is remembered, the more real it becomes.""Host is both vessel and cage.""To forget is to weaken it.To speak of it… is to bring it back."
We flipped to the last page.
A final entry, sealed with wax.
It had one sentence:
"If the Host becomes aware, the Witness must choose:remember with them, or disappear."
Eli looked at me.
His eyes wide.
"That's what the mirror meant."
I nodded.
"Only one can leave."
He whispered, "Unless we break the cycle."
Suddenly, the ground shook.
Books tumbled from shelves.
A deep rumble echoed from somewhere beyond the walls.
Then—scratching.
Long, deep claws dragging across the stone.
Something had awakened.
Something below us.
Behind the walls of the archive, we heard slow breathing.
It was here.
And it remembered us.
We grabbed the ledger and ran.
The stone stairs behind us groaned and cracked as we ascended.
But before we reached the hatch, Eli stopped.
He turned back and looked down into the dark.
"I have to go back," he said.
"What? No, you don't—"
He held up the original contract.
"The only way to end it… is to destroy this."
I shook my head. "We can find another way—"
"There is no other way," he said.
"If I burn this… maybe the cycle ends with me."
Before I could argue, he shoved the ledger into my chest.
"Keep this one," he said.
"Make sure someone knows the truth. Even if they forget me."
And then—
He turned, and ran back down into the archive.
I stood frozen.
Heart pounding.
Ledger in hand.
I waited for the ground to shake again.
For something to scream.
But instead…
Silence.
Total, consuming silence.
Then—
A warm wind blew from the hatch.
And a whisper brushed past my ear:
"One remembered.One remained.The door is closed."
I climbed out of the subbasement.
Alone.
The hatch slammed shut behind me.
When I returned to apartment 4B, Eli's things were gone.
No trace.
Even the mirror was gone.
As if he had never been here at all.
Except—
On the coffee table lay one item:
His name tag.
And beneath it, in his handwriting:
"The Host is gone.Don't let the Witness become the next."