The world hadn't gone back to normal.
It only pretended to.
Imogen walked the silent halls of the university, the journal clutched to her chest like a second heart. Every step echoed too loud, every flickering light buzzed just a shade off-pitch, and shadows clung longer than they should—curving unnaturally around corners, watching her without eyes.
Something had changed.
It wasn't just the ritual. Not just the candles or the voice that had poured into her skull like molten glass. Something fundamental had shifted, like the ground beneath her thoughts no longer aligned with the world above.
She could feel it in the way her vision blurred when she looked too long at doorways, how the tiles under her feet seemed to drift when she wasn't watching. The air itself had weight now. The walls breathed when she wasn't looking.
The journal pulsed faintly in her grip, its spine still warm.
03:07.
That number sat at the top of her thoughts, constant and humming. A tether.
The red wing loomed ahead—condemned, supposedly due to "structural issues." But there was no scaffolding, no warning tape. Just silence. And the sense that this wing of the building wasn't forgotten—it had been buried.
Imogen reached the heavy door.
Its paint had long since peeled. The metal handle was cold as bones. She paused, breathing deep. The hallway was dead silent behind her, like the whole building held its breath.
She opened the door.
And the world responded.
The hallway beyond was wrong.
It stretched far too long for the dimensions of the building. Lights flickered in stuttering patterns that didn't match any wiring. The walls were lined with doors that hadn't existed a day ago—doors with no room numbers, no plaques. Just warped wood and brass handles that glinted with stillness too perfect to trust.
"Walk three steps forward, then seven steps back."
The words weren't just from the journal anymore. They were a command, ringing in her bones.
Imogen obeyed.
Three steps forward.
Each footfall dropped her deeper into something. The air grew heavier. Static danced against her skin. It was like reality became thick, viscous, resisting her passage like water.
Seven steps back.
Each backward step peeled something away—noise, time, temperature. Until the world itself felt distant. And when her heel met the floor on that final step—
A door opened.
It hadn't been there before. No hinges groaned. It just unfolded from the wall, like it had always been part of the hallway—just waiting for her to remember it.
Beyond was a staircase, spiraling down into a darkness that wasn't shadow, but something more unnatural. It wasn't absence—it was pressure. A silence so dense it crushed thought.
Imogen hesitated only a second.
Then she descended.
At the bottom, the stairs gave way to a space between basement and cathedral. The floor was linoleum, yellowed and cracked, but the ceiling arched like a forgotten chapel. Water dripped from unseen pipes. The lights buzzed overhead, strained and dim.
Something whispered her name from the dark.
She didn't respond.
She reached for the journal instead, drawing strength from the warmth still lingering in its cover.
The air around her pulsed, faintly—like an unseen breath shifting against her skin. It wasn't cold, but she shivered anyway.
And then, far across the vast tiled floor, she saw him.
Julian.
Slumped against a fractured column. His back to her. His outline not quite… right.
She stepped closer.
One pace. Then two.
And then—he moved.
But it wasn't natural. His body jerked too sharply, his head twisting at an angle that shouldn't have been possible. His spine cracked once. Twice.
And when he looked at her—
It wasn't Julian's face.