Horrific Shorts: Zombie Edition

The air inside the mansion was thick, heavy with an unnatural stillness that pressed against their skin. The walls stretched impossibly high, disappearing into a darkness that pulsed like a living thing. The doors behind them were gone. There was no way back.

Draven took point, his shotgun raised, but the silence felt wrong—like the mansion was watching. Mira held the Cursed Book tighter, its pages vibrating beneath her fingertips. It wanted to be read. It wanted to be fed.

Elias ran a hand along the wallpaper, his fingers brushing against something wet. "This place isn't made of stone and wood," he muttered. "It's flesh."

Zara exhaled sharply. "Great. A house that bleeds. Just what we need."

A soft whisper drifted through the corridor. Not the eerie disembodied voices they'd grown used to—this was different. A child's laughter.

Mira flinched. "It's her."

The Forsaken Girl.

They followed the sound, the hallways twisting unnaturally, stretching into loops that defied logic. Portraits of faceless figures lined the walls, their heads subtly turning as the group passed. The deeper they walked, the more the air felt wrong, like they were sinking into something thick and unseen.

Then—a door slammed shut behind them.

Draven spun, shotgun raised. Nothing. Just an empty hallway that hadn't been empty a second ago. He exhaled slowly. "It's playing with us."

Elias tried a door. Locked. He tried another. Locked. But the third creaked open, revealing a spiral staircase descending into darkness.

Zara clicked on her flashlight, sweeping the beam downward. "I don't like this."

Mira hesitated. The Cursed Book was burning cold against her skin. It didn't want them to go down there. But they had no other way forward.

Step by step, they descended. The deeper they went, the more the mansion seemed to breathe, the walls shifting, the wooden beams creaking as though alive. The shadows moved too much, stretching unnaturally, bending in ways they shouldn't.

Halfway down, Mira froze.

Something was waiting at the bottom. A figure, small and thin, dressed in a tattered white gown. The Forsaken Girl.

Her eyes were hollow voids. Her mouth moved, but no sound came out. Then, she raised her hand and pointed behind them.

Draven turned—just in time to see the walls split open, revealing grotesque arms bursting through the wood, clawing for them.

"RUN!"

They sprinted down the last steps as the staircase collapsed, swallowed by the ravenous dark. At the bottom, the girl was gone, but in her place stood a door carved from bone.

Mira panted, pressing a hand to her chest. "That wasn't an attack. That was a warning."

Elias wiped sweat from his brow. "Then we just ran into something worse."

The door creaked open on its own.

And inside, something laughed.