Horrific Shorts: Zombie Edition

The world buckled inward as the city crumbled.

Mira awoke in a room lined with endless shelves, each one stuffed with decaying books and scrolls that whispered as she passed. The air was thick with the scent of burnt parchment and ink.

She was alone.

Except for the book in her hands, which now glowed with a faint, hellish orange, like the embers of something ancient still smoldering.

The walls pulsed. Every step echoed, but never ended.

Then, a voice behind her.

"You opened the gate," it rasped.

She turned slowly. A figure stood by the nearest shelf—the Hollow Man.

But he was changed. His once-humanoid form now dripped shadows, and his fingers ended in long, quill-like tips. He walked without touching the ground, leaving trails of ink in his wake.

"This place," he said, gesturing around them, "records every life taken by the book. Every scream. Every failure."

Mira raised the book like a weapon. "You won't take me."

The Hollow Man tilted his head. "I already have. But your story... hasn't been written yet."

Suddenly, the shelves rattled violently. A chorus of screams erupted from the spines of the books, each volume glowing and convulsing. Pages flew from them like birds, forming shapes in the air—faces of those lost: Zara. Elias. Draven.

All screaming.

Mira fell to her knees. The book opened itself, the pages turning faster and faster. Words etched themselves in blood.

"You're in the Archive now," the Hollow Man whispered, "where time folds and horrors repeat."

Outside the Archive, in a ruined, moonlit street, Elias staggered from the wreckage of the collapsing city. Fires burned in the distance. Shadows crawled unnaturally along the walls.

He found Zara—bloodied but alive—standing in front of an old gate twisted with black vines. Beyond it stood a manor, more decrepit than before, its windows glowing like watchful eyes.

"She's inside," Zara said hoarsely. "Mira. The Hollow Man took her."

Before they could move, the ground cracked open behind them, and the Ghoul Trainmaster reappeared, now hunched and spectral, half-transformed into mist and bone.

"You cannot follow her," he warned. "The Archive is a place for the dead and dying. Even I wouldn't enter it twice."

Zara stepped forward. "Then we'll tear it down."

Inside the Archive, Mira stood again, defiant.

"If this place records death," she whispered, "then I'll rewrite it."

The cursed book ignited, flames erupting from its spine. Pages flew everywhere, catching fire mid-air.

The Hollow Man hissed, shrinking into the shadows.

A path opened—a burning hallway of truth and memory.

Mira ran.

Behind her, the Archive screamed. Ahead of her, a single gate pulsed in the darkness.

She didn't know what was beyond it.

But she knew the story wasn't finished.

Not yet.