Four Friends and Their Wildest Journeys

II. Trapped in the shadows

The room was suffocatingly cold, the kind of cold that seemed to seep into your bones and freeze your very soul. The figure in the black dress stood completely still, her back to them, her presence so oppressive that it felt as if the walls themselves were closing in.

Andżelika, ever the one to push through danger with sheer will, took a bold step forward. "Alright, what the hell is this? Some creepy woman in a haunted house?" she muttered, her voice defiant, but there was a tremor in her words that she was desperately trying to hide.

Kuba shifted nervously, the flashlight trembling in his hand. He had been too cool for school up until this point, but now... the palpable weight of the figure in front of them made it hard to breathe. "Is anyone else seeing this...?" His voice faltered, and his fingers tightened around the flashlight as if it would protect him.

Martyna, standing beside Kuba, looked horrified. Her phone was still in her hand, but now it was pointing uselessly at the floor as she stood frozen. She had expected thrills, scares, and the usual jump-scares, but this was different. This wasn't a haunted house attraction. This felt real. Too real. "This is... not okay," she whispered, barely audible. "Why isn't she moving?"

Karolina, however, couldn't take her eyes off the woman. There was something about her that didn't feel like a person at all. It was as though she was part of the house itself, something woven into the very fabric of the old mansion. Something ancient. Something that didn't belong here—at least not in this time. Her mind raced with thoughts, and she had to fight the rising panic in her chest. "We need to get out of here. Now," she said, her voice cold and sharp, her usual sarcasm absent.

Andżelika rolled her eyes, not really hearing Karolina. "Stop being such a baby. It's just some old lady playing dress-up. I'll deal with it."

She stepped toward the woman, raising her hand to grab the sleeve of her black dress, ready to yank her aside and show her who was in charge. But before she could make contact, a voice—soft and far too sweet—sounded from the woman's direction.

"You shouldn't be here."

The words hung in the air, thick with malice. The coldness in the room deepened as if the very atmosphere had turned ice. Andżelika froze, her fingers mere inches from the woman's cloak. For the first time in a long time, she felt a twinge of uncertainty.

"What... What do you mean by that?" Andżelika asked, her voice coming out more hesitant than she intended.

The woman didn't answer. Instead, she tilted her head slightly, the veil that covered her face rustling in the silence. For a second, the room seemed to fall into total stillness—no one breathed. Then, without warning, the woman whipped around, her veil flying back to reveal a face so pale and gaunt it looked as if it had never seen sunlight.

Her eyes were empty—no pupils, no iris, just pure white, like dead, staring holes. The sight was enough to make Andżelika's blood run cold, and for once, her mouth fell shut.

Kuba stumbled back, his breath hitching. "What the hell?"

Martyna let out a strangled scream, dropping her phone to the floor as she backed away, her feet tangling with the folds of her skirt. "What is that thing?!"

But it wasn't just her that was backing up. The entire group, in one unified, panic-stricken motion, began to retreat toward the door. But the door wasn't where it used to be. The hallway they'd entered through—the one with the door they'd just opened—was gone. It had disappeared. In its place was a solid wall of rotting wood, as if it had never existed at all.

Andżelika's eyes widened. "What the hell?!"

"Guys... guys," Karolina's voice was barely a whisper, her hands shaking as she tried to process what was happening. "We... we're trapped."

The woman's mouth parted in an unnerving grin. "Yes, you are."

Then, as if to confirm her words, the walls around them began to shift, the floorboards groaning as they warped and twisted. The very structure of the house seemed to change, expanding and contracting, distorting the reality around them. The air grew denser, heavier. It was as though the house itself had become alive, a monstrous, hungry thing that had just decided to devour them whole.

"We need to leave," Karolina shouted, her usual snarky tone now completely absent, replaced by a raw, guttural fear.

But it was too late.

The woman let out a low, guttural laugh, one that echoed through the hall and reverberated in their chests. "Leaving? You cannot leave."

And with that, the house itself seemed to react. The walls began to pulse, as though breathing, and a deafening sound filled the air—a hum that vibrated the floor beneath their feet, rattling their bones.

"What the hell is that noise?" Martyna screamed, clutching her ears in vain.

The woman took one slow step toward them, her bare feet gliding over the dusty floor without a sound. Each step she took seemed to fill the room with more of that oppressive cold, and as she came closer, it felt as though the very space was warping around her.

"You are in my domain now," the woman said softly. Her voice was smooth, but with an undertone of something far more sinister. "And now... you will be my guests for eternity."

The flashlight that Kuba was holding flickered violently, casting dark, jerking shadows across the walls. With each flicker, the room seemed to shift—tables moved on their own, portraits hung crookedly on the walls, and an oppressive, suffocating sense of dread settled like a weight on their chests.

"W-What does she mean by 'guests'?" Martyna's voice was shaky, and the phone she'd dropped earlier was now glitching, showing flickers of static on the screen as if it were rejecting the very idea of capturing this nightmare.

Andżelika opened her mouth to retort, to make a snarky remark, but the words died in her throat when she saw what had appeared in the room next.

At the far end of the hall, a massive black figure emerged from the shadows, its body too large to be anything human. It moved slowly, deliberately. With each step, the temperature in the room dropped further, the very air becoming too thick to breathe.

The figure's eyes glowed a faint, eerie red, and its body was cloaked in shadows, its features impossible to discern beneath the mass of darkness. It felt like it was watching them with a thousand unseen eyes, all at once.

"What the hell is that?" Kuba choked, his voice full of panic as he backed into the others.

The woman, still smiling that same, twisted grin, stepped forward again. "This is just the beginning," she whispered. "You are not in control here anymore. The mansion has claimed you."

And with those words, everything started to spiral out of control.

The ground beneath their feet began to shake violently, and the door they had tried to escape through swung open once more—but it was no longer an exit. It was a maw, a dark vortex pulling everything into it.

The black figure took one massive step toward them, its arms stretching unnaturally long, fingers curling like claws.

"RUN!" Karolina screamed, her voice breaking, as she pushed forward, trying to make a break for it. But the dark vortex swallowed them whole.