The red envelope sat on the table like a threat made of paper.
Elara couldn't sleep.
She had locked every door, checked every window twice, and placed a chair beneath the doorknob. Still, the silence in her apartment felt fragile—like a pause before something broke.
She turned back to the manuscript. The first letter had told her to "find the hidden word in her final story." Liora's final story was here. Somewhere in these pages was something someone didn't want her to know. Or perhaps… something someone needed her to uncover.
She flipped through the first chapter again.
> "Death does not knock. It slips in when you forget to lock the door."
That line echoed what had just happened to her. The letter. The whisper. The second envelope.
Was it prophecy? Or warning?
Her eyes narrowed as she skimmed line by line, looking for anomalies—misspelled words, strange capitalizations, irregular spacing. Then she saw it.
On the third page, one sentence stood out:
> "Some Words End Silently."
Each word was capitalized. The rest of the paragraph was normal. But these… they felt intentional.
She grabbed a pen and circled the first letters.
S – W – E – S
Nonsense?
She flipped two pages ahead. Another bold sentence in the middle of a paragraph:
> "Time Waits Everywhere Slowly."
Another strange line. Again, capitalized. First letters: T – W – E – S
She wrote both lines side by side.
SWES
TWES
It didn't make sense—yet. But something told her it wasn't random.
She opened her laptop and searched Liora's last known outline—an old email, marked two months before her death. There, she found a folder titled: "Echo Drafts – Not Final". Inside were several versions of the story, each slightly different. Edits. Redactions. Some paragraphs missing.
One file was titled: "Begin Where It Ended"
Her fingers trembled as she opened it.
Only one sentence filled the screen:
> "You looked away when she screamed."
Elara gasped, almost dropping the laptop. That line… it wasn't fiction. It was memory.
She had heard it before—spoken—the night of Liora's breakdown.
"I screamed, Elara. You looked away."
That was the last thing Liora had said before leaving her apartment for the final time.
This wasn't just a manuscript. It was a confession.
Or a trap.
A loud bang jolted her out of thought.
A glass bottle had shattered against her front door—someone had thrown it. She rushed to the peephole, but the hallway was empty, silent, just like before.
On the floor outside lay another envelope.
Black.
She opened it slowly, hands cold.
> "Four days. Your guilt is showing."
No signature.
Just another deadline.
Elara clutched the manuscript tighter. The game had rules, and she was beginning to understand them.
But the most terrifying part wasn't the threats or the countdown.
It was the creeping thought at the back of her mind—
What if she really had looked away when it mattered most?
Elara pressed her back against the wall, trying to quiet her breath. Her apartment, once her sanctuary, now felt like a cage. Someone was watching her. Someone who knew her deepest regrets.
She stared at the sentence again—"You looked away when she screamed."
Was it metaphorical? Or literal?
Memories flooded in.
Liora's last weeks had been strange. She had spoken in riddles, jumped at shadows, barely slept. Elara had chalked it up to stress—publishing deadlines, the pressure of expectations. But now, in hindsight, those weren't just signs of burnout. They were warnings.
She had missed them.
Or worse—ignored them.
The guilt curled in her stomach like acid.
She returned to the manuscript. Her eyes scanned the pages with new urgency. If this was a message from Liora, she couldn't afford to miss anything else.
Another line caught her eye, halfway down page nine:
> "Each word carries weight. Some are heavier than they appear."
She underlined it. Then checked the paragraph above and below.
Again—capital letters hidden in an otherwise normal section:
> "Beneath Every Line Lies Evidence."
B – E – L – L – E
Belle?
Elara froze.
That was Liora's middle name. No one used it. Not even their parents.
But it was written here—buried beneath a sentence, disguised in code.
She wrote down all the initial letters she had so far:
SWES
TWES
BELLE
The first two still didn't make sense. But the third?
It felt like a key.
She turned back to the red envelope.
Five days remain. Time is not your ally.
Then the black one:
Four days. Your guilt is showing.
The countdown was real. Whoever was behind this was giving her exactly six days. To solve the mystery? To confess? Or to suffer the same fate as Liora?
Her gaze fell on a small, faded photo pinned on her wall. It showed the two of them—Elara and Liora—on the rooftop of their childhood home. Liora had her arm around Elara's shoulders, grinning like nothing in the world could touch her. That smile had disappeared in the final year of her life.
What had she seen?
Who had she trusted?
And why had Elara been left behind with this mess?
A knock shattered the silence again—but this time it wasn't at her door.
It came from the window.
She spun around. Her apartment was on the third floor.
A note was taped to the outside of the glass, barely fluttering in the wind.
Shaking, she opened the window and pulled it in.
It wasn't in an envelope. Just a single piece of paper, written in the same sharp, messy handwriting as before.
> "You're running out of time, sister."
Her breath hitched.
This person knew.
Not just about Liora's death—but everything.
The game wasn't just about discovering the truth.
It was about Elara confronting her past.
And someone out there wanted to make sure she didn't survive the truth.Elara stared at the note in her hand, the wind still whispering through the open window. Her pulse thundered.
Whoever sent these letters wasn't just playing games.
They wanted her broken.
And the only way to survive…
Was to uncover the truth before the seventh letter arrived.