Aarav's room was silent. Too silent.
The broken mirror lay scattered across the floor, but the reflection that had crawled out of it was nowhere to be seen. His chest heaved, his palms slick with sweat. He wanted to believe it was over. That it had been a hallucination.
Then—he heard it.
A voice. His voice.
"You can't run from me."
Aarav spun, heart hammering, but the room was empty. He staggered back until his knees hit the bedframe. The diary lay on the desk, perfectly still, its cover closed, as if mocking him.
The whisper slithered through his head again, louder this time.
"You opened the door… and I stepped in."
Pain erupted in his skull. Aarav clutched his temples, gasping. Images flashed before his eyes—his own face twisted in cruelty, the serpent's eye blinking in the void, the pale girl reaching for him. But instead of saving him, she was pulled backward, swallowed by shadows.
Aarav screamed and slammed his fists into the wall.
The whisper laughed.
From the corner of his eye, Aarav saw movement. His reflection in the windowpane wasn't copying him anymore. While he stood frozen in terror, the other Aarav smirked, tilting his head with deliberate mockery.
The reflection mouthed words he couldn't ignore:
"Let me out."
Aarav stumbled forward, rage and fear tangling in his chest. "Stay away from me!" he shouted. His fist shot out, striking the glass—
But the reflection's hand moved first.
The window cracked from the inside.
Aarav stumbled back, glass dust raining onto the floor. The reflection grinned wider, its red eyes burning.
Then, suddenly, all sound drained from the world. His heartbeat vanished. The hum of electricity gone. Even his own ragged breathing muted.
In that silence, a final whisper filled his head, calm and cold:
"Every abyss needs a vessel. You've already chosen."
The glass of the window exploded outward with a deafening shatter. Darkness rushed in—not from outside, but from the shards themselves, crawling like liquid shadow toward Aarav's feet.
He tried to run. But the shadows were faster.
The chapter ended in suffocating silence, with Aarav sinking into blackness that felt like drowning… only this time, the water was inside his own mind.