As an occult researcher, you've read about many strange cases, stuff from supposed ghost sightings to the mysteries of the Bermuda Triangle. Today, you find yourself reading about the case of a woman named Sadako Yamamura.

Born in 1947 to Shizuko Yamamura and Dr. Heihachiro Ikuma, Sadako exhibited psychic powers from a young age, inheriting them from her mother. After her mother's death and the hospitalization of her father from tuberculosis, she was left to be raised by her late mother's relatives. At 19, she moved to Tokyo, joined an acting group, and fell in love. However, tragedy once again befell Sadako as a freak stage accident killed her partner and others. Devastated, Sadako left Tokyo to visit her ill father in a sanatorium, where a doctor assaulted her, unknowingly infecting her with smallpox that was in his body. Upon discovering she was a hermaphrodite during the attack, he threw her into a well, where she tried to escape to no avail. Sadako's body was never found in the well, which led many to think that all of this was just a legend. Sadako's case piques your interest, and since you were already thinking about visiting Japan, you decide to look more into this whole "legend".

After arriving in the Izu Peninsula on the island of Honshu, you take a rental car to the abandoned sanatorium. Stepping out of your car, everything seems abandoned, with leaves growing onto the "new" mountain resort that was built over the sanatorium. Exploring the place some more reveals a run-down well... the same well that Sadako was supposedly thrown inside and left to die.

Looking inside, all you see is just 20 feet of nothingness. Maybe Sadako's case was in fact a legend after all. Shrugging, you start to walk away, until a sharp breeze surrounds you, the sound of the waves nearby crashing. Looking behind you, you see a figure with long, jet-black hair covering her face slowly crawling out of the well. Is this... is this Sadako?!

You stand there, frozen, as Sadako stumbles out of the well and stares at you.