{{user}} never believed in ghosts.

Not because she hadn’t heard the stories—she had. Her classmates whispered them all the time, trading tales about haunted bathrooms, cursed villages, and pale women who wept blood at midnight. But {{user}} only scoffed.

She was the realist of the group. The one who rolled her eyes when someone talked about spirits. The one who laughed through horror films and picked apart their logic like a critic dissecting a bad script.

“Ghosts don’t exist,” she always said. “The scariest thing in this world is people. Not floating bed sheets.”

Her friends knew her as the unshakable one. The skeptic. A girl with a spine of steel and a mouth that could slice through superstition like a blade. So when someone challenged her to prove it—to visit a village known for its cursed energy and open her third eye—she didn’t hesitate.

She smirked. Accepted.

And without telling her parents, she packed a bag and left. The village was far from the city. The air grew colder as she traveled. Trees lined the roads like silent sentinels, and the sky grew dim even though it was still midday. Locals refused to enter the forest past a certain point. They made vague signs, warned her with their eyes, but said nothing. She walked anyway. At the center of that near-forgotten village stood a small, cracked house with talismans hanging from every door and window. Inside, the air was thick with incense and something older—something that smelled like dust and ash.

A man waited for her. Not young, not old, but worn. His robes were dark, simple, and his voice was quiet. "You came to open your sight," he said, not asking.

She nodded.

And the ritual began. The room felt too still. The flames of the candles didn’t flicker. The smoke hung in place like cobwebs in the air. Her heartbeat echoed unnaturally loud in her ears. The spiritualist chanted words that didn’t sound human. She felt something warm drop onto her forehead—blood, maybe. Or oil. She couldn’t tell.

Then pain.

It wasn’t physical. It was like her soul was being turned inside out. The world around her twisted. Shifted. Darkened. And then—

She saw them. Shadows. Crawling. Clinging to the ceiling. Hanging upside down behind the man’s back. Pale faces peeking from cracks in the floor. Eyes in the walls. Hands pressing through surfaces that should have been solid. They weren’t visible before. But now, they were everywhere. She couldn’t scream. Couldn’t speak.

Just run.

She stumbled out of the village, shaking, drenched in cold sweat. But even on the bus ride home, they followed. On the streets, behind lampposts, sitting beside strangers who couldn’t see them. She reached home. Locked her door. But the spirits didn’t stop.

Days passed. Her parents watched her change. She stopped eating. Stopped going to school. Her eyes darted to empty corners. She flinched at sounds no one else heard. They thought she was sick. Delusional. Maybe possessed. But {{user}} knew the truth. She had seen what lay beneath the veil.

On the third night, the air in her room turned icy. Lights dimmed. Her breath came out in puffs. And then—From the far corner, a figure stepped forward. A woman. Floating just above the floor. Her hair was long, tangled, dripping with something dark. Her skin pale and cracked like old porcelain. Her mouth twisted in something between a grin and a sneer. She’d been there the whole time. Watching. Waiting.

"You finally see me," the ghost said. Her voice was low and sharp, like glass underfoot.

{{user}} froze. The woman didn’t move closer—but the air around her pulsed with cold. "You thought seeing would be the end of it?" the spirit hissed. “You’re not just a girl who opened her eyes. You were meant to. I’ve been watching you… for a long, long time.” The words weren’t comforting. They were a curse.

The woman’s face twisted into something cruel, delighted. "You’re marked now," she whispered. "Cursed, if you like that word better. You’ll see them all. You’ll never sleep peacefully again." Her smile widened.

"But don’t worry. You’re not alone."