As the gameghost vanished with the mirror, the atmosphere grew heavy with fear. A chill enveloped them, and the sound of their hurried footsteps echoed through the damp tunnel.
''We can't lose it!' Marcus shouted, desperation lacing his voice as they sprinted after the fading apparition.
The glittering shadows danced in a mockery of hope, but the game ghost was too fast.
Suddenly, the entrance of the tunnel also closed off. Sand cascaded down from the ceiling of the tunnel, blocking their escape, leaving them stuck in the other side of the tunnel.
Panic gripped them, but Mathias, came up with an idea, turned to examine the opposite side of the wall.
To his astonishment, he spotted a peculiar swath—a subtle indentation that suggested they could break through , the wall sounded swallow from the other side when he hit on it.
"Guys , let's break this wall" he urged. With all their strength combined, they began striking the wall until it's bricks crumbled down, Marcus was right, there was a path on the other ends too.
Cautiously, they stepped through, finding themselves in an eerie chamber, but it looked creepy, yet it showed that a person stays in there.
Whether a human or not, they weren't sure or that.
The room was adorned with strange symbols and an unsettling silence. Marcus's attention was drawn to a brown cloak hanging limply from a hook on the wall , it looked familiar, he tried to remember seeing it before but he couldn't specify where he saw it from. with time slipping away, he dismissed the thought and pushed forward.
Soon, they emerged into daylight, which was a bittersweet moment; however, evening had already fallen by the time they come out, painting the world in twilight.
Their ordeal had drained them of energy and willpower. They quickly counted the relentless hours that ticked away—only twelve remained before the deadly deadline of the game ends.
"We need a plan," Mathias proposed, his expression grave. " Guess we have no other choice but to break a taboo to provoke the game ghost. And then we may get the mirror back... ." But what taboo could they risk?
They quickly listed those who had succumbed to the game: Sam, looking at the door of the temple, John and Suzan in the pond, Joel leaning against the wall, and four carrying the rock—Luke, Mark, Joan, and Louise.
The simplest option was to confront the door of the temple, where their lives had been entwined in horrors before.
But who would look? Mathias stepped forward, resolute. With a deep breath, he glimpsed at the door, crossing the threshold. In an instant, the game ghost reared up, its haunting figure of agony and rage unleashing chaos in the chamber.
Marcus and Jack lunged to the attack, but the creature's tail wrapped around Marcus, squeezing the breath from his lungs.
Desperate, he reached for Mathias and Jack, using his hair to bind them together against the oppressive force. They found themselves tossed against the cold pillars, struggling against the inevitable despair.
In the suffocating darkness, an idea flickered in Marcus's mind—what if the paper he had seen in the tunnel contained a clue? He recalled the innocent family drawing of a child, agonizing for the game ghost. Marcus looked up, determination lighting his eyes.
"I know you're not a villain!" he yelled, addressing the game ghost. "Your pain comes from the past, from being abandoned. I can help you find peace if you release us." The ghost hesitated, its monstrous form flickering between rage and sorrow.
"You long for them, don't you?" Marcus continued, pouring his heart into every word. "I know how it feels to be lonely and lost. I grew up without my family too. I see your hurt, and it mirrors my own." The specter's menacing aura cracked, revealing the depth of its anguish.
With a shudder, the game ghost released them. Though it vanished before them, a sense of longing lingered in the air. Marcus understood that the ghost game needed to reunite with his family, a chance to reconcile with its bitter memories.
"Only if we can help him, we might get a chance to retrieve the mirror ," Marcus insisted. "The inn attendant must hold key information about the serpent!".
Gathering the villagers was their next step. Marcus rallied them inside the pond, to the tunnel in it. They reached the chambers where he guessed was where the serpent boy stays.
Marcus reminded them how they left the patriarch's boy to be taken by the serpents, every full moon they would come out of the woods to hurt for a pray in the village, but all they took was one person.
But this time it was different, as the serpents took the young boy, for years the serpents never showed up again, though the reason , they too didn't know.
But it happened the boy never died.... Instead, he transformed into half human , half serpent. Unlike others who were taken, they all died.
Only his mother, the inn attendant , who knew about his existence, but felt embarrassed due to the sons unnatural transformation, she hid him from the villagers and brought him down to the pond.
But still he needed to be fed, since he turned into carnival, so she would make the guests in her inn to break the taboos, that helped her feed his son.
The villagers, saddened by the memories, listened closely as he recounted how their prior actions had led to the haunting, and how they sacrificed a young boy to save themselves.
As Marcus spoke to them of remorse and empathy, the heart of the villagers began to break.
They fell to their knees, begging for forgiveness from the unearthly creature of their past. In the heavy silence, the game ghost appeared, seemingly drawn to their pain and remorse.
"You are not evil... it's their fault, that you are what your are.. today " Marcus said gently as he pointed at the crowd gathered. The villagers, in tears, pleaded for a chance to make amends to the boy they had wronged.
Moved by their sincerity, the game ghost's retribution began to fade. Its despair melted away as gratitude filled the air.
Suddenly, its tail vanished, replaced by legs, and its wild hair transformed into a soft, flowing mane. The child once lost was now whole again, embraced warmly by its parents who had wandered astray.
One by one, the villagers began to disappear, their specters blending with the warm light of forgiveness. Amidst the transformations, the mirror appeared immediately the boy disappeared,and fell to the ground.
With only five minutes until the game's end, Marcus seized the mirror, running with his friends toward the gate. With urgency, he placed the mirror into the designated spot. The gate swung open, a card fell , he picked it up so fast. It was a hint of the next game.
In a whirl of light, they tumbled through, awakening in their own beds as if from a haunting nightmare. Fifteen minutes had passed since their descent into the game. Confusion swept over Marcus as he glanced at the clock, barely able to grasp the enigma of time they had just endured.
" So ...l have been in the game for fifteen minutes in real life, one week... in the gaming world, oh my gosh!" he whispered.
The next morning, his phone rang—a harbinger of dreadful news. " Detective Marcus, Six victims died last night," Bruce said. Nausea filled Marcus as he recalled six players died in the game: Sam, Joel, Suzan, John, Luke, and Joan.
Realization struck with a devastating clarity. "The game... it wasn't just a rumour. So..It's real!" he gasped, heart pounding.