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墨書 Inktalez
Upon entering, it felt as if the surrounding space had been compressed significantly, creating a suffocating visual sensation. The flashlight cast a dim yellow halo on the ground just one or two meters ahead, illuminating nothing beyond that. This oppressive feeling of limited visibility was quite uncomfortable.
I felt a bit panicked; I had never encountered such a situation before. I stopped in my tracks and shone the light back, but aside from Ayu closely following me, I could not discern anything outside the graveyard. A bad feeling washed over me, as if I had stepped into a labyrinth.
Taking a deep breath, I quietly asked Ayu, "The visibility is too low. Can you still remember the way?"
"If there were no fog, it would be manageable. But with the fog, many tombstones are obscured, and without reference points, it becomes much more difficult. However, we have to try. The graveyard doesn’t seem too large; our route last time was simple—just walk straight for a bit and then turn left."
With no other choice, I gestured for him to lead the way while I followed closely behind.
There was no sound; the surroundings were eerily silent. In this quietness, I could almost hear my own heartbeat. Someone once said that what people fear most is the unknown. That statement rang true at this moment. I no longer cared about navigating the uneven ground; I kept sweeping the flashlight back and forth around us, as if that might ward off something that could suddenly appear. Yet every time the light passed over a nearby tombstone, I felt even more oppressed and uncomfortable.
After walking for several minutes, I noticed Ayu pause for a moment before he quickly moved forward again. I didn’t think much of it at first, but after another few minutes, I realized his pace was slowing down considerably. I found it odd.
"Ayu, what's wrong? Is something up?"
Ayu stopped completely, turning his back to me and remaining still. What was going on? I took a couple of steps forward and shone the flashlight on him.
To my shock, Ayu was sweating profusely, his face pale and his eyes fixed on something in the distance. I quickly followed his gaze; his flashlight illuminated a tomb to our left. I looked closely but saw nothing unusual.
"Ayu!" I called out sharply.
"The path is wrong," Ayu replied after a moment.
"If it's wrong, then keep looking! Why stop?"
"How long have we been walking this time? How long did we walk last time? According to my memory, we shouldn’t have gone far before encountering a broken tomb on our left—one that’s missing its upper half. We should have turned left from there to find the right path."
I was suddenly alarmed! Yes! Last time we had only walked for a few minutes before turning left; this time, it had been nearly ten minutes! Had we gone too deep? But the area of the graveyard on the map wasn’t very large; it shouldn’t take ten minutes to traverse!
I quickly shone the flashlight around us again—everywhere were tombstones with no sign of having exited the graveyard.
What was going on?! I was horrified!
I turned sharply and took a few steps back, the surrounding tombstones still faintly visible. "Ayu, are you sure you didn't take a wrong turn?"
Behind me, Ayu said nothing but came closer, handing me the map while the flashlight beam illuminated it.
I quickly examined the map under the light of the flashlight.
This was a cluster of graves, resembling an irregular square. According to this scale, the distance was about seventy to eighty meters. Even if we had missed that distinctive tombstone, we should have been able to walk out of the graveyard by now. How could we have gone so deep without finding our way out?
"Ayu, did we enter through the wrong way?" I asked tentatively.
"There’s no way we could be wrong. You saw it yourself when we came in; the two stones were so far apart, like a big gate waiting for us to enter. How could we be mistaken?"
Ayu also felt those two stones resembled a gateway? I felt a shiver run down my spine. However, I had always been stubborn and unwilling to admit defeat. I spat on the ground defiantly. "So it's just a half-buried grave, huh?" I folded up the map and turned back toward our original path. "Ayu, shine the flashlight ahead of me; I'm going to find that grave!"
I switched the flashlight to my right hand and continued moving forward, shining it left and right in search of that distinctive tombstone. But to my disappointment, under the orange glow of the flashlight, I could clearly see mist hanging in the air like tiny particles, yet I couldn't find that so-called half-buried grave.
Sweat began to bead on my forehead as I glanced at my luminous watch; we had been walking back for five minutes already. Normally, we would have reached where we entered by now, but our surroundings still looked like those similar clusters of graves.
I stomped my foot and walked a little further. After nearly ten minutes had passed, I reluctantly stopped. "Damn it, what’s going on? How did this happen?" I muttered angrily.
"Maybe... we've encountered something supernatural?" Ayu suggested quietly.
"Don't be ridiculous!" I snapped back. I've seen plenty of horror films, but I never thought they were that terrifying or mysterious. Little did I know that on this night, my perception would undergo a drastic change.
"Perhaps we took a wrong path when entering," I murmured to myself. "Right! The compass! Let’s use the compass! We don’t need to look for that distinctive grave anymore; with the compass, we can head directly toward the marked location on the map and take our time looking around for that isolated grave."
Upon hearing my suggestion, Ayu agreed it was a good idea and immediately pulled out the compass. This was a luminous compass provided by our school for each class. The principle behind it is that a magnetic object (the needle) points toward magnetic north based on its properties combined with readings from a graduated ring, allowing us to determine the direction of our target relative to magnetic north. By selecting two known reference points, we could determine the position of another unknown target.
We shone the flashlight on the compass to confirm south first and then used it in conjunction with the map for positioning. Finally, we concluded that the grave marked as our target was located in the northwest direction from where we currently stood. This seemed consistent with our original route—could it be that we hadn’t gone wrong after all?
Ayu and I exchanged glances. I instructed her to hold onto the compass while we adjusted our direction as we walked. We planned to slowly make our way toward our destination.
Ayu was in front, and I followed behind. We walked straight along the designated path for a while when I suddenly heard Ayu's trembling voice calling out, "Old Wang, you, you, come look!" I hurried over to see Ayu staring intently at the compass, and I turned my gaze to it as well.
The compass was shaking, changing direction!
I realized we had taken a wrong turn! It was like when you're driving with a GPS; if you veer off course, it recalculates a new route to your destination. But the problem was that we had been following its direction all along!
How could it change direction on its own?
I snatched the compass from Ayu, gave it a few taps, and then laid it flat in my hand again. It stabilized but pointed to our right front. What did that mean?
"Old Wang, could it be that our strides are uneven, causing the deviation?" Ayu leaned closer.
"That’s possible." Since we were all medical students, we knew that sometimes in low visibility conditions, people tend to walk in circles because the distance each leg covers isn't always equal. When visibility is good, people can self-correct and feel like they're walking in a straight line, but in the absence of clear paths, this phenomenon often occurs.
"Let’s try again," I suggested. I lifted the compass and walked in the direction it indicated, with Ayu closely following behind and occasionally shining a light around us.
I walked slowly, keeping an eye on the compass. Thankfully, there were no disturbances. My heart settled slightly as I continued forward.
After about three minutes, I sensed something was off; the needle of the compass began to tremble as if someone were pulling it with a magnet. The oscillation started small but grew larger. I decided to stop and observe what would happen next.
After shaking violently for a moment, the compass needle swung back to point toward our right rear!
At some point, Ayu had silently stood beside me. I looked up at him; he struggled to utter three words that echoed my own thoughts: "Ghost Wall!"
The Ghost Wall, also known as the Haunted Wall or Spirit Barrier, is traditionally believed in folklore to be a phenomenon where one gets lost at night or alone in remote areas or graveyards. It is said that during midnight or in desolate places like graveyards, travelers may find themselves walking in circles despite believing they are moving in one direction. This situation can persist for an entire night or even several days. Some claim to have experienced similar occurrences during daylight while trekking through deep mountains. While it often happens to individuals alone, there are rare cases involving two or more people or even groups.
To be honest, I didn’t really believe in such things; however, what was happening now made me question my previous understanding. Time passed slowly as my anxiety grew; outside there were still a group of brothers waiting for us. With this strange situation unfolding here, what were we supposed to do?
I forced myself to muster some spirit and said to Ayu, "Don’t be ridiculous; it's dark and foggy. We’re just overly tense and took a wrong turn."
My tone was so unconvincing that even I didn’t believe it. Naturally, Ayu didn’t respond either. We stood silently in the graveyard, each lost in our own thoughts and fears.
The atmosphere had become unbearably oppressive. Suddenly, a chilling wind swept through, causing an involuntary shiver to run down my spine.
A sense of dread washed over me. What was coming? That was my first thought.
I exchanged a glance with Ayu, and we both shouted in unison, "Run!"
We turned and sprinted in a random direction. As I ran, I yelled, "Ayu, if we keep running like this for ten minutes, we should be able to escape this area!"
"Are you scared?" she replied.
"No, but running like this makes me feel a lot better."
"......"
I had no idea how long we had been running, but the grave mounds around us showed no signs of ending!
I was starting to tire when I thought I heard barking in the distance!
(To be continued, more excitement tomorrow!)
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