Mysterious girl's POV:
The mysterious girl sat silently on the velvet chair beside her window; her pale eyes fixed upon the silver moon shimmering in the dark sky. The entire mansion was engulfed in an unsettling silence.
Suddenly, the soft vibration of my phone disturbed the quiet atmosphere. A notification had appeared on the screen.
I slowly picked up her phone. It was a message from my closest friend.
My friend had texted: -
"I am truly sorry, Vritika… when you needed me the most, I wasn't there beside you. I know it has been a week since you ran away from your house, and yet I still feel guilty for abandoning you during such a terrible time."
A faint, sorrowful smile appeared upon my lips after reading the message. My trembling finger typed a reply: -
"It's alright. You don't need to blame yourself. You were out of town, so none of this was your fault."
My friend instantly replied: -
"Then where are you now?"
I stared at the glowing screen for a few seconds before replying: -
"I couldn't escape successfully… my bodyguards found me before I could leave the city. They brought me back home."
A moment later, another message arrived.
"What!? You're back at that house again? Are you alright? Did your stepmother hurt you? And why didn't you text me earlier? I was so worried about you!"
I lowered my gaze. The painful memories of that night flashed before my eyes like haunting shadows. After a long pause, she finally typed: -
"I'm fine…she just scolded me and nothing else."
My friend's reply came immediately, filled with guilt and frustration.
"Thank God you're safe…but what if she had done something even worse to you? Why did you choose to escape on the very night when I wasn't there beside you? I could have helped you, Vritika."
My fingers tightened around the phone.
"I'm sorry…"
A few seconds later, another message appeared: -
"It's not your fault…but what about your father? Did that cruel woman tell him everything."
I let out a bitter laugh before replying: -
"No. She knows very well that if my father learns the truth, he'll blame her for everything."
My friend replied again: -
"Sometimes I really wonder how you survive in such a toxic family. Honestly, you should stay at my house someday. Maybe then your heart will finally feel peaceful."
My eyes darkened with sadness.
"Do you truly think they would ever allow me to stay at someone else's house after I already tried to ran away once?"
My friend paused for a moment before sending a short reply: -
"Oh…"
"Okay, I need to leave now. We'll talk later. Please take care of yourself."
I stared at the final message before switching off my phone.
Slowly, I placed my trembling hand upon my waist, where crimson burn marks from the heater were still visible against my skin.
Tears rolled down my cheeks as I started thinking about that night of the day I ran away from this house.
At Shadow Hunk's Secret Chamber
Rain battered the city without mercy.
The storm had wrapped the night in a dense shroud of silver haze, drowning roads, swallowing voices, reducing the world beyond the windows into blurred fragments of light and shadow.
Hidden beneath the abandoned eastern wing of St. Aurelius School—past a collapsed storage corridor and behind a rusted iron door concealed beneath torn tarpaulin—lay a chamber no one knew existed.
Dim amber light flickered weakly from an old desk lamp balanced atop a wooden table cluttered with wires, scattered documents, maps, cracked monitors, medicine strips, and rain-damp notebooks filled with hurried handwriting.
The room itself bore the exhaustion of someone who had lived too long inside silence.
The faint scent of antiseptic mixed with rust.
Near one corner stood shelves stacked with old police files and newspaper cuttings, their edges yellowed with time. Across another wall hung photographs connected by black threads and pins, though most of them remained hidden beneath shadows.
At the center of the chamber he sat.
Shadow Hunk.
The hood had been discarded carelessly beside the chair, revealing only fragments of his face beneath the dim light—the sharp line of his jaw, damp strands of dark hair falling across weary eyes, and bruises faintly staining the skin near his collarbone.
A fresh cut marked his lower lip.
His knuckles were smeared with dried blood.
Though none of it seemed to concern him.
His attention remained fixed upon the phone resting in his hands.
The screen glowed against the darkness.
One unread message.
For several moments, he only stared at it.
As though the mere existence of those words frightened him more than any wound ever could.
Then slowly—
His thumb pressed against the notification.
"You vanished again."
Silence filled the chamber.
The storm outside growled distantly through the cracked ceiling vents.
Shadow Hunk leaned back against the chair, his exhausted gaze falling shut for the briefest moment. Something unreadable crossed his expression then—something dangerously close to pain.
He typed something then-
Deleted the sentence before it could be completed.
Typed again.
"I had work."
The reply sent.
Another vibration.
"That's not an answer."
A faint breath escaped him.
His eyes lingered upon the message longer than necessary.
Then unconsciously, his gaze shifted toward the shelf beside the desk.
There, hidden beneath scattered papers, rested an old black bracelet.
Burnt slightly near the edges.
His stare hardened instantly.
A memory threatened to surface.
Rain.
Screams.
A trembling hand slipping away from his grasp.
He looked away sharply.
The phone vibrated again.
"Why are you not answering?"
This time, his fingers froze.
A droplet fell upon the screen.
The tear slid silently down his face before disappearing against his jaw.
He did not wipe it away.
Another followed.
His breathing remained calm, but his eyes had begun betraying him long ago.
Slowly, he bent forward, elbows resting upon his knees as the pale glow from the phone illuminated the quiet devastation hidden within his expression.
The chamber remained utterly silent except for the storm beyond the walls and the occasional trembling breath escaping him.
Then, after what felt like an eternity, he typed—
"I'm busy...bye."
The lie lingered upon the screen.
A few seconds passed.
Then came the reply.
"You always pretend that."
Something inside him shattered quietly at those words.
Only enough for another tear to slip free as he lowered his head into the darkness of that secret chamber he had built to hide from the world—
and from memories that refused to die.
At the City- Morning Time
The underground cryogenic storage facility beneath Medical Research Center was never meant for civilians.
Even most employees avoided the lower levels.
The corridors down there were narrow, metallic, and unnaturally cold, with white vapor constantly leaking from ceiling vents like wandering ghosts. Every sound echoed too sharply. Every breath felt thinner.
At 8:42 AM, during a guided academic visit arranged for science students, a technical malfunction occurred in Sector C.
Nobody noticed immediately.
Because by the time the emergency shutters sealed automatically—
One girl had already been trapped inside.
A second-year student.
The temperature inside the cryogenic chamber continued dropping every minute.
By the time the alarm finally reached the upper floors, frost had already begun spreading across the inner glass walls.
Panic erupted instantly.
Researchers rushed downstairs. Security officers surrounded the area. The emergency override failed twice. Even the technicians looked shaken now.
Through the thick frozen glass, the girl could barely be seen anymore.
Curled near the corner.
Shivering violently.
Alive—
But not for long.
"The internal lock system is jammed!"
"Break the glass!"
"We can't!" a technician shouted back desperately. "If the pressure shifts suddenly, the nitrogen valves could rupture!"
Outside the chamber, chaos thickened.
Students cried helplessly. Faculty members argued over each other. Cameras from local news channels began arriving after someone leaked footage online.
Within twenty minutes, the entire city knew.
A student was trapped inside a freezing chamber.
And nobody could get her out.
••
8:59 AM.
The temperature inside had fallen dangerously low.
That girl's fingers had already turned pale blue.
She tried pounding weakly against the frozen glass once—
Then stopped moving much afterward.
Outside, the reporters lowered their voices unconsciously while filming.
Because the situation no longer looked rescuable.
One police officer removed his cap anxiously and muttered under his breath,
"At this rate…"
He never finished the sentence.
Nearby, students whispered among themselves nervously.
"If Shadow Hunk hears about this…"
"He'll come, right?"
"He always comes…"
"Only if he reaches in time…"
The words spread quietly through the growing crowd.
Not mockingly.
Hopefully.
As if his arrival had become something people prayed for during disasters.
Still—
minutes kept passing.
No Shadow Hunk.
No solution.
Nothing.
Inside the chamber, that girl slowly slid against the frozen wall. Her eyelids had begun shutting involuntarily now. Small crystals of frost clung to her hair and sleeves.
One of the female reporters lowered her microphone slightly.
"She's losing consciousness…"
Even the cameras had become quieter now.
Because everyone was beginning to realize they might be watching someone die live.
Then suddenly—
A disturbance rippled through the crowd near the outer barricades.
People turned instinctively.
Someone was walking through the crowd.
Not hurried.
Not dramatic.
Just steady.
Black hoodie.
Black gloves.
Silver insignia beneath the collar.
And instantly—
The atmosphere changed.
"Shadow Hunk…"
The whisper spread faster than the cameras could turn.
Reporters nearly stumbled over each other trying to film him.
Police officers moved aside almost unconsciously.
Not because they trusted him.
Because desperation had already defeated authority.
One senior technician rushed toward him immediately.
"The pressure lock won't release. If we force the chamber open, the nitrogen surge could—"
"Shut off the secondary coolant line," Shadow Hunk said calmly.
The technician froze.
"What?"
"The backup line beneath Sector C," he repeated. "You're stabilizing the wrong valve."
For the first time all night—
Someone sounded certain.
The technician hurried away instantly.
Shadow Hunk stepped closer to the frozen chamber.
Inside, that girl barely lifted her head weakly.
The frost covering the glass distorted everything around her, but she could still see him standing there.
A dark silhouette beyond the ice.
And somehow—
Her trembling slowed slightly.
The technicians finally shut down the secondary coolant flow.
A loud metallic vibration echoed through the chamber walls.
"Pressure levels dropping!"
"We can open it now—but only manually!"
The emergency wheel beside the chamber required enormous force. Two officers had already failed earlier.
Shadow Hunk grabbed it without a word.
The metal resisted violently at first.
Freezing vapor burst across his hands as the mechanism groaned loudly through the corridor.
Then—
Slowly—
The lock moved.
People actually held their breath.
Another turn.
Another violent screech of metal.
And finally—
The chamber door burst open.
A wave of freezing air exploded outward.
Several reporters stepped back instantly from the temperature alone.
Shadow Hunk entered immediately.
Inside, the cold was brutal enough to numb skin within seconds.
That girl's body had nearly stopped responding. She couldn't even stand properly anymore-