The reflection was just the beginning. With every whisper from the mask and every twisted illusion, the boundaries between Asher's reality and the unseen world begin to fracture. But not every whisper is meaningless—some carry secrets. And some? Warnings.
The faucet dripped, again and again.Plink.Plink.Plink.
Asher barely noticed. He sat hunched on the edge of the bathroom sink, eyes locked on the mirror, unmoving. The fluorescent light above flickered sporadically, casting his face into jittering fragments of shadow.
His skin looked paler than usual, jaw tighter, eyes sunken. But the real problem wasn't what was in the mirror.
It was what wasn't.
He raised his right hand.
The reflection lifted its left.
Asher's breath caught in his throat. "No…"
He slowly leaned forward, and his reflection leaned in too—but just a fraction too early. A glitch in a system that wasn't supposed to glitch.
Then it smiled.He didn't.
The expression was wrong. Too wide, too knowing.
And then—it spoke.
"You felt it too, didn't you?" it whispered, mouth curling into something old and mocking.
The voice wasn't his own. It was older, laced with phlegm and malice, like smoke hardened into sound.
Asher stumbled back, bumping into the towel rack, knocking over a nearly empty aspirin bottle and his toothbrush. He blinked, hard.
And just like that—gone.
The reflection was him again. Confused. Afraid. Human.
Asher staggered out of the bathroom like a drunk man. The air outside his bathroom was somehow thicker, heavier. He made it to his mattress and collapsed on it with a groan.
His fingers itched to touch the mask resting on the desk—but he didn't. Not yet.
It sat there like a wound he didn't want to reopen.
Yet from the moment he turned his back on it, the whispers began. Not from the mask—but around it. Faint. Like whispers behind glass.
Murmur murmur murmur.
He closed his eyes, covering his face with both hands.
What was happening to him?
Was it just the mask?
Or was something else using the mask as a doorway?
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Beneath the City – Unknown Depths
Deep below the crumbling bones of the metro system, beneath the parts of the city that no longer existed on any official map, a ritual chamber pulsed with unseen power.
A robed figure moved with reverence, robes stitched together from strips of something that looked like leather—but bore freckles and fine hair. Human skin.
He stood before an altar of bone. Upon it: a cracked mirror framed in gold. Beside it: a living book, its cover rising and falling like breath.
In the far corner: a boy. Shackled. Twitching.
He looked like Asher.
But his eyes were all wrong—wide, unseeing, and filled with static.
"Another fragment stabilizing," the robed man whispered. "The gate between selves grows thin."
From the shadows above, the whispers came like wind through dead trees:
"He's watching now.""He will see.""He will become."
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Back in the City – Morning
A furious knock.Then another.Followed by an urgent, hoarse whisper:
"Asher! Open up! It's Rey!"
Asher peeled himself from the bed, still in yesterday's clothes, and stumbled to the door.
Rey didn't wait. He shoved it open, wild-eyed and holding up his tablet like a priest bearing a cross.
"The guy from Junker's Row—the one who jumped you last week? He's dead."
Asher blinked. "What?"
"Dead. Melted. Bones warped like taffy. His spine was full of mirror shards. Police are calling it a gang killing."
Asher felt the world go sideways.
"…You're not serious."
Rey flipped the screen toward him. The image was grainy, low-res—typical leak quality—but unmistakable. A human skeleton with ribs blackened like charcoal, fragments of mirror glass embedded through flesh and bone.
"I saw him. I felt him," Asher muttered.
Rey narrowed his eyes. "What's happening, man? You look like hell."
Asher stared past him, toward the mask.
The whispers grew louder.
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Later – City Central Library: Restricted Archives
If answers existed, they had to be buried. Forgotten. Or hidden.
Asher bribed Mira, the sardonic archivist who never asked why he needed the cursed texts—just how many floors down he was willing to go.
Three vending machine snacks and a smile later, she handed him a basement key.
"I'm not covering for you this time," she said flatly. "Last time you tried to summon a demon, I had to explain the scorch marks to corporate."
"I'm not summoning anything," Asher replied, forcing a grin. "Just trying not to lose my damn mind."
The basement was freezing. Smelled like damp rot and leather. Every surface was covered in dust, even the light.
He pulled box after box. Skimmed through articles, fringe cult notes, photos of masked corpses and mirror-related hallucinations. Most were insane ramblings.
But then—he found it.
A dossier. Faded stamp: "PROJECT ÆNIGMA – Mirror Phenomena & Neural Bleed Events."
Inside: medical logs. Witness testimony. Diagrams of double-headed shadows. A note scribbled in pen:
"Some reflections are windows. Others are traps."
One line was underlined in red ink:
DO NOT ENGAGE WITH REFLECTIONS THAT DO NOT FOLLOW YOU.
The light above him flickered. Once. Twice.
Then a slow clap.
He turned.
And there he was.
A version of him.
Slightly taller. Slightly more confident. Slicker hair. Better clothes.
Same eyes.
"I'm what you could be," the reflection said. "If you stopped being afraid."
Asher took a step back.
"I'm you, Asher. Just unburdened. You don't have to carry their pain anymore. Just give it to me."
The lights went out.
When they flickered back on, the reflection was gone.
Asher was alone again—book on the floor, heart hammering.
[End of Chapter 25]
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Asher fled the library.
But when he stepped outside, the glass door reflected the city… and not him.
His reflection didn't move.
It stood still. Watching.
Then, with a slow, chilling wave…It turned, and walked away.
Next Chapter Preview:Chapter 26 – "The Fractured Path"As more doppelgangers appear across the city, Asher is forced to confront whether the mirrors are gateways… or traps. Meanwhile, a forbidden pleasure club opens in the city's shadows—rumored to house demons in human skin. And their eyes are already on the Masked One.