The House of Horror

Chapter 20 _ It Was An Ancient Nightmare, Carefully Arranged By The Jinn In Amal's Mind

Meanwhile, lost in her hidden inner world, Sophia was wandering in a nightmare. The dream had seized her violently, dragging her to a scene both familiar and strange: the vast courtyard of her old university, a place she hadn't visited in years.

But the courtyard wasn't empty; it was teeming with faces—faces she knew all too well. They were the faces of her former friends, the girls she had smiled at, laughed with, and secretly despised.

The dream wasn't an innocent memory, but a summoning of deep-seated hatred.

She found herself holding a sharp knife. Its blade gleamed with an eerie light, and her grip was unnaturally tight. The veins throbbed along her wrists, and her knuckles turned white with intensity. The Sophia holding that knife was not the delicate, fragile Sophia the world had known. Her eyes burned with a thirst for blood.

Three girls stood before her. Their faces bore the same expressions that had haunted her in lectures: mocking, contemptuous, and cruel. The air hung heavy with their silent disdain.

She lunged forward without warning. The first girl barely had time to raise her hands before the knife plunged into her flesh. Once, twice, and again. Blood gushed forth, spreading across the floor in dark pools. Her scream pierced the air, but Sophia felt nothing—nothing but a twisting tremor. The power overwhelmed her, intoxicating her.

The girl collapsed, shuddering violently before falling motionless.

Sophia turned to the second. This girl clutched a chair, desperate to defend herself. But Sophia was invincible. Her blows were swift and brutal. She slid the knife into her slender arm, piercing her flesh. The girl screamed, fell back, and Sophia rained blow after blow upon blow until silence returned.

Now only one of the three remained. Her eyes widened in terror. She turned and ran, her screams echoing through the courtyard. But Sophia pursued her. She was ferocious, a bloodthirsty predator. She seized the girl by the hair and pulled her with brutal force. Then she straddled her chest and held the knife high above her head.

The victim begged, fought, and kicked, but Sophia's strength was overwhelming. She brought the blade down with relentless determination. Once. Twice. Again and again until the girl's screams subsided and her body collapsed under Sophia's weight.

Sophia rose, standing over three lifeless bodies. Blood stained her hands, her clothes, even her face. Her chest heaved, not with shame or terror, but with joy. She had never felt so alive. The vulnerability and sensitivity that had once defined her seemed to vanish. She had become something new—something darker.

She returned to the world of wakefulness, her body writhing on the bed. Sweat beaded on her forehead, and her lips trembled with broken words, fragments of screams. A groan escaped her throat, followed by a sharp gasp.

Nafer watched her with delight. A crooked smile played on his lips. His eyes shone with satisfaction, as if the nightmare unfolding in her mind was a seed he himself had sown. He leaned closer, until his face was inches from hers.

He raised his hand and ran his fingers through the air near her hair without touching it. His voice was a whisper, barely above the rustling of the curtains. "This is your real face, Sophia... not the mask of innocence you wear in broad daylight."

In the dream, Sophia stood amidst the corpses. The world around her grew darker. From the shadows at the edges of the courtyard, unseen figures seemed to watch. Whispers rose, faint but insistent, like voices difficult to understand. Something else was coming—something bigger, something monstrous.

Her heart began to pound. She looked around frantically, but before she could see what lay hidden behind her, she awoke suddenly.

Her eyes snapped open to the dark, gloomy room. Sweat beaded on her temples. She gasped for breath, her chest heaving. For a long moment, she stared at the ceiling, then slowly turned her head toward the corner.

It was empty.

The shadow where Nafir had stood was now empty. Silent. As if he had never been there.

Her hand fumbled with the bed beside her, trembling, desperate to find any proof that she hadn't imagined anything. But there was nothing. Only silence and the chill that hung heavy in the air.

Sophia sat up, burying her face in her hands. She tried to steady her breath, to convince herself that it had all been a dream. But the images were too vivid. She could still hear the screams, she could still see the blood, she could still feel the overwhelming force. Her voice broke as she whispered to herself, "This isn't me... I'm not like this..." But the words were fragile, delicate, and the room seemed to mock her with its silence.

Outside, a dark cloud obscured the moon, plunging everything into even deeper darkness. Sophia realized that the real darkness wasn't outside her window.

It was inside her.

—The Wooden Bench

The villa's garden was steeped in a heavy silence, the tense stillness before a storm. The trees swayed faintly in the gentle evening breeze, while the chirping of insects mingled with the buzzing of a distant world still awake beyond the walls of the estate. There, in front of the small room reserved for the doorman, stood the wooden bench, waiting for someone to sit on it, as if it were an ancient witness to secrets never to be revealed.

Xaver sat down first. His position wasn't comfortable; it was the rigid stillness of a body that didn't belong on the bench. His eyes remained fixed, staring silently into the void, as if searching for something suspended in the air. A frozen shadow.

Seconds later, Sayed the doorman emerged from his small room. His face bore the familiar weariness of a man worn down by years of work, yet still clinging to his daily routines. He sat down next to Zafer on the same bench, unaware that he wasn't alone. To Sayed, the bench seemed completely empty except for him.

"There's something strange..." he murmured, his voice barely audible. The words escaped his lips more as a confession to himself than a statement to another. He slowly raised his head, letting his gaze sweep across the dark garden, as if trying to examine every corner for an explanation of the unsettling weight pressing on his chest. He felt something unnatural in the air. The breeze was no longer refreshing—it was cold, heavy, like a breath escaping from a dead man's chest.

Suddenly, Sayed stood up, cleared his throat, and took a few steps toward his door. He turned halfway around, his anxious eyes scanning the garden as if to make sure no one was watching.

The second victim – her college friend. Her old friend from college days, who had always boasted about her beauty and children, never missed an opportunity to hurl cruel words at Amal during their student days. She appeared now in an elegant dress, a sly smile playing on her lips. Raising her eyebrows as she always did when mocking, she said, "You're still childless, aren't you?"

Amal didn't wait for an answer. She pounced on her with a speed she had never imagined, stabbing her throat with the knife. Her neck split open with a single blow, and the sound of suffocation came in ragged gasps, like the notes of a shattered death song. Amal stood over her body, a smile of overwhelming strength etched on her face. The word "pathetic" no longer held any meaning.

The third victim – her old neighbor. This old woman had never been a direct enemy, but she always filled the air with poisonous sympathy: "God will give you something better, Amal." This phrase alone kept the fires of shame burning in Amal's heart. She appeared before her now, leaning on her cane, her back bent, her eyes gleaming with a mixture of pity and hatred. Amal approached slowly this time, savoring every moment. She raised the knife and plunged it into the old woman's chest, pushing hard until the blade pierced her back. The cane fell from her hand, her body trembled, and then she lay still forever. Amal felt no guilt, only relief, as if a heavy burden had been lifted from her shoulders.

The fourth victim—her cousin. Her cousin, who had always boasted about her four children, made Amal feel inadequate. Every family gathering with her present reopened the wound. She appeared now, clutching a photograph of her children, as she always did.

But Amal didn't hesitate. She walked over, slapped the photograph from her hand, and plunged the knife into her stomach again and again. Each stab was a declaration of revenge for years of bitterness. The cousin screamed, but her voice was drowned out by Amal's rising laughter—a loud, savage laugh she had never heard from her before. It was the laugh of a newborn monster.

The Fifth Victim—The Old Colleague

Finally, her former colleague, who had never tired of reminding her that she was an "inferior woman," appeared. Her cruel face stood out, her eyes gleaming with arrogance. She smiled defiantly, as if she feared nothing.

But Amal gave her no time. She lunged at her, grabbed her by the hair, dragged her to the ground, and plunged the knife into her throat in a single cut. Blood gushed forth in a flood that soaked the ground, and Amal sat beside the corpse, her eyes shining with indescribable pleasure.

The End of the Dream

Five faces. Five bodies. Blood pooled around Amal's feet like a dark, ever-expanding lake. She felt no terror. Instead, she felt an immense power coursing through her veins, a power she had never known before, holding her with unwavering resolve. She raised her head, inhaled deeply, and smiled broadly, a smile filled with malice and satisfaction.

Meanwhile, in the real bedroom, her trembling body revealed glimpses of the nightmare she was living: quivering limbs, profuse sweating, and ragged breaths. Hussein was fast asleep, oblivious to the fact that his wife was waging a bloody war in the dream world. As for Zaghir, he continued to rock in his chair, his eyes fixed on her, his smile widening.

He knew perfectly well that he had sown the seed of evil in Amal's heart—and that it had begun to grow.

"Did I kill him?!"

Hussein was fast asleep when the doors of his dream swept open, sweeping him into a world thick with shadows and the stench of blood—unseen, yet felt with every breath. He found himself face to face with Sayed, the gatekeeper, who stood frozen before him, his features taut, his eyes blazing with suppressed rage. It wasn't a discussion or an argument, but a confrontation doomed to violence. From the very first moment, it felt like a fight to the death.

Hussein lunged at Sayed, their bodies colliding with brutal force. Arms and legs intertwined in a vicious struggle, each vying for dominance in a vortex of blows and desperate breaths. The sound of flesh crashing against flesh echoed in the dream, like wild beasts locked in a primitive battle. Sweat mingled with the taste of blood, and the very air pulsed with their ferocity.

Finally, with overwhelming, almost inhuman strength, Hussein overpowered Sayed. He forced him to the ground with merciless determination, pinning him against a wooden bench jutting out from the corner of the darkened courtyard. Sayed fell to the ground, gasping, his body trapped in Hussein's iron grip. Hussein climbed onto his chest, mounting him in a stillness more terrifying than rage. His eyes shone with a cold, merciless gleam.