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The clock read 2:13 AM when Nikitha’s phone rang.
Groggy and disoriented, she squinted at the screen. Unknown Number. Normally, she'd let such calls slide into voicemail. But something about the chill in the air, the absolute silence outside her apartment window, and a strange tug in her gut made her pick it up.
She didn’t speak. Neither did the caller.
Then came the whisper. “Don’t take the Hilltop Mansion case.”
A beat. Then a soft click. Silence.
Nikitha sat up in bed, heart pounding. Not just because someone had called her at this hour, but because she hadn’t told anyone about the potential Hilltop case. She had only received the query via a private email a few hours earlier - no calls, no files, no formal complaint yet.
She tried to shake it off. Probably a prank. She had made enemies. High-profile busts, corruption exposés, political landmines - they had earned her both accolades and adversaries.
But there was something different about that voice. It wasn't threatening. It was warning her.
Like someone terrified... and trying to help.
Two Days Earlier
Hilltop Mansion stood draped in ivy and time, abandoned since the late 1980s. Once a colonial-era summer residence for a wealthy British official, it had seen decades of rumors, vandalism, and urban legends. Locals claimed to hear bells ringing at odd hours. Strange lights were seen flickering through the boarded-up windows.
The owner, Raghava Rao, had emailed Nikitha in desperation.
"People are refusing to work on the restoration. My workers claim they hear things. Tools go missing. One even had a seizure. My project is at a standstill. I need someone who doesn’t believe in ghosts - someone like you.”
That was before the call. Now she wasn’t so sure.
Nikitha visited Hilltop Mansion on a windy afternoon. The sky was an overcast gray, and the dense trees surrounding the estate added an eerie stillness to the atmosphere. Her assistant Arjun, ever the skeptic, joined her - though he carried his usual mix of sarcasm and curiosity.
The caretaker, a wrinkled man named
Joe, greeted them at the rusted gates. “You’re the detective, right?” he asked,
his voice shaky. “You’ve come to see the bell, haven’t you?”
Nikitha raised an eyebrow. “What bell?”
Joe hesitated, then whispered, “It rings... even though it was taken down years ago.” He clutched a worn silver locket around his neck, a nervous habit.
Inside the mansion, time had collapsed. Cobwebs draped every corner. Wallpaper peeled off in long, curling sheets. Faint imprints of where portraits once hung dotted the walls like ghosts.
Then, in the grand hallway, Nikitha froze.
A large bronze bell sat in the center of the room.
It wasn’t there in the original architectural plans. Raghava had insisted the bell had been removed during a renovation attempt in the '90s. And yet, there it was - mounted on a wooden stand, polished and pristine, as if untouched by time.
Etched on its surface were the words. Do not summon death.
Arjun circled it. “It’s not even wired to anything. No rope, no striker, no electricity. How does it ring?”
Joe spoke again, trembling. “We hear it at 2:13 AM. Always that time.”
Nikitha’s spine tingled. The precision of the time, mirroring her phone call, sent a jolt of unease through her.
The Whispers Deepen
Later that night, back at her office, Nikitha dug deep into the mansion’s history. There were whispers of a cult that once operated in the area - "The Fire-Faced Ones." They believed the bell was an object of passage, a conduit between the world of the living and the dead.
In 1947, during a final gathering, the cult leader had rung the bell thirteen times at precisely 2:13 AM - and vanished.
Vanished. Not arrested. Not killed. Just... gone.
Arjun dismissed it as urban folklore. But Nikitha couldn’t.
Especially because she was now getting silent calls every night.
Same time.
Same whisper.
“Don’t take the Hilltop case.”
And now, her dreams were haunted by the tolling of a bell.
The next day, Nikitha returned to the
mansion alone. Arjun had begged off, citing a last-minute doctor’s appointment,
but Nikitha sensed he just didn’t want to be around the bell anymore.
She stood in front of it, alone in the
main hall.
She circled it, phone in hand, capturing images and voice memos.
“Day two. Object still inexplicably present. Bell shows no signs of recent manufacture. Inscription warning against summoning death. Testing ambient noise levels... now.”
She clapped loudly. The echo returned a
second later, strangely hollow. She tapped the bell lightly. No sound. Not even
a thrum.
But when she turned to leave, she heard it.
DONG.
A single, deep chime.
She spun around - the bell hadn’t moved. But the room felt different. Warmer. Like it was breathing. A faint, metallic scent, like old iron, filled the air.
“Okay. Not funny,” she muttered, her voice echoing unnaturally in the sudden stillness.
Then her phone buzzed.
Unknown number. 2:13 PM. That was new.
She answered.
This time, the whisper was more urgent, closer.
“You’ve heard it now. Stop before it sees you.”
It?
She didn’t sleep that night.
Occult Interference
The next day, Nikitha visited Professor Shankaran, a retired scholar of ancient ritualistic practices. He listened patiently as she explained the bell, the calls, and the strange hour it kept recurring.
He nodded gravely.
“There are objects,” he said, his voice a low rumble, “that act as anchors. Not possessed in the horror-movie sense, but saturated with collective energy. If enough ritual, grief, or belief is poured into an object, it becomes... porous. It can pull things through.”
“Things like...?”
“Memories. Echoes. Spirits. Intent. Or even... living beings, if the conditions are met.”
Nikitha asked, “Could it trap people?
Make them disappear?”
He leaned in. “Yes. Especially if it’s rung with intent. But only if someone wants to cross over. It doesn’t take you unless you let it.”
“Is there a way to neutralize it?”
The professor hesitated, a deep frown creasing his brow. “Such objects are rarely truly neutralizable, only contained or redirected. Don’t ring it,” he said finally. “That’s the simplest way. Don’t let anyone else ring it either. Its power is in the resonance, in the invitation it extends.”
A Warning Repeated
Back in her apartment that night, Nikitha double-checked every lock, pulled her curtains, and left her phone on silent.
It rang anyway.
2:13 AM.
She stared at the glowing screen. No number. Just a blinking cursor. A voicemail.
She played it.
Static. Then, the whisper:
“Too late. It’s ringing again.”
DONG. DONG. DONG.
Thirteen times. Each toll vibrated through her bones, a cold, empty echo.
Her lights flickered wildly, then died, plunging her apartment into darkness.
And then... silence. Absolute, profound silence.
The next morning, Nikitha woke to six missed calls - all from the same unknown number - and a strange sensation, like she’d been pulled through sleep instead of rising naturally. A faint, metallic taste lingered in her mouth.
Something had changed.
She turned on the news.
The reporter continued: “…disappeared without a trace during his routine patrol. The only clue? An old bell that no one remembers being there before…”
Nikitha’s blood froze.
The bell was active. And someone else had heard it.
Into the Void
By mid-morning, she stood outside Hilltop Mansion, flashing her credentials at the barricade. A reluctant constable waved her through, muttering, “You won’t last ten minutes in there.”
Inside, the hall was exactly as she’d
left it - dust, decay, and the bell.
But this time, it was different.
There were footprints circling the bell - fresh ones, stopping abruptly as if the person had simply dissolved mid-stride. A single, tarnished flashlight lay abandoned beside them.
Her phone buzzed again.
Unknown Number. Voicemail.
This time, she didn’t wait.
She hit play.
“You’ve heard it thirteen times. It’s seen you. You can’t unring it.”
“Help me. Please. Don’t let it take me…”
It was the missing watchman. The recording ended with a sickening, wet choke.
Nikitha backed away from the bell. But as she turned, the room shimmered.
The walls seemed to breathe, the peeling wallpaper curling like ancient skin. The windows were gone, replaced by solid, unyielding stone. The entrance had… shifted. No longer a decaying mansion.
Now it resembled a temple. Or a tomb, built for something not quite human.
She blinked, shaking her head. The illusion flickered, but the oppressive feeling remained.
Then a new sound emerged - like whispers overlapping each other, a cacophony of sorrow and hunger. Chanting, deep and guttural, resonated from the very stones.
She stumbled back, grabbing her phone. The signal was dead.
And then… she saw it.
A figure, faint and translucent, reaching toward her from behind the bell. Not malevolent. But desperate. Trapped. Its features were indistinct, shifting like smoke, yet the agony emanating from it was palpable.
The watchman? Or someone else, a remnant of those who had vanished before?
A Dangerous Choice
Her mind raced.
If she rang the bell… could she pull them back? But ringing it was exactly what the cult leader had done.
Thirteen times.
Nikitha remembered Professor Shankaran’s words: It doesn’t take you unless you want to cross. But maybe - just maybe - it worked both ways. Maybe a single, clear intention could counteract its malevolent pull.
She approached the bell slowly. Heart pounding. Whispering.
“If I ring you once… will you let him go instead of me?”
Silence. The air grew heavy, expectant.
Then, as if in answer, the bell began to hum, a deep, resonating vibration that filled the room.
She gripped the rope, her knuckles white.
One pull.
DONG.
The room shuddered violently. Dust rained down in thick clouds. The shadows recoiled, shrinking into themselves.
The whisper returned, loud and all around her, a chorus of voices, ancient and hungry.
“One for you. One for him.”
“No,” she said, her voice firm despite the terror. “Just him. I’m not making a deal.”
The bell rang again - on its own.
DONG.
Behind her, Arjun's frantic footsteps echoed, slow and wary. He must have pushed past the constable.
Suddenly, a creak.
They both froze, their eyes fixed on the shadows at the edge of the room.
From the deepest part of the darkness, a figure emerged - thin, barefoot, with wild eyes and a trembling posture. His clothes were rags, ancient and tattered. His hair, a matted mess. But there was something oddly familiar about the hollow, haunted look in his eyes.
“I rang the bell,” the man whispered, as if confessing a sin from a forgotten dream. “I heard them… I heard them from the other side.”
Arjun stepped forward, revolver now drawn. “Who are you?”
But Nikitha already knew.
“Sameer Malhotra,” she said softly, her voice barely a breath. “The missing anthropology student. You vanished seven years ago.”
Sameer's Descent
Sameer nodded slowly, as though the
years had weighed heavily on him, each one a stone on his soul. Seven years before, Sameer, a brilliant but
intensely driven anthropology student, had been fascinated by local legends and
obscure rituals. He scoffed at superstitions, believing every myth held a grain
of undiscovered truth. He heard the tales of Hilltop Mansion and the
"Fire-Faced Ones" and saw not a ghost story, but a unique
ethnographic opportunity.
Ignoring warnings, he had snuck into the mansion, seeking tangible evidence of the cult's practices. He found the bell, not as an object of dread, but as a historical artifact, a key to understanding a lost belief system. His academic curiosity, coupled with a deep-seated desire to prove himself, had led him to experiment, to “document” the bell's reputed power. He had rung it, not with malicious intent, but with a scientific, almost detached curiosity, seeking to confirm the cult’s claims. He believed he was observing a phenomenon, not participating in one.
But the bell had pulled him in, trapping him in a liminal space, feeding on his intellect and his yearning for knowledge, turning his academic pursuit into an endless, terrifying nightmare.
“I thought I could document it. I
wanted to see the truth. I found the bell. I rang it. And they came.”
“Who?” Nikitha asked, her voice laced with dread. “Who came?”
Sameer’s eyes widened, a flicker of terror lighting them, memories of his torment returning.
“They don’t have names. Only hungers. They whisper… always whisper. The call you got - it wasn’t a warning. It was a luring. Once you hear it, you’re marked. It uses your own fears, your deepest regrets, to draw you in.”
Nikitha’s heart pounded. “You called me? You were the one whispering?”
“I tried,” Sameer said, voice cracking, a desperate plea in his eyes. “Tried to stop it. Tried to warn you. But it’s too late.”
And then, the bell rang.
Clear. Sharp. Unearthly.
None of them had touched it. It rang on its own, a final, terrible affirmation.
But it rang - once.
And the walls groaned in response, the illusion of the temple solidifying around them. The ancient chanting grew louder, swirling like a wicked fog.
The temperature plunged, and an oppressive chill filled the room. Shadows twisted unnaturally, and eerie whispers crept in, wordless echoes of rage, despair, and a haunting emptiness.
But the door slammed shut behind them, with a sound like a coffin lid sealing.
The bell rang again, a second, final chime, echoing the agreement Nikitha had unknowingly made.
Nikitha turned to Sameer, her voice strained. “How do we stop this?”
Sameer looked at them, his eyes filled with a terrible knowing. “There’s no stopping. Only closing the gate - but it requires blood. A bond. A sacrifice. You cannot unring a summoned thing without a counter-offering.”
Arjun backed toward the bell, his face
pale. “Meaning?”
Sameer looked at them both, his gaze lingering on Nikitha. “Someone has to take the whispers into themselves. Bind them. Become the anchor for what it pulls through. Then destroy the bell.”
Nikitha’s voice was firm, though her heart hammered against her ribs. “That’s madness.”
But Arjun was already moving, a grim determination setting his jaw. “Let me.”
“No,” Nikitha snapped, a fierce protectiveness rising within her. “You’ve got a family. I don’t.”
She walked to the bell and placed her hand on its cold, vibrating surface. The whispering grew louder - and clearer, no longer just emotions but distorted fragments of language, ancient and terrifying. Memories surfaced, unbidden, vivid and painful: Her sister’s laughter, echoing in an empty house. Her father’s disappointment, a shadow that had followed her for years. A thousand moments - intimate, painful, real. The bell wasn’t just a gate; it was a mirror. It showed what haunted you… and fed on it, drawing strength from your deepest vulnerabilities.
She gritted her teeth, tears stinging her eyes as the onslaught of her own buried pain threatened to overwhelm her. “Light it,” she said to Arjun, her voice ragged but resolute. “Use the kerosene.”
He poured the fuel around the circle, his movements hesitant but quick. Sameer was weeping quietly now, his body trembling, as if the whispers were too much to bear.
“Will you remember me?” he asked, his voice barely audible.
Nikitha nodded, her eyes fixed on his
haunted face. “I’ll make sure your family knows the truth. They'll know what
happened to you.”
Arjun struck the match.
As the flames roared, engulfing the
bell in a searing inferno, Nikitha screamed - but not in fear. In defiance. The
bell rang once more, a final, tortured cry, and then shattered as the fire
consumed it, sending shards of bronze flying.
Light exploded - a blinding flash that momentarily obliterated everything - and then, darkness. A profound, consuming darkness that seemed to swallow sound itself.
The Aftermath
She awoke on the mansion’s overgrown lawn, coughing, her throat raw from smoke and the echoes of the screams that were not her own. The air, though still smelling of smoke, was clean, free of the oppressive presence.
Arjun was beside her, bleeding from a
gash on his forehead but alive. He blinked, looking around, his eyes wide with
disbelief.
“No bell,” he croaked, pushing himself up on an elbow.
“No whispers,” she said, her voice hoarse, a strange lightness in her chest.
Sameer was gone. Vanished, truly gone this time. The mansion’s windows stared down at them, hollow and lifeless, the building itself looking more dilapidated than ever, as if the struggle within had aged it centuries.
Three Days Later
The papers called it a gas leak explosion. The mansion had collapsed entirely, the local authorities citing structural instability. The official report mentioned nothing of bells or spirits.
But Nikitha kept the broken shard she
found in her coat pocket - brass, etched with a half-burnt rune that still felt
faintly warm to the touch.
And sometimes, just as she was falling asleep, she thought she could hear a faint… whisper.
A mere ghost of a sound, like the
rustle of old paper.
But it never said her name again. Not yet. The mystery of the bell was solved, but the scars it left were deep, and the world was always full of new, unsettling whispers.
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