As I sat on the chilly metal bench outside my daughter’s room, the fluorescent lights buzzed as the horrifying scene replayed in my mind. I was driving down the road, the radio was playing some music in a foreign language I didn’t understand but enjoyed anyway.
I looked at my daughter, Avery, through the rear-view mirror. She was dozing next to the window in the backseat. Smiling, I checked the GPS. Only fifteen minutes before we reached home.
Looking back at the road, I saw a truck swerving towards us. I made an effort to get out of the way but still ended up colliding head-on with the truck. The windshield shattered. I lurched forward, hitting my head on the dashboard. A sharp pain surged throughout my body. The last thing I heard before falling unconscious was a pained cry from the backseat and the blaring of sirens.
I woke up in a hospital bed. Bright fluorescent lights buzzed above my head. The entire room smelled of sanitizer and bleach, with a faint hint of vomit. The door opened, and a nurse walked in. I immediately questioned her about Avery’s whereabouts. As expected, she refused to tell me, encouraging me to rest first. I complied, knowing that protesting would be useless.
Later, a doctor walked into my room. He reassured me that I only had a minor head injury and would be discharged in a few days. He looked at me with a pitiful expression on his face when I asked about my daughter’s condition. Turning his head away from me he said, “She wasn’t quite as fortunate as you, she’s still alive, but we’re not sure she’ll make it.”. I hung my head in my hands,sobbing, too miserable to ask the doctor for more details on her condition. This was all my fault.
I felt a tap on my shoulder, bringing me back to the present day. A nurse was looking down at me. The solemn expression on her face told me more than I needed to know. I got up and followed her into the room, already aware of what I would see. The familiar sound of a patient flat-lining had already filled the room. My daughter was dead, and she wasn’t coming back.
The next few days went by like a blur. There were hundreds of calls from my friends and family, the funeral arrangements, the unavoidable confrontation with my ex, etc. It all seemed to lose purpose without her. After my ex-wife and I divorced, Avery was the only reason I was able to keep on going. After she died, life seemed purposeless and dull. I started to take care of myself less and less. It got to the point where my boss told me that I’d either have to move on or get fired. Of course,I eventually chose the latter and was dismissed that same day.
I ended up moving out of my cozy little apartment, and into a cheaper one. I was too depressed to start job-hunting and started using up all my savings to survive. I fell into a monotonous routine of waking up, scrolling through my phone, eating the pizza I ordered and going back to sleep. One particularly dull night, I was mindlessly browsing the internet. I eventually came across an article that peaked my interest:
The Crimson Forest Ritual: Rumored to bring back the dead.
“Maybe this is the way I can bring her back?’ I thought to myself, before immediately rejecting the idea. Avery was dead and no fake internet ritual could bring her back. However, I decided to at least humor the idea, and clicked on the article. It read as follows:
In the days of old,The Crimson Forest was believed to be a place that exists between the realm of the spirits and the mortal realm. While little is known of the myth’s origins, there are rules which are believed to allow one to communicate with the forest’s patron deity. The deity is believed to grant wishes in exchange for a living human sacrifice. Here are the rules to perform the ritual:
1. The forest can only be entered once a month every full moon. Attempting the ritual any other time will result in failure. It is also important to have a partner, unless you are willing to sacrifice yourself.
2. Find a wide,enclosed space and draw a triangle on the ground with cow blood. Using any other creature’s blood will result in failure. Your partner will draw a smaller triangle within yours.
3. Place three items which are close to your heart at the three points of the triangle. Your partner will do the same with their triangle. Placing normal, meaningless objects is fine, but may come back to haunt you later.
4. You and your partner must then cut a thin cross on your chests. This will prove that you are serious about the ritual. Not doing so will result in failure.
5. You will both fall unconscious and wake up in the Crimson Forest. If you wake up anywhere else, these rules won’t be able to help you.
6. When you wake up in the forest, you must remain calm. Do NOT touch any of the trees for prolonged periods of time.
7. You must make your way towards a hut in the center of the forest. You will know where it is, even if you think you don’t.
8. The residents of the forest, the trees, may try to slow down your journey. It is advised to bring a sharp object with you to ward them off. The six objects you and your partner brought can be used to distract them.
9. Once you reach the hut, the deity of the forest will ask you for a sacrifice. Give it to him and ask for your wish. He will then transport you back to the world of the living. You will find what you wished for next to you.
You’re her only hope Matthew….
A chill ran down my spine as I stared in shock at the last sentence. How did this website know my name? Feeling disturbed, I started searching the internet for more information. Nothing came up. I tried going back to the original article, but it seemed to have disappeared completely. Like a ghost in the night, any signs the ritual ever existed were gone.
Now I knew that I had to at least attempt the ritual. Even if the article was wrong and I really couldn’t bring my daughter back, there was no harm in trying. The only issue was finding someone to be my partner. I pondered my options, before I realized the perfect person for the job.
I shivered and clenched my coat closer to my body as a gust of wind blew past me. I walked towards the abandoned basketball court the kids in my town would play at every other day. “Kids like her” I thought to myself bitterly. Suppressing the painful memories, I glanced back at my friend Jerry, who was following me.
Jerry and I had been friends since middle school. We’d been through a lot of crazy stuff together, and I knew out of all my friends and family he was the only one who’d take me seriously in my current state. I smiled weakly at him and he beamed back at me. “If only he knew” I thought with a pang of regret in my heart. It was too late now, we were already here.
“This is the place, huh?” Jerry asked, stepping onto the cold, asphalt floor of the court. “Yeah!” I said, trying my best to be cheerful. I knew the only reason Jerry agreed to help was because he thought it would ‘help me cope with loss’. Poor, stupid Jerry. He should know that no amount of friendly bonding would make me whole again, only bringing her back would.
“So,what are we doing here again?”.
“I already told you, it’s a ritual I heard about on the internet.”
Jerry flashed me a nervous look.
“Don’t worry,” I said, giving him an encouraging smile,”It’ll be just like old times.”
I fished out the necessary supplies from my bag. Grabbing a bottle of cow blood, I started to draw a triangle on the ground. Following my lead, Jerry made a smaller triangle within mine. I took out the three objects I brought with me. A picture of my daughter when she was born, a toy from my childhood and my wedding ring.
Jerry pulled out three similar items that I didn’t pay much attention to. “So, that’s all we have to do, right?” Jerry asked, looking at the mess we’d made.
“No, we still have to draw the crosses on our chests.”
“Are you sure? I don’t want to lose any of my own blood.”
“Don’t worry, we don’t have to cut that deep, just enough for it to be noticeable.”
Lifting up my shirt, I took a small, thin knife and drew a cross on my chest. Begrudgingly, Jerry did the same. I suddenly felt extremely dizzy and nauseous. Crumbling to my knees, a wave of pain swept through me, and everything went dark.
When I woke up, the ground beneath my feet was changed. Instead of the cold asphalt of the basketball court, there was some strange silky brown grass that felt suspiciously like human hair. Sitting up, I saw Jerry lying on the ground next to me. I shook him awake. Groggily, he got up and looked at me, before screaming and shooting off the ground.
“What the hell is this place!” he shouted looking frantically at his surroundings.
“This is the crimson forest, just follow my lead and you’ll be safe.” I reassured him.
Taking a knife out of my pocket, I started walking deeper into the forest. The trees around me were a wide array of colors. Some were a soft peach color while others were more dark brown. They seemed to be eerily reminiscent of human skin tones. Looking upwards, I realized all the trees were bare. Their branches each went up into the air with five twigs on the end, reminding me of arms and hands.
“Ow!”
I looked back to see that Jerry had tripped on a branch that fell on the ground. I walked up to him, and was about to lend him a hand when I looked at the branch. In front of me was a severed human arm. Feeling nauseous, I stepped back. I looked around, feeling horrified. What I once saw as trees were actually pillars of flesh. The innocent looking branches were actually human limbs.
I kneeled on the ground and threw up whatever remained of the food I’d eaten earlier. A sense of unease filled the forest. Something old and evil was stirring within the forest. Whatever it was, I didn’t want to stick around long enough to find out what it was.
I helped Jerry, who looked just as nauseous as me, get on his feet. We both started sprinting, the forest seemed close in around us. We found it increasingly harder to navigate through the forest. One of the hands began to reach down in front of me. Before I even knew what was happening, I ran straight into its outstretched hand.
The tree tightened its grip on my skull. Panicking, I began searching my pockets for the knife I brought with me. All I managed to find was the wedding ring I used for the ritual.”How is this supposed to help me?! “ I thought as the hand began to squeeze my head tighter. I then remembered what the rules said. The objects can be used to distract them.
I threw the ring up into the air. Time seemed to slow down as I watched in anticipation. It began to glow brighter and brighter. The hand holding me seemed to go limp as I fell to the ground with a heavy thud. The ring landed beside me, still glowing but becoming dimmer and dimmer by the second.
Jerry helped me up, and together, we ran as fast as we could. In the distance, I could see a column of smoke rising into the air.”That must be from the hut!” I thought as a wave of determination surged through me. The hut soon came into view, Jerry and I nearly crashed into the door as we ran for dear life.
We stopped for a moment, before I opened the door. The hut was old and dusty. The wooden planks that made up the wall were rotten and reeked of mold. In front of us sat a man in a rocking chair. He sat in front of a fireplace with his turned towards us.
“Um, hello sir, can you help us?” Jerry said, walking cautiously towards the man.
The man turned, seemingly breaking out of a trance. He stood and turned to face us fully. Jerry let out a scream and fell to the ground. I could stand there, frozen in terror as he revealed his full figure to us. I can’t even begin to describe the horror that he was. He wore an old park ranger uniform, and had a gun fastened to his waist. That was the only normal part about him. The rest of his body was mutated beyond recognition.
He had knees in all the wrong places. Where his face should have been, fleshy tendrils stuck out. The skin on his arms sagged, only being supported by a few bones sticking out, giving him weird, fleshy wings. His legs were bent like a werewolf’s. Those are only the features that I can describe. I doubt even the sickest imaginations could describe what the rest of him looked like.
“Well well, I’ve been expecting you Matthew,” The man said.
I stood there, too terrified to speak.
“Not feeling like much of a talker today,huh? Don’t worry I’ll just take the sacrifice, I already know what you want.”
The man stared hungrily at Jeremy.
“This forest could definitely use a new tree.”
Jeremy looked at me, horrified.
“By sacrifice, you don’t mean me right?” He asked the man.
“Of course I mean you! Matthew here agreed to give you to me.” The man said, seeming to take pleasure in the look of terror that spread across Jerry’s face.
My vision started to turn black as Jerry let out one final scream. I woke up in my bedroom, drenched in cool sweat. Getting out of bed, I looked around the room. My attention was drawn to a notification on my open laptop. Sitting down at my desk, I checked the notification. It was a message from an unknown number that read as follows:
10. Individuals who partake in this ritual will be unable to enter heaven or hell. They will be doomed to join the forest after death.
I stared in horror, unable to comprehend what I’d just read. At that moment, the door to my room opened, and Avery walked in. All my fears seemed to disappear as I hugged my daughter, fearing that she would disappear if I let go. She just stood there, barely seeming to register my presence.
Over the next few days, I packed up our things, ready to move far away from my friends and family. I knew that they would question me on Avery’s sudden reappearance and Jerry’s disappearance. The police tried to question me about Jerry, but I just acted like any concerned friend would and told them I didn’t know but to keep me updated.
I changed our names, and we moved away the following weekend. As I drove down the road, out of town and hopefully towards a brighter future, I glanced back at my daughter in the backseat. She stared at me with a cold look, barely even stopping to blink. She’d been like this ever since she came back. I can’t help but wonder if I’m partially responsible. Everything’s been better since she came back, but I still wonder, did I really make the right choice?