I I am writing this for two reasons number one to get it out there to put it on the record that this happened and to never forget what happened number two to warn everyone who reads this there are places in the world old places dark places places that humans should never tread upon. I was a sophomore in high school on the last week of my summer break me and two of my buddies decide to go camping we all love the outdoors and The deep woods lived around them our whole lives we got to the campsite right before dusk pitch the tent started the fire by buddy Higgins I started dinner we ate while Hunter brought out a a jug of moonshine he stole from his dad there was gonna be hell to pay when he got home but he didn’t care we decided in the morning to go hiking up some of the trails the lead up The mountain Now to put some contacts on this we were three pretty built guys Higgins was a little skinnier but he always had that pistol with him Hunter was a bigger boy always ready to knock someone is lights out when we had to hi was 6 foot four not the strongest but I always carried a knife or two with me we felt pretty safe
with all three of us if we stayed at camp we would’ve been. morning came and we packed up our equipment and started hiking laughing joking and just being a bunch of dumb teenagers Hunter nearly fell off the side of a bluff thank goodness I caught caught him by the neck of his shirt we walked for about 15 more minutes when Hunter asked us if it was real quiet out he was right not a bird was chirping and no animals were Moving about this was not a good sign we all knew on the woods goes quiet that means a predator is nearby but we couldn’t hear anything nothing was moving didn’t sound like anything was trying to sneak up on us we couldn’t hear no leaves cracking under weight
Higgins was the first to notice about 10 feet ahead of us was a pile of stones stacked up high and at the top with a deer skull top of head was caved in that’s dumb teenagers do we decided to check it out it looked like the deer skull had been put there when he was still fresh there was blood on the stones leaking all the way to the ground but dried and blackened at this point I was freaked ready to go back to camp but Hunter he wanted to see what or who did this he convinced us to walk a little bit farther to see what we can find Higgins had the pistol and I had my knife so we thought we were safe
about five more minutes of silently walking we come to a clearing the air was cold almost to where you could see your breath at this point Hunter was physically unnerved the grass had this film of gray the trees in this area white as bone
The only thing that had any color to it was a tree large and round in the middle of the clearing its leaves were red like every other tree around it was white from root to branches I didn’t even notice I didn’t hear Higgins walking past me and towards the tree We only noticed when he was about 5 feet from at Hunter and I was screaming at him to get away something not right about this place there’s something not right about the tree we started running towards them to get them away I don’t know what it was the animal instinct to run to flee but I couldn’t leave them there he touches the tree and a blood curling yell came from him we right behind him now I can see his hand it looks like the tree is forming around his hand crimson liquid is flowing out of his hand not his arm he drops to his knees in pain we’re trying to pull him from the tree but it’s pulling him pulling him back to his feet and up the tree I look up in the center of the tree has split it looks like a hideously deformed mouth sharp jagged pointed pieces of wood look like teeth the branches are coming down from the tree picking him up to grab a hold of me and Hunter I was terrified
Icouldn’t think straight I don’t know when I unsheathed my knife and started cutting I fell to the ground with a heart bud but didn’t have time to think of the pain I ran over to Hunter and started cutting him down by The time I got him down I was too late for Higgins he was already inside the mouth of the tree screaming in agony as it closed around him all we could do is watch as the mouth closed I blood dripped out we ran I ran as fast as I could my lungs screaming in protest my heart pounding adrenaline coursing through my veins we didn’t stop until we reach camp but then we realized all the sounds we’re back the birds rustling leaves hunter wanted to go back I screamed at him not to be stupid Higgins was dead there’s nothing we can do we went back it only kill us I called the ranger station and I told him there’s been an attack I didn’t tell him that it was a tree that attacked us just said there was a attack and we lost one of our friends they asked our location and we told them he asked if we walked up the trail I went past the stones I didn’t answer that just stayed silent then he spoke you’re not supposed to be there.