Night fell over the city like a sick blanket. There were no stars, no moon; only a
thick darkness that seemed glued to the sky. Jacob paced the room, unable to
stop the trembling in his hands. Since the red rift in the heavens, his heart had
not returned to its normal rhythm. The Adversary was
Here. Not as a symbol, not as an ancestral fear… but present, breathingin the world
of the living.
Sara tried to get Rebecca to sleep, but she was still restless. Every now and then, the
little girl woke up.She jerked her head sharply, as if she heard something in a
language only she could understand.
Rick stood by the window, looking out at the almost deserted street, where the
shadowsThey seemed to be moving for no reason.
"Something is... getting into the houses," Rick murmured. "I feel like we're
not the only ones."Jacob didn't answer. For minutes he'd been hearing a soft sound, a deep scraping
in the walls, like long fingernails dragging from inside the concrete. At first he
thought it was the house expanding due to the change in temperature.
Now I knew that wasn't the case.
A whisper began to echo through the corridors. It didn't come from any human
mouth. It was awet, almost liquid sound, as if it were seeping through invisible
cracks.
Sara looked up, nervous.
"Did you hear that?"
Jacob nodded.
Rick took a step back.
—That comes… from within.
Then something happened that chilled everyone's blood: the wall of the room made
amotion, a small ripple, as if it were breathing.
Rebecca began to cry in her mother's arms.
—Jacob… —Sara whispered—, what's going on in this house?
Jacob took a deep breath. He knew exactly what it was. All of Job's descendants
had been warned at some point, in one way or another, about how the trials
began.
First, the outside world grew dark.Then
the shadows sought cracks. And
finally… the voice entered.
"It's not the house," Jacob said hoarsely. "It's him."
Rick slowly approached the wall, unsure whether he was being brave or reckless. He
reached out, his hand trembling. Before he could touch it, a voice slipped from within
the wall:
"Jacoooob…"
The name stretched like a thread of pain that pierced the
senses.Rick jumped back.—God! That's not human!
The lamps began to flicker. The air became thick, almost impossible to
breathe.Breathe. Every ray of light seemed to be absorbed into an invisible point.
Jacob closed his eyes. The whisper returned, this time louder, clearer,
repeatingwords that only he understood:
"You let me in…"
Jacob felt a pang in his chest. It
wasn't true. He hadn't done anything.
But divine trials were never fair in the eyes of men.
The wall moved again. This time, a small crack opened in the plaster, as if
something were pressing from within. It wasn't large, but enough to see a black
shadow creeping beneath the surface.
Rebecca suddenly stopped crying. Her body went rigid, motionless. Sara held her,
alarmed.
—Jacob! Jacob, something's wrong!
The girl opened her eyes… and they seemed completely black, as if they were
absorbing
the light.
"The... Adversary... is... here," he murmured in a voice that wasn't his
own. Sara screamed.
Jacob held her by the shoulders.
—Don't look at her! Don't let her finish the
sentence!But it was too late.
The shadow inside the crack began to expand, forming a hole from which something
emergedAn unnatural chill. The whisper grew into a silent roar that echoed deep
within their bones.
Rick ran towards the door.
—We have to get out! Now!
But when she tried to open it, the handle was frozen solid. A dark frost covered
themetal, passing through it like a disease.Rebecca's voice spoke again, now deeper, impossible to have come from a child:
—They can't escape…
The crack widened, like an eye watching those present from the other side of the
wall.
—He… already… chose.
Jacob felt that something immense was watching him from inside the house. Not
outside, not in
the sky, not in the shadows…
Inside.
The murmur echoed one last time, like a wind passing among ancient tombs:
"Your faith… will be crushed…"
And all the lights went out at the same
time.The house was plunged into absolute
silence. A silence that did not belong to this
world