At Ignatius Bernard University, five students follow a light behind a sealed iron door and step into a corridor that should not exist.
Before the first semester began, Ignatius Bernard University was just another grey block in the city centre: rain-stained stone, narrow windows, and a campus that looked as if it had been designed to keep people out. Then Michael and I met Basia, Marek, and Weronika, and the place started to feel less like a university and more like a puzzle waiting for someone reckless enough to touch it.
Everyone knew the story about the forbidden wing. The iron doors at the end of the oldest corridor had been locked for more than a century, or so the legend went. Students repeated the tale the way people repeat the weather forecast: with a shrug, a grin, and the private hope that it might still be true. No one admitted to believing in ghosts, but no one liked walking past those doors alone after dark.
One night, coming back from the library with our arms full of books and our heads already stuffed with too little sleep, Basia stopped so abruptly that the rest of us nearly collided with her. She pointed at the forbidden wing. A thin band of light was leaking through the crack beneath the iron door.
It had not been there earlier.
For a second none of us spoke. The corridor was silent except for the low hum of the old lights above us and the uneven sound of our breathing. Marek swallowed hard and tried to laugh, but it came out thin and strained.
"Do you think someone’s in there?" he whispered.
Basia did not answer. She stepped forward, put her hand on the door, and pushed.
To our shock, it opened.
The hinges gave a long, complaining groan, as if the building itself resented being disturbed. Cold air touched our faces as we crossed the threshold, and the door shut behind us with a heavy, deliberate click that made all four of us flinch. The corridor beyond was dim and strangely narrow, lined with walls so old the paint had blistered into pale, peeling curls. Dust drifted through the air in the weak golden light flickering far ahead.
We moved toward it without saying a word.
At the end of the corridor stood a tall mirror in a frame of dark, carved wood. Its surface caught the light and threw it back in restless flashes, but what it reflected made my stomach tighten. It was not showing the four of us.
It was showing someone else.
Behind us, something exhaled softly.
The door began to close.
We turned at the same moment, and in the mirror I saw a sixth figure standing just inches behind Basia, one pale hand already lifting toward her shoulder.