The burning sensation in Karto’s neck spread wilder, as though the bruised ligature had transformed into rows of fiery fibers scorching through his flesh. On the wooden shelf, the black cloth bag trembled faintly. The rasp of dull burial cloth against the weathered boards rang sharply through the room, dead beneath the sunlight.
Karto wiped away his tears of fear with his grimy palm. His thoughts turned to the figure who had dragged him into this hell: Mbah Jambrong. The shaman at the edge of Penjalin Forest had not merely given him a talisman—he had trapped him in a deadly supernatural bond. The whisper of Marni’s restless spirit in the hut that morning had not been an empty threat; the shaman had deliberately hidden a connection between the girl’s death and this vile ritual.
“Mbah Jambrong... you used me,” Karto whispered, his voice hoarse and trembling with anger tangled up in desperation.
Summoning what little courage remained to him, Karto rose to his feet. He leaped over the pool of foul-smelling red water creeping out from the kitchen, felt his way to the front door, and slipped out of his house. The midday air in Sukamerta stung his skin with an unfamiliar heat, but the darkness inside Karto’s chest could no longer be warmed by sunlight.
He did not waste a moment. Karto ran along the rice-field embankment, avoiding the suspicious looks of villagers who had begun whispering at the roadside. His footsteps cut through gaps in the undergrowth until he found himself once again at the border of Penjalin Forest.
The ancient forest welcomed him with an atmosphere grown even darker. The morning mist had never truly lifted; it had condensed into a layer of cold vapor hanging thick between the bamboo trees and massive tangles of rattan. The incense smoke that usually rose from the shaman’s hut now mingled with a sharp, fishy odor—the exact same smell as the fresh blood from the jar in Karto’s house.
Karto pushed through the tall grass until he reached the yard outside Mbah Jambrong’s hut. But the sight before him brought him to an abrupt halt.
The hut’s plank door had torn free of its hinges and lay shattered on the wet ground, as if struck by tremendous physical force. Thick black smoke billowed from the gaps in the thatched roof, carrying the smell of soot and burning flesh.
“Mbah Jambrong!” Karto shouted as he slipped into the hut’s gloom, a sickle clutched in his hand.
The inside of the hut was in complete disarray. The clay bowls where the shaman burned offerings had been smashed to pieces. Red candles had melted into slick pools across the floor, and the incense brazier had toppled over, scattering embers that slowly died as murky liquid washed over them.
Amid the destruction, Mbah Jambrong sat cross-legged. But there was something strange about his position. The shaman’s head drooped sharply backward, his neck bent at an unnatural angle, as though an invisible hand had forced him to tilt his head up and stare at the hut’s ceiling.
Karto edged closer, his chest pounding violently. “Mbah...?”
Mbah Jambrong did not move, but his cloudy, wide-open eyes suddenly darted sharply toward Karto. Thick, blackish-red fluid seeped from between his darkened lips and crawled down his chin.
“You... came back, Karto...” The shaman’s voice no longer resonated with its usual heavy force. It sounded cracked, like the breath of a severe asthma sufferer on the brink of death.
“What happened here, Mbah?!” Karto knelt a yard from where the shaman sat. “My house... the water in the kitchen turned into blood! And you... you lied about Marni! Who was Marni, really?! Why did her spirit call this a sin of yours?!”
Mbah Jambrong gave a short laugh. It ended in a violent cough that sprayed flecks of thick blood onto his sarong.
“You... don’t understand anything, Karto,” Mbah Jambrong whispered, his eyes trembling as he fought unbearable pain. “Marni... didn’t die from an ordinary fever. She... was a vessel. A vessel I created to contain my black magic...”
Karto’s blood suddenly felt frozen. “A vessel?”
“This red magic... needs a container,” the shaman continued, his throat rasping. “Three days ago... when she was dying... I sealed her soul by wrapping a blood-red Pocong Cord around her neck before the earth was thrown over her. That red cord wasn’t an ordinary wealth talisman... it was the binding of her sin and her magic! I needed someone as stupid and greedy as you... to cut that bond from her body...”
“So...” Karto’s eyes widened as he realized the horrifying truth behind the trap. “You deliberately sent me to dig up her grave... so her magic could be released?!”
“So that her magic... could be transferred...” Mbah Jambrong smiled horribly, revealing his bloody gums. “That red cord belongs to you now, Karto. Every time that Red Pocong’s spirit comes to strangle you... it isn’t trying to kill you... it’s planting its curse and its magic inside your body! You are Marni’s new vessel for vengeance!”
“You bastard!” Karto screamed, raising his sickle to the shaman’s neck. “Take this magic out of me, Mbah! Do it now, or I’ll cut your throat!”
Mbah Jambrong showed not the slightest fear as the sickle’s blade pressed against his wrinkled skin. Instead, he closed his eyes and let the blood continue streaming from his nose and ears.
“It’s... too late...” Mbah Jambrong whispered. “Your blood fused with the cord’s fibers when you cut it in the grave. Marni’s restless spirit won’t stop... until your neck snaps and that red cord is tying her burial shroud again beneath the earth.”
Suddenly, a fierce wind tore through the ruined walls of the hut. The sound of wet cloth dragging across the ground rose again outside the hut’s yard.
Sssrrt... sssrrt... sssrrt...
A suffocating chill rushed inside, snuffing out the last embers in the brazier. Mbah Jambrong suddenly convulsed violently. Both hands clawed at his chest as though his heart were being forcibly ripped out from within.
“It... has come to collect the first payment...” Mbah Jambrong shrieked, his eyes bulging outward.
Karto stumbled backward in terror as he watched Mbah Jambrong’s old body rise several inches above the mat where he sat, pulled by an unseen supernatural force. Through the gaps in the hut’s wooden walls, strands of blood-red fibers crept inside like wild worms, winding tightly around the old shaman’s wrists, legs, and neck.
“Mbah!” Karto cried.
Mbah Jambrong had no time to make another sound. The red fibers yanked his body brutally backward until it slammed into the hut’s main post. Crack! The snap of his neck echoed sharply through the silence of the forest. The shaman’s body went limp, his cloudy white eyes still fixed on Karto, frozen in the last remnants of terror.
Through the smoke billowing across the hut’s yard, a pocong wrapped in a tattered burial shroud stained with wet earth stood rigidly. Its face covered by dull burial cloth slowly lifted, staring directly at Karto, who stood frozen inside the hut.
The bruised ligature around Karto’s neck suddenly throbbed violently, spreading unbearable pain that forced him to his knees as he fought back a scream.
Karto knew the shaman he had sought for help had been killed by his own curse. Now there was no barrier or spell left between him and the Red Pocong demanding retribution. With what little strength remained, Karto dropped his sickle, turned around, and ran as fast as he could, leaving Penjalin Forest as the darkness of night began to close in.