This is an automated archive made by the Lemmit Bot.
The original was posted on /r/nosleep by /u/S_G_Woodhouse on 2024-11-16 15:00:22+00:00.
I'd always thought the rules of my high school library were too strict, but that was before.
Derek had spent the whole week telling me about this mysterious “trapdoor” hidden behind the gym.
“Josh, tonight at 10 p.m. Sarah and I are going to explore what's behind that trapdoor, are you with us?” he asked me as he and Sarah sat down at the table where I'd set up to study.
I glanced incongruously at Sarah, who was standing next to Derek with a big smile on her face.
“Sarah, seriously he got you into this?” I whispered so the library supervisor wouldn't yell at us.
“Doesn't it intrigue you? I want to know what they're hiding there. Besides, what's the risk? Teachers don't go round the gym at night,” she replied.
I leaned back in my chair to think. Derek was a notorious troublemaker, Sarah wasn't, but she was starting to follow him a bit too much for my taste. I'd been friends with Derek since grade school, so I knew he wasn't dangerous. But imagining Sarah alone with him... Who knows what trouble his impulsiveness would bring them.
“Pfft, alright, I'm in,” I said.
They cheered a little too loudly, which earned us a remark from the librarian supervisor.
I'd come with them first and foremost to make sure they wouldn't get into trouble. But I must admit, I was also curious, like them, about what we'd find.
That evening we found ourselves at the spot Derek had pointed out to me on google maps.
The three of us were standing in front of the mysterious trapdoor, equipped with nothing more than a flashlight each, bought at the corner store for the occasion. Derek smoked a cigarette absent-mindedly.
“So that's it,” I said, examining it.
It was strange, to be honest. It had obviously been concealed by vegetation and vines were still attached to the metal handle. It was thick and perfectly smooth, apart from that there was no indication of what might be behind it.
The 3 of us set about lifting the trap door.
Once on its side, we pointed our torches inside.
A stone staircase stretched so far into the darkness that even our lights couldn't reach the end.
“It goes in the direction of the school,” said Sarah. “Do you think it allows access like a secret passage?”
“Maybe,” I replied. “Or maybe there's an old bunker down there that the school was built on.”
Derek stepped onto the stairs and looked at us, smiling: “Only one way to find out, let's go.”
And with that, we headed down the tunnel.
The walls of the tunnel were made of stone and looked solid, apart from a few water seepages here and there.
We walked down for a good 15 minutes before the stairs stopped and a corridor went straight ahead. We kept walking. The light-hearted chatter of the beginning gradually dissipated, leaving only a heavy silence.
“You’d better not be claustrophobic,” said Sarah, peering into the darkness behind us.
It's true that we'd been walking for a good 10 minutes now and it was getting worrying. We didn't know where we were going, and all it took was a rockfall and we'd end up buried alive.
“Hey, I see something,” said Derek while I was lost in thought.
He was right, there was finally a structure in front of us.
We ran the rest of the distance to it, excited to have finally found something.
“What the fuck, is that?” said Derek loudly once we got to the front.
I came up behind him with Sarah to discover the object of his confusion.
It was a simple wooden door with writing carved into the wood.
“Library rules...” I read aloud.
“The library? Seriously we came all this way for this? To find the school library's book stash? Talk about a find...” Derek said with a dejected look.
“No wait,” I replied. “Look what it says underneath. I know the school library well, and I've never seen these rules anywhere.”
The rules inscribed were as follows:
Rule n°1 : Any student entering the library must work there for at least 1 hour.
Rule n°2 : It is forbidden to damage books in any way.
Rule n°3 : Borrowed books must be returned to the place where they were taken.
Rule n°4 : Be quiet.
Rule n°5 : It's forbidden to look the librarian in the eye.
“What the fuck why couldn't we look the librarian in the eye?” asked Derek.
“Maybe the one who worked here was shy...” replied Sarah.
The three of us looked at each other warily.
“Shall we go in?” I finally offered, to Derek's surprise.
“I was ready to get the hell out, but since for once you're taking the initiative : After you,” Derek replied, waving me in.
I grabbed the door handle. For a moment, I wondered if I was making a mistake. I was supposed to be the voice of reason in the group, but in the end, I wasn't as reasonable as I thought when it came to something that interested me.
The door opened with a creak that would wake the dead.
We pointed our three flashlights cautiously inside before entering.
“Hello?” I said instinctively.
“Seriously?” said Sarah, raising her eyebrows.
I admitted, the place clearly hadn't seen a living being in a very long time.
A long, low-ceilinged room stretched out before us.
The stone walls were now hidden behind rows of shelves full of dusty books. Even our footsteps inside raised the dust that had accumulated on the floor for decades, or perhaps even longer.
There were also shelves in the middle of the room, creating 4 corridors.
We split up to explore a little on our own with our flashlights.
I moved to a shelf on my right and began to run my finger along the edges of the books, reading their titles as I went.
Despite the time I'd spent in the real high school library, I didn't recognize any of the authors or titles. They all seemed esoteric. The recurring themes were divinatory art, alchemy, astrology, ceremonial magic and... satanic rituals.
“Hey look at this,” Derek said to the row on the other side of mine.
He showed me the cover of the book he was holding: 'The Art and Usage of Human Sacrifice'.
“Not likely they'll teach us that in high school,” he said, laughing and setting the book on top of several others.
“Derek put it back...” I started to say before he went any further.
But it was too late.
“Bad boy,” said a female voice that sounded ancestral.
What looked like an old woman emerged from the shadows just behind Derek.
She was at least 6'5 ft tall, her long, dirty gray hair falling to her bare feet with their yellow, damaged nails. She wore a drab gray dress and her face... her face was skeletal, to the point where the dry skin stretched over her features looked as if it might break at any moment. Her bulging, lidless eyes stared at Derek with frightening intensity.
He began to turn to look at her.
“Don't look back!” I said eagerly, fear reducing my voice to a whisper.
Suddenly her gaze landed on me and I instantly looked Derek in the eye, my whole body shaking.
She turned her attention back to him, gently grabbed the hand he'd used to pick up the book, and in one swift motion, she snapped two of his fingers.
Derek screamed at the top of his lungs.
“QUIET IN THE LIBRARY,” the thing screamed at the back of his neck aggressively.
Derek held back his scream and tears, biting his lips.
We just stood there. Meanwhile, Sarah had returned to us and was staring at her feet, tears running down her eyelids and falling onto her shoes making little noises in the absolute silence.
Eventually, the thing, which was obviously what the list of rules referred to as the “librarian” went further back.
We rejoined at the other end of the shelf.
“Lets get the fuck out of here,” I whispered to them. They both nodded silently and we quietly made our way to the library door.
As Derek held his aching hand and Sarah stood beside him to help, I gently grasped and lowered the door handle before pulling it gently towards me.
The door wouldn't budge.
“What, what's happening?” asked Sarah.
“It's stuck, I can't open it”
“Force it harder”.
I pulled with all my weight.
“I'm trying but it won't open” I whispered anxiously.
Then I remembered.
“Fuck, Rule #1: Any student entering the library must work there for at least 1 hour.”
We were stuck here.
We heard the old woman's footsteps coming towards us this time.
“Back to work, unless you want to be punished,” she said menacingly.
Trembling like leaves the three of us slowly made our way to a bookshelf together.
“We have to work, take a book, it doesn't matter which one,” I whispered.
We each took a book at random, but all three of us beside each other to make sure we didn't forget where to put them down. Who knows what she'd do to us if one of us repeated the mistake, this time she wouldn't just break our fingers.
“What the hell is that thing, you're not going to tell me it's a human being?” whispered Derek as we made our way to tables spread out in the middle of the library.
“And have you seen these books?” I replied. “They look like they're hundreds of years old, sometimes the titles aren't even in English.”
“What's this room doing below the school? Do you think they know about it?” asked Sarah.
“No way,” I replied. “This place. We're probably the only ones who've set foot in here in a long time.”
“We've got to get out of here,” Derek said as we arrived in front of the tables. “There's nothing to tell us that another one of these things won't fall on us and kill us just for the fun of it.”
He was right. We'd only just discovered this place. We still had no idea of the dangers that could be lurking here in addition to this old woman.
We had to stay ...
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