Table of Contents:
Chapter 1: FOG
Chapter 2: DARKNESS
Chapter 3: NIGHTMARE
Harry Mason stepped into the fog, his footsteps unsteady from the shock of the accident.
His Jeep had broken through the guardrail and sunk into the bottom of a ravine. The cause was a sudden swerve—Harry had panicked when a figure darted onto the road. He managed to avoid hitting the small, childlike silhouette by jerking the wheel, but the steel beast, like an iron horse that refused to follow the driver's reigns, letting out a high-pitched whinny that sounded like the tires scraping, skidded sideways, crashing into the guardrail.
It was hard to remember anything else after that. He was still a bit dazed, but better off than when he first regained consciousness in the stalled vehicle.
“Cheryl,” Harry called out into the vision-obscuring fog. His daughter had disappeared from the car. The passenger door was wide open, but she was unlikely to have been thrown out by the impact. Not only that, but he was sure that he had fastened her seatbelt himself.
He called out to her again but there was no response. She was nowhere to be seen around the car.
A father's anxiety soon consumed Harry. Wiping what he thought was sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand, he found it was blood, drippling from a minor scrape. He wasn't seriously hurt but Cheryl might have thought her father was seriously injured, lost consciousness, and went to find help. At seven years old, Cheryl was a bright child, smart enough to know what to do in an emergency. But still...
His worry only deepened.
Charles Hatcher.... Albert Fish..... Jesse Pomeroy......
Numerous names of notorious figures from the past—flashed through Harry’s mind, their sinister images superimposed on his daughter. Those were the monsters that lurked in society, criminals that were preying on innocent children. What if Cheryl, a little girl alone and lost in an unfamiliar town, encountered one of them by pure chances?
Harry stepped further into the fog. He had to find his daughter, and quickly.
“Cheryl!”
He called out her name over and over, as he pushed through the thick fog, as if it were a sea of mist. The dense mist blanketed the small town of Silent Hill, a small town with a population of fewer than twenty-thousand. Was this kind of weather rare for the area? Harry had never heard of such a dense fog forming in the town, which was known as a lakeside resort. It was as if the entire lake had evaporated into the air.
This vacation had taken a turn for the worse. What was supposed to be a relaxing fishing trip, leisurely enjoying the natural beauty of Maine with his daughter, had spiraled into something entirely different.
"I want to ride a pony! Just like a cowboy, galloping fast!" Cheryl had been bursting with excitement during the drive. It was her first vacation, and she couldn't stop talking, so much so that Harry was surprised at just how chatty she was.
“Alright, cowgirl. There's a kid's ranch where you can ride horses until they're worn out. Just promise me you won't start any bar fights or high-noon duels,” Harry had replied, smiling to match her enthusiasm. "I don't wanna have to skip town before lunch"
“I’ll lasso a cow and roast it for you, Daddy.”
“Daddy would rather have fish. I’m going to try and catch some trout from the lake. Do you wanna try and catch one?”
“Okay, I’ll come with you. But I feel bad for the fishes. If we catch one, can we let it go?”
“Oh? No sympathy for the cows, huh?”
“That's different. They have horns, and they glare at you. They’re always munching and peeing everywhere. They're not cute at all.”
Her childish reasoning had made Harry laugh. Poor cows, he thought, especially since beef stew was Cheryl's favorite.
Only once did Cheryl’s cheerful demeanor waver. She fell silent suddenly, and after a brief pause, Harry noticed her gaze, now cast downward. She looked up at him with a hint of guilt in her eyes.
“I'm sorry,” she said quietly.
“For what?”
“For being selfish and making you take time off work. I know you're really busy.”
“Don’t worry about it. Daddy won’t get fired for just taking a little time off. I’m a freelancer, remember?”
“But Daddy... you argued on the phone with the person who gives you work.”
“Ah, you mean Edward. That blockhead of a publishing agent wanted Daddy to write some trashy celebrity gossip. He said I should cancel this vacation to get it done while the rock star scandals were still hot. So, I just told him—loudly, so even a blockhead like him could understand—that the most important thing to me isn’t work; it’s spending time with you, Cheryl.”
“Okay,” Cheryl nodded, but her warm smile didn’t return right away.
Harry apologized silently. He knew Cheryl felt like she had to be careful around him, and it was his fault. Since losing his wife, Jodie, he had raised Cheryl alone. Luckily, Harry was a writer, which meant he could work from home most of the time, balancing his job with taking care of his daughter. But it also meant that he only had time for the basics: feeding her, bathing her, taking her to school.
The rest of his time had to be spent working to provide for them, leaving Harry with little energy for anything else. Cheryl understood this, even as a child, and she tried not to burden him. She knew that he was doing his best for her, so she never complained when he didn’t take her to the amusement park or let her play in the park or even when they rarely went out to eat. She bore it all in silence, never uttering a single word of protest.
That’s why Harry made the decision—to visit Silent Hill, a place Cheryl had been eager to see for reasons he couldn't quite figured it out or knew where it was. Even though she was thrilled about their first trip, she couldn’t hide her concern that her father might be tiring himself out. No matter how much he assured her that his schedule had conveniently opened up, her worries did not fade away.
Harry felt a deep sense of guilt. Even though, he had intended this trip as a way to make up for all the times he hadn't been able to be the father he wanted to be. But instead, due to one stupid driving mistake, he had now placed Cheryl in danger. If she were to fall at the hands of some deranged criminal, the consequences would be unthinkable.
Every year, sixteen children had been raped or murdered. Twenty-seven had been beaten and dismembered. A hundred boys and girls had been killed and eaten like steaks. Harry had once written a book about past serial killers, and now, all those horrid details flooded back into his mind. What had once been distant, abstract horrors were now a looming, personal nightmare, tormenting his heart.
Cheryl! Cheryl! Where are you?!
The accident had happened just as they reached the outskirts of Silent Hill. Harry had been running down the sidewalk, now deep into the residential area. Even though he was off the beaten tourist path, he hadn’t seen a single passerby. Maybe the thick fog was obscuring his vision, but still, it struck him as odd that he hadn’t encountered anyone. There were no cars on the roads either.
It was quiet. Too quiet.
The silence felt like the dead of night, even though it was in the middle of the day. The eerie quietness was like that of a ghost town, completely devoid of life. Though it struck him as odd, Harry’s mind was too consumed with finding his daughter to dwell on it.
Finally, he spotted a public phone and rushed to it, immidiately dialing the police. But the line just kept ringing—no one answered. He hung up and tried again. Over and over, it is same result. Frustrated, Harry slammed the receiver back into place.
Dammit. The cops must be slacking off. How the hell are they supposed to get anything done around here if they can't even take one simple phone call.
He decided he’d have to go to the station and raise hell himself. There was no way he could search for Cheryl on his own in a town he didn’t know. But then again, he had no idea where the police station was either and finding it might be just as hard as finding Cheryl herselff.
Shit, if only there was someone around to ask for directions.
“Hey! Is anyone there?” Harry called out, his voice echoing through the fog. But all he got in return was the same oppressive silence. Just then, he noticed a flicker of blue amid the white veil of fog. It was the color of someone's clothing. Somebody was out there.
“Hey, wait!” he shouted, running towards the figure. As he got closer, the outline of a small person became clearer, but just as he was about to reach them, the figure turned and began to run away.
The silhouette was uncannily familiar.
“Cheryl? Is that you, Cheryl?!”
But the girl didn’t respond. She just kept walking away, turning her backs to him.
“Where are you going?”
Harry chased after her, but oddly, he couldn’t seem to catch up, despite his longer strides.
“Wait! Please, come back!”
Was he mistaken? Could it be some other girl who now thought he was a pervert or something? Even so, Harry couldn’t stop chasing her. He had to know for sure if it was Cheryl. Even if it was a case of mistaken identity, she was the only person he’d seen, the only one he could ask for help. The girl’s form grew fainter, almost as if she was dissolving into the fog, but Harry kept following her. She turned left, disappearing down an alley.
The alley ended at a solid brick wall, but off to the side was a metal gate that hung open, leading to a narrow passage between two buildings. Although he had lost sight of the girl, there was no other place she could have gone. Harry pushed open the creaking gate and hesitated. Just beyond the entrance, there were splatters of blood.
“What the...?”
In the middle of a bloodstain was the mangled body of a dog, beaten so severely that it had become an unrecognizable mass of flesh, twisted and broken. The brutality reminded Harry extreme cases of animal abuse committed by deranged individuals, and he turned his eyes away, sickened by the cruelty done to the poor creature.
He continued down the passage, which twisted and turned, the fog hanging like a lid above him, closing in all around. Between the fog overhead and the narrowness of the path, it felt like he was completely cut off from the world. The narrow space made him feel claustrophobic, bringing back memories of when he had crawled into a drainage pipe as a child, thinking it was an adventure, only to paniccked and got stuck until his friends pulled him out. He wasn’t fully claustrophobic, but Harry had always disliked tight, enclosed spaces. If it weren’t for Cheryl, he would’ve turned back by now.
The bonds of family, of human connection, can drive people to face difficulties and grow, but they can also push them into reckless decisions that lead to their downfall.
There was more blood on the floor ahead, smeared across the narrow corridor. The walls changed from solid brick to chain-link fencing, and the wire was splattered with blood as well. This was starting to look less like a back alley and more like a crime scene.
It looked like one where a gruesome murder that had taken place.
Where were the police? Had the townsfolk not noticed or even reported this?
Harry stopped dead in his tracks, his eyes widening in horror.
At the end of the passage, a bloodied corpse was strung up on the fence with barbed wire, like a crucified figure.
However, it wasn’t a dog this time. It was clearly a person.
Harry forced himself to approach the body, dreading what he might find. But as he got closer, he was relieved to see that the height and physique were those of an adult—it wasn’t Cheryl. But then, where had the girl gone? There was no other way out of the alley. Harry was certain he hadn’t missed any side passages...
Just as Harry was about to turn back, a deafening roar reverberated through his ears, shaking his very core. It was a sound that defied description—like the furious yowl of a tomcat in a vicious territorial fight, but amplified and twisted into something far more sinister. Whatever made the sound was uncomfortably close. The roar came from right beside him, so close he could feel the foul breath against his skin.
Before Harry could react, something slammed into him, sending him crashing into the fence. The impact was more violent than the car accident he'd just survived. The force of it left him no time to process the pain before his consciousness began to slip away. As his vision surrendered to darkness, he caught a glimpse of something grotesque and horrifying—something beyond comprehension. In the corner of his darkening vision, he could just barely see the figure lumbering towards him. The last thing to reach Harry was the distant echo of a gunshot.
Jodie...
He had met her in the fall of his sophomore year of college. Word had spread that she had just broken up with her high school boyfriend, and Harry had mustered every ounce of courage he had to approach her. It wasn't the most noble move—taking advantage of her heartbreak—but he poured all his passion into comforting her. And it worked; he spent a night with her that he'd only dreamed about before. In truth, he'd known about her since high school. They hadn't been in the same class, but they attended the same school, and he'd admired her from afar, too shy to ask her to the dance because she already had a boyfriend. Finally, he had his chance at happiness. They didn't even wait to graduate before they married in a small church ceremony. For nine years, every day felt like a honeymoon. Even during the early, tough days when he'd quit his job to become a freelance non-fiction writer and they struggled to make ends meet, she had supported him with unwavering kindness. He had wanted to build a perfect marriage and, eventually, a perfect family. But sadly, they were never blessed with children.
Nine years later, she was taken from him. God had ruthlessly stolen her away and plundered her to Heaven.
It happened when a petty thief, fleeing from the police in a high-speed car chase, lost control and veered onto the sidewalk, hitting and killing her instantly as she was walking home from work. In the coffin, her face remained as beautiful as it had been in life... And young Cheryl, still a child, had stared at her, trying so hard to comprehend the fleeting nature of life with her innocent, wide eyes...too young to understand the concept of death.
Jodie... Jodie... Cheryl...
“Cheryl!” Harry shouted, jolting awake on a bench.
“You're finally up. How are you feeling?” a woman asked, a faint smile on her face.
But it wasn’t Jodie, nor could it be Cheryl.
This was a stranger. She had short blonde hair, a face devoid of makeup, and a tough, almost masculine expression. She stood over Harry, arms crossed, not with the eyes of a lover but with the scrutinizing gaze of someone observing a suspect to determine his guilt. And rightfully so—her badge gleamed on her chest, and she was dressed in a police uniform.
“I’m... fine, I think,” Harry responded.
No sooner had he said it than a sharp jolt of pain shot through his shoulder and back. He winced and looked around. The café they were in was simple, with a row of tables along the window and a counter across from them.
“Luckily, just bruises. You were almost eaten,” the woman remarked with a slight smirk.
“You saved me?” Harry asked.
“Yeah.”
“What was that thing that attacked me? That monster?”
“I don’t know,” she replied with a shrug like it was no big deal. Still, there was one thing that irritated Harry.
“So, what kind of cop are you? What’s going on with this town’s law enforcement? I tried calling the station for help, but the phone lines are dead. Please, my daughter is missing! You have to help me find her!” he demanded, his frustration growing.
But the policewoman remained cool, almost detached.
“You’re a tourist, aren’t you?” she asked.
“What of it?”
“I’m not from this town, either. I’m an officer from the neighboring town of Brahms. The name’s Cybil Bennett. And you are?”
“Harry. Harry Mason.”
Cybil let out a whistle.
“The Harry Mason? The one who wrote The Mask of Criminals?”
“Yes.”
“I just finished reading it. Your sociological analysis of criminals who blend into society under the guise of good citizens was fascinating and quite useful. I’m honored to meet the author in person, especially in a place like this. No wonder you seemed familiar,” she said, impressed.
As much as Harry should have been grateful to meet a fan who had contributed to his book sales, he wasn’t. If she asked for an autograph, he felt like crushing her hand in his grip. And if she wanted a signature, he’d gladly write out every curse word he knew, in every language, on her copy of the book.
“My daughter is missing!” Harry shouted at her.
But Cybil remained unfazed.
“Cheryl, right? You were calling her name in your sleep,” she said, her tone still calm.
“While we’re sitting here, some pervert—or worse, one of those things—could be after her! You need to gather every cop you can and start searching right now!” Harry’s voice rose with desperation.
“There’s nobody at the police station,” Cybil replied.
“What?”
“I came here because we haven't been receiving contact with Silent Hill’s police. When I arrived, the place was deserted. It was like they’d all just packed up and left in the middle of the night.”
“That’s... that’s crazy...”
“There’s no one in the town, either. You’re the first person I’ve seen. I tried to get more information, but then that thing came out of the fog, and I barely had time to draw my gun and chase it off. I had to drag you here, you know,” she explained, shrugging again with a faint smile.
“I’m going back to Brahms to get reinforcements. Whatever’s causing this fog might be messing with communications, too, but there’s no way to call for help from here. You should come with me. I know you’re worried about your daughter, but leave it to the police. Come on, let’s go. It’d help if you could give me a ride back to Brahms; my bike got totaled out there.”
“No,” Harry shook his head firmly. “My Jeep’s wrecked in a ditch. And I can’t leave Cheryl behind.”
“It’s too dangerous to stay here alone,” Cybil warned.
“That’s exactly why I have to stay. I can’t abandon my daughter. She could be lost, and still looking for me, and if I stay, there’s a chance I might find her.”
“So, what are you gonna do if another one of those monsters attacks?” she asked.
“Don't worry, I have a weapon. I just couldn’t use it because i was caught off guard before, but—” Harry began, reaching into his jacket pocket.
He had brought a 9mm handgun with him on this trip. Ever since writing The Mask of Criminals, Harry had become a proponent of gun ownership. Even if guns were somehow eradicated, sexual predators wouldn’t disappear, and he needed to be prepared to defend his daughter from such dangers. That’s why he’d brought the gun along, keeping it in the glove compartment until he had grabbed it earlier.
But the gun wasn’t in his pocket.
He searched his inside pocket, his pants, everywhere, but it was gone.
It hadn’t fallen under the bench, either.
“Looks like you lost it,” Cybil observed with a slight frown.
“Probably when that thing attacked...” Harry muttered, feeling a brief wave of despair.
But it didn’t last long.
“I’ll manage. I’ll find a way,” he said with determination.
Cybil sighed, shrugging again.
“You’re being reckless, you know.”
“A parent’s instinct is to protect their child, even at the cost of their own life,” Harry declared.
“So you’re really staying, huh?” Cybil sighed again, then went behind the counter. She pulled out an automatic handgun from a shelf under the register—something the café’s owner must have kept for protection against robbers.
“Take this and be sure to watch yourself,” she said, handing the gun to Harry. “You’re too good of a writer to lose. I’d like to read your next book.”
“Thank you,” Harry replied, accepting the gun and feeling guilty for having yelled at her earlier.
“But listen, I want you to stay put, okay? Don’t leave this café, no matter what.”
“Got it.”
“Promise me.”
But Cybil knew all too well that such a promise from Harry was unlikely to be kept.
After Cybil had departed, Harry stood up from his chair. He tucked the gun he had received into his belt. Moving away from the table, he looked around the store once more. There were unfinished plates of food and half-drunk cups of coffee on some of the tables and the counter. In the kitchen, there were freshly-chopped cabbages and a bowl of unfinished hamburger meat were left behind. There wasn’t anything broken and there was no sign of vandalism. It was as if the customers and staff had just abandoned their meals and work and left the place in a hurry.
If this place was deserted just like the station, then maybe the whole town really was empty.
Nearly twenty thousand residents and three thousand tourists visiting daily during the season—what could have caused such a large group to disappear in such a panic? If such a massive exodus from the town happened, it should have made the news, yet the police in the neighboring town knew nothing about it. Was this a cover-up by a government agency or the military? Could it be that a dangerous, infectious bioweapon leaked, forcing everyone to be removed from town and quarantined...?
No, if that were the case, the town would have been sealed off, preventing anyone from entering or leaving. He also would have run into some sort of checkpoint on the highway. However, on his way here, there were no such checkpoints.
It’s hard to believe there’s a place in town that could house over twenty thousand people.
No, the people of Silent Hill didn’t leave town; they vanished into thin air. Suddenly, in the middle of their daily lives and going about their business, as if they were sucked into a black hole.
Harry gave a wry smile, his thoughts spiraling into paranoia. He didn’t want to consider the possibility of a supernatural phenomenon. There was a time when he had read a lot of books on the subject, but it never fit with his worldview. He didn’t want to acknowledge it. He adamantly rejected it. But now, he had to face the reality in front of him. Something supernatural was lurking in this town.
The creature that attacked him... A creature that defied any logical explanation. If he didn’t believe before, he would have to start believing now.
Something colorful caught his eye and he noticed a tourist brochure with a map of the town printed on it next to the cash register. It also served as an advertisement for the restaurant, with the location of the restaurant marked on the map with an arrow. The restaurant faced Bachman Road, the same road Harry had driven on to get here.
So, this is the area.
Harry tapped the area south of Finney Street, where it intersected with Bachman Road, with his finger. The alley he had entered while chasing the girl was probably here. It might be dangerous to return to the place where the creature had attacked him, but it’s the only lead he has. There had to be an entrance or exit he overlooked. The girl must be hiding somewhere around here.
He folded the pamphlet and put it in his pocket.
As he was about to leave the store, determined, he heard a disturbing sound. It was the white noise from a radio. Harry turned his gaze to a table in the back of the store, where a pocket radio was making noise. Harry walked back and stared at it. The power switch was still on. Maybe one of the customers must have been listening to a baseball game broadcast. But why did the sound suddenly get louder, when it was so quiet that he hadn’t noticed it until now? It could be the strange weather Cybil mentioned playing tricks, but...
Listening to it made him feel uneasy, as if it was agitating his nerves. As Harry tilted his head, the white noise grew louder like nails scraping against a chalkboard, and at the same time, he heard the sound of wings flapping outside.
He turned to the window, startled.
A grotesque creature, different from the one that attacked him in the alley, appeared. It landed on the street outside the store, resting its wings. Unlike the ones that attacked him in the alley, it looked like a bat that had failed to become a bird of prey. It was a creature from some other species, but it was nothing he had ever seen or heard of before. It might be a major discovery for biologists, but the mere sight of the creature was making Harry feel nauseous.
Its wings and body were completely featherless, with shriveled skin and membranes. It was like the mummified remains of a snake run over by a car. The stench of death, which shouldn’t have been able to reach him through the glass, seemed to waft into the store.
Harry, who had been staring in a daze, quickly ducked down and hid behind the wall below the window. The ugly bird-like creature was searching the area and turned towards him. If it saw him with its fierce gaze, it would attack him, and he would surely become its prey. He wanted to avoid having his flesh pecked at by its sharp, pickaxe-like beak.
He held his breath, feeling the creature’s presence outside the wall he was pressed against. The radio on the table continued to emit white noise, now beginning to sound like mocking laughter. He wanted to smash it, to silence it, but it was too far away, and any movement would expose him to the creature.
There was another flapping sound.
The creature let out a screech, similar to the sound of nails scraping against frosted glass, and it seemed to fly away. It sounded like it had left. Harry cautiously peeked outside and breathed a sigh of relief. He turned his gaze to the radio. As the creature flew away, the noise from the radio gradually decreased. It was now almost completely silent, restoring the oppressive atmosphere before its encounter.
Harry had to muster his courage again to leave the café-restaurant. The eerie sight of the island creature had frightened him. For a moment, he even had a cowardly desire to stay hidden and barricaded the store, just as Cybil had warned. However, the thoughts of his beloved daughter encountering such a creature pushed him forward, and Harry forced himself outside.
The abnormal weather that had sealed Silent Hill in fog remained unchanged.
When he strained his ears, the only thing he could hear was the frozen silence... or so he thought.
There was a distant howl somewhere.
It sounded like a dog.
It must have been a pet abandoned by its owner. It’s pitiful, but there’s nothing I can do. My daughter takes priority. I needed to find Cheryl and get out of this town as quickly as possible. All I can do is pray that God will bless you with plenty, even though I have to leave you behind to starve and suffer.
Harry ran north on Bachman Road, then turned west onto Finney Street.
The damp air pushed against him like wind, fighting him in every step of the way and making his jacket and pants feel heavy with moisture. The sound of his footsteps echoed down the road, closed off by a white curtain. Soon, he saw the alley on the left side of the street. He continued without stopping and came to a brick wall. Next to it was an iron gate.
The dog, which had been crouched there like a cherub guarding the gates of heaven, slowly stood up. It looked at Harry with an upward glance and began to approach.
“Hey there, little guy. Was that howl earlier yours?”
Harry thought about petting it. He couldn’t take care of it, but he could at least give it some attention. After all, it was a pitiful creature that had lost its owner. As he got closer, the curtain of mist between them thinned, revealing the dog’s form. It wasn’t something that could even be called a canine. It must have been born as one, but now it was just a shell of its former self. Maybe it had contracted a severe skin disease or suffered severe burns; its body was so disfigured and covered in keloid scars that it was hard to look at. Most of its hair had fallen out and burn-like splotches covered its entire body. The creature was so emaciated it seemed like it was dressed in dry skin wrapped over the skeletal frame of a dog.
There was no chance it would ever greet him with a wagging tail.
Misfortune had piled up, and perhaps it had even contracted rabies, as its upward gaze towards Harry was filled with madness and hostility.
The radio Harry had put in the inner pocket of his jacket was emitting an alarm. Just like when the bird-like monster appeared. Harry had brought it along thinking that it might detect the special electromagnetic waves emitted by the monsters and produce white noise. Maybe that’s how it always sensed the presence of these unnatural beings before Harry could. He twisted his lips and turned the radio around, revealing the dog-like monster peeking out from behind. It growled. A low voice filled with murderous intent mixed with the mist, and a foul stench strongly permeated, unpleasantly stimulating Harry’s nostrils.
"Stay," Harry said, stepping back. "It's okay boy.... Just run along now."
The moment Harry grabbed the handgun tucked into his belt, the "dog" lunged at him like a missile, leaving him little to no seconds to react. Harry couldn't aim properly. The gunshot was followed by the sound of the missed bullet bouncing off the pavement. The dog tried to bite Harry’s outstretched arm holding the gun, nearly sinking its filthy fangs into his wrist. He managed to pull his arm back just in time, but the sleeve of his coat was caught.
"Let go!!"
He couldn't shoot like this. The dog, biting him, shook his arm more violently. It would have been better if the sleeve had simply torn off, but the brand-name jacket he had worn for the trip was made of sturdy fabric. Harry swung his leg back and kicked his attacker as hard as he could.
The toe of his shoe sank into the dog’s belly. With a yelp, the dog’s fangs came free from the sleeve. The usually kind-hearted Harry, who would have been troubled by animal abuse, was overshadowed by the fear of being attacked and was now driven by violent instincts. After all, underneath his gentle nature, was still a human. He quickly aimed his gun and fired. Once, twice, three times... He continued pulling the trigger frantically, hurling curses, emptying the fifteen-round magazine, and he didn't stop even then.
The dog lay motionless, bleeding profusely from a hole in its side.
Still breathing heavily, Harry finally came to his senses. His breath was still frantic. Probably from the tension, his muscles were too tight, and his whole body felt as stiff as stone. The dog raised its head. However, to Harry’s relief, it had seemed dead, but now it started growling again. Harry aimed the gun... but there were no more bullets left to fire, a reminder of his deadly mistake.
The dog he believed to have been killed, was now struggling to get back up on its feeble feet. Despite its near fatal injuries, it seemed to be steadily recovering its strength. This was bad. Harry, motivating himself, approached the dog and stomped on it with all his might. He endured the unpleasant sensation under his shoe, and, engaging in an act he never thought he would perform, he repeatedly kicked the dog.
When the dog’s life finally ended, Harry also exhausted himself and slumped to the ground, as if his legs gave out. Its skull was shattered, and reduced to a bloody, flattened carcass. The mangled body before him was the same as the one he had seen beyond the gate. While the mystery of that corpse was solved, Harry did not feel any comfort. There had been a similar ferocious rabid dog before, and one had just appeared before him... suggesting the possibility there could still be others wandering about.
The unexplained abnormal situation in Silent Hill might have transformed all the town's pet dogs into dangerous beasts. As Cybil had said, the situation was extremely dire.
Harry carefully searched the passage beyond the gate. As expected, he couldn’t find any gap between the buildings that were wide enough for a person to pass through. There was a backdoor and two small ventilation windows. However, the iron door was locked tight and wouldn’t budge even when he rammed it with his entire body strength. The windows were positioned so far out of reach for Harry that even if he stood on his tiptoes, he wouldn't even touch them. It was likely for security reasons so it didn’t even seem possible that a little girl had entered through them.
Deciding to deal with the door and windows later if he couldn't find another way out, Harry pressed on.
He reached a dead end with no results and tried not to look at the eerie, crucified corpse—but as he slumped his shoulders and looked down on the pavement, he noticed paper scraps scattered around. They hadn’t been there the last time he visited.
He crouched down and picked them up. There was a crayon drawing of Snoopy, a bride in a church, balloons and doves flying together, and a flower bed full of blooms… All of them were familiar. The clincher was the face drawn on the green cardboard cover—Harry's face. The torn and scattered pages belonged to Cheryl.
She always carried around the sketchbook Harry had given her for her fifth birthday. It wasn’t that she loved drawing, but rather, she kept it close as a substitute for her father, who couldn’t often play with her. Because of this, she rarely drew in it. In the two years leading up to her seventh birthday, she had only managed to fill half of the pages.
“You’re not likely to become an artist in the future, huh?” Harry teased.
“Yeah. I don't think I want to be an artist. I’d rather work outside than cooped up at home all day,” Cheryl replied, a response that sounded like a jab at her father and stung Harry’s ears a little.
“Well, not all artists stay cooped up in their studios. They can go outside to sketch landscapes too.”
“I think I want to be a truck driver.”
“A truck driver? That’s a dream more fitting for a boy.”
“I could travel all over the country. I’d get to see all sorts of places.”
“You’d have to load and unload heavy cargo. You think you can handle it?”
“Then, I’ll be a taxi driver.”
“Then, you’d have to make sure you don’t give the wrong change. You need to be good at math for that.”
“You meanie!”
“Okay, okay. I'm sorry. Tell you what, you can be anything you want as long as it makes you happy. Whatever you choose, I’ll be right here to support and cheer for you.”
Cheryl had brought her sketchbook on this trip as well. She had it on her lap, holding it like a stuffed toy, while sitting in the passenger seat. For something so precious to her to be torn apart and scattered in a place like this…
What is this…?
Harry furrowed his brow as he picked up another torn page. This time, there wasn’t a drawing but writing.
"TO SCHOOL."
The handwriting looked like Cheryl’s. But why?
He unfolded a tourist brochure and looked at the map. On the outskirts of the residential area was Midwich Elementary School.
She must be there!
Harry was convinced. This was a message left behind by Cheryl. She was calling for help.
He had the sudden terrifying images of his little girl being kidnapped and held captive, all of which vividly flashed before his eyes. His mind was overwhelmed with knowledge of horrific crime cases, almost ready to burst. The pressure of rage and impatience surged within him, propelling Harry into a full sprint, not caring about his burning lungs or his aching feet.
"It's the same here, too..."
Cybil stood frozen, staring ahead. She had searched all across the town to hell and back, but in the end everywhere was the same.
Just a few hours ago, when she came from Brahms, it wasn't like this. No sound, no tremor, no sign, and then suddenly this... It was undoubtedly an extremely dire situation.
The first thing that stunned her was when she headed north on Bachman Road. She found a jeep crashed into the guardrail on the opposite lane, recognizing it as the vehicle Harry had told her about, but that wasn’t the reason she stopped. Up ahead, The road in front of her simply stopped; crumbling down into what appeared in the fog to be a bottomless pit. The highway overpass had collapsed, and chunks of concrete blocked the road. The other side was a valley, so the route to Brahms via Bachman Road was cut off. It would be suicidal to try to reach the road to Brahms from across this chasm.
But it wasn't over. When she turned back into Silent Hill, having no choice but to take another road, even if it meant going out of her way. She planned to take a detour westward, but Finney Street had collapsed across its entire width, isolating the town from the world. Could there have been an accident caused by sloppy gas or water pipework? Even if it was hard to swallow, she could still dismiss it as a coincidence.
But finally, she was dumbfounded and at a loss. Every road out of town was in the same collapsed condition as Finney Street, leaving impassable pits in their place.
It soon became clear that this was no coincidence.
Not only did Cybil feel the act was deliberate, she got an overwhelming sense of malice at the sight.
Who could have done possibly done this? If this wasn't someone's will, then what was it? No god that saved and guided people would play such a cruel prank... This must be the work of the devil. Or at the very least, the work of someone who was as sinister as one. The mist swirled at the bottom of the collapsed pit, making it seem even more bottomless than it actually was.
It looked as if it led straight to the depths of abyss itself.
Cybil could easily imagined any vile creatures crawl up at any moment.
Every route outside to freedom was closed off. The thick gray canopy above showed no sign of clearing. It was as if the entire area had been sealed off by a magical barrier.
Harry was hiding beside the exterior stairs leading up to the front door of a house facing Levin Street. The white noise in his inner pocket fluctuated, while an indistinct black shadow flew over the roof, stirring up the mist with the sound of its wings, moving away, then drawing closer again. It would hover off into the distance, then slowly return again.
It was still looking for him, its prey. He still clung to the handgun, but with the bullets spent, it was no more useful than a piece of scrap metal. His only other weapon for self-defense was an iron pipe—a slightly unreliable one he had found and picked up when he turned back down the alley. With such poor arsenal of weapons, it was better to flee than to fight.
Even so, Harry felt more impatience than fear, thinking how he need to move quickly.
Harry had tried the streets leading to the school—Finney Street, Levin Street, Matheson Street—but all were blocked by abnormal collapses in the road.
He attempted to enter and pass through any of the houses lining the streets to bypass the collapsed areas, but every door and window was locked, and they were so sturdy that even striking them with the iron pipe didn't seem to faze them. Given the country's dire security situation, it was understandable that every house had some form of security, but this was like an impenetrable fortress. It felt like every home had been placed with magical shields.
The streets were impassable, and there was no way to detour around them... It was when he reached the Matheson Street chasm, as he was beginning to lose hope, Harry found a new message from Cheryl at the edge of the pit atop a pile of crumbled concrete.
Once again, it was written in crayon on a torn page from the sketchbook. It read, "LEVIN ST, DOG HOUSE." Without a second thought, Harry understood that Cheryl was telling him that if he could get to the back of the house on Levin Street with the doghouse, he could find a way around the collapse and reach the school. It never occurred to him the possibility of finding that note, telling him where to go exactly the moment he needed it was an amazing coincidence in of itself. It wasn’t because his mind was clouded by a parent’s overwhelming concern for their child. It was because of Cheryl, his precious little girl...out there, alone and afraid.
"Ugh, just get going already!" Harry silently urged himself, waiting impatiently for the bird-like or bat-like monster to fly away from the side of the exterior stairs. He could see the house with the doghouse just a short distance away.
He heard another sound, a soft, wet thud.
It was the sound of paws hitting the damp asphalt.
A dog.
It was the same kind as the mad dog he had encountered in the alley.
Harry clenched the iron pipe tighter with his sweaty hands.
A tiger at the front gate, and a wolf at the back.
If the dog found him and forced him to fight, it would inevitably draw the bird's attention towards him. He doubted his odds against one of them, there was no way he could win against both.
Sweat beaded on his forehead, and his hands became even more slippery with nervous moisture.
Taking a deep breath, Harry leaped out from the shadow of the exterior stairs, throwing caution to the wind. He ran towards the house with the doghouse. Now, while there was still some distance between him and the dog, and while the sound of wings had faded, there might still be time.
A bark rang out behind him. The sound of paws and claws striking the ground grew louder as the dog charged. Harry hurried north along the sidewalk, then made a sharp turn in front of the house with the doghouse placed in a corner of the parking space. He nearly stumbled but managed to keep his balance and rushed up the exterior stairs. Just in time, he had outwitted the dog and reached his goal.
But the door was firmly shut.
"You kidding me..."
Harry rattled the doorknob, trying to turn, push, and pull it, but it wouldn’t budge. Knocking forcefully was equally futile.
With a pale face, Harry turned around.
Pressing his back against the cold wooden door, he thrust the iron pipe out in front of him.
He half-resigned himself to the fact that he would end up in a coffin, but he wondered how much of his body would remain to fill up a grave. It would probably eat him until not even his bones were left. As the hungry dog leaped at him, baring its fangs and drooling, a sudden crosswind blew across Harry's face and hair and tore across the patio, forcing him to cover his face. When he opened his eyes, the dog had vanished.
The sharp cry he had heard once before echoed from above. It was a screeching sound, like nails on frosted glass, followed by the familiar sound of flapping wings.
The struggle, the screams of pain.
The bird had captured the dog as its prey.
Yeah, that's right—let the monsters kill each other!
Relieved to have narrowly escaped death, Harry collapsed, a dazed smile spreading across his face. He slapped his cheek with his palm, trying to bring himself back to his senses before he broke down completely. The suffocating mist, the worry for his daughter, the threat to his life… this extreme situation was wearing on his mind.
Snap out of it, Mason! You’re the only one who can save your daughter!
With still-trembling legs, Harry descended the stairs. He remembered the words "DOG HOUSE" written in the sketchbook and thought it might be worth checking. This was his last hope. Inside the now-empty doghouse, from which the guard dog had fled after breaking its chain, he found a key attached.
It's unclear whether it was something the family owners had left and the guard dog was protecting, or if Cheryl herself had hidden it, but when Harry inserted the key he found in the doghouse, the front door opened without issue. Harry stepped inside the house and let out a sigh of relief. Like the rest of the town, the house also seemed to be deserted. Although entering without the owner’s consent was technically trespassing, for Harry, the only law that mattered now was the "law of nature." If you're hungry, you have to eat and the only thing grew stronger than his unease: The emptiness in his stomach.
He walked through the living room, passed through the dining room, and headed straight for the kitchen refrigerator. Inside, he found some canned beer, and after downing one in a single gulp, he devoured some ham and cheese while drinking another. He hadn’t eaten anything since noon. Although it would make him a bit late, Harry had planned to have lunch at a lakeside French restaurant in Silent Hill. He’d heard their salmon meunière was excellent, and Cheryl had always wanted to eat at a fancy place like that. Rummaging through someone else’s kitchen like this was not part of the plan.
The mild buzz from the alcohol calmed his frayed nerves. His empty stomach was filled, and his energy was restored. After finishing his meal, Harry still had something to do before setting out. He needed to search the house for a replacement for his empty gun. Hoping that the homeowner wasn’t a peace-loving advocate of gun control, he checked the closets in the bedrooms and the drawers in the nightstands.
Luckily, the homeowner seemed to be someone who valued tradition, dating back to the pioneer days. Harry found a 9mm handgun, the same type he had. However, there weren’t many spare bullets. There were twelve rounds in the magazine and seven more in the cartridge box. It wasn’t much, but it was certainly better than just a steel pipe.
Harry swapped his gun for the new one and pocketed the spare bullets. He also didn’t forget the flashlight—a crucial item given the time of day. With everything in place, Harry headed toward the back door of the house.
Having collected everything of use, Harry made his way to the back door. However, he was not prepared for the scene awaited him on the otherside. It was pitch dark outside. It was mid-afternoon when he entered the house. It was too early for nightfall, as if evening had been skipped entirely, and it was suddenly midnight. Whatever was causing the bizarre events was not content with just manipulating the weather, now it was altering the flow of time.
The strange occurrences in Silent Hill were bewildering Harry. However, none of them mattered. Until he rescued his daughter, he was determined to fight on, whether he had to face a hurricane, get caught in a tornado, or get swept up in a fierce battle between gods and devils at the end of the world. Clinging to the faint light of hope that his flashlight provided, Harry charged into the darkness that enveloped the town.
"So night has fallen already...."
Standing atop the church spire, gazing down upon the town as if in judgment, Dahlia Gillespie muttered softly.
"Darkness spills over the earth…like black tears from heaven…."
The night wind, filled with pain, made her veil flutter. The pure white veil covering her head was a symbol of her devotion to God, a humble servant of the Lord. Though faithful as she had been to her God after so many long years, the road was not easy.
Dahlia had continued to worship her God tirelessly, enduring many long years of humiliation. Her faith remained as pure as a virgin’s. Just a little bit longer and the time for her to be rewarded would finally come. The world would enter a shining new era, people would bow down to a new God, and she would be enveloped in radiant glory.
Those who had looked down on her, despised her, and belittled her would be cast into hell by a righteous judgment, and they would suffer eternal torment.
Dahlia’s wrinkled face twisted into a smile. Yet, to bring about that long-awaited time, there was still something she had to do. Anxious as she was for the hour during which her words would come true, there was one last piece that had yet to fall into place
The Holy Mother. The blessed vessel for God, the one who would bring about the birth. Without Her, The ritual for the Holy Mother is impossible.
"Where are you, my dear? Won't you come out?"
Dahlia glared into the darkness beyond, like a seeker in a game of hide-and-seek, searching for the one who was hiding. If it was a game of hide-and-seek the girl wished, then hide-and-seek she would have to play.
Harry had already spent four bullets dealing with the dog in the schoolyard, but he somehow managed to reach Midwich Elementary School safely. He pushed open the front door and cautiously entered the lobby. Instinctively, he raised his handgun with his right hand, while the flashlight in his left hand illuminated the darkness. He feared there might be more dogs lurking inside the school, but after straining his ears, he heard nothing but the soft shaking of his own hands. For now, there was no sign of any monsters. The birds likely wouldn’t venture inside the building, and it seemed the dogs hadn’t been able to breach the heavy wooden doors.
"Cheryl," he called out, but his voice was swallowed up by the emptiness.
Only the echo of his own words responded to Harry’s plea.
"Cheryl, where are you?"
Harry cautiously navigated through the school, gun at the ready, never letting his guard down. He searched everywhere— starting from the first floor to the basement, then back up to the second floor and the rooftop. He checked every classroom, the staff room, science lab, music room, infirmary, library, chemistry room, the courtyard. Harry even went as far as checking each locker room, and even each stall in the bathrooms.
He was sure she had to be here somewhere, hiding from whoever and whatever was after her. Or could she have been captured, gagged, and silenced? What if the filthy hands of the kidnappers had already covered her mouth? What if she was already...
As hard as he tried to push these thoughts out of his mind, the dark thoughts and imagery never stopped creeping in, as it kept filling Harry with immeasurable amount of fear and dread. The mere thoughts was enough for tears to start to welled up in his eyes, frustrated by his lack of progress.
No, I can’t—come on, pull yourself together already! Cheryl has to be alive! The very fact that I haven’t found her yet means she’s still out there somewhere! If my search turned up nothing, I will just start over. I have to go back to the entrance lobby. I must have missed something, a clue of some sort. I will scour this entire place as many times as it takes to find even the smallest of leads.
As he was making his way back to the lobby, Harry suddenly stopped in his tracks. His gaze was drawn to the reception room.
It was stained red.
Blood had splattered and was now clinging to the walls and counter of the reception area.
He had checked this room before. It wasn’t like this last time. Had some tragedy unfolded here without his knowledge in such a short time? Panic-stricken, Harry bursted into the reception room. But there was no blood-soaked girl’s corpse, nor any victims to be found. Just the fresh, vivid blood painting the scene. Relieved that his worst fears had not come true, Harry felt his strength leave him, and he leaned heavily against the counter.
On the counter, the visitor log—where outsiders recorded their name, identification, contact information, and reasons for visitation—was now smeared with blood. No, not smears—but a message written in blood. Smears of red overlapped the black ink on the pages, curving into words that spelled a cryptic poem.
"5:00 Darkness brings the choking heat Flame render the silence Awakening the hungry beast Opens time's door to beckon prey."
It didn’t seem possible that Cheryl had written it, much less any other seven-year-olds. Yet, even so, Harry felt a trace of Cheryl in the emotion conveyed between the lines and became convinced that this was a message left by his little girl. It was a belief that went beyond reason, one rooted in the inexplicable experiences Cheryl had already made him endure. Believing this seemed almost easy.
Grasping the paper tightly, Harry scanned each passage carefully, trying to piece together its meaning.
The phrase "time's door" brought to his mind of the clock tower in the corner of the courtyard. It wasn’t a particularly large structure, with its concrete blocks stacked like stone walls forming a square base, atop which a column stood. While it wasn’t too large around, the base seemed big enough to hide a person inside. When Harry had inspected it earlier, he found no doors to enter, nor could he access it from the basement, and quickly given up on the endavour. But it was now at the top of his list of places to recheck.
He moved to the courtyard and looked up at the clock tower again. According to Harry’s wristwatch, it was a little past six o’clock. However, the tower had been stuck at five for as long as he could remember. If this mechanism were somehow activated, would it open a hidden door? Let's see.... The phrase "darkness brings the choking heat" made him think of the basement. There was a boiler down there, used for the school’s backup power supply.
The switch had been turned off, leaving the boiler in silent inactivity. Perhaps if he turned the boiler back on, the phrases "flames" and "render the silence" would fit with the description. Harry rushed downstairs, bursting into the boiler room with the guidance of his flashlight. The harsh metal shape of the boiler loomed in the beam of light, casting its shadow akin to a monster waiting to be fed. A plastic plate was attached to it. With the flip of a switch on a small control panel, the room was suddenly bathed in red light, followed by the explosive sound of ignition. The noise grew louder as the the boiler roared to life in a near deafening rumble of burning gasoline. Harry didn’t even bother covering his ears; he was out the door the second it started moving.
Harry ran back upstairs, and on the way up, he heard the chime sound. The clock tower had started moving, signaling five o’clock. But had the door opened...? One of the blocks forming the tower's base had shifted. Sure enough, a thick slab had slid aside, revealing an entrance large enough for an adult to pass through. The base wasn’t very deep, and the interior was about the size of a phone booth. Peering inside, Harry saw a square hole in the floor with a ladder leading downward.
He didn't have to think twice as he immediately lowered himself down.
He soon reached the bottom and followed a short underground passage that extended straight ahead. Another vertical shaft with a ladder embedded in it appeared before him.
"Where is this?" Harry murmured, confused as he emerged from the shaft.
He was back where he started.
The courtyard, surrounded by the school building, lay before him, with the dark, mist-filled sky above. He turned and looked at the clock tower, which was identical to the one he had seen before. The design, the material—everything was the same. Was there an exact replica of Midwich Elementary School built behind the original? But why? What would it serve to have a campus that could only be accessed through an underground passage? It was a stupid decision and a waste of resources. Physically, it didn’t make sense. The underground passage was only a few yards long, not nearly enough to reach the back of the school.
Harry’s pocket radio suddenly began to crackle. Its white static signaled imminent danger. Startled, he hastily swept his flashlight around in every direction.
Slap. Slap.
The sound of bare feet slapping against the courtyard tiles echoed through the air.
A shadow, darker than the surrounding darkness, approached. Harry recognized nauseating stench immediately. Slowly, it revealed itself—a small creature, the same type that had attacked him in the alley. It resembled a human but was unmistakably not one. It was almost child-like in its stature and sluggish gait, but the closer it came, the less human it appeared. It was a monster, walking upright on two legs.
It had no neck—or at least, its head was so small it gave the appearance of being headless. Harry couldn’t tell if it had eyes or a nose; most of its tiny head was dominated by a vertical slit of a mouth. Its thick arms ended in malformed hands, but its claws were sharp, like sabers. The small monster moved its mouth, revealing its set of uneven, jagged teeth, as if muttering something. Harry had no desire to listen; whatever it was saying surely had no meaning. It was more likely it was just gnashing its teeth in anticipation in taking a bite out of him.
Harry's hand trembled as he drew his gun from his belt. He had already dispatched two dogs and felt a bit more confident in handling these creatures. Yet, this one, with its vaguely human form, was more disturbing and repulsive than the dogs or the bird. This thing was a broken, shambling imitation of a human being, a child even. The mere sight of it evoked a primal sense of revulsion and fear.
Gunshots echoed through the courtyard, striking the muttering monster in the chest. Black blood oozed from the wound, but the creature only recoiled slightly before continuing its advance, seemingly impervious to pain. It didn’t stop, too single minded in its feral hunting to even feel pain. It kept moving forward with its sluggish, dull steps, preparing to slash Harry with its sharp claws.
Without realizing it, Harry was screaming for his life.
Not with his ears ringing with the sound of gunshots, but rather unable to comprehend with the monster's existence. This thing…this child-like creature that couldn’t possibly exist within his carefully constructed view of reality. He squeezed his eyes shut and, in a hysterical panic, fired his gun wildly. He had regressed to the novice he had been when he first encountered the dogs.
After the barrage of gunshots, all that was left was the sound of the hammer clicking. Realizing his magazine was empty, Harry finally opened his eyes. The creature lay on the ground, convulsing as it bled out, staining the ground with a spreading pool of dark blood.
It was a repulsive sight, evoking even more disgust.
Harry felt more revulsion than relief and grimaced as he nervously wiped the blood splattered on his face with his sleeve. The grotesque creature, whose nature was unknown, felt horrifying to him. It was something that went against the natural order, something that could not have been created during the dawn of creation. Harry was hardly a religious man, but he couldn’t help but feel that this wretched creature was an act of defilement against nature, and it unsettled him deeply.
It was clear now that this place was different from the Midwich Elementary School he had been in earlier. The air was heavy, carrying an ominous presence that sent chills down his spine. His flashlight, which he had replaced with fresh batteries back at the doghouse, now did seem little to cut through the pervasive gloom, as though its light had barely life left. This was a similar yet distinctly different place, as if he had slipped into another dimension through a portal...
What he found in the middle of the courtyard only seemed to confirm that idea.
In the center of the courtyard was a large magic circle. A magic circle that was both a protective barrier against demons and, conversely, a gateway to summon them from hell.
His eyes wandered over to the muttering creature. It had continued twitching for a while but had long since fell silent. Had this thing emerged from that magic circle? Was it a demon? But he couldn’t believe that something as powerful as a fallen angel could be killed so easily by human weapons. It was likely just a low-ranking imp, despite its evil nature.
Were the bird and dogs wandering the town also the same?
Even with all the lingering questions, it was undoubtful that Silent Hill was cursed.
Harry felt dizzy. His head was pounding from its very core. A familiar migraine, likely a result of his desk job, throbbed through his head. He felt nauseous, as though the unbearable reality was about to overflow from within him. He wanted nothing more than to collapse and escape into sleep. But there was no soft bed here, no one to gently care for him. If anyone was to take on the role of caretaker, it had to be him. He had to rescue Cheryl, his little girl who was calling out for help.
There will be time rest once Cheryl’s safe… This thought pushed his body to move forward, the fatigue is likely from the usual desk work. Harry continued to clutch the heavy gun and flashlight and started walking again.
The school beyond the clock tower and the school here are indeed different. While the layout and structure of the building are the same, the atmosphere is entirely different. Inside the classrooms, everything is in ruins—there are no neatly arranged desks, as they had been flipped and scattered about the room as if there’d been a wave of natural disaster or school violence.
Just as Harry was about to leave after finishing his search in the staff room. The sudden ringing of one of the office phones stopped him in his tracks. Harry turned back, as if being called. He had no reason to ignore it, so he picked up the receiver.
"Daddy..."
The unmistakable, beloved voice reached his ears, shocking Harry.
"Help me..."
"Cheryl!"
"...Daddy, where are you?"
"I'm here—I'm right here! Where are you?"
The cold, unyielding sound of a dead line beeped in Harry's ears.
In a second, her voice was cut off.
The call was cut off.
Harry stood frozen, still clutching the receiver. His heart pounded, the blood vessels in his forehead throbbed, and his blood pressure must have shot up. Images of notorious criminals danced wildly in his mind. Cheryl had called out for help. Her voice was on the verge of tears... Monsters... magic circles... Was his daughter kidnapped to be sacrificed in a black magic ritual performed by a cult? His heart felt like it was going to explode.
He had learned nothing about Cheryl's whereabouts from the phone call. However, the fact that the call had come to this phone was evidence that this school was deeply connected to it all. He had no choice but to cling to that faint hope and continue searching.
Leonard Rhine: The Monster Lurks
Those were the words scrawled on the wall, seemingly smeared in blood by someone's fingers. Nearby, a corpse hung, crucified just like the ones Harry had seen in town. He found it in the boys' bathroom, where there had been nothing during his investigation on the other side of the clock tower.
The only thing that disturbed him more than the gruesome sight, was the inescapable feeling that he’d heard that name somewhere before. Leonard Rhine was an old writer, known for penning books that any sensible, rational person would scoff at. Though Harry considered himself a practical man, he had read one of Rhine's books once, out of necessity. But he couldn't recall any specifics—it was just one of many books he'd forced himself through.
Harry's steps led him to the library. Although it was highly a stretch that one of Rhine's book would be in an elementary school library, he felt compelled to check, believing it might be a message from Cheryl.
Cautiously, with his nearly depleted gun at the ready, Harry proceeded down the hallway. The "mumbling" monsters were prowling the school, and he could hear the whispers of white noise and the sticky sound of slapping footsteps more than once, but he always managed to avoided an encounter.
The school’s library was in surprisingly good shape considering the state of the other rooms in the building. Though many books were scattered across the floor, a good number still remained untouched on the shelves. As his eyes scanned the floor, the cover of one book caught Harry’s eye. Feeling a pang of nostalgia, Harry picked it up. It was "The Lizard and the Traveler," the first fairy tale book he had bought to read to Cheryl at bedtime.
"The traveler, armed with a bow and arrow, said, 'In that case, I shall defeat the lizard.' But upon meeting his opponet, he didn’t attack immediately; instead, he began to insult it. 'What a pathetic lizard you are, not scary at all.' The lizard, hearing this, became angry. 'I'll swallow you whole!' It cried, opening its large mouth and lunging at the traveler. This was exactly what the traveler had been waiting for. Calmly, he drew his bow and shot an arrow straight into the lizard's open mouth, where it had no hard scales to protect it. The arrow pierced deep into its belly, and the lizard fell over, dead."
Respectfully wiping some of the dust from the cover, Harry set the book back on one of the shelves. The spot he chose, purely by chance, was right next to one of Leonard Rhine’s books. Unlike the colorful, shiny-covered children's books, Rhine's book was thick, without a cover, and had a plain, dark spine—completely out of place.
Harry picked up the book titled "The Monster Lurks," flipping through it and skimming the contents.
Chapter 3: The Manifestation of Delusions
"...Additionally, poltergeists are also thought to be a type of this phenomenon. Extreme anxiety, fear, stress, and other negative emotions manifest as external physical energy. Cases have been documented where these events were triggered by nightmares during sleep. However, not everyone is susceptible to such occurrences. Inherent traits play a significant role, and these incidents most commonly occur around adolescents, particularly girls..."
Harry slammed the book shut, as if to avoid the memories it stirred. He recalled the unpleasant events—Cheryl's...
"Cheryl, can you please be more quiet. I can't work with all that noise."
"I'm sorry, Daddy."
"Who's that were you playing with? A neighbor friend? Some of the neighboring kids?"
"It's the boogeyman."
"Oh, really? So you’re telling me the ghost from under your bed crawled out in the middle of the day?"
"I asked him not to come, but..."
"Oh, Cheryl, you're such a sweet girl; even the monsters can't resist you."
"He tries to take me away. He says, 'Come with me.'"
"That’s sound serious."
"If I don’t listen, the boogeyman will scratch me with his claws."
"Let me see... This is...!"
The welts on Cheryl's arm were still burned into Harry's memory. They looked like lines of writing, as if they had been carved into her skin. The strange incidents didn’t happen often. If he convinced himself that the odd noises were just rats in the attic, he could just ignore them. Even when furniture moved on its own or dishes scattered on the floor from the cabinet, it was manageable—he just had to clean up. Sometimes days or even weeks would pass by with no activity at all. These occurrences were rare, but they were enough to turn Harry, a vehement non-believer in the supernatural, to researching occult literature.
Harry pondered. Maybe that message wasn't just to get him to read Leonard Rhine’s book. It was more likely intended to make him realize the connection between those unexplained events at their home and Cheryl's disappearance. There had to be a connection between what happened at home and what happens now. And that is...
A curse.
That was the first word that entered his mind, but Harry quickly shook it off. What could a pure-hearted seven-year-old girl have earned anyone’s malice? Cheryl had been raised with all the love he and his late wife Jodie could give. Though she had no blood tied to her parents, Cheryl still grew to become a honest and gentle girl, even sharing Jodie’s kind smile. Cheryl was just like Jodie—kind and gentle.
But...
The harsh realities of life weighed heavily on Harry.
The world isn’t governed by simple concepts of good and evil. Honest, good people aren't always rewarded, and evil doesn't always meet its end. It’s often the opposite—corruption thrives, and wicked people prevail. Jodie, who had committed no sin, was killed in a senseless crime, while the thief who caused her death was still alive, wasting away in prison. Adults corrupt the earth with their selfishness and insatiable desires, giving no care to the blameless children who must pay the price…
Lost in these dark thoughts, Harry found that he’d unknowingly made his way back to the basement. The lair of a villain who defied the light of God was always in a dark, underground place. The location where they kept their victims would also be...
There was a door at the back of the boiler room that didn’t exist in the school on the other side. It beckoned to Harry, its mouth gaping wide. Like the hellish boiler that fueled the vices of this world, it flickered with a sinister flame.
The place seemed like a perfect stage for a madman obsessed with satanic delusions.
Fine, even if this is a trap, I'll walk right into it. I’ll turn the tables, and you won’t know what hit you. I’ll blow your head off, trample over your corpse, and rescue my daughter.
With a grim smile, Harry forced himself to picture his flabby self as a tough guy from a Western movie.
A hole was gouged in the center of the room's floor. In that sunken altar, flames burned high like a demonic campfire. Within the flames, Harry saw a vision. Cheryl? It was the image of a girl tied to a chair. The cruel vision of her burning at the stake vanished in an instant. Even if it was just a trick of his mind born from his fears, Harry's anger swelled. He aimed his gun with a furious expression and shouted,
"Come out, you cowards! Give me back my daughter!"
What emerged from behind the flames was not human. It wasn’t the one who kidnapped Cheryl—It didn't even seem human. It must have been sent to finish Harry off. A monster with a massive body, making the dogs, birds, and other creatures look insignificant in comparison.
Harry's tough-guy act crumbled. His anger deflated and was replaced by fear. He backed away, his shoulders hitting the door. The door he came through was firmly shut, leaving no escape. He was a rat in a trap. The creature, resembling a giant lizard, slowly circumvented the flames and approached. Its body, illuminated by the fire, looked pale, as if it had been born and raised deep underground, far from any light. Its skin gleamed as though wet with slime, and where its eyes should have been, there were only hollow sockets. Despite its enormous size, surpassing even a crocodile, its limbs were underdeveloped and feeble, barely supporting its large frame. Fortunately for Harry, the lizard's movements were slow.
Harry broke away from the door and ran to the opposite side of the flames. His steps trembled as if his feet weren't touching the ground. Yet, the lizard's pace couldn't even match that. But he couldn't keep running forever. It was easy to imagine how Harry would eventually be cornered in this room with no escape and devoured. Exhaustion from hunger and thirst would set in, and when he could no longer move, sleep would overcome him...
"Die!"
Harry aimed his gun and fired. To stop running and turn to face the advancing monster, he had to summon all the courage he had left. Two gunshots rang out, and he was sure they hit their mark. The lizard remained unfazed and continued its approach. It opened its massive jaws, leaving Harry stunned. The creature’s head split vertically, with the gash extending down to its neck. It could easily swallow Harry whole. The inside of its mouth was lined with numerous sharp teeth, and the stench that emanated—like rotten garbage—made Harry's eyes burn.
Would he die, tormented by the pain of being chewed and the stench? It was the worst way to go. Anything but that. Harry desperately leaped back, widening the distance between himself and the lizard. Killing this thing wouldn’t be easy. Maybe if he could fire hundreds of bullets into it, it might be possible... But the revolver only had five measly bullets left. The situation was hopeless. He could feel the blood drain from his face.
Calm down, get ahold of yourself. Harry scolded himself. It must have a weak spot. You just have to find it. But where was the weak spot? Did that thing even have one? How could one kill such a massive beast?
In that case, I'll shall defeat the lizard.
At that moment, a story from a fairy tale popped into his mind.
Oh, please, traveler, take it down with your bow and arrow in my stead.
Of course, that would make him the hunter, armed with a pistol rather than a bow. Harry laughed. He was on the verge of tears.
What a pathetic lizard you are, not scary at all.
He was terrified and more so he'd ever been in life, almost to the point of wetting himself.
—"I’ll swallow you whole."
The monster, now very close, opened its massive jaws again. Its rotting breath and stench brought stinging tears to Harry's eyes.
This was exactly what the traveler had been waiting for.
Harry pulled the trigger with his trembling finger. One after another, he fired all five bullets. The bullets flew straight into the giant mouth, tearing through the monster’s insides.
It let out an ear-piercing cry, recoiling back before collapsing to the ground with a heavy thud.
In an instant, Harry collapsed as well, sitting weakly on the ground, but he still held his gun ready. He was too scared to let go, fearing the dead lizard might rise again, forgetting that the gun’s chamber was empty. His eyes, unfocused and drained of energy, eventually settled on the figure of a girl standing in the distance.
She wasn't Cheryl.
Who was she...?
Before Harry knew it, he was back in the boiler room. The door leading to the room where the flames had burned was gone without a trace. The monster was gone, and so was the girl. Now, he found himself in the original school's boiler room, the one he had been in before passing through the underground passage of the clock tower. Everything was just as it had been before he traveled through the tower. Somewhere, the sound of a bell echoed in the distance.
The darkness that has so suddenly fallen was gone. Though it was still far from dawn, the outside was bright. The fog still hung in the air, but there was even a sense of freshness to it.
Harry stepped out of the school's entrance and unfolded his map. The sound of church bells reached his ears. He didn’t have a clue on who was ringing them, but perhaps someone who knew what was happening was trying to gather the remaining townspeople. It was worth checking out. Scanning over the homes and businesses, Harry’s finger fell on a likely location: The Balkan Church.
He avoided the areas where the roads had collapsed, making his way from Bradbury Street to Bachman Road. Along the way, he searched for a gun shop to restock his empty gun, but he found none. Moving cautiously, he hid in the shadows, trying not to be noticed by the dogs and birds. It took time though it seemed like forever, but the distance wasn’t far, and soon he arrived. Before long, the church’s gothic architecture emerged from the fog.
Twenty-five percent of Maine's population is Catholic, and it seemed that many of Silent Hill’s residents were part of that percentage. Upon entering the church, the first thing Harry noticed was the statue of Christ at the front altar, and the interior was designed with a solemn atmosphere. There were no believers seated in the pews. By the looks of it, Harry was the only one summoned in by the sound of the bells.
A woman stood before the altar.
Harry’s footsteps echoed through the chapel as he approached her.
She wasn’t a young woman. The hair that peeked out from under her pure white veil had no lustrous shine. Her face was lined with age. The austere dark dress she wore made her look even older, but there was still an air of sensuality about her, suggesting she was younger than she appeared.
“Were you the one ringing the bell?”
“I’ve been expecting you,” the woman said with a smile, her face wrinkled with age. “I knew you would come. It was foretold to me by the Lord.”
“Who are you? What’s going on in this town? Where are all the townsfolk?”
“The hour of judgement is at hand. The battle between good and evil has already begun.”
The woman’s smile remained fixed, her expression one of rapture. She wasn’t normal. Harry frowned. Had she lost her mind due to the town's supernatural events, or had she always been like this? Maybe whatever had happened to this town was too much for her and she just snapped. But though her words were ludicrous... there was a look of intelligence in her eyes, a cunning glimmer.
“You’re still looking for the child, aren’t you?”
“The child? You know about Cheryl?!”
Harry latched onto her words. It was like a magic spell that erased any sense of rationality. Whoever spoke that spell, even if it was a crazed fanatic or a deceptive con artist, it didn’t matter. H3is desperation was too strong for him to resist.
“Tell me where she is!”
The woman shook her head sadly.
“Unfortunately, the child has been captured by those who wish evil upon us. She is to be sacrificed.”
“What the hell are you talking about?!”
Harry pressed closer, almost ready to grab her.
“Do not touch me!”
The woman rebuked him sharply with an intense refusal. The tone of disgust, however, was once again hidden behind a smile.
“My body has been sanctified as that of a true servant of God by a vow of chastity. That is why I received His blessed revelations. Do you understand?”
“Fine... sure,” Harry nodded, feeling overawed.
“I am your ally. I desired the child's safety as much as you do. Now listen well, there is nothing to be gained by floundering about at random. There is a path you must follow. The hermit’s path hidden within the Flauros. It is the quickest way to rescue the child.”
“...Flauros?”
“It is the silence of purgatory, the force that shatters the walls of twilight and obstructs the grievances of the mire.”
The woman tossed something onto the floor as she spoke.
“This will help you rescue the child from those who mean her harm. Take it with you. Now, make haste to the hospital before it is too late.”
Harry crouched down and picked up the object she had thrown.
It was a small, triangular pyramid, like a toy. It fit in his hand, but it was heavier than it looked, and didn’t make a sound when shaken. Despite that, he couldn’t help but feel that there was something inside.
“What am I supposed to do with this?”
Harry looked up, but the woman was gone and had vanished like wisps of smoke.
Harry took the Finney Street, heading east, and crossing the bridge leading to the central area of Silent Hill. The mysterious woman had told him to go to the hospital. According to his map, there was a building labeled Alchemilla Hospital on the southern end of town; his best bet at this point. Although it was just a quick right turn at the first intersection after the bridge and then a straight shot south down Crichton Street to the hospital, Harry crossed the intersection and headed for the police station building on the opposite corner. He needed to obtain a gun and ammunition, as there was no way he could stand a chance against the monsters prowling the town with just an empty gun.
The police station was the first place he had called to ask them to search for Cheryl. As Cybil had said, the police station was indeed deserted, and it was no wonder that no one answered the phone. Like the cafe-restaurant, the desks here were littered with investigation materials and documents, as if all the officers hadsimply vanished in the middle of a regular work day.
Harry began to search each room. The firearm storage was locked tight, so he kept an eye out for any guns that might have been left sitting on someone’s desk. In the detective division's room, he found what he was looking for. A handgun still in its shoulder holster had been left beside a half-finished cup of coffee. Perhaps the detective had vanished into thin air while taking a break from the constricting holster... Unfortunate for the detective, but fortunate for Harry.
Whoever this once belonged to must have taken it off on their break and vanished with the rest of the townspeople before they could return for it. He pulled the handgun from the holster and examined it. It was a 10mm automatic with a nine-round capacity, fully loaded... He returned the gun to the holster and put the whole thing on. Something naturally caught his eye, a white slip of paper on the counter where the holster had just been.
Coroner Seals called.
Officer Gucci is unlikely to be murdered. He apparently died naturally. However, medical records show Officer Gucci had no prior symptoms of heart disease.
While putting his jacket back on, Harry's eyes caught something written on a magic board on the wall.
Product only available in select areas of Silent Hill. Raw material is White Claudia, a plant peculiar to the region. Manufactured here? Dealer = Manufacturer?
Harry suddenly had a moment of clarity.
That must be PTV...
Having written several books on domestic crime, Harry had some knowledge of White Claudia. It was a perennial plant with elongated oval leaves and white flowers that grew along riverbanks and lakeshores. The seeds contained hallucinogenic substances, and there were records of it being used in religious rituals in ancient times.
PTV was a drug made by refining the substance from those seeds. It had once been popular, especially among young tourists in Silent Hill, but he had heard that police efforts had soon shut down the local traffickers to help clean up the resort town’s image, restoring its image into a healthy tourist destination. He never would have entertained the idea of visiting with Cheryl otherwise.
By the looks of it, PTV was making its comeback. Perhaps its cultivation had continued in secrecy by a trafficking organization. He couldn’t shake the feeling that it had something to do with Cheryl’s kidnapping. Seeing both the memo and the magic board... It didn’t feel like a coincidence. Every meager scrap of information he could find was a whisper leading him a step closer to the truth.
"That damn woman!"
Michael Kaufmann's voice was filled with rage. Even as he packed his belongings, he continued to spew curses after curses.
"That crazy old bitch! Who does she thinks she is fooling with her nonsense about being a pure servant of God bullshit? Don’t make me laugh. Born in a poor family, a thieving, nasty gutter trash like her has the nerve to act all high and mighty. Just seeing that brazen face of hers makes me sick. She’s nothing but a cunning liar, and everyone in this godforsaken town knew it."
His once lavish office, which he had been so proud of, was now in shambles. His mahogany desk and bookshelves were damaged, his prized antique book collection was trampled and scattered on the floor, and even his expensive paintings were torn up. Important documents and high-value securities were stolen from the hidden safe, and that liquid, his last resort, was nothing but a stain on the carpet.
"And this is how she repays me for my help, for years of cooperation? She’s nothing but a vile, treacherous hag. I’ll swear l'm gonna make her pay for this."
It had to be the cult’s doing. The fact that the safe was opened without any signs of tampering or forced entry meant the combination had been leaked, which also meant he had been spied on by the cult all along.
"They think they’ve outsmarted me. Well, joke's on them, I’ve already taken measures. I knew what their stupid plan was from the start."
Kaufmann had transferred part of his money to an overseas account just in case. Compared to what he had lost in this mess, it was pocket change, but it was still a substantial amount. However, if the incident became public, a life of luxury would be out of the question—he would be facing a miserable life in prison, possibly even the death penalty. He had no choice but to flee the country.
"Ugh...Why did it have to come to this?"
He ground his teeth, not out of regret, but from hatred. To have to deal with this after everything he’d done for The Order, he couldn’t believe that the treatment he had in exchange for certain favors from the cult had led to such a horrific situation, after all the funds he contributed and the space he let them occupy and the medical treatment he offered. He had to stifle a laugh at the very idea that he would end up associating with those deranged cultists in the first place.
"Guess she's more than just a con artist; she's a maniac who’s sold her soul to the devil."
He didn’t care about a change of underwear or clothes, so there was no need for a travel case. What he packed into the attaché case were a regular passport and a forged passport, real and fake IDs, gold and cash that he had stored separately from the safe, a 9mm automatic handgun with two boxes of ammunition, and an emergency set of medical supplies.
As he was about to close the case, reconsidering if he had forgotten anything, he heard a growl from behind and turned around.
A dog.
A hideous demon dog had somehow gotten into the building.
Frozen in terror, his face pale, Kaufmann desperately groped inside the attaché case behind him as he stared at the snarling beast, its mouth drooling and filled with sharp fangs.
The dry sound of multiple gunshots echoed outside Alchemilla Hospital.
Even from outside Alchemilla Hospital, Harry could hear the muffled gunshots. Someone, a normal human, was in there. Feeling equal parts hopeful and uneasy, Harry ran through the hospital’s entrance and down the hall.
Bang!
Another shot rang out from the back of the waiting room... from that room. He entered the examination room with the door wide open, only to be greeted by gunfire. The bullet narrowly missed, shattering the door frame.
"Stop, don’t shoot!"
Raising the hand holding his gun above his head, Harry signaled that he was holding up.
"Thank God, there's still someone alive...."
The man inside the examination room lowered his gun. He looked to be in his fifties, a distinguished gentleman in a fine suit. He seemed surprised by Harry’s sudden appearance.
Glancing at the dead dog on the floor, Harry spoke.
"You were attacked, weren’t you? Are you hurt?"
"No, I’m fine."
"My name's Harry Mason."
Harry extended his hand for a handshake and the man took it with his firm cold grip and damp.
"I’m Michael Kaufmann."
"You're a doctor at this hospital?"
"Yes, but are you an officer?"
"No, just a tourist. I’m carrying this gun around for protection, same reason you needed to shoot that dog."
"Hmm, I see."
Harry could tell by the look in his eyes that Kaufman wasn’t entirely convinced.
"Actually, I just arrived in Silent Hill, but my daughter went missing... She’s a seven-year-old girl named Cheryl. Short. Black hair. Have you seen her?"
"I’m afraid not" Kaufman said, shaking his head. "Listen, I don’t know what's going on. I was just taking a break after work, and when I woke up, everything was like this."
"It's just... I was told I might find a clue about my daughter here..."
"Told? From whom?"
"Well, I don’t know her name but it was a woman from the Balkan Church."
"Does this woman wear a veil?"
"Yeah. Do you know her?"
"No, I don’t. I don’t know any such woman."
Suddenly, Kaufmann became expressionless. It was as if he had retreated back into an impenetrable fortress.
"At any case, I’m sorry about your daughter Mr. Mason, but I cannot assist you. I’m leaving this town. I don’t plan on staying here any longer now that the place is overrun with these abominations."
Kaufmann brushed past Harry and quickly left the room.
"You be careful, now"
Kaufmann didn’t respond to Harry’s words.
What a strange man…Harry thought. However, being inherently gentle-natured, Harry couldn’t bring himself to forcefully confront Kaufmann. There was no evidence, nor was he convinced, that Kaufmann was in anyway involved in Cheryl’s disappearance, but the encounter had left Harry with unshakable sense of unease.
There were no doctors at Alchemilla Hospital, no nurses bustling about, no patients sitting in the waiting room waiting for their name to be called, not a single soul. Each room Harry checked on the first floor was vacant; abandoned with medical charts and instruments scattered throughout. Just like any other building Harry had seen, the rooms on the first floor of the Alchemilla Hospital looked like they were in the midst of busy day, before all medical personnel vanished into thin air.
However, there was one exception.
The hospital director's office looked as if it had been ransacked by a burglar. Perhaps a thief have searched the room? No, this was hardly the work of professional ones. It was more like the work of an amateur that had rummaged through things without any plans, leaving no space to even step. Harry was certain that something significant had been hidden in this room. If someone was willing to go to such lengths to find something in here, he decided to investigate it thoroughly, hoping to find a clue as to what that might be—and praying that it would lead him to his daughter somehow.
He overturned the scattered books, picture frames, paintings removed from their frames, and documents, even examining the floor beneath them.
In one corner, a picture frame lay in a pile of shattered glass. There was a photograph. It was taken at an award ceremony and the person being awarded was the man Harry had just encountered—Kaufmann. If this photo was hanging in the director’s office, then it was very possible that Kaufman himself was the hospital director.
Harry's suspicions deepened. He regretted not pressing him further, but having a heated argument with someone holding a gun would not have ended well and there was no guarantee he could have gotten the information he wanted from Kaufmann.
Huh?
Stepping behind the luxurious desk, Harry saw something that held his attention. At first, he thought it was blood. A dark red liquid had spread across the floor with a broken glass bottle laid nearby, its contents apparently spilled. He dipped a finger in it and sniffed, but it was odorless. It felt smooth when rubbed, so it was definitely not blood. It was probably just a chemical—this was a hospital, after all... but something still bothered Harry.
Even though it's a hospital, would they usually keep chemicals in the director's office? It could be a sample brought by a manufacturer—or someone else. He recalled what was written on the magic board at the police station... White Claudia... Could this liquid be the drug PTV?
As outlandish as it seemed, he couldn't shake the thought away from his mind.
Having fished out anything he could find, Harry left the director's office and headed to the examination room where he rummaged through the shelves of medical equipment, took an unused syringe, and returned to the director's office with a small bottle of pills. Carefully, he used the syringe to draw up the red liquid and poured it into the now-empty pill bottle. With a bit of effort, he was able to fill half of the content.
The woman had mentioned that those plotting evil had captured his daughter. If they were involved in drug manufacturing and trafficking, and if Cheryl had been kidnapped by those connected to this drug operation, this red liquid could be the evidence to prove it. Even if Cheryl's disappearance had nothing to do with it, the authorities would likely intensify their search for her, considering this as a possibility. With the Silent Hill Police Department out of commision, he would have to get the FBI to take over his search. If he couldn't find his daughter on his own, he'd have no choice but to rely on official agencies.
I knew it. That man is definetly up to something.
As he continued his exploration through the empty hospital, his footsteps echoing, Harry thought of a possibility. The so-called "Doctor" Michael Kaufmann, who was likely the hospital director... is connected to the drug organization and in a hospital where they could secretly manufacture PTV. Such a prestigious position would certainly allow him to distribute PTV without arousing suspicion. He had all the equipment and materials at his disposal, he could even easily sell it under the guise of medical practice.
The woman he met at the church might be a drug addict. The fanatical gleam in her eyes could be due to PTV... Spouting delusions in her addled state, but perhaps with some truth mixed in, she might have been exposing the connection between the hospital and drugs...
Harry planned on inspecting the basement next, but the stairs leading to it was sealed off by a fire door. He couldn't go upstairs either. He went to his last option and prayed that it would work, Harry pressed the elevator button. To his relief, the doors opened without issue. However, the buttons for the second and third floors were unresponsive no matter how much he pushed them. Only the button leading to the fourth floor lit up.
The fourth floor?
Harry was puzzled inside the ascending elevator. From outside, Alchemilla Hospital appeared to be a three-story building... So why was the elevator taking him to a fourth floor that shouldn't even exist? Were the buttons for the second and third floors meant to guide him to the fourth? Could something be trying to guide me? A chill ran down his spine, but for some reason, he couldn't turn back. The elevator arrived, and the doors opened.
In some Asian countries, the number four is associated with death, and the atmosphere on the fourth floor was indeed reflected upon that. Unlike the clean first floor that resembled a hospital, this floor seemed as though Harry had wandered into a ruin. The corridor was covered in dirty linoleum, the walls were cracked and peeling, the iron doors were rusted, and the ceiling was blackened with soot... It was as though the place had been abandoned due to aging, left in a state of decay.
Even the sunlight streaming through the windows was dusty and yellowed, mingled with a dusk-like darkness, bathing the hallway in an eerie glow.
Taking the stairs down to the third floor presented Harry with the same suffocating environment. No sunlight reached this floor, and it was shrouded in dense darkness. The corridor had deteriorated so much that it no longer resembled a hallway. It had transformed into a path made up of exposed building foundations, with iron mesh sheets laid across, some of which were missing, revealing dark holes. It was as though he had wandered deep underground.
It wouldn't be surprising if some grotesque creatures from the underworld were lurking here. His ominous prediction would come true sooner than he expected.
The nurse who appeared down the corridor was not a normal human, as indicated by the rising white noise from his pocket radio. With each step she took, the static and crackling grew louder, and her strange appearance became clearer.
Her unnatural walk was due to her hunched posture. Though her face was still youthful, she was imitating like an hunched old woman. She seemed to be carrying something off of her back and it was certainly not her enjoying carrying a young patient in a caring manner. Something akin to a large, camel-like hump had attached itself to her back. The nurse gripped a shiny, sharp surgical scalpel. Her smile directed at Harry was not that of an angel in white but held a sinister intent at the opposite extreme.
She intended to dissect him. Without anesthesia, so that he could feel every sensation of pain. She would cut, slice, and extract his organs, and then use his blood for her skincare routine to maintain her youthful appearance.
"Please," Harry said in a low voice, aiming his gun at the nurse. "I don't want to have to shoot you. You're just being possessed by a monster. Please, if there is any part of you in there that can still hear me, just don't get in my way. Please, move aside."
The nurse's pace quickened.
As she charged at Harry with her clumsy sprint, Harry's finger on the trigger hesitated. If he aimed at the parasite-hump like thing on her back, he might be able to save her without killing her. But it would be a difficult shot. Harry was not a professional with guns. He hadn't been drafted near the end of the Vietnam War, so he had no military experience, and his first time firing a gun was quite recent—even his performance and results at the shooting range had been terrible. In trying to shoot the hump on her back, he might end up hitting her head instead.
As the nurse rushed at him, swinging her scalpel, Harry still couldn't shake his hesitation and only managed to dodge her attack. He barely escaped, but the impact sent him flying sideways into the wall. The nurse, perhaps pushed by the weight on her back, continued her forward momentum, staggering before turning back toward Harry.
Harry crouched on the floor, groaning, struggling to lift the gun with his right arm, which had been injured when he hit the wall.
A thought occurred to him. Could it be that the nurse wasn't human after all? If there were creatures loose in this town that could control people, wouldn’t he have seen possessed patients by now? Maybe his anger, fueled by pain, was making him think that way.
She was a monster, merely pretending to be human... She couldn't be just a poor victim controlled by the lump on her back. She was never part of the hospital staff. If there were creatures that could possess humans, then there would also be patients, citizens, tourists, and even officers possessed by such creatures.
That had to be it! I was being decieved!
The crazed nurse's face was a foot away. The bullet shot from the gun pierced her forehead, shattering her skull. Blood and brain matter splattered as the nurse fell back, and she lay lifeless on the floor. All that remained was her frozen crooked smile on her lips.
Harry was in a daze, feeling a lingering sense of unease, as if he had committed murder. Despite the justifications he’d made himself believe, killing the nurse had left a bad taste in his mouth. Even though he had just taken down the monstrous nurse figure, her human-like appearance, and the sight of a woman being shot, plagued him with unwarranted guilt.
Was it really a monster? Or could it have been a human possessed by something?
He kept asking himself these questions over and over, until even the devotion of finding his daughter was pushed to the back of his mind. He wandered throughout the hospital's winding corridors like a sleepwalker.
Before he knew it, he had descended to the basement. In front of him was a room that appeared to be a storage area for medical supplies. However, what was once orderly had now become a place where dusty items were scattered across the floor. The boxes stacked on the ground and the medical supplies lining the rusty shelves were caked in what seemed to be several years’ worth of dust. Perhaps because of Harry's lightheaded daze that his subconscious intuition kicked in, as his eyes were drawn to a shelf at the back of the storage room.
Despite the floor around it being cluttered with no space to step, the area beside the shelf was completely clear.
As he closely approached, he found drag marks on the floor, trailing along the ground, as if something had been dragged across. It was not unreasonable to think that these were made by the shelf. The shelf had often been moved—slid sideways, almost like a door. Despite its aged state, the marks were recently made. When he pushed, a hidden door appeared behind it.
Instead of boldly entering, thinking this must be where Cheryl was being held, Harry hesitated. His spirit had weakened. The lingering feeling from killing the nurse hadn’t dissipated, and the fear he felt when encountering a monster in the school basement resurfaced. He sat down in front of the door, leaned against the wall, and closed his eyes. It was likely already midday and he hadn’t slept in over twenty-four hours. Overcome by drowsiness and fatigue, he sought refuge in sleep.
"Daddy..."
Cheryl snuggled up to Harry’s lap as he sat in the club chair.
"Are you sleepy?"
The three-year-old girl looked up worriedly at her father, who had his eyes closed with a hand on his forehead. Harry was engulfed in sorrow from losing his beloved wife, Jodie. Memories of her occupied his every thought and only hers filled his heart, but they didn’t comfort him. Even the wonderful ones with her gentle smile, something that should have given him comfort but instead, they only sought to deepened his grief.
"Hey, daddy..."
His daughter shook his lap earnestly.
"Daddy, please be okay. I don’t want you to go away too. Please, don’t leave me all alone."
Her pleading voice reached the bottom of Harry’s heart, and he slowly opened his heavy eyelids. Cheryl was crying. She was biting her lip, her small body trembling. This child… even though she was only three, she knew the sorrows of death and was terrified of losing her father as well. This feeling left Harry struck as if Jodie had slapped him across the face. You’re her father! She needs you! How long are you going to mope around like this?
He lifted his daughter and hugged her tightly.
"I’m sorry, Cheryl. Daddy was careless lately. I was so caught up in the past that I forgot what’s truly important right in front of me."
His most precious, precious treasure. It was something that needed his full attention. He needed to love her, hold her, make her happy, and live with her.
Harry woke up. He seemed to have fallen asleep on the dusty floor where things were scattered around. His eyes were teary. He had cried in his dream about Cheryl. Though a sense of longing lingered in his chest, his heart felt cleansed and refreshed. It felt as if he had slept deeply, but when he checked his watch, only about thirty minutes had passed. Even though it was just a small amount of time, it was a damn miracle that no monsters had wandered here and attacked him.
He felt as though Jodie in heaven was watching over him.
He got up and once again faced the hidden door. The guilt and the hesitation were gone. The only thing that remained was his promise to Cheryl all those years ago. Beyond the hidden door was a small, confined room resembling a storage space. There were no stock items on the shelves, but there was a storage hatch on the floor. When he opened it, a staircase leading further down into the basement appeared.
Descending the stairs led to a ward similar in structure to the one above, with a corridor and rooms on either side. Despite it being an unfamiliar place, Harry felt an odd sense of déjà vu. But it was far from the kind that stirred sweet nostalgia—quite the opposite. The oppressive darkness felt like a heavy mass, dulling the light of his flashlight. A chilling sensation snaked up Harry’s spine like a serpent. It was just like that place.
The twisted reality on the opposite side of the clock tower. The space that felt like a different dimension in the other school.
The radio in his inner pocket started to blare static, steadily growing ever louder. Harry ran down the dark corridor, his footsteps echoing, and the flashlight illuminated a nurse. Pounding footsteps rapidly approached from the darkness until a sprinting nurse came into view. This nurse was different from the one Harry had taken down earlier. She was much older and had a different hair color, but the grotesque, twisted grin, the hunched posture, and the humpbacked figure were the same.
If there was any difference, it was that this nurse held a large syringe. The liquid inside was likely some kind of harmful drug, the kind given to terminal patients with the consent of their families to ease their suffering. There was no way of knowing what kind of vile liquid was sloshing around inside that syringe, but Harry wasn’t about to find out when this nurse intended to inject Harry without his consent.
There was no longer room for doubt. All he cared about was saving Cheryl.
He fired two shots at the nurse. Even as she fell, clutching her bleeding abdomen, the ordeal wasn’t over.
With a roar, a newcomer charged down the corridor, stepping over the fallen nurse’s body and rushing toward Harry. This time it was a man dressed like a doctor, wielding a pair of scissors. Harry dodged at the last second and fired, but the shot only grazed the doctor’s left shoulder. The fight quickly devolved into a close-quarters struggle. Harry had no time to aim his gun. As they grappled, the doctor jabbed the scissors into Harry’s right wrist, causing him to drop the gun. As he tried to track the scissors with his flashlight, Harry fought back with his bare hands. With desperate effort, he managed to grab the doctor’s arm, twist it, and headbutted the doctor’s face with all his might.
When the doctor stumbled backwards, Harry used the flashlight to knock the scissors out of his hand. Now, if only for a moment, the two were finally on equal footing but just as quickly, the tables were turned again. Harry was tackled, knocked down, and pinned beneath the doctor. The flashlight rolled out of his hand, casting light in the wrong direction. Suddenly bathed in the choking darkness, Harry felt his throat being squeezed with almost supernatural strength as the doctor’s fingers dug deeper into his neck. Harry fought back with his left hand while frantically searching the floor with his right, trying to find the gun he had dropped. Come on…come on… It should be around here somewhere. If he could just get his hands on it...
But what his hand found was the scissors. Gripping them tightly, Harry thrust them toward the doctor. A wet, gurgling scream pierced the darkness and the doctor’s grip went limp. Finally taking in a lungful of precious air, Harry was freed from the doctor’s grasp. He quickly got to his feet, retrieved the flashlight, and illuminated the aftermath of the fight. The doctor was writhing in agony on the floor, the pair of scissors deeply embedded in his neck.
Harry searched for his gun and aimed it at the doctor, intending to finish him off. One shot was all it took. He needed to suppress any unnecessary sentiments and remind himself that a monster was still a monster, and it would do the same to him.
Hell seemed to be visible through the gaps in the grating.
Harry trudged down the corridor, which was nothing more than a mesh floor laid over the darkness. The magazine in his gun had four bullets left... but he was exhausted from the earlier fight and wasn’t confident he could win if another were to appeared. Steeling himself, he cautiously checked each room. Every time he found one empty, he felt a wave of relief and disappointment. He wouldn’t have to fight for his life again, but he wasn’t any closer to finding his daughter either.
"Where is this...?"
The last room he entered was no different from the others. But its atmosphere was distinct from the others. This single-person hospital room, with only a bed and a nightstand, wasn’t in a state of decay. It wasn’t as clean as a hotel room, but it wasn’t covered in years worth of dust, either. It had been kept relatively clean, as if someone had recently been here, as if they had just been discharged.
Harry’s heart tightened. Could Cheryl have been held here and then taken away again to God knows where?
On the nightstand was a photo frame. Harry’s gaze was drawn to it, and he felt a slight surprise. The photo was of a girl who worn a sorrowful expression. She looked exactly like the girl Harry had seen in the boiler room at Midwich Elementary School.
No, it was the same person.
No matter how much he pondered, Harry couldn’t make sense of what was happening. However, he became certain of one thing, Cheryl hadn’t been held in this room. The girl who had been hospitalised in this room was likely the mysterious girl.
But who was she?
Even after all he'd been through, Cheryl wasn't found in the hospital, not even a single clue left behind. The only remaining option was to ask that shady doctor named Kaufmann, but he was long gone. Even if I chased after him now, there's no way to know where he went. He could be halfway out of state by now. Maybe I should just wait for the Brahms Police Department to arrive here and request an investigation.
Weighed down with disappointment, Harry returned to the first floor. He found the previously locked fire escape and unlocked it from the inside, pushing it open to reveal a grim sight.
The place had transformed. It was no longer the bright medical facility he had first visited. Like the upper and lower floors, it had become a decayed building, engulfed in darkness. The walls, the floor, even the air itself had been corroded. It was as if the building had aged decades older in the short time Harry had been away. Looking around in morbid bewilderment, Harry made his way back to the entrance.
A theater stage set in a perfect façade of normalcy on one side, but simply walk behind it and one can see it from a different perspective. Could it be that Silent Hill has two different sides? I can't even begin to understand the logic, but it would explain the school and this hospital.
Hearing a noise, Harry stopped in front of the examination room door.
Someone's there. A nurse?
It would be wise to avoid danger and ignore it, but there’s a chance it might be Cheryl. Maybe Kaufmann came back to retrieve something he forgot.
Harry took a deep breath and aimed his gun. His hand, pierced by scissors, throbbed. His joints ached. His body felt heavy with fatigue, too worn out to handle another fight. But when it came down to it, he had no other choice. If things went sideways, he could always run.
"Please, let me make it out safely…" He whispered a prayer and opened the door, pointing his light and gun around the room. As expected, a nurse was hiding under the desk. She looked up at Harry, squinting against the light. He was moments away from pulling the trigger, but the expression on her face stopped his fingers. She wasn’t wearing a twisted smile. Nor did she have an eerie lump clinging to her crouched back.
“Thank goodness. There’s still someone alive.”
The nurse crawled out from under the desk, looking relieved. Harry finally lowered his gun. He couldn’t aim a gun at a woman with such a bright smile.
“My name is Lisa Garland. But you can call me Lisa for short.”
“Name's Harry Mason. Harry is fine.”
She was a friendly woman, soothing Harry’s tense heart. If he had met Lisa as a patient, he would have fallen for her in no time.
“It feels like I’ve been waiting forever, hoping someone would come to help.”
“I’m looking for someone too. Something weird is going on. All the other nurses and doctors…they’ve all lost their minds. You’re the only one who’s still sane.”
“Yeah, it’s awful. While I was blacked out, all the patients was already gone....Harry, just what on Earth is happening?”
“I wish I knew. I’m just a tourist who recently arrived in town. When I got here, it was already like this.”
“It’s like a living nightmare. I just wish I could wake up.”
Lisa's cheerful smile from earlier was gone, and now replaced with a look of fright.
Harry could only nod sympathetically, "Yeah…"
“Anyway, we should hurry up and get out of here. Please, take me with you.”
“Of course… But first, there is something I have to do before leaving. I’m looking for my daughter.”
“Your daughter's missing?”
“Yeah. She’s a seven-year-old girl with short black hair. Her name is Cheryl. Do you know anything?”
“I was unconscious for awhile so I haven’t seen anyone…Sorry.”
“That's alright. You don’t have to apologize.”
Harry felt disheartened, but he still had questions. He didn’t know how it related to Cheryl, but there was something on his mind.
“Hey, I found this weird room hidden in the basement and there was a picture of a young girl in there. Do you know anything about her?”
“What are you talking about? A hidden room?”
“You don’t know? There’s a secret room at the back of the storage area, with stairs leading to the second basement level.”
Suddenly, a sound was heard. A siren was blaring from somewhere.
“Aww…My head…”
Harry put his hand to his forehead. The shrill sound of the siren pierced his mind.
“Harry, what's wrong?”
Lisa looked at him curiously. For some reason, she didn’t seem to hear the loud noise. The sound was so loud it seemed to be drowning out his own thoughts, how could she not hear it? Was it all in his head?
“Harry!? Stay with me… Harry!”
…Harry…
…Harry…
Lisa’s voice faded away, eventually disappearing. The intense headache began to ease. When Harry opened his tightly shut eyes, Lisa was nowhere to be seen, and the darkness that had filled the room was gone. Harry found himself in the bright and clean examination room he had first visited.
“It appears you were able to escape the grasp of the darkness,” A voice that didn’t belong to Lisa pulled Harry from his confusion.
“You-- Harry looked in surprise at the person who spoke. It was the woman from the church, the one who had advised him to go to the hospital.
“I believed introductions are overdue… I am Dahlia Gillespie.”
“I don’t care about your name! What I want to know is where my daughter is. You told me to come to this god-forsaken hospital, but there was nothing here.”
“That’s because you were too late.”
“What?”
“The Darkness,” Dahlia said, her eyes gleaming mysteriously, a look of rapture on her face. “The Darkness is devouring this town. Strength must overcome petty desire. Childish sleep talk. I knew this day would come…”
Harry was utterly disbelief as nonsense poured from her mouth. This woman was definitely insane, driven mad by the town’s strange happenings, and lost in delusions. But his thoughts wavered with when Dahlia addressed him again.
“Have you not seen the crest marked on the ground all over town?”
“The marks…? You mean the magic circle in the schoolyard?”
“It is the mark of Samael. It’s being etched across all corners of the town. It must be stopped before it’s completion.”
Samael… The one known as the Red Serpent, a being revered by some as an angel, and reviled by others as a demon.
“Only you can end this. It’s beyond my capabilities. If you are able to halt the mark’s completion, the darkness engulfing the town will be dispelled, and you may even be reunited with Cheryl. There is another church in this town; that is your destination. Stop its completion.”
Dahlia placed something she had been holding onto the desk.
It looked like a key.
For just a few seconds, Harry was entranced by the glimmer of the metal. When he looked back, Dahlia had vanished from the room once again. She had disappeared without a trace. Harry tilted his head in confusion. Did she use some kind of hypnosis? As he sat in the heavy stillness, only one thought crossed his mind.
She was a witch.
As Cybil had expected, Harry was not at the café-restaurant. It was hardly a surprise that he had ignored her warning and gone off to search for his daughter. Still, she felt just as guilty for not keeping her own promises. She said she’d go get help, but she couldn’t even make it to the town's border, let alone Brahms. She had searched all over Silent Hill, only to find that every possible way out of town ended in bottomless pits.
Reluctantly, Cybil returned to the café-restaurant and waited late into the night, intending to apologize to Harry when he returned, all while keeping her revolver holstered at her waist, ready for any attacks by the otherworldly monsters. Eventually, she fell asleep hidden in the back of the store. Morning came, then almost noon, and still, Harry hadn’t returned from his search.
"What do I do now..."
Cybil was tempted to give up on Harry. While searching the town, she had encountered several bird-like and dog-like creatures. She was a trained professional with a gun, but Harry was just an ordinary civilian. By now, he was probably being digested in one of their stomachs.
“Well, no use in sitting around here.”
Cybil left the café-restaurant once more. Even though she was tempted to give up, she was still worried about his safety and well-being. In this messed-up town, he was the only person she could talk to. She needed to find him and help him in his search. As an officer of the law, she couldn't just ignore a citizen in need.
Even if this woman named Dahlia was mad, her words about the circles didn't seem entirely delusional. There might be some truth mixed in with her ravings and they might lead to Cheryl’s whereabouts, or at least Harry clinged to the hope that it would. Thinking it was hopeless even as he did so, Harry decided to go to the “other church” that Dahlia mentioned.
He rummaged through the hospital kitchen, grabbing some cereal and milk while checking out the map. Besides the Balkan Church, there was no other places that seemed to be qualify as a “church.” Perhaps it was a small church. Afterall, this was just a general map from a tourist pamphlet, so it doesn’t cover every bit of detail of the town. Still, he couldn't afford to wander aimlessly without any leads.
There were still monsters roaming through the streets.
Harry eyed the peculiar keychain Dahlia had left behind - a miniature replica of Buckingham Palace with the name of an antique shop etched on it. But would someone really use a promotional keychain given out to customers as a key to their own shop? It seems like a stupid thing to do in terms of security. Yet, he had no choice but to follow this lead, Dahlia might have put the keychain there as another guide to lead him.
Leaving the Alchemilla Hospital, Harry retraced his steps down Crichton Street towards the police station, then headed east on Sagan Street and north up Simmons Street. Whenever the static on his pocket radio intensified, his heart raced as he took cover in the shadows, waiting for the sounds of dogs’ footsteps or birds’ wings to pass by. He had his gun, and could likely take down at least one of the creatures, but with only four bullets left, that would be the extent of his defense. He had no means or places to replenish them, so he would only use them as a possible last resort for self-defense.
The monstrous creature left out a final, agonizing cry as it tumbled to the ground.
It had been a bird, swooping down suddenly from the rooftop of the building across the street, but its attack had no impact on Cybil, who was among the best marksmen in the Brahms Police Department. She had survived and endured numerous confrontations with armed criminals and faced many perilous situations before.
This was just one of those days.
Instantly dodging the attack by rolling out of the way, she swiftly regained her footing and launched a counteroffensive, firing off rapid shots from her revolver.
"You're a hundred years too young to be messing with me, kid,"
Cybil scoffed, ruthlessly crushing the dying bird's head as it twitched in its final moments. Satisfied with her victory, she grabbed a bottle of cola from a nearby store and took a long, refreshing sip. But her moment of peace was short-lived. Footsteps echoed through the street, and Cybil quickly ducked into the shadows, peering out cautiously, expecting to see another of those dog-like creatures.
As the footsteps grew louder, the mist made it difficult to see clearly, but the figure belonged to a human. Whoever it was, they were rushing north on Simmons Street.
...Harry?
Cybil’s eyes widened in surprise. The unexpected sight caused her to spill some of the cola she was holding, her heart racing at the possibility.
Despite the thick fog, Harry finally found the antique shop. Using the key that Dahlia had given him, he unlocked the door and entered the store, which was filled with quaint British furnishings, mostly small items. The shop appeared more like a souvenir destination for tourists rather than anything related to a "church."
As Harry surveyed the room, his gaze was immediately drawn to an old, worn-out wardrobe standing alone at the back, pushed against the wall and separated from the other furnitures. So plain looking and unremarkable, it likely held little value to its owners. Similar to the shelf in the hospital's basement, there were also drag marks left across the floor. Harry leaned his weight against the door and pushed. It moved with a heavy creaking sound, revealing a large opening behind it, just big enough for a person to pass through.
Suddenly, there were footseps entering the shop.
Startled, Harry spun around and aimed his gun.
"Harry!"
Said a familar voice. They were those that of the officer who he had parted ways at the café.
"Cybil?!"
Harry's voice filled with surprise and relief. The fatigue that had been dragging him down vanished in a heartbeat. It felt like the cavalry had arrived, blaring their trumpets triumphantly.
"I'm glad you're okay. I shouldn't have left you, things here are more worst than I thought. " Cybil said.
"It's fine! I'm glad you're back! What about backup? Did you bring any other officers?"
"No...." Cybil's response was blunt as she explained that all the roads out of town were collapsed, the cars had completly stopped running, the phones and radios remained the same since his arrival. Yet her expression lacked any hints of distress. "I was looking for you. I saw you were running nearby and was lucky enough to catch up with you. I'm really glad you're okay."
Harry, on the other hand, was stunned.
"So that means... we're..."
His face paled, as if he had just been told he had a life-threatening illness. However, Cybil put up a smile and tried to put him at ease.
"Don't worry. The Brahms PD backup will definitely come. It's been a long time since I reported back, the officers there are probably on their way here to check up on things. They'll notice something’s wrong in Silent Hill, contact the station, and send a team. It’ll just take some time."
"So we just have to hold on a little longer."
"Can I trust you on this?"
"Yeah. You just have to hold out a little longer. I assure you that this isn’t going to turn into some sort of a Titanic tragedy. So, how about your daughter? Any progress?"
"Not really... I met this bizzare woman, Dahlia Gillespie. She told me Cheryl’s been captured by some bad people, but so far she’s been leading me in circles, and I don’t know if I can even trust her."
"Wait, there were other people in town?"
"Yeah, there was Dr. Kaufmann at Alchemilla Hospital and a nurse named Lisa Garland... But this Dahlia, she kept talking about how the town is being devoured by darkness and other gibberish like that. Do you have any ideas?"
"Darkness devouring the town? She must be talking about drugs. The town's PD was investigating a drug trafficking route. The drug PTV, which we thought had been eradicated, was started spreading again recently. Maybe she was trying to expose the drug trafficking ring."
"How could the drug trafficking be related to all of this? It feels like there's something deeper going on."
Harry's mind was flooded with vivid images of his extraordinary experiences: the peculiar school beyond the clock tower, the transformed first floor of the hospital. The notion that Silent Hill harbored both a surface world and an unseen underworld had taken root in his mind, but he doubted whether Cybil could comprehend of his experiences. Even though she had seen some of the creatures, she might convinced herself that it was all as a result of some biological abnormality, nuclear experimentation, or a leaked biological weapon—simplistic explanations.
"Speaking of other people in town..." Cybil hesitated, as if she was reluctant to say more to Harry.
"I did see a little girl."
"What?!"
Harry’s eyes changed as soon as he heard this. Cybil took his hand, continuing with her story.
"Calm down and listen. I only caught a glimpse of her through the fog. I tried to follow her, but she vanished. I don’t know if she was your daughter."
"And you just let her go?! Where did you see her?!"
"On Bachman Road. She was heading towards the lake."
As Harry rushed to leave the shop, Cybil grabbed his hand firmly, stopping him.
"Harry! There’s no road as to where she was headed. That entire area’s obliterated."
"What?"
"It wasn't like she ran off exactly. It was more like she was walking on thin air, just floating away. That's why I couldn’t follow her any further."
"I see..."
Cybil misunderstood Harry’s reaction, thinking he was disheartened, but as he turned his back to her, she realized he was more determined than ever. He rushed to the wardrobe and began pushing it again, revealing the large hole behind it, much to her puzzlement.
"What’s this?"
"I just discovered it earlier. Maybe, there's something back here. I’m going to have a look."
"Wait. I will go first. It’s my duty as a police officer, after all."
"No, this is my problem. If I don’t go, I might miss any chances of ever saving my daughter, I’d never forgive myself."
"Then we go together. That sounds fair, right?"
Harry shook his head, finally voicing his hesitation.
"Cybil, have you noticed that this town has two different sides to it, a front and a back."
"Front and back? Every town has its own secrets and its own criminal underworld, no matter how big or small if that's what you mean."
"That’s not what I mean. How do I put this... Dahlia says the town is being devoured by darkness... Whatever it is, it’s seriously dangerous. I think only I have the experience to handle it."
"Harry, you’re just tired."
"Think what you want, but I’m going alone. Please, just wait here."
"Fine."
Cybil shrugged. She had already learned at the café that once Harry made up his mind, there was no convincing otherwise.
The narrow corridor behind the hole descended deeper underground, shrouded in darkness but lacking the oppressive weight of the shadowy world Harry had encountered before. His slight tendency toward claustrophobia contributed to the uneasy feeling.
After walking for a bit, he came across another hole in the wall, which led to a small room if it could even be called that. It was a small, cramped space with a low ceiling, crisscrossed by ducts, water pipes, and gas lines – a leftover space beneath the building. At the far end of this unusual room, something strange caught Harry's gaze.
"Is this... an altar?"
He furrowed his brow, puzzled by the unfamiliar scene before him. A small table, resembling a nightstand, sat on the carpet, with an intriguing emblem hanging on the wall above it. The emblem's design evoked the horns of a bull or the outstretched wings of a bird. Atop the table rested an antique-looking cup, containing a small amount of mysterious powder. The lower portion of the wall was draped with a vibrant red curtain, adding an air of mystery to the space.
"Is this what she meant by the 'other church'?"
But there was no cross in sight—nothing to suggest it belonged to any Catholic, Protestant, or other Christian denomination. It looked more like the altar of a pagan ritual, devoid of the reverence typical of worship but rather filled with an atmosphere of fear towards whatever was being venerated.
Harry contemplated of the peculiar setting. Dahlia had told him to stop their sinister plans at this "other church," but no one was here, and he couldn’t exactly stop what wasn't here in the first place. Maybe this wasn’t the place after all, or perhaps a clue hidden here would point him to the real location. However, nothing made any sense.
Unable to make sense with the pieces he was given, Harry decided to turn back. Since it seemed safe enough, he thought it was best to call Cybil for help. She might spot something he had missed. As he turned his back on the altar and started back down the corridor, a sudden explosion made him whirl around. Amber light pushed back the darkness, illuminating the small room.
The flames were erupting from the cup on the table.
"Harry, are you okay?" Cybil called out from the antique shop, her voice echoing through the hole in the wall. She thought she had heard something from the other side.
She waited, but there was no response.
Worried that something might have happened to him, Cybil squeezed through the hole. "Somehow, he probably messed it up. Talk about that bravado in needing to handle this alone," she muttered, frustrated, as she made her way through the corridor.
"Harry?" she called out again as she emerged from the hole on the other side, only to find herself in a small, concrete-walled space with no other exits and nowhere to hide.
Yet, Harry had vanished and was nowhere to be seen.
Harry awaken himself to a familar surronding. He was in a consultation room. He was back inside the Alchemilla Hospital. One moment, he was staring at the flames on the altar, and the next, a wave of dizziness washed over him, causing him to briefly lose consciousness. When he came to, he found himself resting on a bed. Beside him, nurse Lisa Garland sat in a chair, watching over him.
"You were having quite the nightmare," she said.
"Was I?," Harry replied, wiping the sticky sweat from his forehead with his fingers. He had no memory of lying down on the bed, yet here he was, drenched in sweat as if he'd been in the throes of a deep slumber.. Perhaps the encounter with the altar, everything after meeting Lisa, had all been just a bad dream.
"Then, was Dahlia around here...?" he muttered aloud.
Hearing her name, Lisa interjected, "Dahlia? You mean Dahlia Gillespie?"
"You know her?"
"Yeah, that strange old woman, right? She's a bit of a local figure around here. Everyone in the town knows about her. They say she lost her child in a fire years ago and her mind hasn't been the same since."
"I see, so she’s that kind of person... She mentioned something about the town being devoured by darkness. Do you have any idea on what she might have meant by that? Or was it just the ramblings of a madwoman?"
"Darkness devouring the town... I'm not sure if it's related, but there used to be an occult-like belief here in Silent Hill a long time ago."
"What kind of belief?"
"Before Silent Hill became a popular tourist destination, it was mostly just old residents who lived here, and they had these strange, unique beliefs. Whenever young people disappeared, they’d say things like they were 'taken by the land’s god.' Back then, before it became what it is now, there really wasn't much here, so it wasn’t uncommon for young people to just get up and skip town quietly. But for those still living here, it must have felt like they just vanished into thin air, feeding more and more into their anxieties."
"So, some sort of local beliefs, then."
"Yeah, but after the town became a tourist spot and new residents started to move in, that belief seemed to have fade away. However, I still remember hearing a story from a few years back about how several members of a redevelopment group who were in town died in accidents one after the other. People said it was the curse of the land’s god, but that was the last time I heard anything about it. Since then, nothing. So... it doesn’t seem to be connected to this darkness she mentioned. Sorry, that probably wasn’t very useful."
Lisa smiled weakly, her complexion pale. Her voice lacked its usual energy, as if she were unwell.
"No, thank you for telling me," Harry said, but before he could finish his words of gratitude, he was struck by another strange sensation.
Harry found himself lying on the cold floor, staring up at the ceiling of the antique shop.
"Was that... just a dream? What about the conversation with Lisa?"
He couldn't make sense of it. A terrifying thought crept into his mind—was all of this just happening in his head? Was he in a coma, dreaming after the car accident? Either possibilities filled him with dread. He needed to find Lisa. If he saw her again, he'd know if what just happened was real or just a figment of his imagination. And he needed to ask her for directions—to the lake where Cheryl seemed to be heading, perhaps a shortcut other than Bachman Road.
"Cybil," he called out, but the officer was nowhere to be seen inside the shop. Harry stood up and walked out of the shop. Outside, just like the inside, the choking darkness had taken over again. The fog hanging in the air felt toxic, like a blanket of oppressive darkness, weighing down on him. The pavement of Simmons Street had transformed into a mesh of grates, making Harry realize he had been thrust back into the town's Otherworld. Cybil must still be in the normal version of the antique shop, searching for him, unaware that he had vanished.
As soon as he started walking towards Alchemilla Hospital, the radio in his jacket pocket began to emit static. Each second, the white noise grew louder, signaling the dangers ahead. Harry gripped his gun tightly, his eyes darting around the misty, shadowy landscape. The thick fog and darkness restricted his line of sight to just a few yards. He couldn't tell if the creature was approaching from the front, the back, or even from above.
There was nowhere to hide nearby, and turning back to escape into the antique shop wasn't an option; it was too far away. He steeled himself for a confrontation, pressing his back against the nearest building to avoid being attacked from behind. He decided to keep the flashlight on—fighting in total darkness would be too dangerous. At least with the light, he could aim his gun.
A dog appeared in the spotlight of his flashlight.
But this was no ordinary canine or even the one he had grown accustomed to.
It was a new breed, far larger and even more grotesque than the ones he had encountered before. This creature looked like a bloated, waterlogged corpse that had been buried for a week. Its shriveled, mummified head was crawling with worms, and its misshapen body oozed decay. The dog turned its worm-eaten face toward Harry, somehow sensing the flashlight's beam despite its ruined eyes.
"Ah..." Harry's breath caught in his throat, and he instinctively recoiled, pressing himself harder against the glass behind. The next moment, he tumbled backward into the building as the glass door unexpectedly gave way. Unlike the many other sealed doors in this town, this one had miraculously opened.
The monstrous dog lunged at Harry, but the thick glass shielded him, and the door's weight prevented the creature from forcing its way inside. Harry quickly shut the door and locked it, while the dog raged outside, smearing the glass with the slimy, putrid fluids seeping from its decaying body.
Exhausted and relieved, Harry slumped to the cold floor.
He found himself in a spacious, open foyer. The walls were adorned with numerous storefronts, a massive multi-screen display dominated one wall, and escalators led up to the second floor, indicating this was a bustling shopping center. According to the map, this must be the "Silent Hill Town Center."
Harry's first thought was about the possibility of finding a gun shop, but the town had no such stores so far, but perhaps one was here. After such a terrifying encounter, he desperately needed to restock his ammunitions. However, the shopping center was in a state of decay. The stores were dilapidated, their goods covered in dust, and a section of the ceiling had collapsed near the back of the first floor, blocking any further exploration or progress. In the end, his search for the elusive gun shop proved fruitless.
Harry cautiously ascended the still escalator to the second level. The imposing canine outside may have departed or remained, but Harry dared not venture out until he secured more ammunition or ensured the area was secure. He needed to thoroughly search for the gun shop.
Suddenly, his ears were assaulted by a piercing noise.
However, it wasn't coming from the radio in his pocket. He turned his head toward the source and saw a large panel screen filled with static. The escalator remained dead, but the screen had come to life. Each screen displayed the same magical circle that had been in the school courtyard—the Seal of Samael. Then, the static returned, and another image appeared, capturing his heart almost immidiately.
“Daddy.”
A monochrome image of a little girl appeared, whispering into the speaker.
"Help me, daddy."
“Cheryl!” Harry shouted, his eyes wide as he stared at the screen, but the close-up only showed his daughter’s face, offering no clues about her whereabouts.
“I love you, daddy.”
Cheryl's voice carried a somber weight, as if she were bidding farewell. Then, she vanished into the crackling static. The panel screen continued to flicker between static and enigmatic symbols, offering no chance to replay the events.
Unable to do anything, Harry can only left the panel screen behind and headed upstairs. He had no choice but to keep moving forward to wherever he could reach. He needed to find a gun shop, gather supplies, and cut through the darkness where monsters lurked. However, the second-floor stores had been reduced to ruin, with most collapsing along with the floor. He peeked into the only remaining jewelry store, but it was appearant that this store's anti-robbery measures does not invovle with guns.
Perhaps the gun shop had fallen down below as well…
Harry peered down from the edge of the collapsed floor, scanning the rubble in hopes of spotting any of the gun shop's items. Even with his flashlight, the light didn't reach far enough. As he continued to shone around, his body was suddenly suspended in air as the floor beneath his feet gave way.
Shit!
Harry braced himself for the impact. The ceiling of the town center was high, about the same height as that of a roof of a two-story house. And below, debris was scattered everywhere. He could only pray that he wouldn’t sustain any serious injuries.
Thud! His feet hit something, and he tumbled to the floor. His legs tingled, but fortunately, it seemed to be a flat surface, and aside from a slight bruise on his right shoulder, he had no broken bones. It wasn't entirely bad But it wasn't good either.
"What the--!”
A thunderous roar, as if from a trembling earth, resonated nearby and sounding extremely close.
The flashlight's beam illuminated the cracked floor, where a monstrous insect had emerged. Its massive jaws, capable of easily severing a human torso, were as large as a Halloween pumpkin, and that was just a part of its formidable body. As the creature wriggled and smashed through the floor, its true size was revealed – an enormous caterpillar-like monster, standing twice as tall as Harry. Though he couldn't identify the specific larva, the sheer danger it posed was undeniable. The creature's synchronized, abdominal legs moved in a creepy motion as it crawled towards Harry, its mandibles clacking like metal shears.
Come to think of it, Cheryl hated caterpillars.
Harry forced a twisted smile. Fear and laughter are two sides of the same coin.
“Hah, I hate you too!”
He fired his gun. All four remaining bullets were used up. Yellow fluid, like filthy water, splattered from the punctured hide, but the caterpillar didn’t flinch. It didn’t seem to feel any pain or discomfort. Its nervous system was undeveloped, but its vitality was overwhelming.
“You disgusting beast!”
Harry threw his empty gun at the monster, but of course, it didn’t even faze the creature. He scrambled over the rubble, desperately looking for an exit. The entrance was blocked by the collapsed ceiling—the second-floor floor. On the other side was a wall… but there was a showroom window. He slammed debris against it, but it didn’t budge. It was reinforced glass, just like the entrance door. The glass that had protected him from the giant dogs was now trapping him in.
He slumped to the floor, his body shaking with emotion. Unwilling to accept the reality of death, yet no longer able to find the will to go on, he bowed his head in utter hopelessness.
In the faint glow of the discarded flashlight, something black and shiny caught his eye. The very thing he had been searching for was now right in front of him—a hunting rifle. Next to it was a torn box of cartridges, with bullets scattered around. It seemed a customer had been in the middle of a purchase when the disaster struck.
But he couldn’t celebrate just yet. The guns sold in stores were not loaded, so he would have to load the rifle himself. Harry dove for the rifle, grabbed as many of the spilled cartridges as he could, and stuffed them into his pockets.
The caterpillar smashed through the rubble again, thrashing its massive body against the floor as it attacked Harry. The heavy impact shook the entire town center.
Harry ran without even picking up his flashlight. He couldn’t use the rifle while holding it anyway. He would have to load it in the dark, but at least that meant the caterpillar wouldn’t be able to see him easily either. He hid behind a thick column that once supported the ceiling and fumbled to open the rifle’s breech. He started loading bullets into the fixed magazine. He wasn’t sure how many it could hold, but he figured all five bullets in his pocket would fit.
Loading the rifle was harder than he expected. It was his first time handling one. While he knew how to use it in theory, putting that knowledge into practice was another matter entirely.
The caterpillar slithered over the rubble, dragging itself with a scraping, clattering sound as it searched for Harry. Occasionally, it raised its head as if preparing to spit silk for a cocoon, likely listening for any noise. It didn’t have ears, but its entire body was a sensitive antenna, detecting sound waves and vibrations.
Click
The sound of a bullet slotting into place didn’t escape the caterpillar’s attention. It charged headfirst towards the sound, slamming its body with full force. The pillar Harry had been leaning against shook violently, causing him to lose his balance and fall to the ground. The two bullets he had been holding slipped from his grasp.
“Great.... I’ve only got one shot left. Please, make this count…”
Harry steadied the rifle and turned to face the caterpillar. Something was off about it. The caterpillar, dimly lit by the discarded flashlight, was thrashing about erratically, scattering debris as it writhed. It appeared to be convulsing, likely due to the impact with the pillar.
This was his chance. It was now or never.
Harry quickly opened the breech again and loaded another bullet. There wasn’t time to pick up the ones he had dropped, but he still had two more cartridges left in his pocket.
“Eat this!”
He moved in close to the convulsing caterpillar and pressed the rifle barrel against its bloated body before pulling the trigger. The recoil hit his shoulder with a heavy thud. The force of the shot pushed him back, but at the same time, the caterpillar’s body erupted with yellow fluid. Flesh likely tore off, and he could hear the splat of chunks hitting the ground around him.
“And another one!”
Harry fired again, this time bracing himself better for the recoil. The monstrous caterpillar reared back, screaming in a high-pitched cry of pain. The same monster that had been unaffected by the pistol shots was now suffering from the rifle’s power. The caterpillar fled. Terrified by the formidable Harry, it bolted away, crashing through the showroom window and shattering the reinforced glass into pieces before making its escape outside the town center.
A warm, misty wind blew through the broken window, brushing against Harry’s face.
It gently erased the smell of gunpowder in the air.
The eerie darkness stubbornly clung to the town, refusing to lift. The thought of encountering the massive dogs was unnerving, but Harry now possessed a powerful rifle with him, which he’d obtained from the town center. His jacket and pants pockets were stuffed full of spare cartridges, almost to the point of bursting. Though it made walking slightly cumbersome, tthe rifle provided a comforting presence, a reliable ally in the unsettling gloom.
With a flashlight taped to the rifle’s barrel—thanks to some duct tape he found in one of the shops in town center—Harry hurried back towards Alchemilla Hospital.
“Harry, thank god you came back!”
Lisa was still hiding in the examination room.
“I was so scared to be here all alone and you just disappeared all of a sudden...”
Her complexion was pale, and she looked a bit worn out, just like in the dream Harry had seen in the altar room.
“I’m sorry. Lisa, this might sound odd, but is this the third time we’ve talked like this?”
“Yeah, I think it’s our third time.”
“Did we talk about Dahlia Gillespie and that old religion used to be followed in this town?”
“We did, just a little while ago. You just disappeared in the middle of the conversation.”
“How did I leave? I remember feeling dizzy, but everything else is just a blur after that.”
“I don’t know either. I felt faint too, and when I came to, you were gone.”
The conversation Harry thought had happened in a dream with Lisa turned out to be real. However, this only deepened the mystery. The bizarre events occurring in this town were incomprehensible. The more Harry tried to make sense of it, the more confused he became. If it were all a dream, things would be much easier to explain, but the smells, the textures, the pain—they all felt too real to even be a dream. Though he longed for Cheryl's disappearance to be nothing more than a horrifying dream, he had to confront the harsh truth and take every possible action to save her.
Using the information he had gathered from Cybil, Harry asked Lisa a question.
“Lisa, do you know of a way to get to the lake?”
“The lake? You just take Bachman Road.”
"The route’s blocked.”
“Then I can't think of any other way. It's the only route.”
“Are you sure? There's gotta be another way…”
Harry clutched his head in frustration. Without reaching the lake, there was no way to continue searching for Cheryl.
Lisa suddenly had a thought and spoke up.
“Wait, there is a way.”
“Really?!”
“I don’t think it’s in use anymore, but when I was a kid, near the elementary school I went to, there was a waterworks facility. There’s an underground maintenance tunnel there, and I heard it connects all the way to the lake.”
“I’ll check it out.”
As Harry was about to leave the room, Lisa grabbed onto him.
“Harry, wait! Please, I don't wanna be alone.”
"How about you coming with me? We don’t know how long this place will last and it's not exactly the safest place in the world either. I can't promise anything but I’ll do my best to protect you.”
“No.”
Lisa weakly shook her head.
“Somehow I feel like I'm not supposed to leave here. Oh Harry, I’m so scared... and it’s so cold…”
She hugged her shoulders, trembling. From her pale face, it seemed like she might be coming down with a fever or something.
“In that case, you should rest here. I’ll come back for you after I find my daughter. Just hang in there a little bit longer. I promise I will be back.”
“You better.”
Lisa gave him a sorrowful look as she watched Harry leave.
Her dream started to spill over.
Her tears welled up, overflowing and trickling down to the town.
Each murky drop seeps into the earth, staining everything with darkness.
The girl was weeping.
As she wept, she wandered aimlessly.
She only wanted to smile. That was her only wish.
She wanted to escape the pain that bound her, to be able to smile with joy.
She had always been bullied—at school, at home, even when she was hospitalized. She was always subjected to cold, judgmental gazes. So she wished to go far away, to start over in a place she didn’t know, and only surrounded by kind people.
“I’m sorry,” the girl whispered as she gently touched another young girl, her voice filled with words of atonement.
“It’s okay,” the young girl replied, her face pure and innocent.
It was the very smile the girl had longed wished for.
And yet—
“I ended up dragging you into all of this...”
The girl felt sorrow. She had wanted this child to be happy.
“I am you,” the young girl said, reassuring her. “Don’t worry.”
The young woman embraced the child tenderly, cherishing their shared moment together. Warm memories of joy and love, memories the girl never had, began to flow from the young girl into her. But it wasn't enough, the light from those memories were faint, unable to break through the surrounding darkness.
“Daddy will come and save us,” the young girl said.
“But... your daddy...” The girl responded with a bittersweet smile.
“Even so....”
“We'll be fine. We’ll all be free from here,” the girl assured her.
She began drawing the seal.
One, then another.
All across the town.
Once the Seal of Metatron was completed, they could be free from the curse. But what would happen after that? Even the girl herself did not know. She hoped to return to the young girl’s life, but but it was just as possible that she would fall into a deep slumber, waiting for the angels to sound the trumpet on the day of judgement.
Perhaps she would fall forever deep into hell...
Though her intentions weren’t malicious, she had plunged the town into a thick, ominous void where demons roamed without restraint.
It was the fear and hatred lurking in her own heart that had caused it all.
The girl wept.
Still, she continued to inscribe the seal, praying with every stroke.
It had to be that caterpillar, back for revenge.
Emerging from the Alchemilla Hospital, Harry found his path blocked as the giant, now evolved, challenged him once more. There was no choice but to fight. The streets had shifted again, and the only way forward was to cross the rooftop of the building opposite the hospital.
“Well look at you, you’ve moved up in the food chain” Harry muttered bitterly, staring up at the massive creature. Dirty, soot-like scales drifted from its wings as it hovered ominously above. Yet, Harry showed no fear. Perhaps it was because this was the same creature that had once fled from him with its tail between its legs. He was surprisingly calm, even to himself.
But this giant moth was far more intimidating than any previous monsters encounters.
Her size was immense, her form even more grotesque than the bird-like abominations Harry had faced before. The front and back wings spread out like the talons of a raptor, razor-sharp. Veins bulged across the wings, like angry blue streaks. Her antennae resembled the horns of a water buffalo, and her compound eyes gleamed with cold cruelty. Her proboscis was more menacing than an eagle’s beak. But her most striking feature was the massive stinger protruding from her abdomen, a vestige of her caterpillar form.
Is that thing poisonous? Harry wondered, narrowing his eyes. A caterpillar with a stinger—how bold. He remained cautious but unafraid. After all, he had his trusty hunting rifle by his side, and the hope of finally reaching the lake—and his daughter, Cheryl—filled him with much determination. This thing was nothing more than a roadside obstacle, a mere pebble standing in his way.
He retreated to the emergency stairwell leading up to the roof, making it his stronghold. From this vantage point, he could take cover beneath the stairs and dodge her attacks. The building's wall loomed behind him, preventing her from launching a direct charge.
His strategy worked perfectly. The moth couldn’t get close enough to use her stinger, and instead, she desperately thrust it forward, shooting poison from its tip like a water gun. But Harry had the upper hand. He calmly took aim and unloaded rounds into her bloated abdomen. One shot after another, until the massive creature fell, vanquished.
With its death, it seemed as though the town’s strange distortions were beginning to fix themselves. The streets returned to their former state, and the path ahead opened up for Harry once more.
Cybil paused on Ellroy Street, staring at the river. Her eyes narrowed as she spotted a cruiser cutting through the water, leaving ripples in its wake.
"Harry?"
This river, flowing between the residential area and the town center, originated from the lake. Harry had been fixated on getting to the lake. Who else but Harry would head toward that wide, dead-end lake? Even if he made it downstream, the journey would end at a waterfall with steep cliffs all around. There was no escaping Silent Hill from there.
She scowled, annoyed. The man had disappeared from the antique shop, only to show up on the river.
"Harry, you idiot," Cybil muttered, glancing at the boats moored along the riverbank. She thought about following his lead, but she didn’t have a boat license and couldn’t operate a motorboat. Rowing would suffice, though. Several small boats were tied to the pier.
Meanwhile, Harry was facing yet another grotesque threat. After dealing with the giant moth, he now encountered a swarm of crawling insect-like monsters in the underground passage Lisa had told him about. They resembled oversized cockroaches or woodlice, scuttling about. To make matters worse, their underbellies were disturbingly human-like faces, glaring at him with a haunting, resentful stare. While their sheer numbers were unsettling, they weren’t particularly dangerous. A rifle was overkill, and Harry knew he'd run out of bullets before he'd taken them all down. So, he gritted his teeth, enduring the splatter of body fluids, and resorted to stomping them out with his boots.
The underground passage also housed creatures that looked like hairless, slick-skinned, green monkeys. These monsters crawled across the ceiling and walls like spiders, but also possessed amphibian-like abilities, lurking just beneath the water’s surface and using their elongated limbs to try to grab Harry from below. He had to remain hyper-vigilant, constantly looking up and down as he rushed through the passage, his stamina and nerves wearing thin. By the time he finally emerged back onto the surface, he was utterly drained.
The exit led him to a park known as South Park, situated north of the lake, where hotels and resorts dotted the shoreline. In Silent Hill, where day and night alternated unpredictably, the brightness that had accompanied him from the hospital to the water facility was gone, plunging him once more into deep, night-like darkness. As he stepped out of the park, the beam of his flashlight illuminated a neon sign: "Pool Bar." Harry swallowed hard. It wasn’t that he was craving alcohol, but after running through the underground sewers, his throat was bone dry. If the bar had any juice, he'd take it. And if not, well, one can of beer wouldn’t hurt.
Kaufmann burst into the pool bar, narrowly escaping from the monsters outside. Relieved, he set his ammunition-filled briefcase on the floor and helped himself to a bottle of scotch from the bar’s shelves. It was the finest liquor in the place, but he had no intention of paying. After all, his PTV drug dealings had brought the bar enough business to cover the cost. Besides, the bar’s owner, like the general store clerk and the motel keeper, was surely no longer alive… thanks to that woman.
His destination was now just around the corner. They may have ransacked the hospital office and thought the whole affair was over, but they had no idea about the real stash hidden in an unsuspecting place. Kaufmann smirked as he took another burning sip, confident they would never suspect the lighthouse. He had no idea, though, that he wasn’t alone in the bar.
“Hey, you!”
Startled by the voice, Kaufmann spun around to find a man standing at the entrance, aiming a rifle at him. Panicked, Kaufmann slipped from his chair and fell hard on his backside. The sound of gunfire echoed in the bar, and a bullet whizzed past him.
"Please! Don't shoot! I'll give you money!" he pleaded.
A thunderous shot rang out, but it had not been intended for him. Instead, a monstrous creature collapsed at his side, dark blood seeping from the gaping wound where the bullet had pierced its back. This wretched being possessed saber-like claws in place of hands
“It wasn’t for you. I was aiming at that ‘Mumbler,’” the man explained.
“Mumbler?” Kaufmann frowned, puzzled.
“It’s just a name I came up for that thing,” the man clarified.
"You… I think I know you..." Kaufmann squinted.
"Harry Mason. Surprised to see you here, Dr. Kaufmann. I thought you'd be long gone by now."
"Ah, yes, Mr. Mason. Well, all the roads are blocked. And you, have you had any luck in finding your daughter yet?"
“No... not yet.”
“Well, don’t give up just yet. This craziness can't go on forever. By now, the military or the police must be sending in a rescue team,” Kaufmann said with a stiff smile, bowing with exaggerated politeness before heading for the exit. Harry tried to stop him, calling out for him to wait, but Kaufmann ignored him, his anger boiling beneath his calm exterior.
That young fool had nearly humiliated him with that reckless shot. Helped him in a tight spot? Yeah, right, he didn't need Harry's charitable help. If the man expected any thanks for "saving" him, he was sorely mistaken.
Harry had many questions for Kaufmann, but he couldn’t bring himself to ask them, given their sensitive nature. He considered chasing after him but ultimately gave in to his pressing thirst. His priority was to find something to drink, and after searching behind the bar counter, he found grapefruit juice meant for cocktails. He quenched his thirst with it and then stopped by a convenience store, indulging in chocolate and jelly beans.
As he wandered through the dark streets again, he noticed a red neon sign glowing faintly through the mist—it was the sign for a motel. In the otherwise dead and silent ghost town, the motel's sign gave off the odd impression that it was still operating as usual, carrying on business as if nothing had changed. Inside, the reception desk was empty, as expected. Harry didn’t expect to find anyone there. He rang the bell on the counter, but no one appeared. Guess the neon sign must have simply been left on by chance.
Using a key that Kaufmann had dropped at the bar, Harry headed to Room 3. He told himself he was acting out of kindness, planning to return the key afterwards, but he had a hidden agenda: to investigate the room. Harry had harbored suspicions that Kaufmann was involved in both the town's drug trade and Cheryl's disappearance.
The room was as tacky and faintly animal-scented as the motel's sign suggested. No luggage, no signs of occupancy, and the bed was neatly made, meaning Kaufmann hadn’t stayed there yet. Harry searched the room thoroughly, but his search turned up nothing. Disappointed, he suddenly felt exhaustion's heavy kicker. His body was weary, and his eyelids were heavy. After having eaten, the familiar drowsiness set in. The motel room, though far from comfortable, provided a place safe enough from the dangers outside.
Cheryl, I’m sorry. Please, let daddy rest for a while. Once I regain my strength, I’ll come for you.
The bed wasn’t as soft as he had hoped. The sheets were damp, and lying on them was far from comfortable. As he drifted into half-consciousness, Harry’s mind wandered. He recalled searching for a gun in the convenience store earlier for protection. There was a safe he found unlocked, and inside, he saw something—a white powder. High-value drugs wouldn’t be kept in a safe unless they were worth a lot, or worse, illegal. Was it some kind of drug? Maybe PTV? And what about the red liquid he collected from the hospital? It certainly didn’t seem like any ordinary medication...
His thoughts became more scattered as sleep overtook him. Soon, Harry drifted into unconsciousness.
Kaufmann realized he had lost the key to Room 3. No matter, the room had been rented only as a diversion, a part of his cover. Even if the cult became suspicious of the motel, they would waste their valuable time in searching the registered room, a place devoid of anything significant.
After countless detours, guided by his fear of confronting the monsters, Kaufmann finally reached the motel, even though it was just a short walk from the bar. Returning here had not been his initial plan. At first, he had roamed all over town, desperately searching for any way out. But when he accepted that escape was not possible, he set his sights on a different goal - seeking revenge against Dahlia Gillespie.
Kaufmann had learned that the cult’s activities, led by the lunatic Dahlia, were not merely some twisted game—they were all too real. With this knowledge, he had prepared something the cult feared:
Aglaophotis, a substance he intended to use. He would make sure Dahlia paid the price. He wanted her to suffer, to experience the agony of losing something precious, just as he had. He knew that without stopping her and her daughter Alessa, leaving the town would likely be impossible. He had to confront them—especially her accursed daughter, Alessa.
Kaufmann walked straight to the motel’s garage, bypassing the open-air parking lot meant for guests. His goal lay in the staff-only area, where an old motorcycle was kept. It was this bike that he needed now.
"Help me, Daddy!" cried Cheryl's face from the multi-screen display. As the camera zoomed out, the full picture revealed Cheryl strapped to a wheelchair. White-clad figures tortured her—monstrous nurses and doctors wielding scalpels, scissors, and syringes, tormenting her.
"Get your fucking hands off of her!" Harry shouted as he rushed to save his daughter, but he was too late. Cheryl had already become a lifeless body resting in a coffin.
"It's your fault, Harry" a voice echoed from the coffin. Cheryl's face twisted, morphing into that of Jodie, Harry's deceased wife. Her eyes opened wide, glaring with blame.
"It's your fault! All of this is your fault!" Jodie's voice thundered, each repetition growing louder until it became a deafening roar. The entire house responded with chaos—furniture leapt and clattered, as though startled. Loud footsteps pounded from the attic above, echoing the anger in the room. Harry covered his ears, clutching his head in despair. It was happening again—another poltergeist episode, just like the ones that had plagued him for years. These supernatural events had once driven him to despise the occult, but now, they were consuming his every waking moment.
"...commonly occur around adolescents, particularly girls......"—he remembered a quote from Leonard Rhine’s book on paranormal phenomena.
Lying on an examination bed, Cheryl’s skin was etched with raised letters, as though something had carved words into her flesh.
Come back home.
I won’t let you escape.
Be with God.
Suddenly the scene shift to a classroom where the children were surrounding a young girl, cruelly taunting her. "Freak!" they jeered.
"Just die."
"Don’t even come to school."
"You’re a witch! We’ll burn you!"
Except the bullied girl wasn’t Cheryl. It was the girl from the photograph in the hospital’s private room. Tears streamed from her large, round eyes—tears as black as ink. As they dripped onto the floor, they spread, staining the entire school, then spilling out into the town, covering it in darkness. Each drop transformed into grotesque beings—nurses, doctors, dogs, birds, lizards, and worms.
Jolted awake, Harry emerged from the gripping nightmare. A sound had stirred him—something was rattling forcefully nearby. Seizing the rifle beside him, he crept to the door and cautiously peered outside.
Someone was struggling with the garage door, trying to force it open. The red glow of the motel’s neon sign illuminated the man’s back—it was Dr. Kaufmann. Once Kaufmann disappeared into the garage, Harry quietly followed. Inside the garage, Kaufmann crouched by an old motorcycle. The bike was a rusted wreck, with a flat tire, barely holding together. Despite its condition, Kaufmann worked on it with intense focus.
"This is it... this is it," Kaufmann muttered as he retrieved a small red vial from the motorcycle’s fuel tank. The vial glowed red, not from the sign, but from the liquid it contained.
"What’s that?" Harry called out.
Kaufmann flinched, startled. He turned, a look of annoyance etched on his face.
"You again."
"What’s in that vial?" Harry demanded.
"That's none of your business!" Kaufmann replied curtly, his tone dismissive.
Harry knew this was his moment to press for answers. Without hesitation, he confronted Kaufmann, his words sharp.
"You are involved in drug trafficking ring, aren't you?"
Kaufmann looked up at him, still crouched. Then, slowly, he stood.
"What are you talking about?" Kaufmann asked, his voice calm, but his eyes sharp.
"You’re the hospital director, aren’t you? Is Alchemilla involved in some kind of drug operation?"
"That’s bold." Kaufmann’s voice remained steady, his expression unbothered. He regarded Harry with a mocking look. "What evidence do you have to back up your wild accusation? If you don't have one, don’t bother wasting my time with your baseless claims."
"Someone told me," Harry replied. "Dahlia Gillespie. She said something bad was happening at Alchemilla Hospital."
"Hah! Dahlia!" Kaufmann spat the name with disdain. "That woman is sick in the head. Don’t listen to any of the words she says."
"If it’s not true," Harry continued, "then explain what’s in that vial. You’ve hidden it away in a place like this—there’s no way it’s anything legitimate."
"I’m not wasting my time on you," Kaufmann growled, pulling out a gun and pointing it at Harry.
Harry didn’t have time to ready his rifle.
"Drop the rifle," Kaufmann ordered. "If you don’t want to die, I'd suggest you stop meddling in matters that don’t concern you. Got it? Focus on getting out of this town"
Keeping his aim steady, Kaufmann slowly backed away, vanishing into the night. Harry, with no choice, stood froze with his rifle still in hand, watched him fade away into the darkness.
Dahlia Gillespie watched closely, her hand resting on the shoulder of her daughter, who was bound to a wheelchair. She was drawing power from the great being that awaited its moment of birth within her daughter, extending her watchful gaze over the entire town of Silent Hill. Yet, her clairvoyant abilities were limited—she could only grasp a fraction of the true power. Overseeing everything happening in the town was beyond her reach, so Dahlia focused solely on two figures: Alessa and Harry.
Alessa was currently by the lakeside, plotting another one of her tricks. Dahlia needed to send Harry in that direction—this time, he had to succeed. He was a useless fool, but a fool was all she had.
"Such a worthless man," Dahlia muttered, clicking her tongue in frustration as she observed Harry standing helpless with his hands up, Kaufmann pointing a gun at him in the motel parking lot. She couldn’t hear their conversation; her abilities didn’t allow her to listen in, but the details were hardly matter. She had hoped Harry would shoot and kill that meddlesome Kaufmann, silencing him for good.
Yet, once again, Harry had failed.
"Still, I suppose expecting more from someone like you would be too much," Dahlia laughed, mocking him with a tone of pity.
Despite his ineptitude, Harry had managed one important task—bringing Cheryl to the town. For that, Dahlia could afford him a small measure of praise. It was her sorcery that had influenced Cheryl’s desire to come to Silent Hill, but Harry had been the one to carry out the task. Thanks to him, they had finally taken a step forward after seven long years of stagnation. The dawn of a new world was almost upon them.
Her heart raced with excitement. All the suffering she had endured, the years of hardship, would finally be rewarded. She trembled with anticipation.
Those years had been unbearably difficult. Dahlia had grown up in crushing poverty. Her family struggled daily, with barely enough food to survive. Her mother had died young from the exhaustion of their harsh life, leaving her father to drown himself in alcohol. Dahlia had been unable to attend school regularly, instead working odd jobs in the neighborhood to earn what little money she could gathered. Even as an adult, her lack of education left her with few opportunities. The best she could do was secure part-time work as a barmaid, swallowing her pride as her father drank away her wages. Trapped in the town, she had no way out. In her desperation, she had gotten involved with one of the bar’s regulars and ended up having a child. Her life grew even harder, and she became the subject of scorn and prejudice from the townspeople. No one offered her help. The only solace she found was in the ancient faith passed down through the town.
"My God, come to this world and purify it of the fools who dwell here," Dahlia prayed fervently, once more focusing her attention on Harry’s movements. Kaufmann no longer interested her; he was a useless pawn. Sooner or later, he would be consumed by Alessa’s nightmare, devoured by the monsters that plagued the town. He was nothing more than just a pebble.
Harry, on the other hand, was running through the lakeside resort, desperately fending off the monsters chasing him. He was headed toward the marina, where the lighthouse is connected to.
"Well then, it's time," Dahlia said to herself, preparing to leave. She noticed a woman rowing a small boat toward Harry’s location, but she paid her no mind. The woman was just another insignificant figure lost in the chaos of the town. She was of no consequence.
As Harry was making his way towards the lake, he felt a strange sensation. It wasn’t like an earthquake—it was as if the very space around him was trembling. He stumbled, watching as the street beneath his feet began to transform. The asphalt was rapidly turning into metal grating, as though it were being eaten away.
"Not again..." Harry muttered. He had experienced this phenomenon several times before, but this time it felt different. Rather than moving from the real world into a nightmare, it was as if the real world itself had become the nightmare. Things were getting much worse, that much he knew.
All of his instincts screamed at him to get out of this town as fast as possible, but he couldn’t. He couldn’t abandon Cheryl. He had to rescue her from the dangers of this town, no matter what. At the marina, where pleasure boats and fishing vessels were moored, Harry spotted a brightly lit boat. There was someone inside.
"Cybil!" he shouted as he recognized the officer on the boat. Startled, she turned to face him. "How did you get here?" Harry asked.
"I came up the river by boat," she replied. "I saw a light on the ship and I thought it was you, but I guess I was the first one to arrive here."
"A boat? Why didn't I think of that?" Harry said, chuckling at the thought of all the trouble he’d gone through to get there. "But I’m glad to see you. I was worried about you," he added.
"That’s my line! Where did you disappear to? How did you get out from that hole in the store?"
Harry scratched his head, though his expression was serious.
"Well, it’s hard to explain... This may sound really off the wall, but hear me out."
"Go ahead," Cybil said.
"As I told you before, this town has two sides: the real world and the otherworld. The real world is our reality, and the otherworld is like another dimension. That otherworld is slowly encroaching on reality, and eventually, I think the entire town of Silent Hill will be swallowed up. For now, it’s like isolated pockets of darkness cropping up here and there and I must have fallen into one of those."
"Harry. Hold on a minute, I don’t get it. What is this darkness, and why is the town like this?"
Darkness... someone’s nightmarish delusion. Harry’s mind briefly entertained the idea that maybe it was his own nightmare, perhaps he was unconscious in some hospital’s ICU. But he didn’t have the heart to say it out loud. It was too far-fetched, and saying something like that would make him sound completely crazy.
"Look, I don’t understand it myself," Harry said, shaking his head. "It’s just a theory."
"The darkness is the demon's domain. All of this is the demon's doing. The source is the demon disguised as a girl," a voice suddenly interrupted, startling both Harry and Cybil. Moving like a shadow in the fog, Dahlia Gillespie had silently entered the boat's cabin.
"I’ve been watching all along. That demon has been lying dormant, devouring sacrifices and waiting for this day to come. And now, that time is almost upon us. There are two more seals left to complete the Mark of Samael, which will unite this town with the abyss where the demon resides. When that happens, the end will begin. The sun will be replaced by darkness, and the earth will be overrun by the dead. Martyrs will be consumed by the flames of hell, and everyone will die!" Dahlia proclaimed with eerie conviction.
Cybil, wary of the stranger, aimed her revolver at Dahlia. Harry quickly reached out and pushed the barrel of the gun down.
"Dahlia," Harry said, "you told me my daughter was about to be sacrificed. Does that have something to do with this darkness in town? Is she a sacrifice for some ritual to summon the demon? Is the drug ring involved in some black magic?"
Dahlia nodded. "Stop the girl who leads the evildoers before your daughter is sacrificed. Stop the demon. The demon disguised as the girl before it’s too late, before everything is lost."
"Where is this girl?" Harry asked.
"She’s trying to complete the last two Marks of Samael at the lighthouse and the amusement park. I don’t know which one she’ll go to first."
"So, I just have to go to one of those places?" Harry asked, turning to Cybil. "You heard her," he said. "Will you help me?"
Cybil looked exasperated but relented. "Harry, are you seriously going to believe this woman?"
"I have no choice but to believe her. So far, nothing she’s said has been completely wrong," Harry replied.
Cybil shrugged. "Fine. If there is a chance to save your daughter, I'm in. I’ll go ahead and check out the amusement park."
"Then, I’ll head to the lighthouse. Let’s meet up back here later, alright?" Harry suggested.
"Make haste, both of you," Dahlia said with a sinister smile as Harry and Cybil left the boat.
On a calm, sunny day, this lighthouse would have been a perfect vantage point, offering a panoramic view of the lake dotted with pleasure boats carrying fishermen and sailboats from windsurfers. But now, the once expansive lake, which could have been mistaken for a calm sea, was shrouded in fog and darkness. What was once a scenic spot had become a bleak overlook into the void. Harry entered the lighthouse, which stood tall at the tip of the marina, though much of its grandeur had been consumed by the encroaching darkness.
The spiral staircase inside seemed to stretch endlessly, as if it reached beyond the Earth’s atmosphere. By the time Harry reached the top, his legs were burning with exhaustion, muscles flooded with lactic acid. He finally arrived at what seemed to be the highest accessible level, though it wasn’t the very top where the lighthouse beacon should have been. Instead, it appeared to be an observation deck with panoramic windows offering a 360-degree view. Scattered throughout the area were coin-operated telescopes, but Harry had no desire to do any sightseeing.
As soon as he stepped inside, he froze.
The floor of the room was covered in a massive magical circle—an all-too-familiar symbol: the Mark of Samael. In the center of the circle stood a girl, her delicate, youthful face just as familiar. He had seen this girl many times before—Dahlia had called her the demon.
Stop her! You must stop her!
Dahlia's frantic voice echoed in Harry’s mind. His hands trembled as he raised his rifle, but he hesitated. He couldn't bring himself to pull the trigger.
The girl's gaze returned to him in silence, her eyes a clear, innocent blue. There was no hint of malice or malevolence, only a deep sorrow that tugged at Harry's heart. Her face bore a striking resemblance to Cheryl, and the realization struck him, clouding his judgment. In just a matter of years, Cheryl could very well grow to look just like this girl, a thought that pierced through him.
"Hey... are you..." Harry lowered his gun, his voice faltering. The words "Are you the demon?" stuck in his throat. Before he could finish, the girl’s figure began to fade, dissolving into the surrounding darkness.
"Wait!" Harry cried, reaching out, but his hands grasped only empty air.
A single droplet of something wet hit his shoulder, and then a sharp pain stung the back of his neck.
At the same moment, far away, Cybil was searching through the amusement park. As she passed beneath the towering Ferris wheel, she felt a sudden, sharp sensation on her back, like the bite of a mountain viper. For a brief moment, Cybil recalled a documentary she'd once seen on TV, but that was just a fleeting thought—she had no personal experience with snake bites, and there certainly weren’t any vipers in the northern part of the United States, far from the jungles of South America.
Something unsettling was spreading across her back. She reached frantically with both hands, trying to grab whatever it was, but she couldn’t reach. What began as a ticklish sensation quickly morphed into an intense itch, then a burning pain, before finally fading into numbness, as if her body had been injected with anesthetic.
Cybil's consciousness began to drift away into darkness.
Some minutes passed and Dahlia was nowhere to be seen at the boat they were supposed to meet at, and Cybil hadn’t returned yet either. Harry, growing more anxious by the minute, decided to head toward the amusement park to find her. His body felt lighter compared to when he had left the town center, though that was probably because he had used up most of his spare bullets. As eager as he was to get to the amusement park quickly, he had to move cautiously to avoid more encounters with these things. The fog and darkness ahead gradually revealed a large, looming shape.
It was the Ferris wheel.
Eventually, Harry reached the entrance of the amusement park. He walked past the ticket booth, now deserted, and entered. As soon as he stepped inside, a heavy, oppressive weight of darkness seemed to press down on his shoulders. The ground, once part of the amusement park’s cheerful landscape, had transformed into rusted wire fencing, and everything seemed decayed. Just as Dahlia had warned, the end was nearing.
The park, once filled with visitors, was now completely deserted. Yet, despite the eerie silence, Harry thought he could hear the faint sounds of merriment—children’s laughter, perhaps? It had to be his imagination. Whoosh—the wind whistling through the steel frame of the roller coaster. But then he heard it again, this time more distinct: a soft, high-pitched giggle.
Giggles.
Faint at first, but then growing clearer, echoing from somewhere beyond. Harry stared into the darkness where shapes, shadowy and indistinct, began to materialize and there were many of them.
This was no illusion.
They were small, childlike figures, transparent enough that Harry could see right through them. The giggles grew louder, more cheerful. These shadows were running, jumping, playing—they seemed like children. Harry couldn’t shake the haunting thought that these were the children's lost souls swallowed by the darkness of Silent Hill, unaware that they no longer belonged to the living world.
It was a melancholic, unsettling thought, but Harry couldn't afford to dwell on it. There was no guarantee that these shadows weren’t one of them dangerous creatures. If they were hostile, he wouldn’t stand a chance against this many. Reluctantly, he stopped just inside the entrance and observed them.
One of the shadows came running toward him. Before he could move out of the way, it passed straight through him, without resistance, like a gentle breeze brushing by. It had no real presence—it wasjust a ghost. It seemed they weren’t dangerous, at least for now. Harry cautiously continued forward, moving carefully between the playful shadows.
"Cybil," he called softly, not wanting to disturb the shadows any more than necessary.
By now, she should have arrived at the park, but the place was vast. Where could she be? Had she already found the girl? Despite everything, Harry wasn't worried about Cybil shooting the girl on sight. Cybil had been suspicious of Dahlia from the beginning and wouldn't simply take the old woman's word at face value. Harry wasn't concerned about Cybil's use of violence—his real worry was whether she had managed to keep the girl from slipping away. He felt certain that if they could just talk to her, she would lead them to Cheryl's whereabouts. With this hope in mind, his conviction remained unwavered.
The merry-go-round loomed ahead, its once cheerful wooden horses now still and shrouded in darkness. As Harry’s flashlight beam swept across the carousel, it caught a figure sitting sideways on one of the horses, slumped against the pole.
It was Cybil.
But she wasn’t sleeping; her eyes were wide open, staring blankly into the distance, at something beyond the fog and darkness. Her expression was empty, like a hollow shell.
"Cybil!?" Harry frowned in concern and hurried toward her.
The beam of his flashlight illuminated her face, which appeared pale and expressionless, almost like a death mask. As she squinted against the light and turned to look at Harry, her eyes were distant. She wasn’t really seeing him. Her gaze was cold and unfeeling, as though they were directed at a stranger—or worse, filled with hostility.
Cybil slid off the horse, her movements unnervingly slow. Her hand drifted to her waist, reaching for the gun in her holster. She drew the revolver and pointed it directly at Harry.
"Cybil, What are yo-" Harry’s words were cut off by the deafening sound of a gunshot. He froze, his body stiff with shock as the Magnum round whizzed past him, narrowly missing. He had only escaped injury because Cybil's aim had been careless, the shot fired with little precision.
The hostility in her eyes was undeniable, but they were also vacant. Her sluggish movements made her seem as if she were being controlled—like her body was being manipulated by something that wasn’t fully accustomed to it yet. Harry turned on his heel and ran. In a normal fight, his rifle would give him an advantage, but he couldn’t bring himself to shoot Cybil.
Killing her was out of the question.
As he ran, more bullets pinged off the ground around his feet. He dashed to the other side of the merry-go-round and paused to assess the situation. He couldn’t kill Cybil, but leaving her like this wasn’t an option either. There was something unsettlingly familiar about her behavior—her vacant stare, the way she moved—it reminded him of the nurses and doctors from Alchemilla Hospital. Was she being controlled by the same parasite-like creature?
Except Cybil wasn’t hunched over. There was no sign of the camal-like hump clinging to her back. And more importantly, there was no white noise. The nurses and doctors had completely merged with the parasites that was controlling them, while Cybil, if she was possessed, hadn’t reached that stage yet.
She was still human.
This realization only made it harder for Harry to decide what to do. He couldn’t kill her, but if he didn’t do something, he would...
Harry clutched his rifle tightly, palms damp with sweat. Beads of perspiration trickled down his forehead, dripping onto his face. After a tense moment of consideration, Harry made his choice. He gently set the rifle down, leaning it against one of the nearby wooden frames. The flashlight taped to the barrel cast a faint glow in the direction he had come from. Harry crouched behind one of the horses a short distance away, taking cover. Her footsteps echoed across the floor—slow, methodical, lacking vitality that of the living. Cybil stepped into the beam, her revolver raised and ready. A gunshot echoed through the air, but it fell short of its target.
It was her third shot.
Four... five... six...
Click.
Finally, Cybil’s revolver emitted only the sound of the hammer falling.
Click, click...
Whoever or whatever was controlling Cybil, they continued to pull the trigger as if mindlessly repeating the same action, unable to understand that the chamber was empty.
Harry leaped from his hiding place.
"I'm sorry, Cybil," he said, striking her in the solar plexus.
Cybil let out a short groan and collapsed to the floor, unable to move. Something like an engorged leech was clinging to her neck, resembling a grotesque version of a bloated tick. It was much smaller compared to the nurses or doctors Harry had encountered—a monster in its larval stage, so to speak.
He tried to peel it off with his hands, but it only stretched grotesquely, refusing to come off.
"Flauros... It is the silence of purgatory, the force that shatters the walls of twilight and obstructs the grievances of the mire."
The words Dahlia had spoken resurfaced in Harry’s mind.
He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out two items: a pyramid-shaped object and a bottle containing a red liquid. Dahlia had given him the pyramid, but he had no idea how to use it. He looked at the other item—the same one Kaufmann had held so carefully. Could it be effective against this parasite? Yet, if it harmed the creature, wouldn't it be harmful to her as well?.
What should he do?
There were no better ideas. He decided to try just a little.
Harry opened the bottle and cautiously poured the red liquid onto Cybil’s neck. If it didn’t work, he would have to give up on her. But...
"Ah!"
Cybil’s expression twisted, her brow furrowing as though something was burning her. Although she arched in pain, it wasn’t her own pain but a sensation transmitted from the creature latched onto her—a mere illusion. The small creature’s body convulsed and pulsated, trembling violently.
A scream escaped from Cybil’s mouth.
The monster, which had clung so tightly, peeled off and detached from her neck, wriggling away like a slimy mollusk, crawling across the floor and escaping outside the carousel.
Harry decided not to deliver the final strike to the dying monster, as the thought of doing so felt repulsive to him. Instead, he turned his attention to Cybil.
"Hey, Cybil! Get a hold of yourself!"
Cybil opened her eyes faintly, her face still dazed.
"Harry... What happened...?"
"Nothing, it’s all fine now."
"I was walking around the amusement park... then suddenly, I just..."
"Hey, don’t talk. Just lie down here."
Leaving Cybil where she was, Harry stood up and turned his gaze beyond the carousel. He sensed something—or someone—had appeared.
There was a girl.
She stood alone in the darkness.
Even though Harry hadn’t picked up the flashlight attached to his rifle, he could see her clearly, as if it were daylight. She wasn’t human, after all. Was she the demon Dahlia had spoken of?
Grabbing his rifle from the wooden horse, Harry spoke.
"I’ve figured you show up."
He stepped off the carousel and walked toward the girl.
"I don’t care what you are or what you are trying to do. I only have one question—where is my daughter? You know where Cheryl is, don’t you?"
The girl remained silent.
She stared straight at him, her eyes speaking words that Harry couldn’t understand. He slowly approached, closing the distance. She was right in front of him now. This time, he wouldn’t let her escape, not without revealing of Cheryl’s whereabouts.
The girl raised her arm and pointed at him.
What?
A force erupted from the girl’s fingertip, flinging Harry backward. He tumbled to the ground, crashing onto the metal mesh that covered the ground. It felt as if he had been struck by a violent wind, but he didn’t give up—his determination to find his child kept him going. He rose to his feet and charged at her again, ready to catch her by force if necessary.
But once more, he was thrown back, blocked by something unseen. It was like an invisible wall—a barrier protecting the girl and repelling anyone who tried to approach.
"Damn!,"
Harry muttered, biting his lip, glaring at the girl with a mixture of anger and desperation. His growing hatred for her mirrored the intensity of his love for his daughter, as if darkness were seeping into his heart.
Responding to his emotions, something began to glow.
A mysterious light seeped from his jacket pocket. He pulled out the object—it was the pyramid-shaped artifact. Softly, the pyramid floated out of Harry’s hand, rising into the air by itself. It began to spin, and from each of its sides, blades of light shot out like swords, piercing the girl.
With a scream, the girl crumpled to the ground, while a loud, triumphant laugh echoed around them.
"The power of the magical artifact, Flauros! It slices through and breaks the barrier!"
Appearing with a victorious smile was none other than Dahlia Gillespie.
"We meet at last, Alessa."
“Alessa...?”
Dahlia called the girl by that name with a tone of familiarity, as though addressing her own child. She gazed at her with an affectionate look, but in the next instant, her eyes turned angry as she roughly grabbed Alessa by the collar and pulled her to her feet.
"Enough of this little game of yours. It’s time to go home."
"Mama, let go! Get away from me."
No! No!
Alessa struggled, shaking her body to resist.
Mom?
Harry was confused.
"What’s going on, Dahlia? Is that girl your daughter? Isn’t she the demon who kidnapped Cheryl?" Dahlia ignored his question entirely, not even bothering to look back at him. She raised her arm, pointing at him with her finger. Be quiet—that was the message her gesture conveyed, and a weak but sufficient power emitted from her fingertip, binding Harry and silencing him.
"Mommy didn't know how much you’ve grown," Dahlia said, smiling once more at Alessa. "You tried to escape from the curse by forming Metatron’s Seal across the town, but even with the power of the barrier protecting your soul, I couldn’t capture you all by myself. But then, your other half—the other part of you—sought that man’s help. You gave me the opening I needed. Afterall this little game of yours, you’re still but a little girl."
Her smile turned wicked.
"Now, let’s go. You still have your important duty to do—as the Holy Mother."
Dragging her daughter with her, Dahlia and Alessa disappeared into the darkness.
"Wait!"
Freed from the invisible bonds, Harry tried to chase after them, but a sudden dizziness overwhelmed him. His vision distorted as if he were seeing...
"Harry?"
Cybil’s voice came from somewhere far away. It seemed she had recovered from the damage caused by the parasite. Mustering all his strength, Harry shouted back.
"Hospital, Cybil... Alchemilla..."
It was as he expected. Harry had been brought back to the hospital room. From the amusement park to this place, he had been brought here in an instant by some incomprehensible phenomenon. Lisa was there but she looked even paler than before. She didn’t even seem to register that Harry had returned.
“Harry...Listen to me, ever since we talked, something you said before has been bothering me... I feel like it was stuck in the back of my mind, and I can’t shake off the feeling,” Lisa said in a low, sorrowful voice.
“Even though I was scared as hell, I went down to the basement. The hidden room you had told me about. And I felt something weird... like I’d seen it before, even though I’d never been there... Oh, Harry, help me. I'm so scared. I can’t bear it, it’s too horrifying.”
She clung to Harry, trembling. Tears wet her cheeks. Harry gently embraced her.
“What’s wrong, Lisa? What happened?”
“I... I think I get it now, why all the hospital staff died... why I’m still here even though everyone else is dead... or why I thought I was the only one that was still walking around...”
Her tears began to turn the color of blood.
“No... I wasn’t alive at all. I’m the same as them... I just hadn't noticed it before...”
Blood started to pour from a crack in her forehead. Several streams of crimson blood covered Lisa’s face.
“Lisa!”
Harry gasped, but the shock didn’t end there.
Her beautiful blue eyes turned a decayed black. Her once full cheeks hollowed like those of an old woman, transforming her into a skeletal visage.
In a panic, Harry shoved Lisa away from him.
In a sorrowful voice, she said, “Stay by me, Harry…… Please…….I’m so scared……Help me…..Save me from them.”
She moved closer, trying to cling to him again.
Harry ran out of the examination room and shut the door behind him. He stood there, frozen, with his back against the door.
"Please......Harry..."
Harry heard the mournful sobs on the other side of the door. That was once the voice of Lisa, now filled with deep anguish. She was already gone, had been gone all along. As a dead person, her spirit remained trapped in this place, unable to ever leave the hospital.
"My name is Lisa Garland. But you can call me Lisa for short," he remembered her cheerful smile from the first time they met—a beautiful, comforting woman. Yet now, Harry, not being a priest, couldn’t save her soul. Not even putting her to rest with a bullet would make any difference. His powerless fury turned toward Dahlia Gillespie. He couldn't resist the urge to unleash his anger on her. Dahlia had warranted his wrath.
He had been completely deceived.
That girl, Alessa, wasn’t a demon after all. Dahlia was the true demon. Somehow, Harry had been manipulated, used to capture her runaway daughter. If that was the case, Cheryl must also be imprisoned by Dahlia. She and Alessa were likely intended to be sacrifices, part of some dark ritual.
A wild suspicion crossed Harry’s mind.
Could Dahlia be the cause of all the strange events in Silent Hill?
And was Lisa also a victim of it...?
For the first time in his life, Harry felt the desire to kill a human being. A dark, burning hatred welled up inside him. He wanted to recreate every atrocity committed by violent criminals on Dahlia herself. He was drowning in a heavy, suffocating rage.
However, the memory of his late wife, Jodie, brought him back from that darkness.
The memory of her gentle smile as she lay in the hospital bed, just before she passed away, lingered in his mind. "Forget him," she had whispered, a message he later understood was her plea for him to let go of his personal vendetta and the sorrow that had consumed him. That realization had enabled him to channel his anger into something meaningful, writing a book that exposed crimes and earned him acclaim as an author. And now, once more, Jodie's reassuring smile was soothing him, urging him to concentrate solely on saving Cheryl.
As Harry’s heart quieted, the sobbing from the examination room also grew quieter.
Could even the dead cry themselves to exhaustion? Harry hoped that, in her exhaustion, Lisa might find a moment of peace. He offered a silent prayer for her and left the room.
The hallway on the first floor was almost entirely in ruins. The mesh panels had fallen away, revealing a gaping abyss beneath. There was only one place left to go from the examination room. An elevator, its doors open as if beckoning him, awaited with hidden malice. Even if it was a trap, Harry was ready to step into it. He was convinced that the answers to all the mysteries, and the key to saving Cheryl, lay somewhere in Alchemilla Hospital. With that in mind, he took a deep breath and entered the elevator.
It seemed that this “corrosion of darkness” Dahlia had spoken of had progressed even further. The hospital now looked different from when Harry had last visited. The corridor where the elevator opened was lined with gray doors. The walls and the mesh flooring seemed as if they had been scorched by fire and turned to ash... as if the decay had deepened, leaving everything else faded.
Moreover, the structure of the hospital itself had changed. It gave Harry the impression that the place had been altered by some misremembered version of reality. The winding hallways seemed to stretch beyond the hospital's boundaries. In fact, when Harry descended into the basement, he suddenly found himself inside a classroom from Midwich Elementary School, and he was stunned. There was just one desk in the room, its surface marred by hateful graffiti like “Die” and “Witch”—words eerily similar to the ones the children in his motel nightmare had chanted as they tormented the girl.
On the floor lay old, yellowed newspaper clippings. One headline caught Harry’s eye:
"Six Homes Burn Down"
"Charred Body of Alessa Gillespie (Age 7) Found In The Aftermath"
Harry was confused. Alessa died at age seven? That girl he’d seen appeared to be a young teenager, not a seven-year-old. He felt like he had stumbled into a completely different world. His head was spinning. The entire hospital was in complete disarray. Things that should have been physically impossible were happening. Yet, within someone's imagination, such changes would be easy to conceive.
If this place was the product of someone's thoughts...
Was the “corrosion of darkness” simply just a nightmare?
The thought that had unsettled Harry so many times before now resurfaced. Was this all just a dream of his—one he was having while unconscious after the car accident? No, that was merely a form of his own escapism, a way to avoid accepting the bizarre reality before him. It was a weakness, a refusal to face the truth.
Scolding himself, Harry pressed on, navigating the maze-like hospital and checking each room. One room, in particular, stood out. It was a windowless, cramped space, with nothing but a single table in the corner. A bare lightbulb hung from the ceiling. Shining his flashlight around the room, Harry felt a chill run down his spine.
It was a room of madness.
The walls and floors were covered in scribbles. They were filled with symbols and words—derogatory phrases and curse-like sentences, similar to what he had seen scratched into the desk in the classroom. The confined space had an oppressive atmosphere, made worse by the disturbing weight of the words. It seemed as though someone had been trapped here for a long time. Perhaps a mentally unstable patient? But would the hospital really use such a windowless, oppressive space as a patient room?
Then a thought struck Harry. If this hospital was indeed of someone’s creation—if it was a fusion of reality and a dream overlaid together—then this room might also be a reflection of someone’s mental state.
Startled, Harry swung his flashlight toward the corner of the room.
He heard sobbing.
In a room that had seemed empty, there was now a girl, huddled under the table with her back to him.
“Alessa?” he called out.
No, it wasn’t her. This girl was younger. Could it be...?
“Cheryl?!”
But the girl faded. She neither responded nor turned around. She simply vanished.
Harry blinked. Was it just an illusion?
Maybe she had slipped out in the darkness and he had simply failed to notice. However, when he looked down the hallway, there was no sign of the girl. He would have to continue searching in the other rooms.
A dry, metallic sound echoed down the mesh-lined corridor. Harry wasn’t alone. Could it be a nurse? Or maybe a doctor? The static noise began to grow louder, and Harry, in a panic, quickly tried the doors lining the hallway, one after another. Finally, one opened, and he ducked inside to hide.
The room had a television in it. While a TV was a standard fixture in any hospital room, finding one with a VCR hooked up to it wasn’t as common. This was probably a VIP room. Both the television and VCR were powered on, and a video tape had already been inserted. It was as if the master of this nightmare was urging him to watch it. Without hesitation, Harry pressed the play button.
The footage resembled a personal video diary. The voice, familiar to him, belonged to a woman sitting in a chair, head bowed as she spoke to the camera. It was Lisa.
“...Why? She still has an unusually high fever... she still won’t wake up... She’s just barely breathing with the IV...”
“...Most of her skin is burned beyond recognition! No matter how many times I change the bandages, the blood and pus just starting oozing through almost immediately! Why... What is keeping that child alive?”
Burned?
Harry recalled Lisa mentioning that Dahlia had lost her child in a fire. The newspaper headline... the article about Alessa’s death...
Could it be that the supposedly dead Alessa was secretly being treated at the hospital?
But why? And for what?
“I .... can't stand it any longer... I begged the doctor to take me off her case. It’s too weird... she’s still alive... but her wounds won’t heal.”
“I told the doctor I’m quitting. I can’t work at that hospital anymore.”
Harry thought of Dr. Kaufmann. As the hospital’s director, he could certainly order secret treatments like this.
“Blood and pus are flowing from the bathroom faucet. I can’t stop it, no matter what I do...”
“I feel sick... I’ve vomited so much there’s nothing left. Not even bile...”
“I can’t take it anymore. I won’t tell a soul. I promise. So please... just let me go...”
“I need drugs...”
"Someone.....please"
".....Help me....."
Her final words were barely audible, her voice hoarse and weak. The video gave the impression that Lisa had become addicted to some type of drugs. On the screen, her pale, emaciated face twisted in agony before she collapsed out of the frame. After that, the camera continued to record the room’s wall until the tape ended in a burst of static.
Harry had seen something truly awful.
A heavy, oppressive feeling settled over him.
Was this a record of Lisa’s death? Why show him this? What was the nightmare’s master trying to say?
No, it wasn’t about Lisa herself.
They wanted him to know about “that child” Lisa had spoken about.
The child who had been found as a burned corpse.
The child who, despite that, had been kept alive in the hospital.
The child who had appeared to him as a beautiful young girl.
The child who called Dahlia “Mama.”
Was that child Alessa? The nightmare master, is that you Alessa?
After wandering through the maze of stairs, Harry eventually found himself back on the first floor. The room at the far end of the hall was different from the bizarre storage-like room from before. This space was something else entirely—unlike anything that should belong in a hospital.
It was a child’s bedroom.
The sense of déjà vu Harry felt upon entering wasn’t mild—it was overwhelming. This wasn’t just déjà vu. Harry was utterly bewildered. It felt as if he had come home. The room was an exact replica of Cheryl’s bedroom. The bed, the desk, the bookshelf, the butterfly specimen hanging on the wall, even the clothes in the closet—everything was the same. Scattered on the floor were pages from a sketchbook, drawn in a style that unmistakably resembled Cheryl’s own.
Tears welled up in Harry’s eyes. The familiar scent of the room triggered a flood of emotions—memories of his daughter, sorrow, and longing. He fell to the floor, sobbing uncontrollably. For a while, he lay there, shoulders shaking with grief. Through his tear-blurred vision, he noticed a blue dress hanging on the wall. It looked exactly like the one Alessa had worn, but smaller. It would fit a seven-year-old Cheryl perfectly. Yet Harry didn’t recall ever buying such a dress for his daughter.
There were other discrepancies, too. Regaining some composure, Harry got up and walked over to investigate. Where there should have been a window, a south-facing one that looked out over the backyard, there was instead a door.
A rusted steel door.
It looked as if it was sealing away some dark secret.
With a creak, Harry opened the door.
A gust of wind blew from behind the door. Harry felt the pressure, yet his hair didn’t stir, nor did his jacket or pants flap. It wasn’t a physical wind, but one blowing through his mind. The force of it brought a flood of thoughts, a chaotic swirl of emotions, overwhelming his senses.
"Everything is going according to plan. It has been sheltered in her womb."
Several images began to played out in Harry’s mind, as if they were his own memories. He saw Dahlia Gillespie speaking with three men in a hospital room—the same room where Alessa’s picture frame had been. Alessa lay in bed, surrounded by the men, one of whom was Dr. Kaufmann.
"But it’s not done yet. Half of the soul is lost. Without it, the seed will lie dormant."
"And what soul remains has retreated deep within that husk, deep down within the consciousness and clinging to the seed."
"This girl is really determined to prevent the god’s birth, isn’t she?"
"She must have released half of her soul as an emergency escape. If one destined to become the holy mother dies, the god cannot be born. But she’s trapped in a body where death isn’t even possible."
"So she’s useless to us? That wasn’t the deal!"
"No. No. These are just stalling tactics. She’s barely suppressing the power. With our help, we can draw it out. Have faith, the promise shall not be broken."
"You’d better not be lying. And the PTV arrangement?"
"It is done."
"Do not betray us."
"Still... witihin this state, the power we can draw out now will be very weak; almost nothing. We need to find the missing piece of the soul..."
"We’ll use this spell. The child's pain will draw it back. The soul that fled will return."
"But that will take time."
"For the creation of paradise, no time is too much."
The conversation made it clear that Dahlia and Kaufmann were deeply connected, and that they were involved in drug trafficking ring. Harry’s anger toward Kaufmann flared, but it was his disgust toward Dahlia that overwhelmed him. Dahlia’s smile was so cold, it sickened him. There was no concern for her daughter, no love in her eyes—just the cold gaze of a researcher studying a test subject. Could she really be subjecting her own child to black magic? The horrifying thought sent shivers down Harry’s spine. Suddenly, he was overcome by intense pain, a new vision seizing him.
Mama!
Mama, it’s so hot!
Mama, please, help me!
Flames roared, engulfing the house. Alessa’s screams echoed in his mind. Her skin blistered and burned, and Harry felt so much of her agony—so vivid that her pain became his own. The searing touch forced him to the ground, writhing in torment. The mental onslaught was nothing but pain and suffering. Her memories flooded his mind, threatening to drive him mad.
I have to get out!
Desperate to flee the torment, Harry tried to turn back, but his disoriented mind couldn’t distinguish front from back, and he couldn’t find the door he had entered.
Daddy.
A voice called to him.
Daddy, this way.
It was Cheryl’s voice. A cool, soothing wind blew, dispelling the chaos and pain swirling in Harry’s mind. He saw a flash of the first time he’d met Cheryl, back when she was still an unnamed baby, smiling innocently.
"Oh you poor thing. Who could have abandoned her like this?"
"Whoever it was, they weren’t much good. But... looking at such a beautiful baby, they must’ve had their reasons..."
"Still, leaving her outside like this... It's a miracle we found her by chance."
"Maybe, it wasn’t by chance. Maybe, it was meant to be fate."
"What?"
"God sent her to us."
"Oh? Coming from you, that sounds strange."
"Would you mind raising her together with me?"
"Of course not. I’ve wanted to hold her forever... I’ll never let her go."
The voices were of Harry and his late wife, Jodie. They had been childless due to Jodie’s illness, and for years, their weekends had been filled with dates and outings. Seven years ago, during one of Jodie’s cherished picnics, they had found Cheryl abandoned near a cemetery.
But why were Alessa’s memories mingled with Cheryl’s? Harry leaned on the wall for support as he shakily stood. He had been saved. Saved by the very daughter he needed to rescue.
"Thank you," Harry whispered to the Cheryl in his heart.
You saved me before.
Now it's my turn.
Daddy's coming to get you. Wait for me.
Harry continued down the corridor, now noticing that it was no longer made of mesh, but ordinary wooden boards. The darkness had lifted, and he found himself in a typical house, walking along a hallway leading to the basement. Ahead, on the landing, he saw a mother and daughter arguing.
"No! I don’t want to!"
"Do as you’re told!"
"I just want you to lend me a teeny bit of your power... lend it to Mommy, that’s all I ask."
"I don’t want to do it!"
"It’s for your own good. You’ll be happy. Don’t you want to show them they were wrong?"
It was Dahlia and a young Alessa. Realizing it was another vision, Harry understood it was only an illusion. He watched as schoolchildren taunted Alessa, calling her a witch, carving insults into her desk, spitting into her food, poking her with pencils, and throwing dirty water at her.
"If you become the Holy Mother, the bride of God, no one will ever mock you again. They’ll stop treating us like outcasts."
"I’m happy just by being with you, Mama. I don’t want anything more. Please..."
Dahlia sighed, looking down at Alessa with an annoyed expression.
"Fine... I was wrong."
"You understand now?"
"Yes, I understand. Why didn’t I see it sooner? It doesn’t have to be me... the one with enough power for the resurrection is right here! I should’ve done it all myself!"
"Mama?"
Alessa looked at Dahlia in confusion, but Dahlia’s smile glowed with fanatical zeal.
The illusion vanished. Darkness returned, and Harry found himself descending a seemingly endless staircase. Finally, a door appeared ahead of him, radiating an eerie presence.
This was it.
The heart of everything.
The darkness, the nightmare, the tragedy.
All of it.
Beyond the door, candles flickered on candelabras. Several of them surrounded a magic circle and the girl within. It was the same scene Harry had glimpsed in the school's boiler room— a girl strapped into a wheelchair, gagged and bound in a straitjacket. And beside her was another...
The foul stench of evil filled the room, burning Harry’s throat and nostrils, making him feel as if his lungs might rot away. His claustrophobia surged, overwhelming him with the urge to flee. Yet, something pulled him toward the center of the room, as if he were being drawn into an abyss.
“Well, well. To think you'd make it all the way here!”
From outside the circle of candles, Dahlia Gillespie greeted him with a sly, twisted smile. Though she expressed surprise at Harry’s intrusion, there was no shock in her voice—only amusement.
Harry aimed his rifle at her brazen face.
“Where’s Cheryl? What have you done to her!?”
“Oh, you still haven’t figured it out? Even after meeting her so many times.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Don't you see? She’s right there.”
Dahlia nodded toward the center of the circle, where the two girls stood—one strapped into the wheelchair, the other standing nearby, her expression drained of all vitality.
Harry couldn’t comprehend what he was seeing. Both girls were clearly older than Cheryl. The one in the wheelchair looked emaciated, her face deathly pale, bearing no resemblance to his daughter. As for the other girl... she was unmistakably Alessa.
“I'm not in the mood for jokes!”
“Would I, a servant of God, ever jest?”
“You’re a liar!”
“I’ve never lied. I simply didn’t tell you everything. You were the one who jumped to conclusions.”
“You’re the real demon here!”
“Those who deny my God are the true demons. Alessa tried to flee, rejecting her destiny.”
“What did you do to her? She’s your own child!”
“She was destined to fulfill her role as the Holy Mother. My blood flows through her, and she was born with extraordinary power—far more powerful than mine. That’s why she was chosen to bear the Great God and bring forth a new world, transforming this old one.”
Dahlia was lost in self-righteous ecstasy, preaching as though speaking to an invisible audience. From the dark silence around them, Harry thought he could hear the murmur of countless voices, the sound of thunderous applause. It sent chills down his spine.
The "Great God" she spoke of, the one aiming to reshape and destroy the world, could only be some kind of malevolent deity. Did Dahlia offered her own daughter to this being? Was she really working with Kaufmann to use Alessa in some crazed black magic ritual? Harry felt sick. Compared to every criminal he’d interviewed for his work, this was the most horrifying.
No, it was beyond insane!
“And yet, Alessa ran away. Foolishly, she rejected the joy of bearing the god and used her divine power to cast part of her soul far away, hiding it in another body and pretending to be someone else. It’s been a long seven years. But we, the cult, have been patient, casting our spells on her all this time, waiting for her runaway soul to return. And now, at last, it has! Finally, the Great God can be born.”
“Wait!”
Harry’s voice was filled with anger.
“Another body? Pretending to be someone else? Are you saying Cheryl is—”
Dahlia laughed mockingly.
“Slow as ever, aren't you? You’re only now just figuring it out?”
“You...bitch!”
Harry didn’t believe her. Alessa’s soul splitting off and becoming Cheryl—how could anyone believe something so absurd? Yet, even as rage shook his body, some part of him began to understand. Cheryl, the girl he had loved and raised, might have been entangled in this plot from the very start.
“The complete soul has now returned to Alessa. She will bear the Great God and become the Holy Mother, the savior of this world! The old world will be reborn, and everyone will be freed from their suffering! On this promised day, all sins will be washed away, and the true paradise will come!”
As Dahlia chanted a twisted incantation in a vile, harsh tone, something unbelievable happened. The two girls were enveloped in a strange light and began to merge. Alessa’s form shimmered like a mirage as she melded into the body of the girl in the wheelchair, absorbed into her. Harry's rage dissipated as he stood there, his intent to kill Dahlia vanished, utterly bewildered. His rifle drooped, the barrel aimed harmlessly at the ground, while he watched in stunned amazement at the bizarre spectacle unfolding before him.
He hadn't noticed the presence of another figure until they spoke.
“A true paradise? Is this messed-up town, your idea of paradise? What a fucking joke! Who would even wish for this? You used me!”
It was Kaufmann, shouting.
“You…” Harry now aimed his rifle at Kaufmann. He was in league with Dahlia. Though they seemed to be at odds now, Harry knew better than to lower his guard.
Kaufmann glared at Harry.
“You’re going to defend her? That madwoman tortured her own daughter for seven years, all to realize her delusional grandeur plan, and now this is the result. Alessa’s been trapped in a nightmare, and that’s why Silent Hill has turned into this chaotic mess.”
“You were all too eager to cooperate,” Dahlia sneered.
“When the cult offered you the oppertunity to control the drug trade, you eagerly accepted, wagging your tail like a dog. You went so far as to arrange for fake death certificates and prepared bodies. You got the nurse addicted to PTV, all while keeping your own hands clean.”
“You shut up!” Kaufmann’s gun fired.
For a moment, the room lit up in a ghostly blue light, followed by a red stain blooming on Dahlia’s chest. She collapsed to the floor, groaning, but it wasn’t a fatal wound.
“How foolish you are. Killing me now won’t change anything… It’s far too late,” she sneered through her pain.
Kaufmann smirked back.
“Oh, really? Still think you’re in control? Let’s see how you handle this!” He pulled out the small red vial—the same one hidden in the motorcycle at the motel garage.
Dahlia’s eyes widened.
“Aglophotis?! No… I thought I got rid all of it!”
“You’re an idiot. You think I’d come here without a backup plan? This ends here!”
Kaufmann uncorked the vial and poured the red liquid over the girl in the wheelchair.
Dahlia screamed, her face twisting in a grotesque fury.
“Stop it! No!”
Kaufmann grinned.
“Take that! Now the demon inside her is finished. Your little dream is over!”
But his triumphant smile quickly faded as the light around the girl only grew stronger, brighter. Something was emerging from the radiating light.
“That liquid… wasn’t it supposed to exorcise the demon?” Harry asked, still staring at the girl.
Kaufmann, equally stunned, nodded.
“Yes… It should have… This isn’t how it’s supposed to go…”
The red liquid, Aglophotis, was supposed to be the ace in the hole, a holy substance capable of vanquishing demons—Kaufmann had been confident. Harry was sure of it too. He had seen the liquid’s effects when he used it on Cybil, so why wasn’t it working now? Was the demon in the girl too powerful, or perhaps they hadn’t used enough?
Harry fumbled through his pockets for his own vial of the red liquid. If he poured more of it on the girl, maybe—just maybe—he could save Alessa, just as he had saved Cybil.
But it was too late. Before Harry could act, the light around the girl exploded, supernova-like, blowing out all the candles in the room. Harry and Kaufmann shielded their eyes from the blinding light, feeling an odd, unsettling force push through their bodies as the blast wave passed by. As the light faded, an impossible sight emerged above them. A swirling mass of black clouds, thick like tar, coalesced on the ceiling, crackling with lightning that dimly illuminated the room.
And in the center of the magic circle stood a terrifying figure.
It had a humanoid form, but with a grotesque face, horns protruding from its forehead, and hooves for feet. From its back extended grotesque wings—a twisted amalgamation of skin, feathers, and insect-like membranes that defied any logical structure.
A demon.
“Is this… the God Dahlia spoke of?” Harry muttered.
“No,” Dahlia replied bitterly. “This… this is just a lesser demon… My God… is far more magnificent…”
“This is ‘lesser’?” Harry was dumbfounded. Though Dahlia’s plan had clearly failed, the creature before them was still a horrifying abomination. The Aglophotis had disrupted the ritual but wasn’t powerful enough to completely exorcise the demon. Instead, they were left with this half-summoned, monstrous entity.
Kaufmann, terrified, took slow steps back before turning and fleeing. But the demon wasn’t about to let him escape. A flash of lightning tore through the air, one bolt landing in front of Kaufmann, blocking his exit, while the other struck Dahlia. The woman who had summoned the demon was now burned alive by its lightning, her body convulsing as her own creation consumed her.
Harry knew there was no way out. He gripped his rifle tightly. If defeating this demon was the only way to save Cheryl, then so be it. Even if it cost him his life, he would see this through.
“She’s gone… Cheryl and Alessa have become one…” Dahlia’s words echoed in his mind. Cheryl, the daughter he had loved, had been used in some grotesque ritual, her fate entangled with that of Alessa. No matter what, Harry couldn’t accept this. He had to get her back.
“No… I’ll get her back, whatever it takes!” Harry growled. He fired his rifle, the bullets sinking into the demon’s flesh.
The creature barely flinched, glaring at Harry with its eyes full of malice. Reloading as quickly as he could, Harry dodged a bolt of lightning, narrowly avoiding the demon’s attack. But he noticed something—the demon wasn’t moving from its position.
“It can’t leave the circle…” Harry realized. The botched summoning had bound the demon to the magic circle.
This was their chance. He needed help.
“Kaufmann!” Harry called out. “Get up! We can take this thing down together!”
There was no answer. Kaufmann had collapsed, unconscious from the shock of the lightning strike. He was out cold, leaving Harry to fight alone. Cursing under his breath, Harry kept firing, dodging the demon’s relentless attacks. But his ammunition was running low. Just as he feared all hope was lost, a familiar voice rang out.
“Sorry to keep you waiting!”
The sound of gunfire followed. Cybil Bennett had arrived, her revolver blazing. She had finally caught up to him. The demon recoiled as her bullets struck it, pushing it back. Harry couldn’t help but admire her resolve for a moment, quickly reloading his rifle.
“You’re late!” he shouted.
“Stopped by the station for some more ammo,” she replied coolly.
“He’s throwing lightning! Watch yourself!”
“I’ve seen it,” she shot back, steady in her aim.
Together, their bullets tore into the demon’s body, black blood spraying from the wounds. Chunks of its flesh fell to the floor, evaporating into nothing. Just when it seemed they were winning, their ammunition ran out. Both Harry and Cybil were out of bullets. The demon, still standing, began to gather its strength. Lightning crackled through the dark clouds above, growing more and more intense. The air was thick with the smell of ozone as the creature prepared to unleash its full power.
Harry clenched his fists, ready to face the end. But just as the demon was about to strike, its form began to fade. The demon’s body flickered, becoming transparent before vanishing entirely into the darkness. Harry and Cybil exchanged confused glances.
Then, a voice echoed in their minds—the voice of a girl.
“The demon couldn’t stay in this world for long… That’s why my mother wanted me to give birth to it.”
Harry turned and saw the girl—Alessa—no longer bound to the wheelchair, no longer glowing with unnatural light. She stood before them, bathed in a pure, serene glow.
“This place… will collapse soon. It’s a world created from my nightmare.”
Harry stepped forward, seeing something familiar in her sad smile.
“Cheryl?”
The girl reached out to him, but what she offered him wasn’t herself—it was a baby.
A pure, innocent baby, smiling just like the first time Harry had laid eyes on Cheryl.
“Daddy…”
Her voice was soft, pleading, as if asking him to take care of what mattered most to her. Tears filled Harry’s eyes as he took the baby into his arms. It felt like he was holding Cheryl’s heart, her essence. He held her tightly, sobbing. The room shook violently as the building began to collapse. Fire, born from the demon’s lightning, spread throughout the room.
The nightmare was near its end.
"Harry, we’ve got to go!"
Cybil grabbed Harry's arm, urging him forward.
"We need to get out of here—now!"
"But... Cheryl... Alessa..." Harry muttered.
The girl shook her head gently, acknowledging her fading life with a calm expression. Harry looked into her eyes, ready to speak again, but stopped, only gazing at her in silence. The girl returned his gaze with eyes devoid of emotion, yet deep within those icy blue depths, Harry sensed something familiar—a warmth that tugged at his heart.
I love you, daddy.
Cheryl's voice echoed in his mind.
Harry nodded, tears welling in his eyes.
The girl pointed toward the exit, guiding him and Cybil, leading them—and the new life he held—to safety.
Sparks rained down from the collapsing ceiling, and sections of the grated floor began to fall away into the dark abyss below. They had no choice but to leave. Steeling himself against the lingering sorrow, Harry turned toward the exit, with the girl watching them vanish into the light beyond the darkness.
"Wait for me!"
Kaufmann had regained consciousness. He cautiously avoided the gaping holes in the floor, shrieking as fiery embers fell around him. Desperately, he chased after Harry and Cybil, trying to keep up.
"Don’t leave me behind!"
A whisper echoed in his ear.
Someone clung to him from behind, holding him back.
"You..." Kaufmann turned his head, and his blood ran cold.
It was Lisa Garland—the nurse who had been forced into addiction and used to secretly care for Alessa, eventually dying from the torment she'd endured.
"You will stay here with me..." Lisa’s quiet, haunting voice whispered as her decayed breath washed over him.
"No! Let me go!" Kaufmann struggled in vain, but against the grip of a vengeful spirit, his efforts were futile. Lisa dragged her former master with her, pulling him toward the edge where the floor had collapsed—into the abyss, into hell. His screams echoed as he fell.
Harry kept running, holding the baby close, with Cybil by his side.
The town of Silent Hill was still shrouded in fog, but the darkness—the creeping evil—was no longer there.
The warm, living child in his arms was his reclaimed hope.
I will raise this child with love
Harry vowed silently to Cheryl’s memory.
I will create the home that she deserved.
With that promise, he ran down the centerline of the street, toward the future that awaited them.
Maybe someday, someone might take notice. Until then, I’ll write down all the things that have happened here.