Our family’s ancestral rules forbid opening coffins. Anyone who does will die a violent death.
But my father didn’t believe in that nonsense, and secretly opened my great-grandfather’s coffin.
The next day, the whole village found him dead in front of my great-grandfather’s grave, with five black fingerprints on his chest.
The coffin was completely empty. There was only a note: “Grandson, you’re next.”
That night, I locked every door and window and curled up in bed, only to hear heavy footsteps in the courtyard.
Moonlight slowly cast a long, thin shadow across my bedroom door.