This short story is for an entry in 'And Then contest 2021' conducted by Wattpad Anthologies team with the prompt provided under Mystery/Thriller category.

I was enjoying the manga I’d found in the city library until suddenly the main character began having experiences that seemed familiar.

With shaky hands, I continued reading. Rox received a call from his mother about his father being in a terrible accident. His situation seemed critical.

My phone vibrated, and it was a call from my mom.

“Hello?” I whispered, dreading what she might say next.

“Chad..., your dad.... your dad is in the emergency. He’s been in an... an accident,” she replied, sobbing.

I gasped and asked her the location to the hospital and rushed there not before purchasing the manga.

On the way, I completed reading this week’s release, but the last chapter is going to be released next week, leaving me anxious.

I reached the hospital in time and as revealed in the manga, the doctors assured me and mom that dad was out of danger.

We stayed the night in the hospital. After mom went to sleep, I searched for the details of the manga and the author. To my surprise, there were no results about it and the search engine was suggesting to try other words in the search bar.

I went back to the library to inquire the staff about the book. When asked, they said that it wasn’t their library book. This had to be a cruel joke. I wanted to show them the bill, but I couldn’t find it in my pockets.

I apologized to the staff for the trouble and came outside feeling helpless. I took out the manga and carelessly turned the pages. In the end, a fresh page with blood stains appeared. The letters soon started showing, and it read, ‘Rox’s life slowly faded away as he unfortunately fell prey to a psycho killer.’

As Chad raised his head up, there was a man with a cap on, a few feet away, who ran and stabbed him in the heart.

I enjoyed writing this and it was kind of difficult to write the story in just 300 words other than the word count of the prompt.
Hope you too enjoyed reading it.
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