Axel Vance did not waste time trying to force the safe open. He raised the Remington 870 again and fired several more blasts into the wall surrounding it, tearing apart plaster, drywall, and wooden framing until most of the safe’s mounting points were exposed. Fortunately, the wall was only an interior partition rather than a structural support, so every shotgun blast opened more space around the heavy steel box.
Once enough of the surrounding wall had been destroyed, Axel slung the shotgun behind his shoulder and stepped into the debris. He wrapped both hands around the exposed sides of the safe, planted his feet firmly, and took a deep breath as the muscles across his back and arms tightened. With a low grunt, he pulled with everything his enhanced body could produce.
The safe tore free from the wall.
Clarice stared at him in disbelief as chunks of plaster and broken framing crashed onto the floor. Axel rolled one shoulder, lifted the heavy safe partly off the ground, then adjusted his grip until he could carry it against one side of his body. "You planning to stand there admiring me, or do you want to leave before the building cooks us?"
That snapped Clarice Starling out of her shock. Axel shifted the safe onto his shoulder and used his free arm to guide her toward the hallway, where the temperature had already risen noticeably. Together they rushed toward the stairwell and began descending through smoke, sprinkler water, and the constant roar of alarms.
When they reached the landing near the fourteenth floor, Axel suddenly caught movement from the corner of his eye. A vague human-shaped figure seemed to pass through the smoke beyond the stairwell door, but what disturbed him more was the wave of cold that followed it. The sensation was completely wrong in a building hot enough to make metal railings uncomfortable to touch.
Axel slowed for half a second, but this was not the time to investigate something he could barely see. Clarice was coughing beside him, he was carrying a heavy safe, and firefighters were still evacuating the hotel below. He forced himself to remember the location and continued downstairs without stopping.
They finally burst out through the Dolphin Hotel’s main entrance into the chaotic street. Axel carried the safe away from the doors, set it down near an emergency vehicle, then grabbed a nearby hose long enough to rinse soot and hot ash from his clothing. Cold water rolled across the tactical vest and instantly made breathing feel easier.
Several yards away, a fire captain was shouting into his radio with increasing frustration. "Increase pressure on the upper lines! I don’t care what it takes, get more water on that floor." A soot-covered firefighter hurried toward him and replied that the crews were already using everything available, but the water seemed to vanish almost as soon as it reached the worst part of the blaze.
Axel looked up toward the upper floors.
The flames were still concentrated around the fourteenth floor.
Room 1408.
The memory of the stubborn writer arguing at the front desk returned immediately. Mike Enslin had practically fought the hotel staff for the right to stay there, even though everyone working at the Dolphin clearly wanted nothing to do with the room. Now the floor containing 1408 was burning in a way professional firefighters could barely understand.
Something was wrong.
Axel searched the evacuated crowd until he spotted the hotel manager speaking with several frightened guests. He crossed the street, displayed his badge, and said, "Miami Police. I need to know exactly what happened in Room 1408."
The manager looked genuinely startled to see him. "Officer, you were inside the building?"
"I was."
The man’s expression changed when Axel mentioned the room number. He glanced toward the reporters and guests nearby before quietly pulling Axel a few steps away from the crowd. "My name is Gerald Olin. And yes, if you’re asking about 1408, there are things about that room we normally avoid discussing publicly."
Axel folded his arms. "Start talking."
Olin wiped sweat from his forehead and looked toward the burning floor. "The Dolphin has been connected to fifty-six deaths involving that room over the years. Suicides, accidents, sudden illnesses, incidents nobody has ever been able to explain properly." His shoulders lowered slightly as he added, "If the fire finally destroyed the room, maybe that nightmare is over."
Fifty-six deaths.
Axel stared at him.
That was not a cursed-room rumor anymore. Even allowing for exaggeration, the number was large enough that any reasonable hotel should have sealed the entire section permanently. Olin’s strange relief also told Axel the manager knew far more than he was volunteering.
Axel decided not to press him yet.
Olin was clearly more interested in protecting the Dolphin’s reputation than explaining supernatural history to a police officer. If Axel pushed too hard, the man would probably retreat behind lawyers and carefully prepared statements.
Instead, Axel returned to the emergency crews and obtained respiratory protection from the firefighters preparing to reenter the building. After making sure the equipment was secure, he found Clarice standing near the safe and said, "There’s something wrong with the fourteenth floor. I’m going back inside."
Clarice immediately frowned. "The building is still on fire."
"I noticed."
"Axel, I’m serious."
"So am I."
He tapped the heavy tactical vest Marcus had issued him earlier. "Think of it as field testing federal equipment."
Clarice stared at him with open disbelief. "That is not what field testing means."
"Call the department and get backup here." Axel tightened the straps on his respiratory gear and picked up the shotgun. "If I’m not back before the fire gets worse, then you can start complaining."
Before Clarice could argue again, Axel headed toward the hotel.
This time, he climbed more carefully because there was no immediate need to rescue evidence or civilians. Firefighters moved through the lower floors while smoke thickened above, but the fourteenth floor became stranger the closer he got. The outside of the building was burning violently, yet the hallway itself was dominated more by black smoke than open flame.
Axel reached the door marked 1408.
Only a thin stream of smoke escaped beneath it.
He touched the handle.
Locked.
Axel stepped back and raised the shotgun.
Bang!
The lock exploded inward.
Axel followed with a hard kick that knocked the scorched door open.
The instant it moved, the unnatural cold sensation he had noticed earlier disappeared.
Axel froze.
The hallway remained hot enough to sting exposed skin, yet the strange chill was simply gone as though opening the room had broken something invisible. He kept one hand near the Blessed Bible beneath his vest and cautiously looked inside.
There were no flames.
The room had already burned.
Everything inside was blackened, cracked, and partially collapsed. Most of the furniture had been reduced to charred remains, sections of the windows and exterior wall were missing, and even the sprinklers overhead had stopped producing water.
Axel stepped across the threshold with the shotgun raised.
The atmosphere immediately felt wrong.
Not dangerous in the same way Michael Myers had felt dangerous.
This was different.
It felt empty.
Too empty.
Then something moved near the bedroom.
Axel caught another glimpse of the shadow.
"There."
He rushed forward.
The burned remains of the bed had collapsed inward, leaving twisted metal and blackened wood piled near the floor. Axel used the shotgun barrel to move part of the debris aside, then grabbed a charred section of the bed frame and pulled it away.
A body was underneath.
The corpse had curled into an unnatural position as if desperately trying to escape something that never allowed it to move. Both hands were clamped around its own throat, and severe burns covered nearly every visible section of skin. Judging from the posture and discoloration, the victim had probably died from smoke inhalation or suffocation before the fire finished destroying the body.
Axel stared at the face.
Despite the burns, parts of the original features remained recognizable.
Mike Enslin.
The man who had insisted on staying in Room 1408 was dead.
Axel no longer hesitated.
He pulled out the Blessed Bible, opened to the same judgment-heavy passages he had used against Michael Myers, and began reading aloud. If Mike’s soul was trapped anywhere near the corpse, Holy Reading should tell him whether something supernatural was involved.
The effect was immediate.
A faint white glow appeared over Mike’s charred remains.
Axel’s eyes narrowed.
"So there really is something here."
He raised his voice and continued.
Unlike Michael’s violent resistance, the purification happened almost instantly. The pale light intensified for only a short time before something seemed to release from the corpse, leaving the atmosphere inside the room noticeably lighter.
Then the system appeared.
[Holy Reading: EXP +100]
[Holy Reading Lv.1 — 400/1000]
[Trapped soul successfully purified.]
[Purified soul power detected.]
[Beginning absorption.]
[Psionic Power +0.1]
Another notification followed as Axel’s status refreshed.
Name: Axel Vance
Physique: 2.0
Psionic Power: 1.2
A cool sensation spread through Axel’s mind.
It was completely different from the warmth created by Physique increases. His thoughts became sharper, the lingering mental pressure from the room faded, and even the oppressive atmosphere around Mike’s body seemed less disturbing.
Axel slowly lowered the Bible.
"That was fast."
Michael Myers had required hours of continuous recitation before the corruption finally left him. Mike Enslin, by comparison, had barely resisted at all.
That suggested an important difference.
Michael had been corrupted.
Mike had merely been trapped.
Axel studied the corpse for another moment, trying to determine what kind of force could imprison a dead man’s soul inside a hotel room. Before he could investigate further, a familiar booming voice suddenly came from the hallway.
"Vance!"
Axel turned.
Chief Woody walked through the ruined doorway wearing an irritated expression and enough protective gear to make him look even broader than usual. He glanced around the charred room and shouted, "You better have found something important. I had plans tonight."
Axel stared at him. "Chief, why are you here personally?"
Woody spread both hands. "Because I sent every competent officer I have chasing fugitives around Miami. Then dispatch tells me my newest rookie is running through a burning haunted hotel with an FBI trainee."
He looked around again.
"So congratulations. You got me."
Axel pointed toward Mike’s corpse. "One dead man in here. No obvious signs of a physical struggle before the room burned."
Woody stepped closer and examined the body.
Axel continued, "There was also a hotel waiter on the fifteenth floor who broke into Clarice’s room and tried to access federal evidence. I shot him in the leg when he ran, and he killed himself before we could question him."
Woody grunted. "Cult fanatic?"
"Probably."
Axel then summarized what Gerald Olin had told him about Room 1408 and its history of unexplained deaths. He left out nothing except the system itself, explaining the unnatural cold, the bizarre fire behavior, and the strange condition of Mike’s corpse. Woody listened with increasing skepticism.
When Axel finished, Woody scoffed.
"Haunted room."
Axel looked at him.
Woody shook his head. "Somebody drugged the guy, sabotaged the place, or this hotel was built by contractors who should be in prison."
He walked toward one of the interior partition walls and knocked on it.
Hollow.
Woody sneered. "See? Cheap construction."
Before Axel could stop him, the chief lifted one leg and kicked the wall.
Crash!
Plaster shattered.
The interior framing cracked.
A large section of the partition collapsed inward.
Woody froze.
Axel slowly stepped closer.
Hidden inside the hollow wall cavity was something neither of them expected.
Symbols.
Dozens of them.
No.
Hundreds.
Dark, intricate runes covered the concealed surfaces from top to bottom, forming overlapping circles, geometric patterns, and unfamiliar markings that had been completely hidden behind the hotel wall.
Chief Woody stared into the opening.
Axel tightened his grip on the Bible.
The entire wall was covered in occult symbols.
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