The Unseen Guest In Room 219

The van’s headlights shimmered across the wet asphalt, slicing through the mist as it crossed the threshold into Toyohashi City, winding toward the foot of Mt. Horaji. The highway was dark and tree-lined, cloaked in fog. The air smelled of pine, rain-soaked earth, and the fading sharpness of spilled sake. Towering trees flanked both sides of the road, their branches brushing the roof like outstretched fingers.

Inside, the mood clashed with the silence of the night—seven drunken men slumped in their seats, some half-asleep, others too loud, too careless. Their laughter echoed faintly beneath the van’s crackling radio, which played a scratchy old tune laced with static.

One of them raised a bottle and slurred, “Here we come, Hotel Toyohashi!”

The van didn’t slow down.

And the forest didn’t echo back.

Hotel Toyohashi glowed with a nostalgic warmth—its facade bathed in golden light. Yet beneath that glow, something colder stirred, like a current beneath still water. The staff waited in a polite line, their smiles stiff, their eyes watchful.

Headlights flashed across the lobby windows. A silver van screeched to a halt outside. Bold glittering script stretched across its side:

Club Athena Philippine Pub Toyohashi

The doors slid open and the chaos spilled out—laughter, shouting, brash Tokyo accents cutting through the provincial calm. Seven men, staggering and loud, tumbled out like sake from an overpoured glass. Their suits were wrinkled, ties loosened, faces flushed with alcohol and bad decisions.

While the lobby buzzed with their arrival, a different silence pressed against the walls of Room 219.

Haruki stood before the door, the sounds below fading into a distant hum. His hand hovered over the knob, hesitant, as if it might burn. His heartbeat pounded louder than the laughter downstairs. Slowly, he turned the knob—click—and opened the door with a trembling flick.

Nothing.

Just the corridor. Still and cold. Wallpaper curling at the corners. Flickering hallway lights casting uneasy shadows.

He took a cautious step forward. Glanced left, then right.

No guests. No footsteps. No voices. No shadows.

Only silence.

Haruki forced out a dry laugh. “Maybe I’m just tired,” he muttered, rubbing his eyes.

He leaned over the wooden bannister and looked down into the lobby. His eyes widened.

No way…

Descending the stairs, he suddenly approached Nakai and two staff members heading toward the new arrivals.

"These clowns are my colleagues," Haruki muttered to Nakai. "Surprised me by booking here."

Nakai nodded stiffly, lips pressed thin.

Haruki forced a grin. “Go ahead—charge them as much as you want.”

The men stumbled into the lobby—some laughing, others slumping against the walls, halfway to sleep. Haruki scanned their faces.

No sign of Tomo.

“Where’s Tomo?” he asked one of them.

“Bathroom,” came the slurred reply.

Moments later, Tomo emerged from the hallway—his arm slung around a woman in heels and a short dress. She giggled, her heavy accent dragging over each word of broken Japanese and thick English. Lipstick smeared on his collar. Their closeness left no room for doubt.

Haruki stepped forward, grabbed Tomo’s sleeve.

“Are you out of your mind? What if your wife finds out?”

Tomo chuckled. “Relax, Haruki. This isn’t Tokyo. No one’s watching.”

Haruki didn’t reply. He turned and walked away as the staff herded the men upstairs like drunken sheep.

Sleep didn’t come.

Haruki sat in his room, laptop open, camera plugged in. He scrolled through the files again—the manhole photo.

Gone.

The one with the doll.

He blinked, refreshed the folder. Still nothing.

“Come on…” he muttered, ejecting the SD card, checking it manually.

Still gone.

Frustrated, he opened a browser and typed: voodoo doll Japan.

Dozens of images. He clicked one—straw-bound, red thread, sharp pins protruding from the limbs.

Nakai knocked, entering with a tray of green tea.

Haruki turned the screen toward him. “Look familiar?”

Nakai froze. The tray trembled in his hands.

He sat down slowly, gripping the table like bracing for a quake. His voice dropped to a whisper.

“I’ve seen a doll like that before.”

The mood shifted. The air grew still.

Flashback: Post-War Japan, 1949

Nakai was ten, living in the family quarters at the back of Horaji Ryokan—where the shadows lingered longer than daylight ever dared. One night, he slipped from his futon, padding barefoot down the hallway, drawn by candlelight behind a half-open fusuma.

His grandfather, Ichiro, sat cross-legged, a straw doll in his lap. His fingers—thin and wrinkled—wound red thread around the doll’s limbs, chest, and head. Silver pins gleamed in the flickering light.

“Yumi… Yumi…” Ichiro chanted, his breath trembling.

Yumi—Nakai’s aunt. She’d been accused of an affair with a traveling merchant. Nothing had been proven. But Ichiro had gone silent for days.

That night, Nakai saw him stab the doll.

First the head.
Then the arms.
Then the legs.

The next morning, Yumi’s body was found at the bottom of the well. Head fractured. Arms broken. Legs twisted. No witnesses. No signs of foul play.

The family called it suicide.

But Nakai remembered the doll.

And something else.

Later that night, after everyone was asleep, he returned to the room. The doll lay beside the altar. He took it. Slipped it under his futon.

He didn’t know why.

But something had whispered: Keep it. You’ll understand someday.

Back in the present, Nakai still stared at the screen.

Haruki leaned in. “Nakai-san? Are you still with me? Sleepy?”

“That doll…” he began slowly, his voice hollow with unease, “was never our business to begin with. I believe jealous settlers in this area deliberately planted those dolls. They're trying to ruin the ryokan’s reputation—bring the whole hotel down from the inside.”

Silence filled the room. Then—from beyond the hallway wall—a faint sound:

Tap… tap… tap…

Something small, dragging itself across the rafters above.

The curse had stirred again.

And it wasn’t done yet. 

Then—it rang. A phone. From upstairs. The ringtone—familiar. Too familiar. Haruki froze. It was his. But he’d left it in Room 219. And now, in the silence of the late night, it was ringing—too loud, too clear, too late.

[Next: The Doll Beneath The Soil]