"Please tell me this isn't another cursed building," I muttered, staring up at the oxidized gates of the Forgotten Museum of Occult Accounting. The wrought iron was twisted into symbols that made my skin itch just looking at them. A pigeon exploded spontaneously on a gargoyle above us. Not a good omen.
"This place," Rafe said, voice low and grave, "contains the Ritual Ledger. The original one. All promotions, demotions, blood pacts, tax fraud signatures... they're all documented here. If someone forged Emily's promotion, it's written in that book."
Emily stood next to me, arms crossed, trench coat billowing just a bit too dramatically. "Once we find my name in the ledger, we replace it with a decoy. Something that'll implode the ritual instead of fulfilling it."
I gave her a sidelong look. "So, me."
She didn't deny it.
"Right. Great. Glad we're on the same page." I cracked my knuckles. "Let's break into a haunted building filled with demonic accountants."
Inside the Museum
The interior smelled like antique despair and scorched coffee. Rows of dusty glass cases displayed cursed calculators, haunted spreadsheets, and pens with ancient teeth marks. In one display, a ghostly figure cried silently over a redacted expense report.
"Who funds this place?" I whispered.
"HellCorp," Rafe said. "They're very proud of their accounting history. Necro-ledgers and spectral auditors were a big part of their branding push in the '90s."
I paused in front of a particularly nasty exhibit: a giant wheel of corporate misfortune with options like "Audit Possession", "Bonus Soul Repossession", and "Lunch With Legal."
Emily stopped beside me. "Let's move. The ledger's in the vault beneath the executive exhibits."
We moved cautiously, each footstep echoing like a gunshot. A disembodied whisper followed us down the halls.
The Seven Security Locks of Absolute Corporate Hell
Lock One: The Bone Gate
At the end of a narrow hallway was a bone-shaped door. No handles, no keypads—just bone. Rafe pulled a jagged key from his coat and whispered to it in infernal Latin. The door groaned and peeled open like a reluctant blister.
Emily: "Gross."
Me: "Agree."
Lock Two: Whispering Numbers
Inside the next chamber, floating numbers swirled in the air, whispering stock advice from forgotten timelines. Each wrong step made the whisper louder, more painful.
Rafe took the lead, stepping carefully between the numbers. "They can't trap you if you don't believe in their market predictions."
I followed, eyes shut. "How do I know if I don't believe them?"
"Do you believe in crypto dividends?"
"No."
"Then you're safe."
Lock Three: Screaming Interns
A hallway lined with cubicles materialized. Inside each: an undead intern, wailing as they typed endless reports.
Emily pulled out a bag of snacks. "They only scream because they're hangry."
She lobbed packets of cursed granola bars into each cubicle. The wailing stopped. One even gave us a thumbs-up.
Lock Four: The Passive-Aggressive Ghosts
Portraits lined this hallway—each one a ghostly face of some long-dead CFO. As we passed, the spirits whispered nasty comments.
"Must be nice, wearing that trench coat."
"Oh look, it's Emily. Still haven't dealt with your unresolved trauma, huh?"
"Jax's emotional maturity is… cute."
I stopped. "Okay, that one's just rude."
Emily: "Ignore them. They feed on insecurity."
I muttered, "Then we're definitely in trouble."
Lock Five: The Tax Demon
A ten-foot-tall demon in a necktie blocked the next room. "PAPERS."
Rafe handed him a stack of documents. The demon sniffed them, flipped through with clawed fingers, then frowned. "Line 38B... is incomplete."
I panicked and reached into my pocket, pulling out the first thing I could find: a half-eaten bagel.
The demon stared.
Then he took it, nodded, and stepped aside.
Rafe: "That wasn't regulation."
Me: "Bagels are universal currency."
Lock Six: The Sentient Calculator
In a sterile room lit with flickering fluorescents stood a massive, twitching calculator. Its buttons glowed faintly. As we approached, it beeped.
"Solve this or die: What costs nothing, weighs nothing, and can bankrupt even the strongest?"
Emily: "Time?"
Rafe: "Love?"
Me: "A wedding."
The calculator paused.
Correct.
A hidden door opened.
Emily looked at me. "You've really been burned by love, huh?"
I shrugged. "And tux rentals. They never refund the deposit."
Lock Seven: The Vault
A circular vault door inscribed with shifting infernal glyphs stood before us. Emily pressed her palm to the center and chanted. The glyphs flared red, then dimmed.
The door swung open with a hiss like a dragon sighing in annoyance.
Inside was the Ritual Ledger.
It was huge—bound in demonhide, glowing faintly, each page pulsing like a slow heartbeat.
As we stepped inside, I felt the temperature drop.
And then everything went wrong.
Attack of the Audit Golem
The moment Rafe touched the book, alarms blared. A statue in the corner cracked open, revealing a ten-foot-tall stone golem made of receipts, overdue notices, and burning paper clips.
Its eyes glowed with the fire of bureaucracy.
"UNAUTHORIZED ACCESS DETECTED," it roared. "PREPARE FOR AUDIT."
We scattered.
Emily dove behind a filing cabinet. Rafe ducked under a cursed desk.
I ran in circles.
The golem launched a salvo of flaming staplers. I grabbed an old cash register and flung it back.
Clang.
No effect.
"Emily!" I shouted. "Ideas?!"
She pulled out a demonic printer and hurled it at the golem's head. It screamed and staggered.
"Use outdated tech! It can't process obsolescence!"
I threw a PalmPilot.
Boom. Golem reeled.
Rafe: "Hit it with more 2000s nostalgia!"
We launched everything we could find—BlackBerrys, fax machines, AOL install CDs.
The golem stumbled, groaned, and collapsed into a pile of unread invoices.
The Escape
Alarms still blared. Ghosts screamed. The museum came to life behind us.
We ran.
The hallway twisted, floors shifting, walls caving in. A possessed timecard machine tried to eat my leg. I kicked it off and threw Emily ahead of me.
We crashed through a stained-glass window, tumbling out into the street as the entire museum began to collapse inward, imploding into itself with a burp of demonic energy.
Silence.
Then a pigeon exploded above us again.
"Still a bad omen," I muttered.
Later — Rooftop Safehouse
We regrouped on the roof of an abandoned office building above a cursed pretzel shop.
Emily spread the Ledger out across a crate. The ink shimmered, showing every entry from the last 9,000 years.
She flipped to the promotion section.
There it was: her name, inked in red.
Emily Cross — Head of Dimensional Realignment
Effective: Next Blood Moon
Sponsor: N/A (Special Selection)
Emily stared at it for a long time.
"I didn't sign this," she said quietly.
"I know," I replied. "But someone wants you up there. They're either hijacking your soul or… it's bait."
She didn't respond. Her eyes glowed faintly, hands trembling.
Rafe knelt beside her. "We overwrite it. Add a name the ritual can't bind. One that burns the entire system down."
I stepped forward. "Mine."
Emily looked at me, pained. "Jax, if you do this, your name becomes ritual law. If the spell backfires—"
"Then I become upper management in HellCorp. And trust me—no one survives that."
She turned away, biting her lip.
Rafe: "It's the only way. We overwrite the record tomorrow night. At the promotion ceremony."
I took a deep breath. "Guess I better iron my cloak."
That Night — Quiet Moment on the Rooftop
Everyone else was asleep. The moon cast silver light on the rusted air vents.
Emily sat alone, legs dangling over the edge. I walked over with two mugs of stolen coffee.
"Peace offering," I said.
She took it. "Thanks."
We sat in silence for a moment, the city distant and weirdly calm.
"I still don't trust this plan," she said finally.
"Good. It means you're still smart."
She chuckled faintly. "You always made jokes when things got serious."
"It's either that or cry. And I ugly cry. Lots of snot."
She smiled, then looked at me. "Why did you come back? After everything?"
I looked out across the city. "Because you were the only thing I ever believed in. And I figured if I was going to die, I'd rather do it beside you than live pretending you didn't matter."
Her eyes softened. She leaned her head on my shoulder.
"For what it's worth," she said, "if this all goes sideways tomorrow... I'm glad you'll be there too."
I nodded.
Then we sat in silence, watching the moon, sipping coffee that definitely had a soul trapped in it.
End of Chapter 4