Part Four: The Final Reckoning
Mahmoud and Hussein were terrified after they discovered that the box had returned to them again, and they knew that the curse was still ongoing. It was clear that burying the box in the mosque was not enough, and that something bigger than that had to be done to get rid of this curse once and for all
They decided that they could not give up, and that they had to find someone who knew more about these things. They thought about going to Umm Abdo in the old library, maybe she would have an answer
The next day, they went to the library and asked to meet Umm Abdo. When they told her about what happened to them after burying the box, Umm Abdo looked at them with a sad look and said: "I knew that the matter would not end easily. This curse is linked to the child's soul, and the box is not just a material thing. We have to solve the problem from its roots"
Mahmoud asked her: "So what should we do? We buried the box in a sacred place, but it did not solve anything"
Umm Abdo replied: "The matter is bigger than that. This curse started when the child disappeared, and his soul will not rest until he knows the truth about what happened to him. You must return to the farm and find the place where the child disappeared, and know exactly what happened to him"
The decision was difficult, but they knew that there was no other choice. They had to return to the farm and face the secret buried there
The next night, they returned to the farm by the same dark path. This time they were more careful, and every step they took was calculated. When they reached the abandoned house, they entered again, but they knew that something was different this time
The house was quieter than before, but the atmosphere was unnaturally cold. They started searching in every corner of the house, trying to find any evidence of what happened to the child
Suddenly, Hussein found an old staircase in the wall, it was well hidden. He opened the drawer and found old handwritten notes inside, clearly belonging to the person who lived in this house
Mahmoud began reading the notes out loud. The notes talked about a man who lived in the estate and had magical powers. People were afraid of him, and he worked in secret. One day, the child Ali disappeared, and people suspected that this man had something to do with the disappearance
The notes revealed that this man was performing magical experiments on the child, trying to control the child's spirit and obtain a mysterious power from him. But the experiment failed, and the child died, and his spirit remained trapped in this house
The man tried to get rid of the spirit by locking it in the wooden box, but the spirit was stronger than his magic, and it continued to haunt the place and anyone who tried to enter the estate
Mahmoud and Hussein were astonished by what they heard. They understood at that moment that the only solution was to find the place where the child's body was buried and bury him properly in order to free his spirit
They started searching the house until they found a place under the floor of the hall with dirt that was different from the rest of the place, it was clear that something was buried under it
They quickly dug in the floor and found the remains of the decomposed body of the child Ali. It was a terrifying sight, but they knew that they had to bury him properly. They decided to take the body to the mosque where they buried the box and hold a simple funeral for the child
On the way to the mosque, the atmosphere was calm, as if the spirit was watching them. When they arrived, they prepared the body, prayed over it, and buried it in the same place where they buried the box, but this time they buried the body by praying over it as Islam says
While they were digging and burying the body, they felt a strange relief surrounding the place. It was clear that the child's soul had finally been relieved after years of suffering
When they finished, they decided not to talk about what happened to anyone and to start their lives anew, after getting rid of the curse that was haunting them
On their way back to the city, the sun was rising, and the long night they had lived was ending. They finally felt that they were rid of the nightmare, but they knew that this experience had changed them forever
And with that, the curse was over, and the lost childish spirit returned to the peace it had been searching for all these years
The End