The Rope in the Fern

The academy stood at the edge of a vast, untamed forest, a place where the students were taught to revere nature and to conquer their fears. Every semester, the Aulita society—a group devoted to the wild and the brave—held a trial for new members. The candidates were sent into the dark heart of the woods at night, to stand where past members had stood, and to face whatever the darkness might bring.

Rizky was not a senior that year, so he was not among the testers. But his friend, a senior named Arief, had devised a particularly cruel trick. Arief planned to dress as a ‘pocong’, a ghost wrapped in a burial shroud, and leap out from the undergrowth to terrify the candidates as they passed a certain grove of ancient ferns.

Rizky watched from a distance as the candidates set out one by one into the moonless night. He saw Arief disappear into the ferns, his white costume barely visible among the shadows. Rizky felt a thrill of excitement mixed with dread. He knew the forest was old and full of secrets, and he wondered if the prank might summon something real.

The first candidate passed without incident. The second was a girl named Sari, who walked with a steady pace, her flashlight beam cutting through the dark. As she neared the ferns, Arief burst out, arms raised, his face obscured by the folds of his shroud. Sari screamed, stumbled backward, and ran, her flashlight clattering to the ground. Rizky laughed quietly, but then his laughter died.

Arief did not step out of the ferns. Instead, the ferns rustled, and a shape rose—taller than Arief, broader, with a tattered cloth that seemed to weep blackness. Rizky squinted, thinking it was just Arief’s costume, but the shape moved with an unnatural fluidity, and it turned its head toward him, revealing a pale, eyeless face.

Rizky’s blood turned cold. He wanted to run, but his legs were frozen. The thing stared at him for a long, silent moment, then it melted back into the ferns, leaving only a faint rustling. Rizky finally forced himself to move, stumbling toward the school. He found Arief later, huddled in the dormitory, pale and shaking. Arief claimed he had tripped and twisted his ankle, but Rizky saw the raw, red marks on his neck, like finger-shaped burns.

The next day, the school was abuzz with Sari’s story of the ghost in the ferns. Some mocked her, but Rizky said nothing. He went back to the ferns alone, searching for any trace of the costume, but found only a length of old rope, frayed and knotted, hanging from a branch. He took it, thinking to dispose of it, but the rope felt warm and somehow alive in his hands.

That night, Rizky dreamed of a burial ground, of a shallow grave beneath the ferns. He saw himself digging with his bare hands, unearthing a body wrapped in the same tattered cloth. The body sat up, and its eyeless face turned to him, and it whispered, ‘You let me out.’

Rizky woke in a cold sweat. The rope was coiled on his nightstand, glistening as if wet. He tried to throw it away, but it kept reappearing. He tried to burn it, but the flame died at the first touch of the rope’s strands.

Weeks passed. The trial ended, and new members were inducted, but Rizky noticed a change in Arief. He grew withdrawn, muttering to himself, and he began to carry a length of rope everywhere. One night, Arief vanished from his dormitory. The search found him in the ferns, hanging from the very branch where Rizky had found the rope, his face contorted into a silent scream.

Rizky knew then that the rope was not a prop, but a connection to the thing in the ferns—a thing that had been waiting for a window to the world. He returned to the ferns, determined to bury the rope, to close the door. But as he dug, he uncovered more ropes, old and new, all knotted together, leading into the earth.

And then he saw the face, rising from the soil, its eyeless gaze fixed on him. It reached out with a hand, and Rizky felt the rope wrap around his ankle, pulling him down into the cold, dark ground. The last thing he heard was the sound of his own scream, muffled by the earth, as the fern fronds closed overhead, sealing him in a green embrace.

Years later, students still whisper about the place where Arief and Rizky were found, and they speak of a rope that lies coiled in the ferns, warm and waiting for the next brave soul to touch it.