Ever since I was a child, tales of the devil riding your back had swirled around me like specters in the night. Those eerie stories had always been mere superstition in my mind, but little did I know that a chilling encounter would one day test my skepticism. It was a night that etched itself into my memory, an event that transpired seven years ago when I was on the cusp of turning thirteen.
I woke up one moonlit night, the world bathed in silver, and my room blanketed in an eerie, ethereal glow. However, there was something amiss that sent shivers down my spine. I lay paralyzed, unable to move a muscle, a weight pressing down upon me like an invisible force. Panic swelled within me as I strained my senses to detect any presence in the room.
For the longest time, I saw nothing. No shadowy figure, no spectral form – just an oppressive stillness that gripped me in its vice-like hold. Fear clung to me like a second skin, and if only I could’ve moved, I would have sprinted to my parents’ room for solace. But the curse of that moment was my immobility.
Outside, a full moon cast its luminous rays through my window, bathing the room in an otherworldly radiance. Desperation churned within me, and I tried with all my might to scream, to break free from this immobilizing grip. But all my efforts were in vain. My voice remained trapped, and my limbs refused to obey.
It was then that an ancestral knowledge, handed down through generations, surged within me. Drawing from the wisdom of my great-grandfather, a monk, I began to utter prayers in Cambodian. In the recesses of my mind, I chanted an incantation learned from his teachings, hoping to shield myself from whatever malevolent force held me captive.
Minutes stretched into eternity, each second heavier than the last. And then, in a breathless moment of release, the weight lifted, vanishing as mysteriously as it had come. Terrified yet elated, I shot up from my bed, engulfing the room in blinding light as I switched on every available source of illumination. My clock mocked me from the nightstand – almost 4:00 in the morning. I had been ensnared for ten terrifying minutes.
Desperate to share my harrowing ordeal, I confided in my parents the very next day. Their skeptical gazes met my trembling words, and disbelief clouded their expressions. Months passed, and I continued to sleep in that room, haunted only by the memory of that dreadful night.
Yet, fate was not done with my family. One sweltering summer day, my mother decided to take a nap in my room. The very same phenomenon that had besieged me occurred in broad daylight, robbing her of breath and movement. To this day, she remains tight-lipped, refusing to utter a single word about her experience.
The enigma of that night still lingers, a dark specter cast against the backdrop of my memories. Was it truly the devil riding my back, as some believed, or an uncharted realm of the supernatural? The truth remains shrouded in obscurity, like a phantom waiting to reveal itself once more.