In the small town of Barkul, nestled on the edge of Odisha's vast and hauntingly beautiful Chilika Lake, whispers of an old legend passed from one generation to the next. It was said that on certain nights, under the full moon, a mist would roll in over the lake, bringing with it shadows of the past - restless spirits from an ancient village that lay submerged in the lake's depths.

On a cold winter night, four friends from Bhubaneswar, drawn by the allure of the unknown, decided to explore the area. There was Ravi, a thrill-seeker; Priya, a budding photographer; Arjun, who studied ancient folklore, and Sneha, who was more cautious but couldn't resist the mystery of the lake. They set out at dusk, hiring an old fisherman, Kailash, who knew the lake like the back of his hand. He was hesitant at first, urging them to stay away from certain parts of the lake, but curiosity and money eventually convinced him.

As they glided over the still waters, the last light of the day vanished, and a thick fog began to rise. The lake was eerily silent, save for the occasional splash of water against the boat. "Turn back," Kailash whispered, his face pale, eyes darting over his shoulder. "This place is cursed. It's the home of those who never found peace."

Ignoring his warnings, they pressed on, excitement building as they drifted toward the center of the lake. Then, out of nowhere, Priya spotted something unusual through her camera lens - a shadow beneath the water, shaped like a person, reaching up towards the boat. She blinked, adjusting her focus, but the shadow vanished. She shook her head, trying to shake off the chill that had settled over her.

Moments later, Ravi felt something cold brush against his leg. He looked down, expecting a stray branch or a fish, but there was nothing. The fog thickened, and they could barely see each other. Just then, a faint, distant chanting began to echo across the water - a chorus of voices murmuring in a language none of them understood. The sound grew louder, filling the air with an otherworldly resonance.

Suddenly, Kailash stopped the boat, his face stricken with terror. "We need to leave. Now." Before they could question him, the boat began to rock, as if something beneath the water was pushing it from side to side. Priya screamed as she saw a face - a woman's face, her eyes hollow and her mouth open in an eternal scream - rising out of the lake, just inches from the boat. The face vanished as quickly as it appeared, but it left an icy chill in its wake.

In their panic, they tried to steer back, but the fog disoriented them. Arjun, grasping at his knowledge of the legend, remembered stories of a lost village called Kanika, submerged centuries ago after a devastating flood. It was believed that the spirits of those villagers haunted the lake, searching for someone to help them find their way back to the world of the living.

As they rowed, the water seemed to grow heavier, as if pulling them down. Each of them felt hands grasping at their ankles, unseen forces tugging them toward the depths. Just when it seemed all hope was lost, they saw a faint light on the shore. Fueled by desperation, they rowed with all their strength, breaking through the mist as they reached the safety of the shore.

When they turned around, the fog had lifted, revealing a calm, still lake under the moonlight, as if nothing had happened. Kailash, trembling, refused to speak about what they had encountered. The friends, shaken to their core, left the village the next morning, vowing never to return.

As the years passed, each of the friends struggled to put the haunting experience behind them, but the memories seemed to cling to their minds like a shadow. Ravi found himself plagued by nightmares of icy hands pulling him down into the lake. Priya's camera, which had captured stunning landscapes in the past, now seemed cursed - every time she developed her photos, shadowy figures appeared where there had been none.

The worst affected was Arjun, the folklore enthusiast. His fascination with the supernatural turned into a relentless obsession. He became consumed with the desire to learn more about the lost village of Kanika, scouring old texts, temple records, and speaking to anyone who had knowledge of the lake's history. He found disturbing details that he hadn't known before - that the villagers of Kanika had practiced forbidden rituals, hoping to bring prosperity back to their drought-ridden village. When the floods came, it was said they took everything with them, including the spirits bound by those rituals.

One night, unable to resist any longer, Arjun returned to Barkul. He hired a boat and went alone to the heart of the lake, hoping to perform an ancient ritual he had uncovered, which he believed would appease the spirits. He whispered into the mist, chanting the words as best he could from the brittle, worn pages he'd read. But as the ritual ended, a thick fog crept in, swallowing his small boat.

The next morning, the locals found his boat washed ashore, empty, with no sign of Arjun. No one ever saw him again.

The remaining friends mourned his loss, and the disappearance only deepened the lake's terrifying reputation. Ravi and Priya tried to move on, but eerie reminders of that night continued to haunt them. One evening, Ravi received a letter that shook him to his core. It was addressed in Arjun's handwriting, postmarked from a town miles away, but with no return address. Inside, it read:

"The lake never lets go. Don't come back."

Both terrified and grief-stricken, they abandoned any thoughts of returning. Yet, they couldn't shake the feeling that Arjun was somehow still out there, bound to the lake, like the villagers of Kanika, forever lost in the silent shadows of Chilika.

Years slipped by, but the ghostly memories of that night at Chilika Lake never faded for Ravi, Priya, and Sneha. Each of them carried the burden differently. Ravi became reclusive, drifting away from his friends and family, fearing that the lake's curse might somehow follow him. Priya, plagued by visions and shadows in every photograph she took, gave up photography entirely, haunted by glimpses of hollow-eyed figures staring back at her from the edges of her images. Sneha, the most superstitious of the group, began to immerse herself in spiritual practices, hoping they'd keep the darkness at bay.

One autumn night, Priya had a dream that was far too vivid to ignore. She saw Arjun, his face pale and weary, standing on the shore of Chilika Lake, gazing toward her with empty eyes. He seemed to be mouthing something - words that sounded like a desperate plea. She woke up drenched in sweat, and the message replayed in her mind, like a haunting refrain:

"Come back. Free me."

Priya felt a strange compulsion growing within her, as if something - or someone - was calling her back to the lake. The urge became so overpowering that she reached out to Ravi and Sneha, sharing the dream and confessing her belief that Arjun was trapped somewhere between life and death, bound by the spirits of the lake.

Ravi hesitated, fear flashing across his face, but eventually agreed, convinced that it was the only way to find peace. Sneha, though terrified, saw it as her duty to help their friend, believing they couldn't leave Arjun to suffer alone in the lake's grip.

The three friends returned to Barkul under a waning moon, stepping cautiously into the village that seemed eerily unchanged since their last visit. The locals had heard about Arjun's disappearance and eyed the group warily, warning them again to stay away from the lake. But Priya was resolute. She felt a strange, heavy certainty that this journey would end everything, one way or another.

They rented a boat, the same creaky vessel that had carried them before, and pushed off into the dark waters of Chilika, where a mist began to rise almost immediately. It was as though the lake remembered them.

As they reached the center, Ravi felt an unbearable chill, and Sneha began to tremble, sensing a presence around them, like cold hands pressing against her shoulders. Priya held tightly to the small pendant she had brought - an ancient symbol of protection she'd found while researching Kanika's history. She raised the pendant and chanted a prayer, one meant to free spirits from worldly attachments.

The fog grew thicker, and for a moment, all was silent. Then, a low, mournful wail echoed across the lake, and shadows began to appear in the mist, forming the faces of those lost villagers - gaunt, desperate, reaching toward the boat. In the middle of them all was Arjun, his eyes vacant yet somehow pleading, as if caught between worlds.

Priya spoke his name, her voice trembling. "Arjun?if you can hear us, we're here to bring you home."

The figure of Arjun moved closer, his lips forming silent words. Ravi and Sneha couldn't bear to look at him directly, but Priya held her ground, her gaze locked on her friend. She lifted the pendant higher, chanting with all her strength. "Let go. Find peace."

A fierce wind tore across the lake, scattering the mist and rocking the boat violently. The faces began to dissolve, one by one, fading into the fog, until only Arjun's face remained. He looked at Priya, a glimmer of gratitude softening his hollow eyes, and whispered, "Thank you."

Then he was gone. The fog lifted, leaving the lake calm and eerily serene.

The three friends returned to shore, exhausted but feeling lighter, as if a weight had been lifted from their souls. The shadows no longer haunted Priya's photographs, and Ravi's nightmares ceased. They all sensed that Arjun had finally found peace and that the lake would no longer hold him - or them - in its grip.

But the locals still say that, on certain nights, if you stand at the lake's edge and listen carefully, you might hear a whisper in the mist - a voice warning you to never venture too far, lest you, too, become one of the silent shadows of Chilika Lake.

Though Ravi, Priya, and Sneha felt a sense of peace after that final night at Chilika Lake, the strange happenings didn't entirely disappear. Every few months, Priya would receive messages in her dreams, often indistinct and fragmented. She saw glimpses of places she'd never been, ancient temples, desolate pathways, and dense forests, all somehow connected to the lake. Ravi, too, began experiencing an odd pull toward the places in Priya's dreams, as if a hidden force was calling him to uncover the lake's deeper mysteries. Sneha, meanwhile, felt a growing unease every time she saw water, haunted by a feeling that something from Chilika was still watching them.

Unable to shake the feeling, Priya decided to investigate further, diving into the forgotten history of Odisha's hidden, mysterious sites. She discovered references to old texts that spoke of a secret network of sacred sites across Odisha, all connected by an underground stream running beneath Chilika Lake. The texts hinted that these sites held the remnants of ancient rituals, places where spirits and souls could be bound, freed, or even brought back.

Determined to uncover the truth, the three friends set out again, traveling through dense forests, ancient temples, and abandoned shrines, following the clues from Priya's research. Each site they visited carried an unsettling energy, as if eyes were watching them from the shadows. At one shrine, they found inscriptions depicting a ritual that had to be performed to permanently release the souls bound to the lake. The ritual involved chanting sacred verses at three key points around the lake during a total lunar eclipse.

Driven by both fear and responsibility, they prepared for the ritual as the next eclipse approached. On the night of the eclipse, the lake seemed different, darker, with a stillness that felt almost sentient. The three friends moved to their assigned points around the lake, each carrying a piece of Arjun's pendant, which Priya had kept in memory of him.

As they began chanting, a dense fog rose from the lake, wrapping around each of them, growing thicker and colder. Shadows started to appear again, but this time, they seemed more forceful, as if fighting against the ritual. Ravi felt hands grasping at him, pulling him toward the water. Sneha's voice trembled as she continued the chant, her vision blurring as ghostly faces swirled around her.

Priya, standing at the main point of the ritual, held her piece of the pendant high, shouting the verses as loud as she could, determined to complete the ceremony. The fog grew denser, and just as it seemed they might be overwhelmed, the pendant in her hand glowed, emitting a bright, blinding light. The lake roared in response, waves rising as though the waters themselves were alive, thrashing and pulling the spirits away.

In the final moments of the ritual, Priya saw Arjun's face one last time, calm and smiling. He mouthed the words, "It's over. Thank you." Then, with a final gust of wind, the fog cleared, and the lake became still, calm, as if nothing had ever disturbed its depths.

The next morning, the locals noticed a subtle but profound change. The lake seemed brighter, the water clearer, as if a heavy weight had been lifted. For the first time in years, there were no eerie tales or sightings. The spirits had been released, their restless journey finally brought to an end.

For Ravi, Priya, and Sneha, the experience left them changed forever. They knew the truth of Chilika Lake, a truth buried beneath the water, hidden from the world but alive in their memories. And though they would never return, they knew that somewhere in the depths of that mysterious lake, their friend Arjun, and the spirits of the forgotten village, had finally found peace.

By, Manoj Kr Das