Mount Horrour by Ivy Catherine (phonics readers .txt) 📕

MOUNT HORROUR

Chapter One: The Sign

It was early in the morning and Thomas and his parents were walking down the small village town. The village town was very small, but all people were very happy together. The village was located under a mountain, and locals call it Mount Horrour, meaning: `The Mountain of Horrors’. There is a reason to call it that. 200 years ago, a tourist named Milado came with his family: his wife, and children. Milado wanted to visit the cave but his wife, Esmeralda, was scared in case the cave opening got blocked by rocks, or maybe there would be a sudden earthquake or a landslide. So, leaving his wife and children alone, he went to visit the cave. But, he never came back. Everything was calm- the mouth of the cave was open, there was no landslide or earthquake, and there was no abnormality anywhere. The only thing was there was a spine-chilling tune coming from the cave, and it was so horrifying, Esmeralda fainted. They were taken away to their home, but Milado was never found. Locals believe that evil souls have taken away his soul and has made it a ghost. From then, locals called it Mount Horrour.

Thomas was right under the mountain, in front of the cave. After the disappearance of Milado, the opening was closed tightly and there were verses from Holy Books. And beside that was a stone like a grave where there was written:

In Remembrance of Milado Hamm, Who Died in This Cave. Born: 7th June, 1824, Died: 31st October, 1864.

Thomas shivered when he saw this cave and the stone. But, he loved horror story and was always thrilled when he realized the fact that there was horror in the village where he lived. His parents tried to avoid this place, but Thomas found his way here all the time. He slowly crept to the stone and he noticed something he never saw before: there was a mark under the death date. It was actually not a mark, but it looked like it. The thing is, it was like someone scratched the stone angrily so it created a mark like three arrows. Thomas never saw it before, and only if he knew better, he would’ve guessed it was made recently. He got scared and came back to the cave entrance. He tried to peep through a hole but was carried away instantly by his mother, Emily Own.

`No Darling, it’s too dangerous.’ she said, looking at the boulder fearfully.

`Oh come on Mum, it is just a cave. No one knows if he died there. Maybe he got lost and died of starvation! Please, I want to just peep through a hole.’

`No, we cannot risk anything.’ his mother replied sternly, but her voice was shaking.

Thomas was a boy of 12, and he studied at West Horrour School. After the Milado incident, the whole village was called Horrour. Anyways, one thing Thomas loved was reading books. He was an extraordinary lad who had read all the history and life science encyclopedias in the Local Library. The librarian, the plump and kind woman, Mrs. Crème always helped Thomas pick the perfect books. Since he really was thirsty to know the history of Milado, he read the whole 1986-page book named: History of Mount Horrour. His best friend at school was Jean Christopher. He was thin but intelligent. He was a technical boy and was always busy with making devices. Both of them did everything together, literally everything. In all, Thomas loved his village and his life. He says: Love life and life will love you. And so he does.

Mrs. Own said, `Oh, will you look at that! It is almost 7. Come on Thomas, you have to go to school. Today I’ll go to the city to buy the groceries.’

`I will take Thomas to school. Go home and get ready.’ Mr. Own said warmly as he took Thomas by the hand and went west, and Mrs. Own turned back home.

Chapter Two: The New Student

Mr. Own left Thomas at the gate and headed home. As Thomas was planning about how to tell Jean about the mark, he noticed something. He could go to the cave with Jean! He went to sit with Jean. Every desk had 3 students sitting on it. But, there were only two students, Jean and Thomas in the back desk. As they all settled down, the old and boring teacher, Mrs. Barely called, `Everyone, we have a new student. She will sit with Mr. Own and Mr. Christopher.’

`She? Oh no, she has to sit beside you Thomas, I am allergic to girls’. Jean exclaimed, moving away from the vacant seat.

`Oh, come on, doesn’t mean she is evil because she’s a girl!’ Thomas said.

`Well, do you know that most evil people were girls? And for your information, girls has always represented desperate ghosts in seriously horror movies’, Jean said worriedly.

Their short discussion was cut off with the entrance of a girl of their age, maybe a bit younger.

`Please introduce yourself. One of the rules of this class is new students has to give a 2 minute lecture about themselves in the first day of school.’ Mrs. Barely said, least interested in the new student.

The student cleared her throat nervously and said, `OK. Uh- My name is Emma- Emma Hemming, and I lived in Switzerland. My father had bought a house here, because my mother lived here and wanted to come back. Uh- what else- err- I like drawing, I won a national drawing championship in Switzerland. And the thing I like most is reading. I read all the children’s books and encyclopedia in the Bern Museum. I can do very good hiking, because I lived up in a mountain and had to go down to get water from the well in the downtown. I like horror movies, and I love to go on adventures.’

`You know, I think we can actually be friends’, Jean said confidently.

`Now you think that. Actually we could. And as she can hike, we can take her in the adventure I am planning.’

` What plan?’ Jean asked curiously.

Thomas was about to tell him, but then he told, `Let me listen to her, let’s judge if she is eligible to go or not.’

`OK, as you say’, Jean said and turned to the girl.

`…. Because I love studying and I can make new friends. I think that’s it, Mrs. Barely.

Mrs. Barely was writing something in a file, and didn’t notice anything.

The student coughed clearly and said, `Mrs. Barely?’ She looked worried and uncertain. She could not decide what to do and was going `Uh’ or `Err’ or `um’ sometimes.

Thomas felt pity for the girl, because he could understand she is feeling embarrassed. So, he said, `This happened a lot of times. We totally know what to do.’ Then he went to the place where everyone kept their bags. He took out his heavy flask as usual, went in front of Mrs. Barely and dropped it hard right in front of her nose.

BANG!

Instantly, Thomas slipped into his seat and Mrs. Barely looked up from her work.

`Well? Start girl!’ she shouted.

`Err- I finished already, Mrs. Barely’ she told uncertainly.

`Oh- go and sit beside Mr. Own’

The girl walked worriedly and sat beside Thomas. He offered his hand and said, `Hello, I am Thomas, and this is Jean.’

For the first time, girl smiled and shook his hand and said, `Hello, I am Emma.’

`Turn to the chapter of Algebraic Equations of Mesmerizing Mathematics, Page- 198. Discussion with desk students. Start’ Mrs. Barely said and turned back to her work. She always gave these type of short instructions.

`Emma, I highly recommend you know the history of Horrour as soon as possible. I have a book in my bag, named History of Mount Horrour. You can read some of it now.’

She replied in her usual uncertain tone, `B-but aren’t we supposed to-‘

`Trust me, there’s no use. That old scallywag never even cares about our learning. We’ve done this discussion for the last 2 weeks.’ Jean said.

`But I did not’, Emma said in a very stern voice.

Jean raised his eyebrows. `Don’t you know anything about Algebraic Equations?’

`I know all the equations’ names and how to solve it. I am not totally useless.’ she said again, much more confidently this time. As they discussed the history of Mount Horrour, Thomas slowly realized that Emma is a really good friend, she is only sometimes uncertain with awkward happenings.

`So, my plan is we go to an adventure in the cave of Mount Horrour. We can totally go there next week, at Halloween, the day Milado died’, Thomas said excitedly.

`I will bring my ghost catcher’, Jean said with dreamy eyes.

`Excuse me?’ Emma asked.

`It is a type of device that catches any quick movement, breathing or anything highly unusual. I added two new features some days ago, one is that is can blueprint any prints, like you know, hand prints and foot prints’, Jean added, seeing the blank look at both of their faces.

`Wow, you invented it?’ Emma asked, amazed.

`Well, yeah. I invented many other stuff, but the Ghost Catcher is my favorite.’ Jean said proudly.

`What is the other feature you added?’, Thomas said.

`Oh, that. It has a type of recorder thing, like if the detector detects a spirit or demon, it starts reading holy verses. It is not that special, but it is kind of necessary in case the spirit tries to bite our head off’, Jean said.

`It can’t. It can take place in your body, or can do what spirits do. But it can’t – what did you say- `bite your head off’, Emma said.

`SILENCE! No talking!’ Mrs. Barely suddenly shouted.

`Old scallywag. How are we supposed to discuss without talking?’ Thomas said, without giving much attention to the matter.