The Haunted Tunnel

[Posted： 2025/11/28]

This is a story I heard from Mr. T, who used to work at a game development company.

It happened decades ago?back in the days when overnight crunches and sleeping at the office were just part of the job.

Mr. T had a habit of going for drives when work got too suffocating. Especially late at night?he liked to cruise around the loop road near the office, engine humming, city sleeping.

But on this particular day, the route wasn't near his office. It was near his home.

You see, they'd just hit the peak of a brutal dev cycle. No days off. Sleepless nights. Endless debugging.

So when he finally made it home, he collapsed onto his bed without even showering. Dead asleep.

When he woke up, it was already deep in the night.

His body felt better, but mentally?he couldn't accept that an entire precious day off had passed in a haze of unconsciousness.

So he grabbed his keys, thinking he'd salvage the night with a quick drive around the neighborhood. Maybe hit up a convenience store and grab a bento.

Now, Mr. T's prefecture was infamous for a certain tunnel?a notorious local “haunted spot.”

They say that during the tunnel's construction, a landslide buried several workers alive. Their bodies were never recovered, sealed beneath layers of concrete.

Ever since, strange things had been reported:

A woman in white appearing in the dark… a pale face reflected in your rearview mirror…

And it's not just rumors. The tunnel actually has a disturbingly high rate of traffic accidents.

Of course, no one can say if the accidents are caused by ghosts or just bad road design.

Mr. T? He didn't believe in any of that nonsense.

That night, he had no hesitation adding the haunted tunnel to his route.

It just so happened to be the most direct path. Nothing more.

As he entered the tunnel, the dim sodium lamps buzzed and flickered above?

szzzt… szzzt…

like bugs sizzling in a bug zapper.

Ghosts? Nothing.

Just a regular old tunnel?worn down, sure, but completely ordinary.

Then?

CRASH.

In the next instant, Mr. T's car slammed into a guardrail.

He didn't understand what happened.

Heart pounding, he looked around and realized he had already exited the tunnel?

But apparently, he hadn't made it through the curve that immediately followed.

He must have passed out. Probably from exhaustion after so many sleepless nights.

Just… blacked out behind the wheel.

And the crash?

It happened right where the landslide supposedly occurred.

The same cursed spot.

But he didn't see a ghost.

No woman in white. No face in the mirror.

Just a man who entered a tunnel…

and almost never came out.