Greetings, and welcome to this diatribe. I don't know how and when anyone will have the good fortune or misfortune to read these lines, so the first thing shall be to explain or introduce some things that will happen hereafter in this book.

  First of all, I want to make absolutely clear that what you are about to read is real. I am aware that this is a statement that has becoming less and less value nowadays if it is made by the author of the story himself, especially if we are talking about one that could fit into the category of horror, but, unfortunately, traditional essay writing has not found my testimony to its liking, even in the branches most akin to the subject of the bizarre. Publication as a work of fiction, much to my regret, is the only alternative left to me for this experience to see the light of day.

  So, regarding proving the veracity of my words, I have no choice but to be as truthful as possible hoping you will believe all that I am about to tell you. In fact, I would ask all those who believe that what I am narrating is a chimera, or outright madness of a somewhat dreamy mind, to consider for a moment what kind of benefit or advantage I receive by stating as true all that will follow, because, let's be honest here, like so many other witnesses of the weird who gathered the courage to tell their experiences before me, the only thing I will receive, probably, will be mockery or condescension. I don't care, I just need to get it all out, to discharge it from my conscience and know that the testimony of what happened will not disappear with me.

  Second, these events took place back in the summer of 2016, so I wrote these lines no less than six years after the fact. This may raise many questions (especially as to why write them now and not before), so I prefer to be the one to tackle the situation by explaining it directly: I needed that margin to gather the time and, most especially, the strength to process, order and remove myself from the events long enough to have the courage to write them. The loneliness and isolation during the COVID confinement also contributed, I suppose, because, like many others, it gave occasion and impetus to old, shelved projects. I only hope that passaging time will not make me forget or distort some memories I treasured at the time.

  With all that said, I have to clarify that what you are about to read will comprise a series of prose texts reorganized and rearranged by me based on communications received through instant messaging applications or e-mail. In other words, what I am doing is trying to paraphrase and articulate loose and fragmentary texts that were produced over the course of a day, several days or weeks. The intention is to create a single narrative that can be easily followed without being disjointed, unclear or overly vocativistic (I cannot emphasise enough that the original information was, in most cases, a conversation). This narrative, from what I have been able to check on the internet, would fit into the typology of protagonist narrator or witness narrator (I am not very clear, and I am not an expert on the subject, so I leave the classification to people more expert than me).

  This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

  Also, real people, places and businesses are involved in this narrative, and, sometimes, I could not get permission or confirmation that they want to appear in the account of events (because I could not contact them or because they are no longer with us). Therefore, I will try to avoid as many allusions or references as necessary in order to protect their privacy. This includes my friend, the main protagonist of the events. In the same way, all information that is not relevant or is part of banal conversations will be removed or cut out as far as possible, especially in the first parts of the text, where, between the conversation on the subject at hand, there was another content of a more anodyne nature, typical of a conversation between friends.

  However, despite these efforts to write a clear and readable text, sometimes one or more clarifications become necessary. In such circumstances, a footnote will most often be used so as not to interrupt or hinder the smooth reading of the text. For remarks that are too long, a direct inclusion in the middle of the text should be chosen. These remarks should be indicated by italics:

  This is a paragraph in italics

  These remarks will be especially relevant in the final events of this testimony, since, because of circumstances beyond my control, some of the information was mutilated or interrupted, leaving me only the option of trying to fill in as much as I could based on the information I had before and after the interruptions, and always trying to avoid unfounded speculation. In any case, I invite those who read this text to be critical of my contributions and draw their own conclusions.

  Finally, in relation to the criterion of narrative division, the chapters obey a structure or temporal ordering made by me, in no case were the events referred to me in that order, except for the last chapters, which are practically complete translations of the e-mails that were sent to me in a relatively periodic and orderly fashion. Therefore, the period covered by the chapters is quite flexible and can range from a few days to several weeks, which is why the time interval in which the chapter takes place will always be referred to by a subtitle.

  Thank you very much for your attention and, once again, for taking the time to read this book.