"Class is in session," a voice rasped, sounding like dry leaves skittering on pavement.

From the shadows of the supply closet, a figure emerged. It wore a tattered, Victorian-era lab coat stained with centuries-old bile. Where a face should have been, there was only a surgical mask fused to rotting skin, and eyes that glowed with the frantic light of a man who had never finished his work.

As Blackmore leaned over him, the last thing Thorne saw was the doctor pulling a fresh needle and silver thread from his pocket. "You have such a fine constitution, Professor," Blackmore whispered. "You'll make a wonderful Dean."

Thorne was a man of science, until his scalpel hit something hard inside a cadaver that shouldn't have been there: a brass key engraved with a crow.

Suddenly, the heavy iron doors slammed shut. The flickering fluorescent lights died, replaced by a rhythmic, wet dragging sound coming from the ventilation ducts. Scrape. Squelch. Scrape. "Who’s there?" Thorne shouted, his voice cracking.

Blackmore didn’t want blood; he wanted a replacement. He raised a rusted bone saw, the metal humming with a ghostly energy. Thorne turned to run, but the floorboards surged upward like ribs, trapping his ankles. The walls began to bleed a thick, black ink that formed the names of every student who had gone missing from the university since 1892.