story scary short I Bought a Cursed Object on the Dark Web and the Bizarre Disasters That Followed

I Bought a Cursed Object on the Dark Web

I used to read those “cursed object” posts the way you read junk news at midnight half entertained, half annoyed, scrolling past the same headlines in different clothes. Haunted doll. Possessed painting. A box that “won’t stay shut.” You know the type. And honestly? I thought most of it was marketing. People selling a vibe. Then a friend messaged me a link with, “This one’s got your name all over it.” Like it was funny. Like it was nothing.

It wasn’t a normal site. It was a dark web marketplace plain listings, blunt warnings, a weird little culture of people acting like they were trading contraband. Some of the items were obvious scams. Some were just… unsettling. Not because they looked scary, but because whoever wrote the descriptions sounded tired. Like they’d already had the same conversation too many times. I told myself I was only browsing. Research. Material. I run a horror site collecting stories is basically my whole thing. But I kept coming back to one listing.

The Listing That Didn’t Read Like Fiction

It said:
“MOURNER’S GLASS — VERIFIED ACTIVE — DO NOT SLEEP FACING IT.”

That was the headline. No jokes, no dramatic poetry. Just a warning. The seller claimed it was a small antique mirror used in a funeral tradition where people covered mirrors so the dead wouldn’t get “caught” and linger in the house. This one, they said, was the reverse a mirror kept uncovered on purpose, to invite the last face back for one more look. They called it a cursed mirror. A haunted item. They used both phrases like they meant different things. I stared at it for a long time, trying to feel clever about it. Trying to talk myself into the purchase without admitting I was drawn in. And yeah, fine I bought it. I told myself it was a prop. A conversation piece. Something I’d photograph, write about, and then stash in a drawer. I didn’t buy it because I believed. Not at first.

Unboxing It (And Immediately Regretting It)

It showed up in a plain padded envelope. No return address. No branding. Just my name, and a random mess of characters where the sender info should be. Inside, the mirror was wrapped in black cloth and tied with thread that looked old enough to snap if I breathed on it. When I unwrapped it, the first thing that hit me was the smell stale cigarette smoke, and something metallic underneath. Like coins. Like old keys. Like blood, if I’m being honest, though I hate even writing that because it sounds dramatic.

The mirror itself was small, palm-sized, with a tarnished frame. The glass was reflective, but not clean. It didn’t brighten the room. It sort of… darkened it. Like it drank whatever light was there. I set it on my desk and waited for the moment where I’d laugh at myself. Nothing happened. And that should’ve been a relief, right? But it wasn’t. It was worse. Because once you buy something labeled “cursed object from the dark web,” your brain starts scanning for proof. You start watching your life like you’re waiting for a jump scare.

The First Weird Thing Was… Small

That night, my power cut out. Not for long maybe ten, fifteen seconds. Long enough for my laptop to go dead, long enough for the room to turn into a black box. I remember freezing in my chair like a kid, because when the lights go out unexpectedly you can’t help it. Your body reacts before your brain does.
And in the dark, I heard a soft tap from the desk. Not a bang. Not a crash. A tap. Like a fingernail touching glass. When the lights came back, the mirror had turned a few degrees. Facing my chair.

I sat there staring at it like an idiot. My first thought was vibration, like maybe the power surge shook the desk. My second thought was… no. No, that’s not what that was. I covered it with the cloth again. I didn’t even debate it. My hands were already moving. The next morning, my bank app opened and showed some insane negative balance, like I’d been drained overnight. Then it corrected itself a minute later, like it never happened. That same day my phone slipped out of my hand and hit the floor screen-first. It shattered into a spiderweb crack that looked a little too… symmetrical. Like something had drawn it. Normal stuff. Annoying stuff. But it started stacking up.

Scary stories to read in the dark: “Disappearance of My Hiking Group in the Alaskan Wilderness” click to find out what really happened on that trail.

Building and Building and Building

Over the next week, everything went wrong in a way that didn’t feel random anymore. It felt paced. Like it was taking turns with me. My kitchen tap burst in the middle of the night. I woke up to that rushing sound and stepped into cold water. It soaked the bottom cabinets, ruined a couple of boxes I’d stored under the sink, warped the wood. I spent the next day mopping and swearing and pretending it was just bad plumbing. Then my neighbor knocked on my door and asked politely, but with that tight look people get if I’d been “moving furniture around” late at night.

I hadn’t been home. My car’s brake warning light flashed once, then went away. No code. No alert afterward. Just that one moment of panic on the road and then nothing, like the car had changed its mind. A framed photo fell off the wall when I was in the other room. I heard the smack, ran in, and saw the glass had shattered outward onto the floor, not inward like it had just fallen. I stood there trying to picture the physics of it and couldn’t. All week, I kept glancing at the covered mirror like it was a live thing. Like it was waiting.

I started searching constantly: “dark web cursed object,” “haunted mirror experiences,” “cursed item symptoms,” “bizarre disasters after buying haunted items,” “paranormal activity after antique mirror.” A lot of it was junk. People trying to sell their own “haunted items.” But there were forum posts scattered, half-coherent, written by people who sounded embarrassed describing the same shape of experience. Electrical issues. Accidents. Sleep problems. A feeling of being watched. One word kept popping up: attachment. I hated that word. It felt too neat. Too confident.

The Dreams Started Stealing My Sleep

By the fourth night, I wasn’t sleeping like a normal person. I’d drift off and then jolt awake, like my body refused to settle. When I did sleep, I dreamed of the mirror uncovered, propped upright like a doorway. I’d lean in and see myself but not exactly. My face would be delayed, like the reflection was lagging behind. My eyes would move a split second late. And then the reflection would smile when I didn’t. I woke up with my jaw clenched so hard my teeth hurt. Once I woke up standing in the hallway, barefoot, facing my desk like I’d been walking toward it. The mirror was still covered. But the cloth had slid down, just a bit, exposing the top curve of the glass. And I know how this sounds. I do. But the exposed part didn’t look like a normal mirror. It looked deep. Like there was distance behind it. Like it wasn’t reflecting my room it was reflecting somewhere else.

I Messaged the Seller (Because What Else Do You Do?)

I wrote the seller. I asked if it was a prank, if there was some trick to it. Magnets, chemicals, anything.
The reply came later, one sentence:
“If you uncovered it in your sleeping space, move it now, and don’t look into it after 3 a.m.”

That was it. No apology. No “what happened?” No explanation. Just instructions, like I’d joined a club I didn’t remember signing up for. I moved it into a closet. Shut the door. I even put stuff in front of it, which is ridiculous, because what was I picturing? A mirror crawling out? That night my smoke alarm went off at 3:07 a.m. No smoke, no heat, no reason. Just that violent, shrieking beep. I stood there under the buzzing ceiling light, sweaty and shaking, and as I pressed the button to silence it, I heard a faint scrape from inside the closet. A careful sound. Like glass shifting against wood.

The Moment I Knew I’d Gone Too Far

The next day I decided I was done. I didn’t want a cursed mirror. I didn’t want a haunted item. I didn’t want content. I just wanted my life to feel normal again. I kept it wrapped and drove toward a donation drop, because part of my brain still wanted to treat it like an object. Like a mistake I could quietly get rid of. At a red light, my phone camera opened by accident. Front-facing. It popped up for a second.
And in the screen, I saw my face… looking down. My real head was up. Eyes forward. Both hands on the wheel.

But the image on my phone tilted its gaze toward my lap toward the wrapped bundle on the passenger seat and its mouth moved like it was whispering something. No sound came out. Just the movement.
The light changed. Someone honked behind me. I dropped the phone like it burned. I drove home on autopilot, repeating the same thought until it felt like prayer: Get it out. Get it out. Get it out.

What I Did With It (And Why I Still Don’t Feel Safe)

I didn’t donate it. I didn’t throw it away. And I didn’t smash it, because every thread I read said breaking cursed objects can “release” whatever’s tied to them. I didn’t want to test that. So I did something that felt stupid, and also… necessary. I rewrapped it in the cloth. Put it in a plastic container. Packed salt around it until it was buried. Taped the lid shut so thoroughly it looked like evidence. Then I drove it to a storage unit across town and rented a locker under a different name. For about a week, things calmed down. No flooding. No alarms. No sudden freak accidents. But my sleep never really came back.

Sometimes I still wake up around 3 a.m. with that heavy feeling like there’s a presence in the room, like something is standing too close even when I’m alone. And when I pass a dark window at night, I don’t look too hard at my reflection. Because I’m scared I’ll see a version of me that’s a fraction of a second off. Or smiling when I’m not.

If You’re Thinking of Buying a Cursed Object on the Dark Web

If you found this by searching “I bought a cursed object on the dark web” or “dark web cursed object story,” let me be clear: curiosity doesn’t protect you. Treating it like a joke doesn’t make it harmless.
I bought that mirror because I wanted a story. Now I have one. And I don’t know if it’s finished with me.