Iskalde Grøss #1/1989

In "Dødssikker!", a doctor devises a chilling test to prove his friend’s theory about consciousness after death, using a carefully staged anesthetic to simulate poisoning. As the experiment unfolds, the line between life and death blurs—when the heart specialist doesn’t wake, the doctor realizes too late that the hoax has become horrifyingly real. Told from the doctor’s first-person perspective, the story lingers on the unsettling aftermath, leaving the full weight of what the dying man perceived lingering in the silence.

In "Rått parti," Sigmund, Henning, and Field are drawn into a secretive government contract for a staggering number of wooden discs, pushing them to innovate with a new saw. As tensions rise, Henning and Darby conspire to cheat Field out of his share in the business, culminating in a rigged poker game that ends in tragedy. After Field’s suicide and burial, a rotting hand rises from his grave, silently following the two men back to the mill—where a gruesome fate awaits. The story unfolds with quiet dread, building to a shocking climax that leaves the mill’s foreman face to face with a horrifying aftermath.

In the frozen silence of a snow-lashed city, Barton Gordon answers a desperate ad for a superintendent, drawn to a crumbling apartment building where the heat has been cut off. His search leads him to Marcus Kingsley, a pale, yellow-skinned man who lives in an unnaturally cold apartment, his world kept at a sterile, unnatural chill. When the air conditioner finally fails, the silence grows thick with dread—until Gordon sees something wrong, something alive, oozing from beneath Kingsley’s door.

In the darkly whimsical tale *Med skatt skal landet bygges*, King Moneymad’s endless taxation pushes a desperate kingdom to the breaking point—first with coins, then with fingers, and finally with something far more horrifying. When the people can no longer pay their "thumb" tax, the king’s cruelty spirals into violence, igniting a revolt that turns the nation’s greed into its own reckoning.

In "Vel blåst!", a dying California gold miner recounts his final moments after being shot by a claim jumper. As he slips into unconsciousness, he awakens to find himself a ghost, watching helplessly as the killer attempts to bury him—only to discover that no earthly act can truly lay him to rest.

In "Pladask," a young man’s fascination with a striking new office worker spirals into a deadly misstep, as the Old Witch recounts two possible fates: one where he falls prey to a ghoul feeding her mother’s cats, and another where his infatuation leads him to tumble twenty stories to his demise—cursed for his folly. The story unfolds with chilling precision, blending eerie atmosphere and dark irony in a brief, unforgettable tale.

In "Den siste vilje," the dying Harold Farber, skeptical of his relatives’ greed, stages his own funeral to expose them—hidden in his coffin with a microphone, he listens as they mock him and scheme over his estate. When the lid opens and he leaps up to disinherit them, he instead signs everything over to the Happy Home for Orphaned Children—only to collapse moments later. The stunned gathering erupts in laughter as the doctor and lawyer, revealed as the charity’s leaders, thank the very relatives they’d hired to play the part.

In the quiet town of Iskalde Grøss, a reclusive chess prodigy known only as "Sjakk-geniet" becomes the center of a parade he never wanted to attend. When the crowd demands he remove his signature top hat to salute the flag, his secret unravels in a moment of shocking horror—revealing the twisted truth behind his genius.

In "Ekteskapsløftet," a woman returns from the grave to reclaim her place beside her husband, her presence both haunting and eerily dutiful. Though he pleads for her to go back, her final words echo a vow that now demands both lives — not just one — as she calls him to bed, her promise unbroken.