After falling down, she is held by Maya who cries out in bitter rage and kills Shankar. She goes in search of it, when she gets shot by Shankar. They fall into a big ditch and Vasanth helps her out, while he stays in. Soon Apsara and Vasanth get separated from the group, and are chased by the ghost.
Apsara gets caught too, and when they eventually find Maya's coffin, a figure is seen to appear behind Kate and Ram, and all hell breaks loose. Vasanth gets caught by Kate and is held at gun point while they search for the ring. Ram and Kate, the author, is shown to make a man dig into the grounds of Mayavanam, searching for the expensive ring that Maya was said that died with. As Apsara continues to watch, she is inexplicably teleported into the film. The film starts to play, and it is revealed that Vasanth's side of story is the film Irul. Swathi begs her not to, fearing for Apsara's life and in hope of the director backing her up, she appeals to him too, but the director supports Apsara even though he knows what could happen later on. The director of Irul had witnessed the bizarre death of the ad film producer while watching the film, but claimed to the police it was a heart attack.Īll lost and her being emotionally tortured by the money lender, Apsara decides to watch Irul, to make ends meet. By the time she reaches the studio, the producer is dead and is taken on a stretcher towards the ambulance. The scenes are alternated with Vasanth going to Mayavanam and the ad film producer watching the film. She catches an auto and goes to the studio. The contest is a promotional ad for Irul, in which contestants are awarded ₹5 lakh if they succeed in watching the horror film alone at night without showing signs of fright. In frustration, she goes to visit the ad company where she learns that the producer has gone to take part in the contest arranged by Swathi's company. He keeps visiting her house demanding cash and she keeps putting it off by saying that the cheque she has been entitled to, after acting in another ad film previously, keeps bouncing off. She doesn't give much thought to it because she is always preoccupied by the loan that she has taken from a local gangster. After a poster of the film, Irul, that Swathi is currently working on is put on to the walls of the house, Apsara experiences strange things happening inside the house. She is separated from her husband Arjun who is an actor, and lives with her friend Swathi ( Lakshmi Priyaa Chandramouli) who works at a film production house, RK Studios. In alternating scenes, Apsara ( Nayanthara) is a single mother struggling to make ends meet by working in ad films.
Madhan disappears, and after escaping from Mayavanam somehow, Vasanth's friend meets with a grisly death soon, by falling off the building just like Maya, which spurs Vasanth to embark on an investigation into Mayavanam. Later, Madhan and Vasanth's friend-an auto driver-visits Mayavanam to write about his last episode. She falls to her death from the building, with an expensive ring rumoured to be on her body, and is buried in the grounds of the asylum (Mayavanam), where it is believed her vengeful spirit now roams. Madhan then recounts the story of one such inmate, a woman named Maya Matthews, who was taken to the asylum after murdering her husband and forced to give up her newborn daughter to the authorities in the asylum.
He tells him about a book, Asylum by Kate, that details the life of the mentally ill who were forced into asylums and experimented upon. Ram points out a smoky form near them and warns him of it. The next day, Vasanth shows the pictures taken by him during the dressed up Maya's entry to his boss, Ram Prasad ( Amzath Khan) and Madan ( Uday Mahesh), the episode writer on Mayavanam. He falls back in fear, but the figure reveals itself as his wife it's just a birthday surprise. In order to ridicule Vasanth, the friend says the same three times, and a similar figure enters the room. He tells him about how one experiences chills and witnesses a spirit descending on them when one says "Maya! your daughter is not with me" three times. On his friend's birthday, he tells a story involving 'Maya', a malevolent spirit. Vasanth ( Aari) is an artist who is working on a story about 'Mayavanam', a haunted forest.