Hall of Infinite Doors
The rending, crashing sounds fuel you as you burst into a powerful sprint, managing to crash out of the clearing you landed in just as you see the monster bore into it. You peek back as you leap over some outstretched roots: the monster is huge, now that you can see it in its full length. It simply shoulders through the trunks of the trees, either oozing its boneless mass between them or muscling them out of the way. Its horrible, grinding maw devours anything that gets in its path; you see it descend on your comparatively small cage with rapid gusto, vacuuming it into the grinding, hungry throat. It has no eyes, but the waving tendrils seem to serve it better - they constantly grasp at the world around it, and the few that extend from its mouth sweep hissing trails along the burnt ground.
Your only hope is to keep ahead of it. You increase your speed, leaping huge boulders and clustered undergrowth quicker than you can see it, grasping small tree trunks to hurtle yourself in sudden hairpin turns, hoping to lose the thing in wild zigzagging. It doesn't work. The sound is behind you, close enough to be an almost physical assault; thankfully, the air is rushing past your face far too quickly for you to be able to smell the intestinal horror.
But there is another smell, another sound - running water. You burst into the brightness of an exposed glade, bordered by the almost miraculous sight of a deep, running river. You leap over the purplish grass, barely managing to clear the trees before the thing bursts them asunder, crossing the sloping meadow in a few leaping strides before jumping into the clear, running water. It's incredibly cold and deep and fast, and you revel in it, swimming as far and as fast as you can as the worm-monster coils itself onshore.
Coils, and leaps.
For how fast it was in the woods, it's like lightning underwater. It simply fires itself towards you, crossing the distance in less time than it takes you to blink. You feel fibers, impossibly strong ropes wrapped around your ankle, and they burn like the devil's tongue.
But not for long - as it pulls you into its mouth before you can even scream. Your last sensation is of incredible agony as the worm's thorn-lined throat tears to you ribbons.
Your only hope is to keep ahead of it. You increase your speed, leaping huge boulders and clustered undergrowth quicker than you can see it, grasping small tree trunks to hurtle yourself in sudden hairpin turns, hoping to lose the thing in wild zigzagging. It doesn't work. The sound is behind you, close enough to be an almost physical assault; thankfully, the air is rushing past your face far too quickly for you to be able to smell the intestinal horror.
But there is another smell, another sound - running water. You burst into the brightness of an exposed glade, bordered by the almost miraculous sight of a deep, running river. You leap over the purplish grass, barely managing to clear the trees before the thing bursts them asunder, crossing the sloping meadow in a few leaping strides before jumping into the clear, running water. It's incredibly cold and deep and fast, and you revel in it, swimming as far and as fast as you can as the worm-monster coils itself onshore.
Coils, and leaps.
For how fast it was in the woods, it's like lightning underwater. It simply fires itself towards you, crossing the distance in less time than it takes you to blink. You feel fibers, impossibly strong ropes wrapped around your ankle, and they burn like the devil's tongue.
But not for long - as it pulls you into its mouth before you can even scream. Your last sensation is of incredible agony as the worm's thorn-lined throat tears to you ribbons.
