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Your boots tramples fallen dead leaves, your eyes glances around to spot something out of the normal, but you notice nothing but an endless swarm of tall, coffee-colored trees around you and your lost mind.
Fidgeting your hands is really the only way you could keep your fears at bay when you’re deeply lost in the middle of the silent woods. At moments, a slight breeze would startle you, or perhaps it was indeed something else within this endless maze of trees.
You thought to yourself how stupid it was to decide to explore such a forest, and not give even a slight hint of caution by letting someone else know nor prepare tools in the case that you wandered too far.
That was quite the misplay you took when conceiving ideas akin to this. Despite that, lingering on how unplanned or dumb your thought process was to “go here and maybe see how beautiful nature is,” will do nothing but make you wish to give up here and now. And frankly, you don’t feel like losing hope so soon, surely you will eventually stumble upon something useful, right?
You sighed, and kept walking at a slow-and-steady pace, your legs moved one step at a time, crushing leaves and dirt under you. Occasional paths to the highs or leaps to the lows would hinder your firm momentum, but it was mostly quiet and simple, if not a tad bit mind-numbing.
It was really only you, and the mildly-peaceful forest; watching as leaves fall and the wind blows along is quite calming, at least to you. You’re still stuck in this endless patch of trees with yellow-green plants, but alas it could always be worse. At least, your mind echos to yourself.
...Hmm? Is it getting cold? You notice moments subtle yet noticeable feelings of chilly contact on your skin. Your ears seem to caught on as well, it seems like the sounds are gradually raising volume.
You look up, and quickly realize there’s a building-sized gray blob in the sky. Oh, it’s raining! Nevermind, it’s STORMING!
The raindrops shower your body, each contact felt like an aggressive and ice-cold poke to your skin. Your shirt and pants are going to end up draped, oh this is not going so well now is it, and of course you didn’t bring an umbrella, lovely...
Like your mind, you scramble to look for shelter. Your soaked legs propel you forward, your face was getting pummelled by countless droplets falling from up above. Even so, you shifted your focus to finding something, just anything really to hide from the weather.
As you dash between trees, you spot something in the distance. It looked greyish, oh, it’s a cave! You knew that going into caves is generally not a good idea, but maybe you could try to at least wait for the clouds to lighten inside the cave entrance. Ah well, you can probably make a break for it in the case that something is inside, you think.
With your half-baked plan built, you sprinted for the stone structure, until you find yourself at the entrance. With a final leap, you make it inside an-
*CLINK!* *CLANK!*
Your foot smacked onto what felt like a large pile of something really sturdy! You tumble and spin into the darkness of the cave, the rough surface scratched on your body, the pain was not pleasant at all, it was as if someone was trying to give you scratches. After a few seconds of struggle and a couple vocal expressions of pain, you finally broke the momentum that was dragging you on the cave floor.
You rested yourself on the uneven and bitter-cold walls, you were soaking wet, and probably covered in a few scratches here and there, you couldn’t really be for certain since you were in the da-
Oh... Your head checked around erratically to look for the cave entrance, only for you to realize that the entrance was quite far away. It was a distant and blurry image, surrounded by the dark shadows around you. You panic, you’re far away from the exit, and now you’re physically damaged.
*Grrrrrrrr...*
Oh no... With your shaking injured hands, you attempted to pull yourself to the exit. There’s something, there’s definitely something in here with you, and it doesn’t seem happy. This is REALLY not good.
Crawling and crawling you kept at it, but the exit was barely approaching, and what was most likely a beast was coming after you. A few tears spill from your eyes, no you’re not going to die like this!
You were pressing deep into the stone ground, trying to move faster, but you couldn’t do it so soon. In your vision, a silhouette covers the outside world. Its shape was large, it had menacing horns on its head, it legs would be strong enough to crush a car.
You stopped, as the beast approached you. Overwhelmed, you lie on the wall, now having realized that you couldn’t do anything this time. It came closer, you closed your eyes. Its heavy breathe blew on your chest, you squall and curled your body. It’s over, you’re going to be chomped and devoured, and be nothing but another monster’s meal...
...
..?
A warm slimy swipe suddenly on your face made you jitter, you looked to see the beast just... idling? Its crimson-tipped mouth poked you on the forehead, what is it doing?
You raised your hand to its face, and rubbed your fingers on its scaly surface, your ears then heard a seemingly satisfied sound made by the creature. You glanced over at its back to see its spiky tail wagging back and forth, it looked like a giant and somewhat intimidating pet. Perhaps you misunderstood what its intention was, well at least it’s not trying to kill you.
You slowly picked yourself up, then halfway through you remembered that you’re still really scratched. The large beast seemed to notice, and went into the void of the cave; maybe it was looking for something? That’s what you think it’s doing.
There you idly stand, the outside seems to keep raining, but it much less than earlier. Still, you assumed it’d be best to stay with the friendly creature and wait the storm out with them.
You look back to see the beast returning back holding what seems to be, a medical kit? You were slightly startled, and was deciding whether or not to ditch this place while it’s still not mauling you. How did it even get one? Did it... No it didn’t, right..? What’s getting into you? You really should get out of here, but... Can you really abandon that friendly creature of yours..?
You took a deep breathe, it’s probably fine. The large paper-white animal drops the medical kit in front of you, and gestures you with its head and tail to use it. You comply and the thing is now in your hands. As you wrap your limbs in bandages, you hesitantly ask if it took it from another person like you.
Its eyes looked at the cave walls, before slowly nodding. You continued the conversation by then asking if it killed anyone before. Again, it gazed somewhere else before nodding. You were slowly getting a chilling feeling climbing up your back. You questioned if it was, friendly to you. Which like before, it nodded. Well good thing it’s not trying to kill you...
As you finish up covering your other leg, you pet the creature, it replied back with a poke to your head. It’s admittedly adorable? You walked over to rest on the cave wall. The friend comes over and sits next to you, it’s basically a pet dog. Or pet beast, you’re really not thinking straight right now but, oh well.
You rested there, when the creature came closer to you, and licked you right on the face. You can’t help but chuckle aloud, and patted it on the head. Despite everything that happened before, it seems to have worked out in your favour.
A tiring feeling comes over you, gradually it strengthens, resulting in you feeling quite sleepy. Your mouth let out a sigh, and you told the beast that you were heading for rest. With that, it lied next to you, and laid its head on your legs. You smile, before closing your eyes.
The rain outside drips to the entrance’s edge, the sound of drops splashing play as background noise. The occasional purr from the creature would come to your ears. Rest would take you slowly away, as you find yourself sleeping next to your new big friend.