Its way too hot here

  I’ve been walking in this desert for a few hours now. I would’ve prepared more before I left bastion city if I knew it would be like this. At least I'm finally out.

  The sand seeped through the cracks in his sandals.

  How annoying.

  a sudden tremble spreads through the ground

  Why is the ground shaking so hard, there shouldn't be anything out here-

  Suddenly, dozens of small, slender tentacles wrapped around Morrow's leg, pulling him deep into the sand.

  SHIT GHHHHH

  Do I really die like this?

  “GET THE FUCK OFF OF ME-” RIP

  “FUCK MY LEG GOD DAMMIT, ITS COMING OFF”

  “YOU STUPID MOTHER FUCKER ILL KILL YOU”

  Morrow bites down as hard as he can on the tentacles, ripping some of them off before spitting it out. He continued doing this but to no avail.

  It burrowed deep into the sand taking his leg with it, and all he was left with was a missing leg, and the tentacles morrow chewed off.

  He scraped away at the sand, just wanting to see the surface again. His hands began to bleed as he crawled his way to the surface.

  “Please, please just let me get to this damn forest, cough cough.”

  How much longer… It feels like I've been digging for hours. I'm losing my mind. How far did that… thing drag me.

  Then he saw it, a beam of light, a light so bright, it filled his empty hopes with a will to keep going.

  Morrow crawled out of the sand before ripping a bit of his shirt off and tying it around his leg.

  He began to crawl towards the forest, and so he crawled, and he crawled, and he crawled. Hoping he can at least achieve something before he dies.

  I can't die here, I want to live.

  Seconds, minutes, hours, days, It didn't matter anymore to him. All he had was the will to keep moving forward. To die with a sense of freedom, whatever that would feel like, he needed it.

  Until morrow hit something, at first he didn't know what it was, he stuck his hand out to feel it, the rough edges of bark, the wideness of a trunk, the sound of leaves swaying on branches.

  Did I make it, is this it-

  There was a loud thud

  His body hitting the floor under the comfortable shade of the forest’s canopy, he relaxed his muscles and fell into a deep sleep.

  …

  When morrow woke up it was the middle of the day, the trees shading me from the heat.

  He sat there for a couple of minutes organizing my thoughts.

  I need to find shelter before night, if I don't I won't last even a couple of hours.

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  He decided to wander further into the forest searching for a cave or a town he could rest at. Just in case he observed the surroundings looking for anything that may kill him. But there wasn't much to see. Every tree had the same wood pattern as well as a weird red slit going directly down the tree. The ground was almost entirely flat showing no signs of any wild life

  Maybe I don't need to look for shelter? No it was better safe than sorry, for all I know these trees could be the monsters themselves.

  And just as this thought came to my mind I noticed a small cave in the distance, It was almost barely visible with the entrance being only a couple feet in diameter.

  The entrance doesn't seem to be that big, there's most likely nothing lurking in there.

  And just as I thought.

  The cave was completely bare, with the only notable feature being odd scribbles on the wall. The writing was completely unreadable, it was almost as if it wasn't words at all. But I was getting a strange feeling that these were words and they held a secret I desperately needed.

  It's getting late, I should rest.

  And as he drifted off to sleep he couldn't help but look up at the strange words and study them as if they were the most important thing in the world. Weirdly enough the more I looked at the words the more nauseous I became.

  When he woke up in the morning the pain from his missing leg was blinding. Morrow sat there unable to move from the blinding pain. He was scrunched up there for an unfathomable amount of time, or what felt like it.

  When he came to, it was already the middle of the day.

  I guess I should look for food, starving to death is not on my bucket list.

  …

  Morrow wandered around for a couple of hours before turning back, although he didn't find food, he was already lucky enough not to get lost in that maze. The forest was almost entirely the same, it was as if he was traveling in a never ending loop.

  I need to be able to walk, I can't keep crawling like this.

  He began scouring for any pieces of wood he could find, he spent hours crawling around gathering wood.

  Finally he gathered 3 well shaped logs. He carved away at them with a piece of stone until one of them finally shaped into what he desired. A peg that could help him walk around.

  He took the shirt wrapped around his leg off, it was painful but it had to be done. The wound wasn’t fully healed yet, you could still see the flesh hanging out, but there was no bleeding. He took a long jagged piece of wood and held it next to the wound opening and picked up the peg and positioned it next to the wound.

  Through the excruciating pain from scraping against open flesh, he managed to create a makeshift leg, a peg held together by a piece of wood and cloth.

  Finally, I can do some effective surveying now

  Every step accompanied excruciating pain. It would be a while until his leg healed around the peg. Some of his wounds reopened, blood running down the peg as he grit his teeth.

  He walked around, picking berries, trying to remember which mushrooms did what, then he saw it. There was a deer, it had 4 antlers lined with barbs. A tail so long and ridged it looked like it belonged to a snake. Its body was covered in a slimy mucus, and it was standing on two legs, looking over the forest from a height of 3 meters.

  The deer began to look in his direction as he ducked behind a set of bushes.

  What is a Dizrke doing here, this part of the forest looked uninhabited when I came here.

  I thought that I had only come a mile or two out?!?

  He was in a whole new area, but everything looked as it did at the cave.

  Crack

  A branch cracked next to him as he looked up. The giant creature towering over him, looking down with a sense of superiority, to the Dizrke he was nothing but a meal.

  With all his might, he ran, the peg cracking as he desperately tried to escape. But he wasn’t faster than the Dizrke, not with a makeshift leg made of wood that cracked with every stride he took.

  He didn’t know how long he had been running, ducking behind trees, taking leaps over rocks, trying every way to shake the Dizrke, who was still at least 500 feet behind him.

  This couldn’t last forever though.

  Shatter

  Morrow dropped to the floor as the fake leg finally gave out, the cloth and splint wood unravelled and the peg followed suit. The wound on the stub of his leg reopened, spilling blood and flesh onto the ground.

  Could I use the broken peg as a weapon? Would that work on a monster like that?

  He grabbed the peg and hid it behind his back as the monster walked over to him.

  It stood over him, breathing heavy with annoyance and hunger. It lunged its mouth down to eat him.

  I only have one shot at this

  As he prepared to lunge the peg at the Dizrke, a red branch shot out of the base of a tree nearby, burrowing into the head of the Dizrke and dragging it into the tree.