Shrill ululations and venomous coos crept out from the fathomless black shadows lurking beyond the strange unnatural trees. The unearthly sounds slithered up my spine and overwhelmed the very essence of my soul with an avalanche of trepidation and fear. Frightened and confused, I continued to hysterically race through the godforsaken cesspool of nightmares that I’d somehow accidentally stumbled into.

The putrid-smelling air burned in my lungs, and the cut on my foot felt like it had been dipped in acid, making running a toilsome task. I wove my way through the sickening gnarled trees and glowering ferns, scrambling over sharp stones and rotted roots while screaming at everything like an alarmed guinea hen. Everything here was so dark and malevolent, saturated in atmospherical woe. I was hopelessly lost within the twisted thorny clutches of this harrowing forest of death.

My fingers repeatedly pinched at the skin on my arm, leaving little stinging red marks behind, confirming my worst suspicions... I’m not dreaming... How am I not fucking dreaming!? I had no idea where the heck I was, but there was no doubt in my mind that I was somehow no longer on earth. And all I wanted to do was get the flipping fuck out of this... unknown world.

Did I die and go to Hell!? Is this some sort of divine punishment because I secretly ate that stolen blueberry muffin at work!?

I didn’t have any clue where I was running to or how in the world I was going to get back home, but one thing was for certain, I had to find somewhere safe immediately. Dillydallying for even a measly second wasn’t an option in this wretched place.

In my haste, I tried to brush some of my golden hair out of my face to see a bit better, but it was tangled in my flower crown. It was also still wet from being submerged in the creek and hung around my head in darkened stringy strands. While fussing with my unruly locks, my soaked and now see-through peachy pink dress suddenly became snagged on a branch.

I went to tug it free and ended up screaming in terror. The branch that my dress was caught on was more like a gnarled skeleton hand with claws. And it was attached to a desiccated-looking ashen corpse within the tree’s gaunt trunk. Dry papery skin hung in loose tatters from its haunting face as if it were shedding like a snake. An echoed otherworldly screech poured out from its black abyss of a mouth, while its soulless midnight eyes stared at me with an eerie emptiness.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck!” I frantically sputtered in panic, while furiously ripping my dress out of its grotesque grasp. A piece of the thin material tore off, making my dress scandalously sort and frayed on one side.

With a whispery hiss, the tree corpse devoured the shredded fabric, slurping it into its void of a mouth like a tasty spaghetti noodle. I swiftly staggered away with wide terrified eyes and my mouth unflatteringly hanging agape in horror. My injured foot slipped on a slimy, black moss-covered stone, smearing it with my blood, and causing me to stumble back and fall onto my butt. I landed on another stone, slamming down hard enough to leave a bruise. “Oof!”

Tears flooded my eyes and flowed down my cheeks in thin rivulets of despair. Never in my life had I ever felt so afraid. My breathing was uncontrollably rapid and my bones rattled painfully beneath my flesh. Everything in this strange dark place was so frightening and gloomy, cloaked in a nightmarish veil of grievous obscurity. The fragile threads of veracity had begun to fray in my mind, as the undeniable verisimilitude of this otherworldly place had me believing that I was going insane. I just simply couldn’t comprehend the fact that this was my current reality.

“Help! Someone, please help!” I screamed at the top of my lungs, causing my distraught voice to echo into the inky darkness, stirring the slithering shadows within it. “Please, someone! Please help me!” I shakily stood back up, pitifully looking around in desperation for someone, anyone, who could possibly help me. Although, rationally I knew that there probably wasn’t anyone else around in this dreadful wilderness. Especially not at this time of night. “Please, anyone, help me.” I hopelessly whispered, alone in the dark bleakness.

...How am I ever going to get home?

With that despondent thought, sobs began to wrack my petite frame. I buried my face in my hands and pathetically wept. I’d only been here for about fifteen minutes, and yet, it felt like an eternity of despair. All light seemed to have faded away like ashes upon cruel winds, while the suffocating darkness blinded my soul from any possible glimmer of hope like a burial shroud.

A sudden consonance of eerily sinister-sounding howls suddenly ripped me away from my woebegone moment of self wallowing. The harrowing notes were like cries of agony from souls trapped beyond the grave, echoing within the hollows. Their baleful song threaded throughout the forest, coming from all directions as if it were weaving a transcendental web of terror to ensnare unsuspecting prey within its silky strings of malignity.

My blood turned to ice in my veins and my heartbeat slammed in my chest. Each howl pierced through every inch of my soul like the wicked blade of a scalding knife. There was no doubt in my mind that whatever creatures were howling would bring only death. Adrenaline and anxiety coursed through me, and every instinct and fiber of my being screamed at me to fucking run.

I took off in a dead sprint, completely ignoring the pain in my foot. Twisted gnarled twigs snapped beneath my bare feet, and little sharp stones continued to bite at their tender flesh. I Stumbled over thorny roots and slimy black vines that seemed to be actively trying to wrap around my legs. As the howling continued, my eyes shifted to my right where I saw a massive black shadow swiftly pursuing me.

I screamed again while trying to run even faster. Echoed barking joined in with the howls, and dread poured into my spirit... Oh shit... I’m being pursued by wolves! Realizing that I needed to get off of ground level immediately, I rushed over to a massive gnarled tree that thank god didn’t have a fucking corpse writhing in its trunk.

My dainty pink nails clawed at the rough ebon bark, causing little flecks to chip off, as I desperately tried to scale up the side of the trunk in a lame attempt to get away... Fuck! This was a terrible idea! I’m actually going to die! Hearing deep harrowing growls, I slowly turned around, and my heart sank into my stomach. Out from the thick shroud of slithering ghostly mist, slowly emerged six massive undead-looking wolves.

Holy fiddlesticks... They’re not just wolves, they’re zombie wolves!

Their sharp black claws clicked on the slimy stones, causing little loose pebbles to fall to the rocky soil. All of them had areas within their bristly black fur where their flesh had rotted away, revealing pale jagged bones. Their black soulless eyes stared at me with voracious hunger and bloodlust, as they snarled and slowly circled over, readying to make their kill.

One with no flesh on half of its frightening skeletal maw malevolently yipped to the others, then they all stared to sibilantly cackle like a bunch of jackals with sore throats. They looked downright rabid and deranged as if they relished my fear and suffering. I knew then that I would not be given a quick death. These animals liked to play with their food.

The lead wolf’s formidable jaw loosely hung open with an unsettling otherworldly growl echoing from it. It stared at me with a desire for maleficence in those fathomless black eyes. With a few loud skeletal cracking sounds, it hunched its gnarled back, then pounced with a vicious snarl.

I screamed in terror and covered my face while crumpling to the ground in defeat. And yet, I was stunned when I didn’t feel razor-sharp fangs sinking into my flesh, but instead heard the mellifluous swoosh of a blade and a loud thump. I warily peeked my teary eyes up over my hands, then widened them in complete shock and awe.

The wolf laid decapitated on the forest floor, completely sliced up and mangled, with thick black blood oozing from its stump neck. Standing over its limp scraggly body was a mysterious man holding a huge menacing sword. His long tattered black jacket eerily blew in the breeze like a phantasmal shadow, while a large hood cloaked most of his features. He looked totally badass and radiated danger, like the type of guy who knew a thing or two about surviving in this awful place.

A savior!

He was very tall, well over six feet, and extremely well built. A line of thick upturned spikes curved up along the backs of his strange calf-high obsidian boots, meeting the black leather pants which perfectly hugged his strong masculine thighs. His midnight shaded belt had two sword holsters descending from his hips, with the ends hidden within the shadows of his jacket. And that very jacket was open with no shirt underneath, revealing his perfectly sculpted abdominal muscles. Trying not to leer at his incredibly alluring body, my gaze lifted up to his half shadowed face just as he turned towards me, giving me a glimpse of his handsomely strong jawline and full lips... Holy hot damn!

Then my eyes grew even wider as I watched his large hand, with literal black claws as sharp as daggers, reach up and pull back his hood, fully revealing his face... My jaw practically hit the ground. Even though his handsomely formed features could have easily put any male model to shame, he was completely inhuman-looking.

...What in the world!?

A mass of thickly tangled raven locks tumbled down behind him, reaching all the way to his thighs like the world’s most scraggly cape. Bright blue clashed with crimson red, as he stared back at me with equal shock in his otherworldly gaze. What was particularly startling about his eerie gaze, however, was that the whites of his eyes weren’t white at all, but rather abysmal black, with two equally black thin lines stretching over his left eye. Pointy elf ears poked up on either side of his head, while his flawlessly smooth skin was a pale grey as if kissed by ashes, and not ivory like I’d originally thought.

And to top it all off, some sort of strange boney spikes were grotesquely twitching on his forehead. They made soft skeletal clicks and looked like a bizarre crown of horns, or boney antennae, or something... It was disgusting.

My stunned gaze met his again, while the remaining wolves prowled even closer around us, carefully planning their next attack. He was staring at me dumbfounded, with a strange mixture of confusion and horror etched onto his otherworldly face. “Human?” He practically whispered. His deep baritone voice was laced with utter disbelief. While he spoke, I got a quick peek at his sharp pearly white teeth and fangs which could easily rip right through my tender helpless flesh.

Oh shit, never mind! This guy’s just as scary as the wolves!

I began to freak the fuck out and screamed in terror at the sight of him. “Shh, no, no, no.” He quickly said while waving his free hand at me with his palm facing down. But the wolves abruptly pounced, forcing him to fiercely leap into action.

A second menacing sword seemingly materialized in his other hand with a metallic hiss. Then he violently slashed at the wolves with swift agility and startling proficiency, twirling his blades like a true adept, shredding the ferocious beasts to mere ribbons in a shadowy macabre dance. I frantically took off running in the opposite direction, not wanting to linger for another measly second. That was not a man, but a monster, and he was lethal!

Holy shit! Holy shit! Holy shit!

My lungs burned in my chest and my bare feet stung from the roughness of the ground, as I made a mad desperate dash to get away. Unfortunately, between my panicky cracked-out state of mind and the suffocating darkness of this dreadful place, it was hard to navigate my surroundings. I somehow ended up scrambling through a thorny brittle shrubbery. Each twig seemed to claw and grab at my legs, ripping up the bottom of my dress and leaving behind little red scratches on my flesh.

I whimpered in pain while thinking about how crazy all of this was. It felt like I had been abruptly hurled off into wonderland. Only instead of some wacky mushroom trip with talking caterpillars, this was more like if Alice had smoked a boatload of PCP in the world’s most godawful house of horrors.

This is fucking madness! I’ve gotta get the hell out of here!!

In my haste to get away from the accursed and seemingly sentient bush, I accidentally slipped on another slimy rock. I ungracefully tumbled down a steep embankment leading to what appeared to be a dried-up riverbed. A few little rocks and burgundy fern-like plants plummeted down with me. The wind was knocked out of my lungs as my body slammed to the rocky ground, and I hit my head on an old splintering log with a painful thwack.

The surrounding corpse trees seemed to appear in doubles, as my vision momentarily blurred. I held my head in a dizzied haze and sat up while slowly blinking a few times. As soon as I no longer felt so discombobulated from the fall, I shakily removed my hand and saw a layer of glistening crimson coating my fingers. I grimaced then looked around, noticing a small concaved area made from eroded stone and twisted gnarled roots within the side of the embankment.

With trembling limbs, I pathetically crawled into it like a weak frightened poltroon. Tears streamed down my cheeks while I huddled with my knees tucked up to my chest. My puffy eyes warily darted around, trying desperately to see whatever was lurking within the abysmal darkness. And there I sat, a beaten, bleeding, and bedraggled mess.

Shadowy unnatural fog ominously slithered and swirled throughout the ashen trees. Their soulless eyes appeared to be staring right at me as they whispered sibilant lamentations. They seemed oddly sorrowful as if they were forgotten hollow shells of who they once were, cursed to carry the weight of this world's grief and remorse upon their boney branches. I tried to be as quiet as possible in hopes that nothing else would notice me.