W1 – 100 percent sanity- The Dark

The maze is tight and winding and in the part your kin finds themselves in, deeply, deeply dark. Not a speck of light seems to bleed in through the clustered and tangled thorns and after a time it is hard to tell where the sky even was. Everywhere you turn your kin’s fur is pricked with sharp thorns and their horns (or any other appendage) constantly get snarled up in the twisting, grasping plant life. The way seems to get smaller and smaller, the space more oppressive and claustrophobic until even the slightest sound of a twig snapping nearby is enough to ring out like an ominous threat. You see some light at the end of the tunnel, but it seems so extremely far away. Describe your kin’s trip through this part of the maze, do they manage to squeeze through the exit easily or is it difficult?

Ever since the mountains, Journey’s travels had been somewhat more subdued. He had instead spent time visiting family and friends, not speaking much but just enjoying their companionship and thinking about his survival. He hadn’t expected to return alive and had, at one point, completely accepted death. A part of him had been left behind on that mountain, some piece of his soul and he both longed for it and felt freed. It was a strange feeling. He still ached, from the scars in his neck, especially as the days grew colder.

But this time of rest and family did not last long and Journey had found himself elsewhere, in a dark part of the Swamp. A place that left a bad taste in his mouth, and it wasn’t just the food - which seemed pleasing to the eye but somehow all smelt of death. There were stories that he had heard, of kin who ate their own and wallowed in the deepest sins. Was this such a place?

He who had proverbially died and been reborn again, knew little fear as he discovered the maze.

The wild tangle of thorns that beckoned him in, and so off he went, determined to see something new. Something just as strange as a ghostly eagle on a mountaintop.

But after some time walking, it seemed that Journey wasn’t going to see much of anything. His path was incredibly dark, so much so that he had to stop multiple times, waiting for his eyes to adjust. Each step forward was harder, thorns catching at his side and branches that he hadn’t been there before somehow catching in his horns. It took time to free himself each time he was forced to stop and he knew that he would leave here with his body littered with scratches and tears.

It wasn’t the first thicket he’d ever tried to push through but this was different.

The darkness was oppressive, pushing in on all sides just like the maze itself.

The smell was cloying, sticking up his nose and making him want to snort it out in search of fresh air.

Though there was a flicker of light in the distance, it never seemed closer and Journey was starting to feel the effects of being boxed in. He hated being constrained and caught. His was a life of freedom. If there was a danger to take on, he would face it himself, fight or flight - not trapped, waiting, listening to the crunch and crack of twigs that could be a hunter in the dark.

Journey decided to forget his cautious approach and started to really push, teeth gritted with determination. It hurt. And he stumbled, many times, over roots and branches, feeling like a stumbling foal. But finally, bleeding in long itchy lines up and down his sides, he stumbled into the light and was free. He breathed deeply, despite the strange scent that filled the maze, dragging air into his lungs.

W4– 75 percent sanity – Paralysis

Something is very very wrong, and as your kin makes their way down another winding path and runs into something terrifying. A buzzing and twisting shadow that barely holds together, it is shaped like something they might fear and it turns and slowly comes towards them, crackling and barely part of the world around it. When it comes within a few meters it lunges into a run and leaps at them, there is no way to outrun it. However as whatever it is closes the distance enough to touch your kin, it vanishes in a hiss of static, leaving nothing but shadows behind.

At least now the path had opened up, though it was winding and long. The rest should be easier, Journey thought - and if faced by another path like the one before, he would simply pick another way.

But he was soon proven wrong and he halted, as something appeared. His heart immediately sped up and his ears flicked back, the ground seemed to waver hazily between him and the sudden arrival. The shadow buzzed and crackled and formed itself into an eaglehound pierced by shards, a beast from mountains, from far away. It was impossible.

But it was here.

It turned to him.

When Journey tried to move, to run or perhaps fight, he wasn’t sure yet, he could do neither. He was frozen in place, bound to only watch. Watching as his death loomed and his throat ached and it came for him, leaping forward.

And he waited for  the death he had avoided once to claim its due.

But it did not.

He lived, the shadows dark at his hooves, and almost, somehow... disappointed. 

W7 – 50 percent sanity – In Peril

Your kin comes across another kin who is hanging on by nothing more than a thread to the edge of an impossibly deep pit. The pollen is heavy on the air, so heavy that everything seems tinted red. Does your kin try and help them up? No matter what they do after a short time the kin they are trying to help falls into the pit. It can be a stranger or someone they know. How do they react? Only after some time do they realise that the pit was never a pit at all, just an area of the ground where some light stone surrounds some dark stone. The kin never existed.

You should have died.

The thought came to him as a voice not his own, or was it? Had he spoken? Journey shook his head to try and clear it away, to set himself free from that niggling reminder that he had failed his own dream.

That which had named him, the journey, all in one dream, the desert and the mountain, the light, the cold, a death. Was he allowed to be reborn? Oh hello. There was someone in distress.

He approached them, a kin he didn’t know, hanging on to dear life at the edge of a pit. They begged for his help with their eyes. The world was red. Maybe he was dead?

Should they be dead?

“Maybe this is your purpose,” he said. “Maybe this is how your dream is meant to end.”

And they looked at him and maybe they let go on purpose or maybe they simply ran out of energy but then they were gone, without a trace, down into the darkness. And Journey frowned, fighting the rising guilt and horror.

How terrible.

But maybe he should follow their example.

As he stepped forward, to tumble into the pit as well, it was gone.

And so he carried on.

He had no other choice.

W9 -25 percent sanity- Death

The pollen feels intolerable and every breath drawn is agony. Your kins body feels odd in whichever way you like, whether this is chills, delirium, fever, whatever is up to you. All they know is that suddenly they feel very, very much like they are dying. They realise whatever else is true about this pollen it becomes clear to your kin it has poisoned them and they are dying. They feel their body give up inch by inch until they fall to the ground, feeling their life leave them. They are certain this is death, what do they see? What are the things they think in this situation? Mercifully, death is not for them this night and after blacking out they come to their senses further along in the maze with no concept of how they got there.

It became clear, after some more time wandering in the red haze that was his reality, that death would soon claim him regardless of whether he fell down a pit or had his throat torn out. Oh yes, time did that to everyone. But especially now that the sickness had claimed him.

Journey laughed and coughed, felt his muscles explode with pain. Each scratch he had received was an open wound, oozing out his life. It was inside him. The red. The pollen. Now it wanted to ruin him and escape.

This wasn’t how he had wanted it.

The cold had been acceptable. Freezing to death in the snow, bleeding out, feeling nothing. That had been his ideal. This was just uncomfortable. Messy.

His cheek shifted against the earth, the ground had come to meet him, there was dirt in his eyes. He blinked it away. The fever burned within him. The pollen was like worms in his gut, pushing past the skin and spilling out. They wriggled around him, trying to find a way back in to make more holes. Just another corpse covered in maggots. He'd seen enough of those. He wasn't a pretty sight. That was why he had wanted the cold.

Journey died without a struggle, he wheezed out his last breath gratefully and thought of his family. He had left a wide legacy. Many children he had told his many tales too, so many stories that he had collected. It would be nice to return to the feather tree again and be content.

Had he ever been content?

He had always been seeking the end of his dream, only to live beyond it.

What did he do now?

Ah right, die in the dirt.

Oh how he hated mazes.

And then he awoke.

Again, again, again.

Well then, let’s go.

And so he got up.

The world tipped sideways but he had excellent balance.

He walked.

He never stopped walking.

FIGHT! - The Hobby Horse

Your kin can no longer discern what is real from what is not as they approach the end of the maze. They have taken almost everything a body can stand from the condensed and slightly toxic pollen in the air. They are delirious and detached from the world around them, everything swirling together in a haze.

In this place your kin finds themselves in everything is red. Red as blood. Red as a bloody moon over a burning landscape. Red and wild. Sounds are intolerable. Sights are intolerable. Everything has come to this hellish vision before them.

A figure. Too tall. Too too tall. Too strange. Staring eyes and jangling accessories is before them. It has a fixed rictus smile of bone but your kin could almost think that it was smiling at them. It has been waiting for them. It snaps its bone teeth at them and makes no sound other than that. Snap snap. Snap. It is here for them. Here to take them away, and they know it. They can feel it. It bows and dances and it goads them without words.

They want to fight it, they feel its important, they need to kill it, they need to defeat it or they might never leave this place, consumed by the pinnacle of the madness that runs wild in their veins thanks to the evil pollen and the dark consuming hatred of this place.

Journey knew not who he was or where he had come from, he knew not his name nor his own thoughts. There was red inside out. There was the burning, suffocating rage. There was scarlet snow that fell ever so gently to the earth, floating down and melting away.

There was himself, unknowable and unknown, a traveler in a strange world... and there was the enemy. Snap, snap, snap. Towering, bowing, dancing, tormenting. This was his death or his salvation. This was a decision.

He wanted to fight. Mindlessly. He was a bird, he was burning red, he was sliding across hot sands, his was a battle song.

And Journey struck.

[blockquote]Rolled 2d10-6 : 1, 1 - 6, total -4[/blockquote]

JOURNEY
Health - 50HP
Attack - 2d10-6
Defence - 14
Intellect - 14
Speed - 14

HOBBY HORSE
HP:60
Autodamage: 3
All damage done to this enemy is TRIPLED as your kin is in a berserker like state.

Oh yes, he struck!

Or so he thought.

But that which had been there was somewhere else instead and he slips across red sands to try again.

JOURNEY
Health - 50HP
Dmg: 0

HOBBY HORSE
HP:60

[blockquote]Rolled 2d10-6 : 4, 9 - 6, total 7[/blockquote]

DMG: 7 X 3 = 21

JOURNEY
Health - 44HP

HOBBY HORSE
HP: 39

He entered the darkness and sought the end of the tunnel, he sought the light. He rose up on his hooves, lashing out wildly.

[blockquote]Rolled 2d10-6 : 1, 8 - 6, total 3[/blockquote]

DMG: 3 X 3 = 9

JOURNEY
Health - 41HP

HOBBY HORSE
HP: 30

And the mountain that loomed and this was just one of the monsters that had tried to block his way. This one fail too. His heart was unfaltering and his rage was all consuming.

[blockquote]Rolled 2d10-6 : 8, 8 - 6, total 10[/blockquote]

DMG: 10 x 3 = 30!

HOBBY HORSE
HP: 0!

To the mountain top and down into the snow, then arise! Fly! You are untouchable here!

And the beast was beneath Journey's hooves as he struck again, again, again, again, no more suddenly the space below was empty and the creature was slipping away.

The fight was done.

He stumbled away as well, voices chasing him, into the light.

Fresh air flowed into his lungs.

He came out of the maze coughing and bewildered.

Journey's mind recovered slowly. Tired, he sunk, fearful of all that had been seen and done. Such a terrible place. This was not a story he would ever tell.