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Prompt 4: The village always has dull weather during the daytime, but it's easy enough to navigate through. Though the sky is cloudy and little light breaks through, by nighttime the climate changes. The air cools rapidly and within an hour of the sun setting, a chilling mist rolls from the forest and covers the village. It is almost suffocating and inhaling it even for only a moment will result in hallucinations. The visions are terrifying, often including shadows covering everything, the sensation of eternal falling, and the appearance of a great beast attacking. These hallucinations are always frightening and can last anywhere from a few moments through the entire night. There is no way to dispel the fog and it is too dangerous to stay outside past sundown.
Not again.
Running would serve no purpose at this stage, if anything it would only encourage further clumsiness and result in injury. Nevertheless he knew what fate awaited him and as the mist began to roll towards him there was little else he could do other than accept his fate and allow himself to be subjected to something he would very much have preferred to avoid. He did at least have the concious thought to remind himself of the fact that in the forest it was difficult to tell the time of day and given he didn't necessarily carry a watch he wasn't entirely at fault... Not that it made the prospect of experiencing this adventure any more appealing.
He slowed his breathing, bracing himself for 'impact' in the same manner that he had the last few times the fog had greeted him. A force march was all that he could do, his gaze fixed on the village and his home that lay close by. Fortunate in that they had picked a home that wasn't the whole way in to town, he at least stood a chance of getting back without the beast collecting yet another morsel to feed on. Perhaps it was this that helped to will him on and even as the fog chilled his skin and began to sweep up towards his face, he kept his gaze set.
It wouldn't be long now, the paranoia that licked at his heels and the doubt that sought to plague him would be here soon. This would be where it would get difficult, where the fear would set in and he would hesitate. The coward in him would come out and despite his best efforts he wouldn't be able to contain it. Suffice to say it wasn't a side of him that he liked and he definitely didn't respect it. He'd thought himself better than this and yet here he was in a place that had brought him to his knees and left him less useful than a whimpering child.
Just move. He instructed his feet, jaw hardening as the shadows began to flicker into his vision and the looming presence began to rise behind him. Flashes of something nearby caught his attention and he knew that he would only have a small window to get home safely. If he didn't manage to walk himself back in time then he didn't trust himself to think coherently enough to pick somewhere safe and secure to take refuge.
It was perhaps a ridiculous notion but the 'power of friendship' may have been his saving grace this evening. The knowledge that he did have others waiting for him did seem to be biting at his heels with considerable ferocity and despite the whispering of the mists, he still managed to keep moving. He was taken by surprise himself by this insistence but remained eternally grateful. Urge to whimper ever presence (yet swallowed through sheer force of pride), he did finally manage to get himself home and it was with an unceremonious crash that he spilled through the door and kicked it shut behind him.
...Leaving him prone, but safe, as he dealt with the lingering effects of the gift that just kept on giving.
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