I don’t know how I got there. But there I was, dazed and groggy, seated on the floor of a cold, damp dungeon.

Trying to get a sense of my surroundings, I could only locate a dark shadow with my blurry vision, moving rapidly towards me. I soon saw that it was a person cloaked in black, hood over head that concealed his or her face.

“Help,” I croaked, throat parched. “Where am I?”

“I can’t stay long,” the shadow whispered raspily, before handing me a rusty dagger and pressing a small piece of paper into my hand. “Just remember, they’re always watching. When all seems lost, read the note…” his voice trailed off.

And with a swift turn, he was gone into the darkness.

I started to come to, maybe because of the sharp, icy coldness that was piercing into my skin and maybe because my sense of danger was heightened. I heard a ferocious snarl coming from the darkness. I quickly slipped the note in my pocket and gripped the dagger tightly with both hands. Whatever it said could wait.

A pair of red eyes were approaching from out of the shadows. I could faintly make out sharp ears and a snout, but as it closed near, I could soon tell that this was no ordinary wolf.

It was walking on its hind legs, balancing uncannily as a person would. But instead of hands, it had sharp claws that came out of paws lined with grey fur and stained with bright red blood — blood that was also dripping from its rows and rows of glistening white fangs. Then it rushed towards me.

What came next happened so fast that it was an absolute blur, over in perhaps minutes but what seemed like an eternity. I saw sharp teeth and claws frantically slashing at me, trying to rip me to pieces; while I tried to avoid all these attacks and retaliate with dagger stabs of my own.

And yet, I prevailed. My whole body stung with cuts to my arms, legs and torso; ripped open by the beast’s claws and which I knew would get infected if they weren’t sterilised soon. But my dagger had ended up in the back of its head and it lay still beside me, unable to hurt me anymore.

As I stared at the furry grey corpse of this horrible, deadly unknown creature beside me, I realised that despite being seriously wounded, I was even more scared and confused.

Who was behind all of this? How did I get out? Then I remembered the piece of paper the shadow had given me. From the depths of my pocket, I pulled out the scrumpled forgotten note. It read…

The only escape is death.

Then I heard the sound of more growling, and looked up to see not one, not two, but countless pairs of red eyes peering at me from the darkness…