“Keep your voice down! It may be blind, but it’s not deaf!” Bolad said as he pulled us once
again through a series of tunnels. “How many tunnels are there? It seems endless! We can’t keep
running around, we need to find a way to kill this thing!” I said to him. “We need to see how this
network of tunnels are interlaced, so we will know which way to escape when the worm comes
for us!” Bolad said, and immediately realizing that he spoke too loudly. He dragged us once again,
this time running along another tunnel. I could hear the worm squirming through behind us. As
the worm was coming closer and closer, we managed to dodge into an adjacent tunnel. I felt the
touch of a tentacle on my back just before I landed on the cement ground.
“Look at this,” Bolad whispered, picking up a sharp piece of broken brick. “This could be used
as a weapon.”
“But we’re going to need perfect timing if we want to cut this worm.” Sara said, “Look! There’s
a room there!” she pointed to the far end of the tunnel.
We walked quickly towards it, being careful not to make any noise. Bolad opened the door, it
was a small room just big enough to fit one person.
From the route that we walked through, we know that this part of the tunnel network is
rectangular in shape, with an intersecting tunnel passing through it. What we are in is basically a
squared-8-shape, or simply, two squares put together.
I had a plan, Sara could wait in the small room and lure the worm by shouting. Me and
Bolad would be in the intersecting tunnel with the sharp brick. I told the plan to them and we all
thought it was a great idea.
“Come here! Death worm!” Sara shouted at the top of her voice from the small room. Soon I
saw the side of the worm’s body. I stabbed it with the brick and continued to slice through as it
moved along. It was quite gruesome, with the worm squirting some kind of yellow pus onto my
shirt and all over my hands. But I managed to finish the job. The worm slowed down a bit, and
eventually came to a stop.
“Yes! We did it!” I said with a sense of accomplishment.
“Stela? I can’t open this door!” Sara shouted nervously.
“Oh no… the worm has blocked the door!” Bolad said, and my sense of accomplishment was
now gone, in its place was sheer regret. How am I going to get Sara out now? This gigantic worm
cannot possibly be moved by just two people.
It seems that there is only one way left. We are going to have to cut this worm up piece by
piece until we reach Sara.
We stood in front of the head of the worm. For the first time I saw what this beast looked like.
It had a dark, red body, its mouth was wide and filled with small, saw-like teeth. It could certainly
tear a lion apart. I was about to stab it in the head when it opened its mouth and made a lunge
forward. Both Bolad and I jumped backwards.
“Look at that brown spot on its head. It seems like a weak spot.” He snatched the sharp brick
from my hands and stabbed the brown spot. The worm squirmed before it vanished into thin air.
It was only when I got to the front of the door that I realized that the worm hadn’t disappeared
after all, it had transformed into a man, the old man who helped Bolad.
I didn’t understand. Why did he help Bolad, but try to kill him afterwards?
“It is said in the folk stories that the death worm is the reincarnation of evil spirits. It enjoys
gaining your trust, and then destroying you. It combines all the twisted mentalities of people.”
Bolad explained, “I should have known better.”
