The being's attention was suddenly prodded by the familiar feeling of another view attempting to overlap its normal sight. It could ignore this - and probably should, given the urgency of the situation - but this was the orb's only way to communicate. Very limited. Very rare.

  If the light resorted to this, then it must be for something vital.

  So it allowed the communication to go through, and watched a vision of the very same creature that was in front of it right now, lightly touching many creatures and inflicting the same kind of horrible wound as it had left on the being's hand moments ago. In particular, it also saw a hairy figure that was probably supposed to be itself - though a very bad rendition, admittedly - getting poked more thoroughly and consequently deprived of enough essence to cause death.

  The underlying concept shoved at its mind was that touching the creature was dangerous.

  When it was over, the being felt a sudden urge to thank the little orb, but meaning exactly the opposite. Which was absurd on multiple levels, not the least of which that it couldn't communicate back.

  This was ridiculous. It had become clear long ago that the orb was actually wielding the principle to communicate, which had been exciting beyond belief at first.

  But its usage and endurance with it was incredibly weak and limited. So much so that the being hadn't been able to learn anything in the very few times the light had bothered. It wasn't like the knight. It couldn't afford to throw whispers around.

  So why waste it on something so clearly useless!?

  And while the being was stuck in that pointless vision, the bramble had grown even further inside the room. Still incredibly slow, but that wouldn't matter if fighting back was impossible and all escapes were barred.

  But the being hadn't struggled so much, lived through so many challenges, only to die in this tunnel without even putting up a fight.

  It started by checking the exits on the opposite side from the enemy more thoroughly, while still keeping an eye on its advance.

  It really was a strange thing: the actual body wasn't the bramble, but the flesh flowing through it. A slime, judging by the vision the little light had sent. Somehow, it could build up a hard structure with that strange, non-living material and use it to move along.

  It was by far one of the weirdest creatures in the entire world. Because it really was a living creature, despite everything. One of those that felt disproportionately weak for how dangerous they were. Only that, unlike the dark one or the guards, it felt completely... normal.

  Its intelligence was even lower than a critter, a mind simpler than anything the being had ever felt. If it weren't clearly moving with purpose, it might have thought it just a very dangerous rock.

  The only approach it seemed to be taking was growing straight towards the being, uncaring of everything else - sometimes even taking very bad routes through mountains of clutter around. The only exception was when it already had a path of bramble, through which it could move much faster.

  This was something the being could make use of.

  Unfortunately, a closer inspection of the exits was much less successful: they were as completely barred as the entrance had been. And while the being was almost sure the bramble there was pulling back - maybe there was a limit to how much material could be around? - that was much too slow a process to be useful. The entire cave would be filled before the exits cleared.

  If the creature's lack of intelligence weren't so obvious, the being might have suspected it had planned this.

  But there was one tunnel that looked promising. Still filled with a lot of bramble, but a clearly much less intricate mass, and retreating at a much faster rate than the other exits.

  Unfortunately, it was precisely the closest exit to the creature, which would give it an almost straight path towards the being, given how much bramble there still was. It would be able to catch up, and that would be the end.

  ... Unless the creature was somewhere else when it started.

  With time running out, the being rushed to stand next to a wall... and the slime proceeded to follow along in a straight line.

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  Just as planned.

  From there, the being dodged around and moved along the sides, forcing the creature to build the longest and most convoluted path possible.

  Until it reached this corner, almost opposite from the target tunnel.

  Then, it waited for its pursuer to catch up.

  Ideally, it should try to slowly get the slime to build an enormously complicated, curving path that didn't intersect itself anywhere. So that even if the thing ended up right next to the being, it would still prefer to retrace the entire cave to catch up, rather than building over that small gap from scratch.

  But this was a life or death situation, with no space for mistakes. Better to settle on good enough now than dying because it had overestimated the slime's preference for treading already built bramble.

  The creature slowly crawled forward, looming threateningly.

  But the being stood still.

  There would be no second chances. If it wanted to try this, it needed the most time it could gain.

  And just when the slime was coming close enough to surge forward like it had--

  another vision jerked its focus away, showing that getting encased by the slime would mean death, and so it needed to-

  the being threw a spike straight at the little light.

  The vision broke immediately, allowing the being to duck under the bramble and out of the way just in time.

  The being dashed towards the exit as fast as it could, glad that the little light had clearly made it out fine.

  But just how simple did its friend think it was, to need these useless visions?

  It reached the opening and started crawling through and under the bramble, into the unknown tunnel that was nevertheless its only way out of this death trap.

  The stuff was much more pointy and annoying than expected, but the being was making good progress regardless.

  Until it wasn't. Though the bramble was clearly getting sparser further in, the way it unraveled made everything more problematic, as it formed hooks and loops that kept digging into its flesh, and catching onto its fur and more precious stuff.

  More and more of its precious cargo was getting snagged each and every way... until it got stuck completely.

  The being had crafted the bags in order to optimize capacity rather than ease of carrying, and that was coming back to bite it.

  But these were its treasures and it would never give them up.

  But no matter how it pushed and pulled, there was no way to dislodge them. And the bramble was far too hard to break

  But the being wouldn't give up. These bags had followed it for so long. They were its precious invention and represented its versatility. What would be of it without them?

  Maybe it could get a spike out and try to loosen the hooks w--

  there was suddenly flesh all around its vision and then terrible pain on the front of its legs.

  The being shrugged off everything and hurled its body forward. Easily clearing the hurdle and reaching safety, now that it wasn't weighed down by its cargo.

  Turning back, it saw the slime forming a kind of tube around where it had just been, with the bags almost at the center.

  Its precious bags...

  ...but perhaps its behavior had been a tad ridiculous.

  After all, tools were good and everything, but weighing itself down with such a big burden wasn't that smart. That had been far too close.

  Still, there was one thing it just couldn't leave behind.

  So, sure that it could move much faster now, it went back inside.

  It reached one final time into the bags and easily found the gem, as it knew these things like the back of its hands.

  The ingenuity they had required to make and that allowed the being to unleash... Such utility and versatility! Leaving them like this now that it was so close...

  Wasn't it a terrible, terrible sin to even-

  The hostile flesh almost closed on it fully this time, and the being felt some sting on its closed hand as it rolled back out, clutching its most precious, and last, prize onto safety.

  Sort-of safety.

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