A strangely delicate shudder shook my assailant, squeaking rasps escaping it's frame as the wiry, shriveled claws seized my face and pulled it closer. A depthless abyss stood in stark relief to the merely stained oil-black hide of the corpse, cracked brown teeth jutting out at irregular intervals. A rattling gasp and a cloud of stale stinking air buffeted my face as the totem drew in a breath.
"Cóng shénme bùluò nǐ bīngbáo? Nǐ fúwù de rén?"
Some part of me registered the lips of the freak moving, but the entirety of my conscious mind was focused on the pain that bloomed behind my eyes. Each syllable struck my paralysed skull with the full force of a hammer blow, slamming home with with a resounding boom that echoed through my ears.
"Shuō wàiguó rùqīn zhě."
Another lance of pain, thundering crashes resounding in my skull... And without. From the corner of my eye I could see the treetops against the light of the moon shaking and falling as the rumbles drew closer. The corpse-totem lowered my captive body, turning toward the edge of the clearing as the clawing things scattered. With a final crash of thunder a massive shape rushed into view.
The beast stood perhaps twice my height, it's twisted form illuminated by jagged tusks glowing bright in the dark night. A monstrous boar, hide dappled with pink splotches and bristling with long, thick hairs, each step seemingly shaking the earth and sending aftershocks through my chest. A challenging bellow erupted and the great swine moved. Five footfalls and the tusks slammed into the corpse-totem, parting the arm that held me captive from the freak with a single blow. Several of the chittering masks that festooned the dried flesh snapped away, their every strike upon the earth accompanied by a keening shriek, only to be snatched up by the furtive creatures, dashing into the light cast by the Boar. The forest floor left a trail of numbness down my back, stretching from right shoulder to left hip. Rolling over to keep the monsters in the center of the grove in view, the detached arm - still clutching my chin with an iron grip - flopped about like a dying spider, the dry tendons twisting and straining at the skin, the stump flailing about in search of the rest of it's body.
As my rescuer rounded for another pass, a band of the snarling snapping figures burst from the treeline, charging the boar from behind. Their protracted emergence into the light revealed more of their features - almost humanoid, hunched over and running alternately on two legs and knuckle-dragging on four. Their faces, though contorted into hateful grimaces, still resembled men and women in some basic respect. One, two, three of the twisted monsters sprung onto the pale boar's back, clawing and chewing at whatever flesh they could reach. The colossal swine huffed, pausing but a moment to flog itself, throwing the freaks into the air and impaling them on the arrow-like hairs that bristled from it's flesh.
Before my very eyes, the monster's bodies crumbled into smoke, leaving no trace of their existence. The boar charged again, slamming the totem into a tree, the mighty blow ripping it from it's roots. For a moment, the corpse-beast was illuminated by the glowing tusks. The colossal husk took a single look up at it's foe, broken masks dangling from it's flesh, before turning tail and fleeing into the darkness, slithering through the trees like some abominable serpent.
Even as I stared after the freak, it's smaller compatriots following it into the night, the great swine approached me, the steps that had shattered trees and cracked the earth now seeming almost delicate. It's front legs buckling, beady eyes came level with mine for a long moment, then a huff, before it's head slammed into me, sending me flying. The last thing I saw before I hit the tree was a large bright green frog perched on the boar's snout.