it was a dragonlike creature , as von helrung had mentioned , that took its victims `` higher than the tallest mountain peak '' before ripping them apart in its frenzy ; it was a giant troll-like beast that flung pieces of its prey with such force that they fell from the sky miles from where their owners had lost them ; it was an enormous wormlike invertebrate-a cousin of the mongolian death worm , perhaps-that spat its venom with such velocity that it blew apart the human body , vaporizing it into a fine mist that came down again as the phenomenon called `` red rain . ''