This was pretty cool actually, the graphics were very nice, UI was pleasant and the atmosphere was fittingly creepy with the sparse lighting.
I like the concept of being only able to retreat unless you have certain items too, in fact for most of the first level I kept thinking "man, if only I had to escape in real-time" And then sure enough the deer god comes out of the ground and gives me the most tense moment I've experienced so far this jam! The running sequences were incredibly successful in panicking the player, the third one especially though I kinda have mixed feelings about it. The third was by the far the closest call, but also felt like it could easily be the death of several players. Because I had to mash the mvoment keys with both hands just to be a single tile ahead of the chaser, and I had died once to it. So while it wasn't that bad for me I could see it leading to players dying multiple times, and then the fear would turn to frustration and ruin the excitement of the sequence.
I should mention though, I highly appreciate the checkpoint system. Very helpful and always nice when it exists in a jam game (unlike mine lol).
Regarding the combat mechanics itself though, I found I was able to slightly cheese the fights by just using Pray and then moving into a light source to get my life to recharge to 60%. I also noticed there was an item later on that said it could dispel all illusions, was there planned to be multi-enemy fights that wasn't implemented?
I found the underwater level was neat where you could look outside, and I almost had a jumpscare when I saw a large creature swimming up to the surface. The last level was also fittingly creepy and esoteric for a cosmic horror game, though I agree with there being a bit too many combat encounters.
Overall this was a very solid entry, great work!