Yu Sheng and Little Red Riding Hood rode two Shadow Wolves fitted with temporary license plates through the old lanes of Old Town. They leaped into the "shortcut" from an underground parking lot nearby and soon entered the expressway. After traveling for thirty minutes through the spatial network covering all of Boundary City, the shortcut automatically delivered them to a special exit.
A tunnel seemed to have appeared out of thin air. Beyond it lay a gloomy sky. The Shadow Wolves leaped out of the tunnel, and Yu Sheng, riding on one of their backs, looked behind him. The tunnel that had been brightly lit and supported by reinforced concrete just a second earlier had already become a giant hollow in a tree. A huge dead tree, almost requiring ten people to wrap their arms around it, stood silently there, with the tree hollow serving as the shortcut's exit near its roots.
Eileen hugged Yu Sheng's head and curiously surveyed their surroundings. The dead tree stood in the middle of a forest, where tall, nameless trees stretched all the way to the edge of sight. The sky was gray and overcast, as if it could start raining at any moment. A path ran through the woods, and at its end stood a large gray-white building in a clearing.
"Wow..." The little doll exclaimed. "There's such a huge forest in Boundary City?"
"This forest is also part of Quiet Forest Sanatorium—we're no longer in Boundary City," Little Red Riding Hood's voice came from beside them. "Follow me, and don't stray too far. This is already the Otherworld space around the sanatorium. If you wander around, you might be identified as a lost patient and forcibly teleported into a ward."
Yu Sheng rode after Little Red Riding Hood, and the two of