As long as I followed these traces, I could find a way out. Of course... that was assuming I still had enough strength.
The river was cold, maybe only a little over ten degrees. Freezing.
My clothes had long since been soaked through. Honestly, bathing felt nice, but being underwater with nothing around but water and silence...
That inexplicable
sense of fear was hard to bear.
If I hadn't already gotten used to fear, an ordinary person would have gone crazy after just half an hour here.
Fortunately, I didn't have to worry about drowning.
As I swam forward, I scanned my surroundings, trying to find even the slightest clue. However... to my disappointment, even after swimming for over half an hour,
there were still nothing but strange, oddly shaped rocks all around me. Not a single trace.
I was starting to panic.
Not drowning didn't mean I couldn't die of exhaustion.
I gritted my teeth and began to swim faster. Whatever happened, I had to find somewhere I could get out of the water. It was too cold down here.
Other than the gurgling of the water in my ears, everything around me was terrifyingly quiet. Those strange rocks also sent a chill down my spine.
My strength was rapidly ebbing away. Just as I felt I might not be able to hold on much longer, something strange tickled my nose—
a smell... Was it the aroma of food?
It was incredibly faint. If I hadn't had such keen senses underwater, I might not have noticed it at all. And... mixed in with the scent was
a hint of that artificial fragrance from dish soap.
Was someone nearby?
How could that be?
But the smell made it impossible to ignore what my body was telling me. I looked at