Things Were Starting to Get Strange

"This is such a pity. I've never seen anything like this before. Is there really no way at all?" Kraft rubbed his deflated purse, unwilling to give up.

The Wood Family was not short on money, but getting spending money from his grandfather was no easy matter. Young Kraft had already developed an instinct for profiting off price differences.

"Then go ahead. I'll just watch how you cut it down." Ryan crossed his arms and looked helplessly at the pillar. "Long ago, a king pulled a sword from a stone and founded our Norse Kingdom. Now Kraft will cleave stone with a sword. If you make it big someday, don't forget your dear cousin."

"Thanks. If I really can cut it apart, I can consider making you the next Baron Wood." Kraft gave up on the impractical idea of taking the pillar home and turned to leave. Ryan quickly caught up and patted him on the shoulder from behind.

"We can't take it away, and other people probably can't either. It's fine to leave it here. We can let them keep digging for now, then bring Grandfather and Teacher Anderson next year to see the whole thing."

By the Norse Kingdom's usual weather patterns, a heavy snowfall never lasted long. After they had idled indoors for a while, the snow outside the window had already dwindled to tiny grains like salt. There was little wind, and the rolling low hills in the distance carried a faint resemblance to the hills south of the Yangtze. With a cup of hot tea in hand, it would have made for a fitting snow-viewing scene.

Ryan had grown so bored that he made a miniature snowman from the snow on the windowsill. He was now trying to use a snapped-off icicle as one of its arms.

"Next time we come somewhere like this, we have to bring backgammon. I really don't know how they endure winter at home." Ryan finished his snowman. The snow on the windowsill was all gone, and for the moment, he had no desire to go outside and roll a larger one.

Including today, they had already been stranded here for four days. Whether they could bring the thing back or not, getting out of this boring place would be good news.

"Yes, yes." Kraft answered absentmindedly. One part of his soul simply could not adapt to a life without a phone. Whenever he had nothing to do, he became restless. "We'll leave tomorrow morning. Remember to wake me early."

"I really wish something would happen. Anything at all. This is way too boring." Ryan yawned, knocked over the crooked snowman, then got up and returned to his room.

Kraft, meanwhile, continued staring out the window. He looked motionless, but he was actually missing his phone. The native part of his soul had no particular advantage when it came to fighting boredom. On the contrary, having learned of another world's splendor and wonders, it had become somewhat restless. The otherworldly visitor in him, however, enjoyed the current peace and natural scenery even as he missed his phone.

He watched the already dim sky gradually darken. The spruce forest beyond the wheat fields changed from a cluster of oversized Christmas trees into a continuous black shadow, stretching all the way to the layered low mountains in the distance.

It reminded Kraft of the days he had spent at his grandmother's house as a child, mostly during the New Year. Fields dusted with thin snow spread from the village to the distant hills. The difference was that back then, he could often see lights in the distance and scattered fireworks blooming near and far.

Though he could not see them, he knew that farther away stood a huge mountain dam and a waterworks. All the water within and beyond his sight was drawn and supplied by that enormous structure.

That mighty force of lightning and steel worked without rest, day and night, dispelling the confusion and fear humanity had felt before the grandeur of heaven and earth since ancient times. Turn on a tap, and you could feel humanity's power everywhere, from the distant mountains to right before your eyes.

But here, in this place where time seemed to have rolled back hundreds or even thousands of years, a tiny village and the few wheat fields around it were all the land humanity controlled. In less than ten minutes, one could step from human territory into a purely primordial wilderness.

That was the realm of spruce trees and all manner of unknown things. Wolves and other unknown beasts clad in fur or scales wandered where cold mist drifted, watching the tiny works of humanity from the vast, ancient darkness surrounding them, no differently than they would inspect a herd of deer.

Modern people often liked to mock the superstition and folly of the ancients, never realizing how terrifying the power of nature and the unknown could be in such darkness. Even the evil spirits and ghosts of gory horror films seemed insignificant beneath that oppressive feeling.

From tales of wolves attacking humans to rumors of some remote village vanishing overnight, the more chilling stories were often discovered only much later by passing travelers. The victims had long become unrecognizable matter, completely devoured by this savage world shrouded in darkness—and countless more unknown stories swallowed even their discoverers, continuing to disguise themselves as blank spaces on maps.

At that moment, humanity's most advanced weapon—the sword at his waist—was as laughably weak as a toothpick. Even in the most arrogant legends, no mortal had ever dared challenge the mountains.

The otherworldly part of Kraft had once felt that the earth beneath his feet was so small that humanity had made it crowded within only a few centuries. Every magnificent or bizarre legend had nowhere to hide beneath the miracles of technology, leaving only the mysteries of the stars waiting to be explored.

But now, he was no longer so sure. Something inexplicable had happened to him. Two utterly unrelated souls—if they truly were souls—could be mixed together. It was a phenomenon neither world could explain, and if he spoke of it, people would only take it for the ravings of a madman.

Did that mean this world had secretly hidden another side of itself? A more magnificent and chaotic domain, untouched by the technology humanity took such pride in.

It was this very mystery that had lifted a corner of its veil before Kraft. That corner alone had completely changed his life in an unimaginable way, casting sharp doubt upon the worldview he had built over the brief course of his past life.

It was like the little cloud that had once hung over twentieth-century physics, like a blemish on a perfect celestial sphere. It shattered everything once thought unbreakable and demanded an entirely new theory to mend this fatal flaw, insignificant as it might seem in the grand whole.

Yet he was now standing before a crudely made wooden window. Darkness rushed toward him, swallowing everything in sight. His limited talents were worthless before such ignorant, terrifying darkness. Even the scraps of specialized knowledge that surpassed this world, without context or foundation, were merely the useless art of slaying dragons. It was undoubtedly a torment.

Kraft could feel an unknown craving stirring deep within his body. Perhaps it had taken root in some corner of this soul as early as last night, ignoring a person's character and desires as it spread silently on its own. Only when all was quiet and he noticed one of its vines would he understand that it had always existed within his body, its vast roots reaching deep into the Deep Layer of his consciousness.

In the silence, Kraft stared at the dark world outside, unable to find anywhere for his gaze to rest. With his sight lost, his hearing became sharper. He noticed that a faint sound seemed to have broken through his thoughts.