The Strange Door

"Thump, thump, thump!" Fang Bie woke up right on time as the sun began to rise, just like yesterday morning. Caught off guard, he slammed his head against the edge of the bed, his face twisting in pain.

However, he only grimaced; he wasn't as delicate as he appeared. The fact that Fang Bie could live alone without any relief aid and still play games comfortably proved that he didn't lack the ability to survive in this society.

He first opened the side window and carefully poked his head out to check the situation. After confirming that the monsters that spawned last night hadn't wandered near his house, he took out his stone pickaxe, ready to knock down the door and head out.

But just as Fang Bie finished breaking the four blocks at the entrance and was about to mine the twelve blocks to the side, a strange sound reached his ears.

"Hum..." The sound was somewhat like the noise made when a Nether Portal was built and ignited with fire while he played the game.

According to the game's official lore, it was a whisper from crossing worlds, but he had only used a stone pickaxe to tap these stones to clear a path for himself; he hadn't performed any mysterious ritual.

Fang Bie carefully touched the stones with his pickaxe. He could see the wooden door outside through the gaps in the stones, and no other sounds occurred, making it seem like a mere hallucination.

However, Fang Bie didn't step out immediately. He was certain the previous sound wasn't a hallucination, and since it continued to echo in his ears, it meant there was no illusion at all.

He took a stick from his backpack and cautiously probed it toward the seemingly transparent doorway. Just as he expected, when the stick touched the air at the entrance, it felt as if it had entered water; the door, which perfectly mirrored the scenery outside, rippled like a pool.

Fang Bie carefully walked out (he had opened another door in the adjacent wall) and, circling the stone frame, knocked away all the surrounding wood to rebuild his house.

Only then did he see the shape of this strange stone frame clearly—it was unmistakably a Nether Portal made of stone!

"In other words... I accidentally built a portal using stone?" Anyone who played Minecraft knew what a Nether Portal looked like. Seeing the frame from the outside, Fang Bie realized with a start that it was indeed a Nether Portal.

Except for the material being stone, the door was no different from a Nether Portal. Having probed it with a stick earlier, he was already mentally prepared, so he wasn't particularly shocked.

However, Fang Bie didn't intend to step inside right away. Who knew if there was a bottomless abyss or a terrifying demon realm on the other side?

He was just a little Steve who had barely managed to secure his next meal; how could he have the ability to venture into such a terrifying region?

Fang Bie quickly planned his next steps. He didn't intend to run outside today; he needed to designate an area for farming.

He clearly remembered that in the place where he mined coal yesterday, there was a spot that was difficult to break with his stone pickaxe. He needed to go check it; if nothing went wrong, those should be a few blocks of iron ore.

Three iron ores could be crafted into a bucket, and in this world, every bucket of water was a source block. A single source block possessed terrifying power—sometimes, it could even flood the world.

But he only wanted to scoop up a few buckets of water to build his own farm. He already had enough plant seeds, and in a mod like Food Craft, an abundance of food could provide him with more assistance.

Moreover, he clearly discovered that this was different from the very limited food mod he once knew. This seemed to be an ultimate, heavily modified version of the mod. He could see many plant seeds that were only found in reality, which was quite good news for him.

According to his estimates, if everything went smoothly, he should be able to spend a few hours today planting all the seeds he had on him.

If his guess was correct, the time it took for these seeds to grow into plants would be at most a few days, which aligned with the game rules he had seen so far.

And just as Fang Bie went to mine the exposed iron ore on the ground and began to clear paths and land on the hillside where he lived, two discordant voices emerged from behind the strange stone portal.

"I think we should go over and take a look, Yinsen."

"No, no, no. I think we should stay right here. If those people outside find out we're gone, we're done for!"

"It's just a corner inside the wall. They all know it's the restroom. As long as we're careful and don't stay long, it'll be fine."

"Our lives are in their hands, are you sure?"

"Two minutes, that's enough!"

"Fine, but we must be quick!"

The two voices soon faded, followed by a clattering sound, and a piece of scrap metal was tossed out.

"Clang!" The metal hit the stone with a crisp sound, but no one nearby heard it. Then, a pant leg covered in dust and sand stretched out from the stone portal.

"Whoa! Yinsen, you never told me the view outside this cave was so beautiful!" said the man who stepped out first.

"Oh, Tony, I didn't expect it either. But this door only appeared this morning. If I hadn't come out of the restroom, I probably wouldn't have noticed it."

"Hmm... but this doesn't look like Earth."

"Hm? How can you tell?" Yinsen was a bald, tough man holding a crude gunpowder gun made of mechanical parts, looking around cautiously.

Tony clutched his seemingly injured chest and pointed a finger at the sky. "I don't remember any place on Earth where the sun is square!"

"My God! Allah be praised, it really is a square sun. Could we have passed through a black hole? Did we arrive in another universe?" Yinsen rubbed his eyes hard, saying in disbelief.

"Space-time travel shouldn't be theoretically possible, and wormhole theory hasn't been fully invented yet. I don't believe it!" Tony shook his head. He held no weapons, but his stride was unexpectedly firm.

"Tony, I think we should go back. It's almost time!" He looked at the watch in his hand anxiously and tugged at the man in the tattered suit to head back.

"No, I think we can stay here for a while." A smile appeared on Tony's face. He pulled a string at his side, and a watch was pulled out from the portal.

"I discovered that after this watch arrived in this world, the time stopped moving. The watch outside is the same. If you don't believe me, look!" He pointed to the watch on the bald Yinsen's wrist.

"This... it really isn't moving!" Yinsen didn't know how many times he had been shocked, but it didn't stop his sharp mind from considering a question. "You mean... in this world, time in our world stops flowing?"

"I'm not sure about that, but the owner of this place seems to have found us..." A smile appeared on Tony's dirty face as he waved at the young man rushing toward them from afar.