Find Somewhere to Hide

The wind seemed to have been raised by a wicked stepmother, lashing his face until it stung.

Chu Hang could no longer feel the pain at all. Or rather, he had no time to care about how his face felt. All his attention was focused on two things: first, move his legs; second, do not fall.

His lungs were like a leaky bellows, every breath accompanied by a strange wheezing sound. The air he sucked in was cold and hard, like countless ice needles stabbing into his windpipe and piercing all the way into his lungs, bringing searing pain.

The Healing Factor had indeed given him endurance and recovery far beyond that of an ordinary person, but it did not come with after-sales service. It only repaired his body; it did not care whether he was suffering.

If it had been the Chu Hang from his previous life, the one who had sat in a cubicle until his ass grew calluses, he would probably have been foaming at the mouth and sprawled in the snow, waiting for the big dogs behind him to start their feast.

But now, he could not stop, and he did not dare to stop.

The barking behind him was like the drumbeat of the King of Hell calling for his life, louder and closer with every bark. "Woof! Woof woof woof!" The sound carried the excitement of dogs spotting meaty bones, piercing through the silent snowy forest and traveling far into the distance.

Damn it, what a pack of beasts! Chu Hang cursed inwardly, not knowing whether he was cursing the dogs or the Hydra soldiers holding their leashes. Using dogs to track him was practically cheating. It was completely dishonorable.

He did not dare run in a straight line. That would be nothing more than making himself into a live target. He could only rely on his vague memory of the map and deliberately pick the most difficult routes.

A patch of waist-high shrubs appeared ahead, buried under thick snow. Without a second thought, he plunged straight into them. Sharp dead branches cracked against his military coat and even tore his trousers, leaving bloody gashes across his legs.

The Healing Factor immediately went to work. A numb, itchy sensation spread from his wounds, and they healed in an instant.

After bursting out of the brush, he stepped into a deep pit concealed beneath the snow. He instantly lost his balance and fell face-first into the snow, ending up with a mouthful of icy slush.

"Pah! Pah!" He spat out the snow, ignored whether he was injured, scrambled to his feet, and continued sprinting forward.

He could feel his strength draining at an alarming rate. His limbs were growing heavier and heavier, as if filled with lead.

He could not keep running like this. A human could not outrun a dog, especially across snow-covered terrain this complicated. He had to find a way to completely shake off the pursuit.

What could he do?

His mind raced. Climb a tree? No. He would be too obvious, and the dogs would keep barking beneath the tree. He would become a sitting duck.

The only way was to find somewhere that could completely cut off his scent and tracks.

A river, or... a cave!

A river! His eyes lit up. There seemed to be a small stream covered by thin ice not far away. He immediately changed direction, rushed to the bank, and stepped in without hesitation. With a crack, the thin ice shattered, and freezing stream water instantly submerged his calves.

The cold seemed to bore through the cracks of his bones and into his marrow. Clenching his teeth, he endured the bone-freezing chill and ran downstream through the water for over a hundred meters.

That should disrupt the dogs' sense of smell for a while.

He climbed out of the stream, dripping from head to toe. His trouser legs had frozen stiff, crackling as he walked. He knew he had to find somewhere to hide before his body froze completely.

As he ran, his eyes frantically swept over the surrounding terrain. Moonlight and the reflection of the snow allowed him to make out the outlines of most things even in the darkness.

Suddenly, his gaze was drawn to a black cliff face around two hundred meters to his left.

Most of the cliff was bare, but a patch near the ground looked unusual.

A particularly dense cluster of low shrubs grew there. The snow piled atop them formed a slight outward curve, making it look as though the cliff had grown a little belly.

In nature, that shape made no sense.

There was something there!

A huge surge of hope rose within him. He did not hesitate any longer, using the last of his strength to charge toward the cliff.

The closer he got, the stronger his intuition became. When he finally reached the shrubs, panting heavily, he pushed aside the branches bent beneath the snow and found a pitch-black, narrow gap just wide enough for one person to squeeze through sideways.

The entrance was perfectly concealed by shrubs and snow. If he had not observed so carefully, he could have passed by it a hundred times without discovering the hidden opening.

He did not crawl in immediately. Who knew whether there was a hibernating bear or a family of wolves inside? He pressed his ear against the cold rock wall, held his breath, and listened carefully for movement within.

Everything was silent.

Other than a few drops of water falling from the rock wall somewhere inside with soft drips, there was no other sound.

He leaned closer and sniffed the entrance. The smell of damp soil and stone washed over him, without the distinct musky stench of wild animals.

It should be safe.

He did not delay any longer. The barking behind him seemed to have drawn closer again. He clutched the MP40 submachine gun tightly against his chest, turned sideways, and squeezed through the narrow gap inch by inch like a mud loach out of water.

The moment his entire body entered the cave, air entirely different from the outside enveloped him. The temperature inside was clearly much higher, and the bone-deep chill instantly faded by more than half.

Just as Chu Hang was about to breathe a sigh of relief, his foot slipped. He fell uncontrollably deeper inside. With a thud, he hit the ground hard, nearly losing his grip on the submachine gun.

Only then did he realize that the ground at the entrance was a smooth slope. Seepage had frozen into a thin layer of ice over it, making it wet and slippery—a natural trap.

Ignoring the pain in his backside, he struggled to his feet and carefully made his way another dozen meters inward, supporting himself against the rock wall. After rounding a bend, the space before him suddenly opened up.

It was a fairly spacious natural cavern, about half the size of a basketball court. The ceiling was high, with many bizarre stalactites hanging down. In the faint light filtering in from the entrance, they bared their fangs and claws like the skeletons of some ancient beast.

He could finally stop.

Chu Hang dropped to the ground, his back against a huge, cold boulder. It was as if all the bones had been pulled from his body, and he went completely limp. He gulped down the damp, murky cave air as the relief of surviving washed over him like warm seawater.

He took out the high-energy compressed biscuit he had seized from the Hydra captain, its scent rich with meat, and used all his strength to take a huge bite.

The biscuit was dry and hard, hurting his gums, but its rich aroma of grain and meat made it feel like the most delicious thing he had ever eaten.

He wolfed down more than half of it, unscrewed his canteen, and chugged several mouthfuls of icy snow water. Only then did the fire burning in his chest gradually subside, and his depleted strength slowly began to return.

The abrasions and cuts from branches on his body had stopped bleeding under the Healing Factor's effects and were beginning to scab over, leaving only an irritating itch.

He pulled out a lighter from his pocket. With a click, a tiny orange flame flickered in the darkness, driving back a small patch of suffocating blackness and bringing a hint of warmth and security.

By the weak firelight, he eagerly pulled the precious map from his clothes and carefully spread it out on the dry ground.

The map was crudely drawn, but it lacked none of the key information. At its center, "Fabrik" was marked with a huge red-pencil X, like a poisonous spider crouching at the center of a web. More than a dozen densely packed dotted lines extended outward from it, covering the entire mountain region. Every line was marked with German words and time numbers.

This was clearly Hydra's patrol network in the area. Chu Hang carefully identified the route he had taken and realized that he had happened to pass through the largest gap between two patrol routes.

"Damn, I really was destined to make it." Chu Hang stared at the map, breaking out in a cold sweat again. Only now did he understand just how lucky he had been. It was like a precise game of chess: he, an uninvited piece, had stumbled onto the one path to survival. If he had strayed even slightly, he would have been like an insect crashing into a spiderweb, walking straight into another patrol's arms.

From another pocket, he carefully took out the dark-blue cube.

Under the flickering firelight, the fist-sized energy block seemed even more mysterious. The flowing light within it appeared to grow more active and profound as the firelight reflected across its surface.

He could clearly sense an incomparably pure and powerful force, as though it had existed since the birth of the universe, confined within this tiny cube.

How exactly was he supposed to use this thing?

Chu Hang turned it over several times, even trying to press an imaginary switch on it as though he were turning on a television. Naturally, it did absolutely nothing.

He then tried concentrating, hoping he could establish some kind of mental connection like in novels. Other than making himself dizzy, however, the energy block could not even be bothered to react.

"Damn it, high-tech product and no instruction manual. One-star review!" he muttered, shaking his head helplessly. It seemed he would have to study how to use it later.

He carefully wrapped both the energy block and map in oilcloth and tucked them into the innermost pocket against his body. They were his greatest assets for survival now, far more valuable than the MP40.

Just then, faint shouts and barking came from outside the cave. He immediately moved to the gap at the entrance and peered out quietly.

In the distant forest, several flashlight beams swept back and forth. The sounds were much farther away now, and they were moving in the opposite direction.

It seemed the stream tactic had worked. They had lost his trail.

Chu Hang let out a long breath and finally relaxed completely.

He was safe. At least, safe for now.

An indescribable exhaustion swept through his entire body like a flood after a dam burst.

His eyelids felt as if two iron weights hung from them. All he wanted was to lie down and sleep without waking for three days and three nights.

No, he absolutely could not sleep!

He viciously pinched his thigh. The intense pain instantly cleared his head somewhat. Falling asleep in a godforsaken place with nothing around was no different from sticking out his neck and waiting for someone to chop it off.

The pursuers outside could return at any moment. And who knew what unknown dangers might be lurking deeper within the cave?

His intense desire to survive overwhelmed his exhaustion. He struggled to his feet and decided to thoroughly inspect the cave before resting, making absolutely certain it was safe.

He held the loaded MP40 submachine gun in one hand and the tiny lighter in the other. Using the bean-sized flame that could go out at any moment, he cautiously headed deeper into the cave.

The cave was deep, and the ground became increasingly uneven, littered with rocks that had fallen from the ceiling. The air grew wetter and colder. Clear dripping sounds echoed through the empty cavern, magnified into an eerie rhythm that beat against his taut nerves.

After walking roughly fifty or sixty meters, he came upon a corner blocking the way ahead. He stopped, pressed himself tightly against the cold rock wall, and slowly, inch by inch, poked his head around it like a gecko.

Beyond the corner, the cavern opened into an even broader space, like an enormous underground hall. The darkness in the distance was bottomless.

Just as he was about to step forward, his ears suddenly caught an extremely unusual sound.

It was very soft, very faint, almost completely masked by the drip, drip of falling water.

But Chu Hang's body froze in an instant. He could be absolutely certain that it was neither wind nor water.

It was the scraping sound of a heavy metal object being dragged across a rough stone floor.

"Scrape... drag..."

The sound came intermittently, carrying a teeth-grating texture, as though someone were slowly dragging a rusted, impossibly heavy iron chain through the darkness of the underground hall ahead.

Chu Hang's body instantly stiffened like stone. The lighter fell from his hand with a slap and was extinguished by a drop of water falling from above, taking the last trace of light with it.

The surroundings instantly plunged into suffocating, absolute darkness.

His heart began pounding wildly again, each beat like a heavy hammer smashing hard against his chest.

There was someone else... in this cave!