Chapter 121: Running

«Ugh... Aaaaaahhhhh! »

A face of scaled fissures and jointed appendages cast a fleeting glance, releasing an invisible yet tangible mental pressure; the clustered arthropod's backward spines conveyed a desperate craving to seize something from him.

Intuitively, Kraft experienced centuries ahead of time the sensation of being stuffed into a washing machine, with several extra spoons of bitter, irritating detergent added—especially since this washing machine was in freefall through the air, while nightmarish visions slammed into his eyeballs, adding a peculiar flavor.

The surrounding environment existed in a superposition, shifting from the original cave into a cracked, widened form; changes in the present world were projected onto this place, as if the ink of the "upper sheet" had been pressed into the "lower sheet," resembling a process of peeling and reshaping—strikingly similar, yet never fully aligned.

The worst part was, he couldn't pass out again; his chaotic consciousness had fully endured the entire uncontrolled fall sequence, ending in a mad, violent stop that felt like his soul had been shaken apart.

The hand on his shoulder released him, letting him stumble forward a few steps in the dark to regain balance, then frantically ignite a light.

The flame, stained with greasy fuel, offered negligible reassurance, illuminating their two figures; beyond the circle of light, darkness lay utterly still, with no sign of anything emerging.

«Kraft... » William wanted to ask if the thing above had passed, but his companion's silence alerted him to something odd: «Are you alright? »

Kraft offered no explanation for the uncontrolled fall, nor did he light his torch first; he simply stood in place, slowly raising his hand to wipe the underside of his jaw—the side beyond the firelight—as if trying to wipe away sweat from exertion.

Yet his face remained dry as ever; the cave's temperature made sweating nearly impossible.

Kraft brought his hand into the firelight: crimson fluid slicked his back, dripping from his fingertips; the collar along the shadowed side of his neck was soaked red.

«Not bad. » His mandible was intact, and speaking inevitably pulled the other side; he could only limit its movement, forcing out a muffled, guttural sound. «But not good either—check my wound. »

He turned toward William, who then saw the wound—a horizontal slash one finger-width below his left ear, barely missing the earlobe, slanting downward and forward along the right branch of the mandible, its momentum clearly still extending toward the neck.

But the vast expanse of red made the injury impossible to assess; even when the torch was brought close enough to scorch a few golden hairs, all that could be seen was a thin film of blood slowly oozing along the skin.

«Maybe it hit a neck vessel, » William hastily tore off a piece of unknown fabric, trying to wipe the blood and examine the wound.

His dusty hand was blocked; Kraft tilted his head, didn't even look, but seized William's wrist, pulling it and the suspicious cloth away from his face: «No, if it had, blood would've sprayed to the ceiling, and I'd have collapsed immediately. »

After saying this, he paused several seconds, reclaiming his ability to speak through the pain: «There's a small bundle under the torch—get it out. »

The neck's condition was unclear; deep pressure was too risky, and compression offered only limited hemostasis—but the bleeding had indeed lessened, whether from clotting or pressure alone, it was uncertain.

From William's opened bundle, he selected a small bottle of strong liquor, poured it over the wound, then wrapped himself in clean cotton cloth into a ridiculous shape. Fortunately, his old teacher had taught facial bandaging with real care.

«I never thought I'd use this on myself! »

Thanks to his spiritual senses, he gained not only the ability to dispel darkness, but also an enhanced sense of spatial distance; his perception of space no longer came from indirect visual translation, but jumped directly to an intuitive grasp of three-dimensional space.

This allowed him to guide his movements with precise, timely, and all-angle spatial awareness, accurately timing his strikes and tracking every motion of the appendages and face, creating the illusion of brief precognition.

Of course, it was purely an illusion—he couldn't predict the outcome of reckless actions, only detect the trajectories of sudden appendage movements, giving his mind enough data to conceive and execute countermeasures within moments.

Failing to escape unscathed was unsurprising—or rather, surviving even a single moment of evading multiple simultaneous, chaotic appendage strikes was a high-level feat; not dying inside was the real surprise.

Under haste and injury, the dimensional leap was disrupted, nearly slipping out of control, plummeting downward far faster than imagined—he nearly believed he'd plunge straight into the second layer.

«Ready? »

No time to wait; Kraft gripped William's shoulder—the environment was stabilizing, indicating the thing had left.

«Aren't you going to rest at least a little? » William widened his eyes; the situation was like a coachman on a mountain road driving his cart at cavalry speed, hammering two nails into a cracked axle, then inviting him aboard for another ride.

«I think you could wait a bit longer... »

Heaven and earth reversed; a sensation of upward fall washed over his senses. He realized this wasn't a request—it was a polite prelude to departure.

Kraft had his own idea: he had to return to the present world and exit the mine before his spiritual senses expired, or else he'd be forced to linger in the depths for half an hour to endure the negative effects of closure.

If another sound of jointed limbs walking rang out during that time—another race—his mind would truly shatter.

He pulled William toward the present world.

Simultaneously, his consciousness deliberately sensed the speed, comparing the time of each dimensional transit with his subjective experience.

Kraft tasted a certain habit.

A habit as natural as walking on two feet—accumulated through repeated transits, seeping into his body. Earlier, during the sudden high-speed fall, he'd stabilized the process, as if when tripping suddenly, his balance reflex had automatically controlled his muscles.

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But balance reflexes are innate to humans; yet when he activated his spiritual organ to use this mysterious geometric prism, a similar phenomenon emerged.

He tried accelerating; William screamed in a disoriented rollercoaster fashion as the world spun; Kraft felt like a toddling infant, trying to swing his legs faster.

The limit had not yet been reached; the habit of this motion caused him no discomfort, and his spiritual senses faithfully fed back depth changes.

He was running—moving between layers at an unprecedented speed. The wound sent a sensation both burning and icy, seeping into his body or deeper still; the habit sank deeply into his spirit, like a neural reflex perfected gradually with growth.

A transformation had clearly occurred: quantitative change had accumulated into qualitative change, triggered and catalyzed by injury and hurried descent, manifesting as a habit toward the depths and transits—but he still could not comprehend what it meant.

To subjective consciousness, it only knew it was running: a toddler, suddenly pushed, had involuntarily leaned forward and taken large strides in motion, realizing he had already completed the learning phase of "walking" through prior practice.

A thin, cool ray of light appeared before him, cooling his retinas, which had been tortured by firelight and shadow all night.

Kraft released the prism, savoring this hard-won moonlight; it poured unimpeded through the exit, spreading across the ground of crystals into a magnificent path of emerald and silver, leading toward the sky of the present world.