Chapter 13: Attempt

The night was deep, and all was still.

Lu Mian woke up in his dream once again. The first thing that met his eyes was the faint gray fog.

He instinctively raised his hand and reached into the pocket of his clothes.

The cold, hard sensation of metal immediately traveled to his mind.

He took out the item he had touched, and a flash of gold illuminated his eyes.

It was a gold coin.

A gold Louis.

"It's actually still here..." Lu Mian sat up and looked down to examine himself.

He was still wearing the cotton coat, cotton trousers, and leather jacket from his previous exploration. The nearly two-meter-long steel fork and the sharp, iron-black axe were placed within reach.

This was exactly the same state he had been in when he left the dream.

"In other words, this dream is developing; it doesn't start over every time I enter..." Lu Mian toyed with the gold Louis for a moment before tucking it into the pocket of the cotton coat he wore underneath.

Although he couldn't bring it into reality, it was still pleasant to look at.

Lu Mian rolled out of bed and looked out the window for a while, confirming that there were no obvious changes to the ruins or the reddish mountain peak.

He picked up the axe and the steel fork, walked out of his room, and entered the dim hallway.

Aurora's bedroom and study remained in their opened state.

Lu Mian glanced at them, and a thought suddenly occurred to him:

"In the dream, my room basically corresponds to reality, with everything that should be there. Aurora's room seems to be the same at first glance.

"Then, can I find her witchcraft notes, secret potion formulas, or the method to become a witch in this bedroom?"

This thought was like a devil's whisper, making Lu Mian's heart race with the urge to try.

Compared to exploring that unknown, dangerous, mysterious, and weird ruin, rummaging through Aurora's room was a much easier and safer choice.

No, no! Lu Mian shook his head violently and cast the thought aside.

He would rather take risks than pry into Aurora's privacy. He would not rummage through her bedroom until he had her permission.

This was out of respect for Aurora.

If not for Aurora, he would have died five years ago as a stray child.

Lu Mian withdrew his gaze with some pain and headed toward the stairs.

If the owner of that bedroom had been anyone other than Aurora, he would have already gone inside to search for useful information.

After descending the stairs, Lu Mian didn't rush to go out; instead, he checked the kitchen's supplies.

The olive oil, corn oil, and animal fat that Aurora had stockpiled were neatly arranged in barrels and jars, just like in reality.

Almost subconsciously, Lu Mian first took out the barrel of corn oil and placed it next to the stove.

The only reason for this choice was that animal fat and olive oil were more expensive.

Then, he skillfully used coal and wood to light a fire in the stove and made a few torches to be lit later.

This was in preparation for burning that monster.

Of course, if he could solve it using other methods, that would definitely be better; this was his last resort.

Having finished these tasks, he picked up the axe and opened the door to leave.

Lu Mian immediately noticed a difference:

The faint gray fog permeating this dream felt a bit more humid than last time, and the ground beneath his feet was slightly muddy.

"Did it rain? When I'm not here, when I'm not dreaming, does this place still exist and evolve naturally according to certain laws?" Lu Mian was both surprised and inexplicably felt that it should be this way.

Thinking of the weird stories Aurora used to make up, he suddenly had a guess:

"Could this be the real world?

"Is my dream connected to a real world, and is the purpose of that Tarot card making me sober to cross the barrier between the dream and the ruins?"

Lu Mian hurriedly looked left and right, discovering that on both sides of the ruins, at the "edge" of the dream, was gray fog that stretched to infinity.

"I can verify this later. I won't go to the ruins; I'll walk outside the gray fog and see if what lies beyond is a strange, illogical dream, or real land, sky, villages, and towns..."

If it were the former, it would mean this place still belonged to the dream. If not, Lu Mian would have to confirm which world this actually was.

He believed that judging by the use of gold Louis, this place seemed to still be in the Intis Republic, but not necessarily the current era; perhaps it was some lost, vanished place from decades or centuries ago.

However, Lu Mian felt that there was a very high probability he wouldn't be able to walk out of the surrounding gray fog.

Collecting his thoughts, he continued to advance toward the ruins.

He hadn't forgotten that the purpose of entering the dream this time was to try and deal with that monster.

After walking a hundred or two hundred meters on the muddy wilderness filled with rubble and cracks, Lu Mian suddenly stopped in his tracks.

He thought of a problem.

The preparations just now had a flaw!

Previously, his two-story building had no firelight, making it very safe in this world shrouded in gray fog. But now, it had a stove fire, emitting light. Would it attract a large number of monsters, making the safe zone no longer safe?

Lu Mian subconsciously looked back at where he came from. He saw that in the faint gray fog, the bottom of the semi-underground two-story building had crimson light reflecting on the different glass windows.

It was like a lighthouse in a dark world.

Considering that quite some time had passed, it was clearly too late to try and extinguish the stove fire now. Lu Mian simply quickened his pace, entered the ruins, and hid inside the building that had collapsed due to fire.

He tucked the axe into the belt behind his back, nimbly climbed up a wall, and hid in a dark corner partitioned by bricks and wood.

Lu Mian looked far off toward his home on the other side of the wilderness.

As time ticked by, he didn't see any monsters attracted by the stove fire approaching that side.

"It seems the stove fire won't bring any changes, at least it won't let my house be surrounded by monsters..." Lu Mian quietly breathed a sigh of relief.

This meant that even if he really encountered any danger, as long as he could escape home in time and fall asleep as quickly as possible, he could successfully escape.

He began to consider the problem of how to lure out and deal with the monster from before:

"Judging from the brief fight last time, its strength, speed, reaction, and agility were about the same as mine, but it was obvious that it fought entirely on instinct. It lacked sufficient experience and technique, and it also lacked corresponding intelligence. That's why I was able to counter-kill it while being ambushed...

"It also gets confused and stunned; it's no different from a human...

"Aside from combat techniques, I have two points where I'm stronger than it: first, I crush it in IQ; second, I know how to use weapons and utilize tools. This is the greatest advantage humans have against this kind of monster...

"As long as I'm a bit careful, defeating it again won't be a difficult task. The key is how to solve it completely..."

Just as Lu Mian was thinking about intentionally creating some noise to see if he could attract some monsters, he saw a figure silently approaching beside the completely collapsed house.

That figure was blood-red all over, with no skin, directly exposing muscles, blood vessels, and fascia. It was clearly the same monster from last time.

And unlike last time, this monster was carrying a manure fork in its hand.

A manure fork!

"It knows how to use weapons too..." Lu Mian's face stiffened for a moment, and his expression turned bitter.

His confidence had dropped a little without him realizing it.

As the monster approached and turned, Lu Mian saw exaggerated wounds on its back, neck, and the back of its head, but those cracks were no longer oozing pus, showing a state of being more than half-healed.

"It really is the one I encountered before...

"Its self-healing ability is stronger than mine and normal humans by I don't know how many times..."

Lu Mian silently gasped.

He forced himself to calm down and quickly analyzed the current situation.

A moment later, Lu Mian made a decision:

Now was a good opportunity, and when an opportunity arises, one must strive for it; it cannot be missed!

He quietly pulled a brick from his side and waited for the monster to walk to the expected position.

In just a step or two, the monster entered Lu Mian's "ambush circle."

Lu Mian threw the brick out violently, aiming at the ground behind the monster.

Thud!

The brick landed, causing the monster to turn around rapidly to look at what had attacked it.

Seeing this, Lu Mian gripped the axe with both hands and jumped fiercely from the wall toward the monster from the side.

Bang!

The axe, carrying the weight of his fall, slashed heavily onto the monster's neck, splitting it open by more than half.

With two thuds in succession, Lu Mian and the monster fell to the ground at the same time.

Lu Mian leaped up quickly, grabbed the axe, rushed over, and slashed heavily at the monster's neck again.

Once, twice, three times—the monster didn't even have time to resist before its head was chopped off.

As the head rolled to one side, the skinless body twitched twice and stopped moving.

Lu Mian didn't stop there. He took a diagonal step, turned the axe, and used the thick spine to smash the hideous head violently, smashing it to pieces.

Immediately after, he turned back and slashed the body—which was exposing muscles, blood vessels, and fascia—several more times, crushing the heart and other vital organs.

After doing all this, Lu Mian stepped back two paces, looked at his masterpiece, panted heavily, and laughed in a low voice:

"I thought you were truly unkillable; who knew you only had this much skill!"

Amidst his controlled laughter, the headless corpse suddenly twitched once.

Lu Mian's eyes tightened, and he instinctively wanted to turn and run.

He forcibly suppressed this impulse, stepped forward again, and raised the axe.

After twitching twice, the corpse returned to stillness, as if it had just made one last unsuccessful death struggle.

Lu Mian observed for a while longer and finally confirmed that this monster was completely dead.

"Such tenacious vitality..." Lu Mian sighed to himself, then moved closer, squatted down, and used the axe to pry open the muscles and fascia to examine the corpse.

The monster's body structure was no different from a human's, but its muscular vitality was clearly much stronger. Even though it was already dead, some of the incisions still had slight writhing movements.

"No treasure, and no supernatural power transferred into my body..." Lu Mian evaluated his current state and felt a bit disappointed for a moment.

The idea that one becomes stronger with every monster killed only existed in Aurora's stories, after all.

He then moved the monster's corpse and head into the collapsed building and used bricks and wood to bury them to a certain extent.

Then, he searched the burned-down house, hoping to have some gains.

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 14 =====