Chapter 2: Unable to Leave

When his hand touched the cold handle of the library door, Xiao Fen could not help but shiver. At the same time, a sense of panic began to appear inexplicably in his heart.

Xiao Fen frowned slightly, pushed open the spring door of the library forcefully, and walked into the library.

Suddenly, Xiao Fen found that the passage under his feet was rapidly becoming transparent. A new road emerged, just like the prehistoric World seen in the morning; a new World appeared beside him again.

Compared to that vibrant but murderous prehistoric World, the World Xiao Fen stepped into this time was full of an indescribable sense of corruption.

The houses on both sides of the street were tall and large, but very old. Just looking at the dilapidated appearance of these houses, one could tell that the people living here were mostly not the property-owning class; it was not an exaggeration to call it a slum.

Most of the houses had shops downstairs, but the doors were shut tight, looking dilapidated and decaying. Only the floors upstairs used for living occasionally had dim lights, showing some signs of life.

There were also some houses that were in disrepair for a long time and looked as if they were about to collapse onto the street, but the owner obviously did not have the funds to repair them, so they could only simply use a few large logs, one end supporting the wall and the other firmly inserted into the road.

However, how long such support could last could be known by looking at the bottoms of those large logs, which had already begun to rot.

There were also some houses that had lost their uppermost roofs; the whole house was no different from a ruin, and the doors and windows on the ground were firmly nailed shut with heavy pine boards.

However, even these houses were not completely without owners. Homeless vagrants chose this place, pried open a part of the rough boards on the doors and windows, leaving a gap sufficient for people to enter and exit, as a nest for these people to take shelter at night.

However, Xiao Fen could observe that some of these pried-open rough boards were very abnormal.

Judging from the openings, they were not pried open at all, but a hole was knocked open by powerful external force. If the vagrants had such great strength, they would definitely not need to beg.

In fact, Xiao Fen could not imagine how much strength was needed to punch through such a huge hole that could allow a person to pass through.

As for the pedestrians on the road, they all held their arms, no joy could be seen on their gray faces; they hunched their backs, walked evasively, and even when they spoke, it was very brief, almost just saying hello and then leaving immediately.

As for those vagrants, they shivered as they walked past the street corner; the newspapers in their hands looked like their only wealth. Those newspapers could shield them from the cold a little at night, ensuring they could survive one cold night after another.

However, no matter who it was, when they passed those holes that Xiao Fen considered abnormal, they always detoured a very long distance, as if they feared that a Demon’s big hand would appear in that hole at any time to snatch them into Hell.

Withdrawing his gaze, at Xiao Fen’s feet, the sewer was blocked and impassable, smelling terrible; decaying rats were scattered here and there.

As for those living skinny rats, they walked slowly past Xiao Fen’s feet without fear; one could think that these rats no longer cared about death, or one could think that these rats were already too hungry to move.

What place this was, Xiao Fen had no idea. The bulky skirts and old coats worn by the women on the street, and the short-cut jackets and suspender overalls worn by the men, made it easy for him to associate with the Industrial Revolution era.

But just based on the performance of these clothes, it was still impossible to say clearly where and what era this was.

Almost instantly, before Xiao Fen could react, this World completely replaced the Real World. In other words, this World that seemed to be in the Industrial Revolution era was now the true “Real World.”

This was an extremely chaotic change. For any ordinary person, this change would be enough to make them panic and not know what to do next.

However, Xiao Fen’s experiences since childhood gave him a calmness obviously surpassing that of his peers or even adults. While confirming that he could not return to the Real World for the time being, he had already made a new judgment quickly in his mind.

“First of all, it is necessary to be clear about what kind of World this is.”

“Theoretically speaking, the best way to understand the nature of this World is to communicate with the people of this World and observe every detail around. Only in this way can one return to the initial goal, leaving this World and returning to Reality.”

“But before that, one needs to first find a relatively safe place so that one does not appear so alien.”

Thinking of this, Xiao Fen began to select his action destination.

A pit hole that was dry enough, had very few vagrants living in it, and was safe enough; similarly, it had to have a good field of vision to observe the surrounding movements at any time. These were the prerequisites for Xiao Fen to choose his destination.

After a few minutes of observation, coming back to his senses, he realized that if he continued to delay, his body might be frostbitten. Xiao Fen finally determined a pit hole.

It was not one of those pried open by vagrants, but one of the abnormal pit holes that Xiao Fen had observed earlier.

That pit hole was the largest among all the abnormal pit holes, and it also looked the most terrible.

Let alone pedestrians, even those vagrants were unwilling to approach this pit hole. Above this pit hole, that is, the third floor of the whole building, one could look down on the entire block from a high position.

Although it looked dangerous, Xiao Fen always felt that something in that room on the 3rd floor seemed to be calling him constantly, which made him finally make up his mind.

Once the judgment was made, Xiao Fen immediately began to act. He strode across a small street, snatched a newspaper from the hand of a shivering vagrant, and then, amidst the curses of this vagrant, leaped into his selected target.

After he jumped into this doorway, the sound of the vagrant chasing and cursing behind him stopped abruptly. After that, there was the sound of a group of pedestrians mumbling, nothing more than “God bless” and the like.

Xiao Fen clearly heard that these people, including that vagrant, were all speaking English, which made him feel a little more settled. English conversation was not difficult for him.

He stood behind this doorway, or to be precise, in the hallway of a room, and began to carefully explore this house with the help of the dim light.

This was a fairly large house; there were a few steps at the entrance, and one could enter the first floor by walking up the steps.

On the left side of the first floor was an empty porch, and on the other side were two small rooms. Judging from the traces on the ground, one of them should be a kitchen.

In a corner of this kitchen, there was a narrow staircase; this staircase was estimated to be generally used by servants. On the wall beside the staircase, there was also a small galvanized iron window.

Just like in those movies, this window was used to lead directly to the master bedroom upstairs to deliver the food needed by the Master, but now these things had lost their meaning.

As for the other empty room, it should be counted as a study, and there was nothing left either, empty like the wallet on Xiao Fen’s body.

The ground was exceptionally damp, and there were no traces of living. It seemed that the owner of the room had left this house for a long time.

In the porch, there were stairs leading to the second floor. The wooden stairs made a creaking sound that made one tremble under Xiao Fen’s feet, as if the next step would make the whole staircase collapse.

Near the second floor, Xiao Fen noticed something. On the staircase handrail, which had a slight amount of floating dust, there was a handprint, as if not long before, someone had entered this house.

Xiao Fen compared it; the person who came first had a very large hand, almost twice the size of Xiao Fen’s current palm. Such a huge palm, Xiao Fen had only seen in highlight reels of basketball players.

The second floor was where the living room of the whole house was located; it was divided into three rooms by half-open arches, and each room looked about the same size.

Overall, there was not much difference from what Xiao Fen expected; his target was still the third floor.