Chương 10: Chapter 9: Into the Unknown

The electric car rolled slowly over the uneven ground. I kept both hands on the steering wheel, my eyes constantly moving between the narrow path ahead and the dense forest surrounding me. Nothing followed. Nothing moved. After everything that had happened over the past week, the silence almost felt suspicious. The forest stretched endlessly on both sides of the natural corridor I had chosen to follow. I had no intention of venturing beneath its canopy.

After all, the trees had spent the past several days proving they couldn't be trusted to stay where they were. So I kept to the open ground, where the mountains remained in sight and the route back to the house was easy to remember. If I couldn't make it back before nightfall, it would probably be game over. I wasn't willing to risk that. The road—if it could even be called one—was little more than packed earth interrupted by patches of grass and scattered stones. I drove slowly. There was no reason to hurry.

The entire purpose of today's trip was simply to see what existed around the house. The farther I traveled, the more my attention shifted away from searching for danger. The forest was... alive. Not with predators. With ordinary life. Birds darted between branches high above, too quick for me to study for more than a second before disappearing behind the leaves. Their songs drifted through the air in unfamiliar melodies. Small insects buzzed lazily over clusters of flowers growing beside the path.

Even the flowers themselves seemed unfamiliar. Some were bright blue. Others grew in tight spirals of white petals around dark centers. A few hung beneath thin branches like tiny lanterns. Beautiful. Completely unknown. I wasn't exactly an expert on plants. For all I knew, half of them might have existed somewhere on Earth. Still... I couldn't recognize even one. Not a daisy. Not a dandelion. Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit. Not a poppy.

Nothing that made me think, I've seen that before. I kept driving. The deeper I went, the more one realization settled into my mind. Right now, this world seemed so... ordinary. Or at least... Ordinary enough. The insects behaved like insects. The birds behaved like birds. Plants reached toward the sunlight. Wind carried the scent of grass and damp soil through the open window. Everything fit together. It was simply... different. A brighter patch of light appeared ahead. I eased off the accelerator.

The trees gradually grew farther apart. Sunlight spilled across the ground in widening bands. The corridor opened. Then, almost without warning, the forest ended. A vast meadow stretched before me. The sudden openness made me instinctively slow the car even further. Dry, amber grass swayed gently beneath the afternoon breeze, rolling across the landscape like waves. Wildflowers scattered patches of color throughout the field, while the mountains seemed far closer than they had from the house.

For several quiet seconds... I simply looked. After days surrounded by walls and trees, seeing so much open space felt strangely unreal. Movement caught my eye. Far across the meadow, dozens of white shapes wandered lazily through the grass.

"Sheep?" I drove the car forward, closing the distance. White wool. Four legs. Rounded bodies. Several lowered their heads to graze while others wandered aimlessly through the meadow. A pair of lambs chased each other in loose circles before losing interest and returning to their mothers. One let out a familiar bleat.

"They're... sheep." Not something that resembled sheep. Not creatures that merely filled the same ecological niche. Sheep. As ordinary as any flock I might have passed beside a country road back home. I stayed where I was, watching them for a while. No fences. No shepherd. No dogs. No buildings. Nothing. Just sheep grazing peacefully beneath an endless sky. I frowned slightly.

"Okay... so whose are you?" I scanned the meadow again. Nothing. No movement except the wind and the sheep. Nothing. I checked the tree line. Nothing. The distant hills. Nothing. No smoke. No roads. No cabins. No movement except the wind and the sheep. I waited another ten minutes. Nothing changed. Eventually I lowered my gaze and leaned back against the driver's seat. I let out a quiet breath. The sheep continued grazing, undisturbed.

One peaceful meadow didn't erase the memory of the beast sleeping outside my barrier. But it changed something. Until now, I had only experienced one truly terrifying encounter in this world. Now... I had seen flowers. Birds. And sheep peacefully grazing beneath the mountains. It was enough. I started the car again. My gaze lingered on the mountains. They no longer felt unreachable. From here, I could trace the slope of their lower ridges, see where the forest thinned as it climbed.

What had once seemed like a distant backdrop now felt like a place I could actually reach—just not today. I'd lingered longer than I'd intended. Watching the meadow. The sheep. The forest. Letting the quiet settle in. If I kept going now, I'd be pushing into unfamiliar terrain with less daylight than I wanted. I exhaled quietly. There would be time for that later.

I turned the car around, and the meadow slowly disappeared behind the trees as I began the quiet drive back toward the only place in this strange world I could truly call home.