Kevin scrambled to his feet using both his hands and feet, then pinched his thigh while muttering to himself, "Dammit, can I still happily be a human on Earth...?"
He was one hundred percent sure that he had been lounging in front of his house earlier, surrounded by the old streets and alleys he had become familiar with over the past twenty years. The dilapidated houses common on Baishi Road in the southern suburbs and the uneven cement road beneath his feet were still vivid in his memory. But after just dozing off for a moment, everything around him had completely changed.
Kevin found himself standing on a vast, boundless prairie!
As far as the eye could see, there was nothing but green grass covering his calves and stretching endlessly. A cooler night breeze blew in waves compared to the city, and the grassland beneath his feet seemed to undulate like waves. Kevin looked up at the sky, which was a clear, star-studded night sky he had never seen in the city before. The stars were so dense and bright that he could see the scenery on the prairie even under the night sky.
At the very horizon in the distance, two silver orbs, one larger than the other, were slowly rising into the sky. A halo-like glow could be seen around the edge of the larger silver moon. Two moons!
"I knew I shouldn't have read too much... Kevin watched the two moons rise slowly into the sky, with unfamiliar stars scattered throughout the night sky (of course, he didn't recognize many stars on Earth either). Finally, he couldn't help but jump to his feet, "Did I just get transported to another world!?"
Kevin had pinched his thigh more than once, and now it hurt so much that he could barely walk. He was convinced that he wasn't dreaming. What was going on with all this? Could lounging on the curb lead to being thrown into another world? For heaven's sake, he still had two monster girls at home waiting to be fed!
Countless thoughts raced through Kevin's mind like a kaleidoscope, recalling a dozen classic cases of people transported to other worlds. He thought about the two troublesome beings at home and his newly acquired identity as an employee of the Temporal Administration Bureau. But in the end, all those thoughts turned into a long sigh. He realized that he couldn't just wait here, because he had just heard a wolf howling...
Kevin bid farewell to his lawn chair and headed in the direction of the two moons in the sky: in that direction, he faintly saw what seemed to be the silhouette of buildings, at least serving as a goal to move towards. Of course, he knew that wandering around in such an unfamiliar environment wasn't a wise choice, either wasting his energy or easily encountering greater danger. But the key was that he felt like he had been "transported"! The process of getting here was abnormal, and waiting in place was impossible to wait for someone to rescue him. It was better to check out the surrounding situation first.
"The landing spot for this transportation is unreliable too. Being thrown onto such a vast prairie where not even a single tree is in sight, how am I supposed to survive?" The chill of the prairie at night was piercing, and Kevin could only hug his arms and mutter as he walked, "Am I going to have to eat grass eventually? If I encounter poisonous grass, I'll be a goner. How wonderful it would be if there were a forest here. I could cut down a tree and make a workbench, and maybe I'd survive..."
Obviously, Kevin was not a qualified time traveler. Just over ten minutes after arriving in this strange environment, his mind was already racing with all sorts of thoughts, which was not at all in line with the stereotype of a time traveler becoming calm, wise, resolute, and courageous upon entering a strange environment for the first time. But he couldn't control his wild imagination, as it helped to slightly dispel the bone-deep unease and tension. He was just an ordinary person, a confused little citizen who went through life aimlessly. Until three days ago, the biggest crisis he had encountered in his life was merely not being able to rent out his house. How could you expect such a little citizen to be calm, courageous, and intelligent?
Another faint howl of a wolf came from the far distance, but it could also have been a hallucination due to excessive tension. At this moment, Kevin couldn't help but think of the werewolf at home with a slightly troubled mind: Lily would howl like this too, and it sounded much nicer. How wonderful it would be if that werewolf were here... Although she wasn't very bright, she should be enough to deal with wild wolves, right? Speaking of which, he wondered if she could get along with Weili. If he couldn't go back, they would definitely tear the house apart within three days. But let them tear it apart; it's not his concern anymore.
Kevin walked on with his mind filled with wild thoughts, across a prairie that seemed to stretch endlessly. The surroundings were so vast that he hadn't noticed any change in the scenery after walking for so long. If it weren't for the lawn chair that had disappeared from sight behind him and the two moons ahead that could guide his direction, he would have thought he was just walking in circles.
The temperature around was also getting lower and lower. The night wind on the prairie was not something that could be withstood with just a T-shirt. At first, Kevin thought the air here was fresh and invigorating, but now he really missed the slightly hot and polluted air of Earth from half an hour ago.
Just at this moment, another howl of a wolf came, this time very close and incredibly clear. It was definitely not a hallucination.
Kevin felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up straight instantly, and his eerie sixth sense developed over the past twenty-five years kicked in. He realized that he had unwittingly walked into a deep grassy area where the grass even covered his knees. And all around him, pairs of eyes glowing with a faint green light emerged as if floating out of the darkness.
Ghostly wolf shadows emerged one by one from the bushes. Kevin had no idea how these creatures had managed to get so close without him noticing. To be honest, he was terrified at this moment. He had never seen such a scene before!
Fortunately, even though he was just an ordinary person, Kevin had a proud side of calmness. He restrained the urge to run away or scream out loud, as he knew it would only lead to his quicker death. Kevin confronted the wolf pack, striving to find a way to escape, with a pile of frustration in his heart that had nowhere to vent: Could things get any worse? What kind of end was this, to die so unexpectedly!
If only he had a weapon for self-defense now. Although Kevin was certain that even if he were holding a Qinglong Yanyue Dao, he couldn't possibly defeat the at least twenty or thirty prairie wolves in front of him, at least having a weapon could boost his courage. However, after carefully searching through his pockets for a while, all he could find was an old Nokia phone... Well, in a sense, this thing was a super weapon. Tied to a stick, it might serve as a war hammer. But come on, let's not joke about cosmic superphones at this life-or-death moment!
The wolf pack, of course, wouldn't give Kevin the chance to indulge in his wild thoughts. Just as he lost his concentration for a moment, the closest wolf suddenly leapt silently at him. Kevin saw only a dark shadow rushing towards him. Its figure seemed different from the wolves on Earth, and all he could do was instinctively raise his arm to block...
"Landlord! Landlord!"
A deathly scream suddenly came from his ear. Kevin felt a sharp pain in his temples, and the whole world seemed to spin around him. When he blurrily opened his eyes, he saw the familiar streets, the familiar old house, the familiar gray and star-scarce urban night sky, and Lily's foolish face.
Kevin took a deep breath, an action he hadn't had time to complete when the wolf leapt at him earlier. Then he looked around blurrily and asked, "Did I come back?"
"What do you mean, came back?" Lily poked Kevin's arm and then pulled him up with one strong hand, "You didn't come back to the house for a while, so the one with wings came to ask me to find you, and then I saw you lying on the ground, um, making strange noises."
Kevin's arm almost got dislocated by the strong and foolish werewolf, but at least he was fully awake now. He looked at himself and saw that everything was fine. He then turned his head to look at the lawn chair that had somehow flipped over onto the ground. Finally, he realized that the incredibly realistic "time travel" experience was actually just a laughable nightmare.
It was just that the dream was too realistic!
"It's okay, just a dream," Kevin waved at Lily, feeling touched that the two troublesome ones at home cared about him. It would be even better if they could stop fighting.
And as Kevin waved his hand, he noticed something sticking out from the gap between his tightly clenched fists in the nightmare.
A tuft of black wolf hair.
"What the hell!!" Kevin shook off the tuft of wolf hair as if he were holding a burning coal, and jumped up, "I saw a ghost!"